Located in Piccadilly (Mayfair), the imposing neo-Palladian mansion called Burlington House contains five learned royal societies. After his mad-dash adventures, Kairos welcomed a return to medicine, which was factual and orderly as opposed to the chaos of war.

A letter from Colonel Koch granted Kairos admission to Burlington House, where he studied up on new developments, like Penicillin, making him aware of the disadvantageous lack of knowledge the war had caused Dutch students.

Kairos could mostly be found in the East Wing of Burlington House, attending lectures or mingling with members of the Royal Academy of Chemistry, who inspired him to pursue his career in medicine again. Kairos was not only fascinated by the newly discovered “miracle drug” penicillin (that would save millions with antibiotics), but also by its almost accidental discovery…

Sir Alexander Fleming, and Oxford University’s Harold Florey and Ernst Chain who had expanded upon his work, would be awarded the Nobel Prize on December 11, 1945, for the discovery of penicillin. Sir Fleming acknowledged that “One sometimes finds what one is not looking for”. It was only towards the end of the 20th century that immunologists saw Fleming’s discovery as “the most important medical discovery of the 20th century.” For more information, see: https://www.nationalww2museum.org/sites/default/files/2017-07/thanks-to-penicillin-lesson.pdf

After going on rounds in hospitals in Oxford, acquaintance Dr. Peters took Kairos to prestigious sixteenth-century, Tudor-Gothic Trinity College in Cambridge. To his surprise, Kairos was not only offered a sumptuous dinner, cigars, and brandy, but was also asked to participate in a panel discussion with all kinds of medical big wigs. The evening made him more hopeful and rekindled his passion for the medical profession.