Onan
I managed to avoid mainframes in my previous life as a code monkey (but did dabble on VAXs for a while).
My upbringing was on C and then C++. Although I program in
VB.NET these days for ease of use to knock up prototypes I do miss the rigour and structure that C/C++ enforced in that if you did something implicitly then it might compile, it might execute, but later down the line it would come back to bite you.
VB tends to be a happy medium of easy to understand syntax, but sometimes it allows the programmer to do things the easy way and makes assumptions on your behalf.