Julie
My blogs
| Gender | Female |
|---|---|
| Industry | Education |
| Occupation | EFL/ESL, Spanish teacher/tutor |
| Location | Brussels, Belgium |
| Introduction | I am currently living in Brussels, Belgium where I work as an EFL teacher, editor and proofreader. Though my Cancerian nature prefers to settle in one place and put down deep roots, I have previosuly lived in Staunton, Virginia, U.S.A., and Colmenarejo, Madrid, Spain. In my youth, I was a bit of a vagabond, studying, working and living in Kalamazoo, Michigan (my birthplace),Huesca, Spain (as a YFU year exchange student),New York City (for a semester internship in the Salvation Army Archives),Caen, France (college semester abroad), Cavaillon, France (a year-long stint as an English assistant in a French school), Chicago (Burg Translations, as translator and office manager in the First National Bank of Chicago),Morelia, Mexico, Arequipa, Peru, and Burgos,Spain for three summers of intensive study for my M.A. Spanish from California State University-Sacramento),State College, Pennsylvania (studying for my M.A. TESL),and my last stop before Brussels - a 16 year career teaching Spanish and ESL at Mary Baldwin College in Staunton, Virginia. |
| Interests | writing, traveling, languages, gardening, yoga, biking, tennis,architecture, art history, interior design |
| Favorite movies | The Way We Were, What's Up, Doc?,Manhattan Murder Mystery,Out of Africa (any film with Meryl Streep -she is fantastic!), De-Lovely (Kevin Cline is superb as Cole Porter)... Enchanted April, Room With a View |
| Favorite music | 1940's and '50's era vocal jazz interpreters that my father loved and I grew up listening to (Mel Tormé, Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, Peggy Lee, Ella Fitzgerald,Nat King Cole, etc., 1970's soul (Al Green, Stevie Wonder, Roberta Flack), the singer/songwriter/poets of the 1960's and '70s Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, Donavan, Cat Stevens, Carole King, Janis Ian), 1970's and '80's pop/rock (ELO, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, The Police, Kate Bush, Heart, David Bowie, Queen, Supertramp, etc.)an ecclectic mix: Lily Allen, Nora Jones, Diana Krall, Malika Ayane, Thomas Fersen, Ana Belén, Lucio Dalla, Ornella Vanoni;classical piano especially Debussy, Chopin, Schubert's piano sonatas for four hands (recorded by Evgeny Kissin and James Levine),also Vivaldi's "The Four Seasons," Grieg's "Peer Gynt Suite," Manuel de Falla's "El amor brujo;" Bizet's "Carmen," Carl Orff's "Carmina Burana." |
| Favorite books | "Kristin Lavransdotter Trilogy", and any novel by Sigrid Undset, "Angela's Ashes" and "'Tis" by Frank McCourt, Winnie the Pooh (the original stories - not just for children!) by A.A. Milne, "A House with Four Rooms" the autobiography of Rumer Godden, "Hanna's Daughters" by Marianne Fredriksson, "The Story of San Michele" by Axel Munthe, "War in the Val d'Orcia" by Iris Origo, "Voltaire in Love" by Nancy Mitford, "Enchanted April" by Elizabeth Van Arnim, short stories and more by B. Traven, "The Girl in Hyacinth Blue" and "Luncheon of the Boating Party" by Susan Vreeland, "Cien años de soledad" de Gabriel García Márquez, las novelas de Pío Baroja. |