I was born in Hong Kong, where I received a traditional education at a British public school.  Subsequently, I studied for one year at Columbia University (NYC), where I originally planned to major in Mathematics.

My interest in music led me to withdraw from college and spend a year in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh), where I studied Indian music and the Bengali language.  From there I went to Spain, where I studied classical guitar, learned to speak Spanish fluently, played jazz with local musicians, and read voraciously.

After four years in Spain, I returned to the United States, where I earned a B.M. and M.M. in classical guitar at the Peabody Institute in Baltimore, after which I taught music theory and guitar for one year at the Pennsylvania State University.  I then returned to Spain, where I taught both music and English, while giving guitar recitals.

When I returned for the second time to the United States, I became a certified secondary school language teacher, spent a summer in Taiwan teaching ESL, and then completed my M.A. and Ph.D. in Spanish at the University of Maryland, College Park, where I taught Spanish as a graduate teaching assistant from 1989-1994.

I taught at St. Mary’s College of Maryland from 1995-2001, and during this time I published several articles and a book on the fiction of Antonio Muñoz Molina.  Since my primary love is teaching, I decided to make a career change by leaving St. Mary’s for NOVA, where I began teaching in August, 2001.  I chose NOVA because it has one of the best language programs in the Washington DC area.

Other than teaching, my main interests are literature, music, film, and progressive politics.