| David
Appleyard |
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To cut a long story short . . .
I'm a
Londoner by birth but spent most of my childhood years near Eastbourne on the
south coast of England facing France. Continental European teenagers
traditionally flocked to this seaside resort to experience home stays while
taking intensive English courses during their long summer holidays.
Exchanges with many of them for mutual language development had a
profound influence on me at an impressionable age — on gaining my
independence at 18, I left family and friends and headed off north to
Scandinavia. After one year at a Swedish folk high school, I joined the ground staff at Stockholm's
International Airport — first as a
check-in clerk, later on as an aircraft load planner and ground services co-ordinator. Another seven years on, making a clean break with the travel industry, I
sold my Volvo and took degree courses in Swedish, German and even English at the
University of Uppsala, with a view to becoming formally qualified to teach English and
German in Swedish
public schools. I could never have guessed that, owing to the few openings on
the local job market at the time, I would eventually be tutoring businessmen and private students
in far-flung Japan. Life really is full of surprises!
Work on this Web presence began back in
1998, originally to put my own local English school on the map. With the
addition of more and more themed links and EFL resources, however, I
increasingly found I was catering to an international audience.
During 2007
we registered hits from no fewer than 199 identifiable countries and
territories — so how about it, North Korea?
About half of you log on in North
America — not at all inappropriate since my mother was born in New York City and still holds
a U.S. passport. Wherever you happen to be in the world, thanks for
dropping by and making it all worthwhile!
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