Hi! I’m Em. I grew up in a small Midwestern (USA) town, and ventured to a Small Liberal Arts College outside Boston for my BA where I started studying Russian because the alphabet was pretty. I majored in Political Science and Russian, and had the opportunity to travel to Russia twice–once to Siberia, and once to Moscow. I spent my junior year abroad in London studying politics and history and enjoying life in London. I was interning in DC when the August 2008 War broke out, and I started to become interested in Georgia; another seed of interest was dropped in my anthropology class when I heard about the archeological site at Dmanisi. I was sold on Georgia when I saw how pretty the Georgian alphabet is (do you see a trend here?). I decided to go to grad school back in the Midwest in a tiny program within a gigantic state university, where I focused on post-Communist politics and learned Georgian and Russian. During grad school, I had a fantastic summer working in Tbilisi.
After graduation I moved down to the Southwest with my parents, where I complained about the weather, read lots of YA novels, taught Russian lessons, and worked retail until I could return to Georgia. I’ve now been in Georgia for seven and a half years, teaching English (primarily to adults) and editing and a touch of writing. My first semester as an English teacher was spent in a town in the Kakheti region. Since then I have worked in Tbilisi, and enjoy exploring Tbilisi and the rest of Georgia when I have time. I recently married a Georgian man, and am getting used to being part of a Georgian family.