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From a very early age, Valia Smyrnaki had a pretty good idea of the career
which was to come.
“I was always a good student and my parents wanted me to become a
doctor,” she remembered. “At the same time, I had a particular liking for
the English language, and, when I was a teen, I wanted to read only English
books, listen to foreign music and watch English-speaking films. Even
in the supermarket when I went, I wanted to see if the product labels said UK," she added with a smile.
This affinity for the English language carried through the years, and
today Mrs. Smyrnaki is a dynamic English professor in charge of two language
schools, one in Gournes and the other in Tylisso, a village west of
Iraklion.
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A native of Iraklion, and, of course, a “good” daughter,
Valia tried to oblige her parents and was eventually accepted into medical
school. But, because medicine did not “express who I am,” she did not
follow through.
“Because of my love for the English language I decided to leave for
England,” she recalled. “I studied to take
the Proficiency while working in a ceramic workshop painting crockery in
order to secure some extra money for my future studies abroad."
Valia studied English literature in Birmingham and, in 1997,
she returned to her home ground.
“In the beginning I worked as an English teacher in a foreign language
school in Iraklion
and I also ran a classified looking to give private lessons," she said. “I
soon had my first students from Tylissos, and going to the village and
seeing the positive response of the students, I decided to leave the city
and open a foreign language centre there in 2003.”
Her professional life was on an upswing, and, in 2006, she decided to
open another language centre in Gournes, so she could be closer to her new
home.
“It is very difficult to manage two language centres, but when you love
what you do it makes it easier,” she admitted, pointing out that it’s the
contact with the children…”their naivety and their cheerfulness”…that makes
her job so pleasurable.
“It’s amazing, but there are no disadvantages in my profession,” she
said. “It's a big moral satisfaction for me seeing my students progressing.”
When asked about the benefits of learning a foreign language, Valia was
quick to state: “A foreign language extends our horizons, helps us to come
in contact with other cultures, it is useful in our travels abroad, enables
us to read foreign literature and helps us in so many other ways," she
stressed. “And, as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe said: He who does not
know any foreign language, does not know anything about his own.
When Valia isn’t teaching, or quoting late 18th century German
writers, she relaxes with a good book or tending to her garden.
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