Biography
Posted by Maura Riordon on August 26th, 2010
Chiclayo, can’t wait to meet you!
Hola a todo, my name is Maura Riordon,I am 22 years old, and from a small rural community called Pokeshaw in New Brunswick, Canada. I recently graduated from Mount Allison University in Sackville NB with a Bachelor of Arts degree with a Double Major in French and Hispanic Studies. I am currently taking a year off in order to Travel to Chiclayo, Peru to Volunteer as an English as a Second Language Instructor at the “Instituto Cultural Peruano Norte Americano” for 3 months. Upon my return to Canada I plan on working until the following September. I then plan on attending the University of Ottawa to take a second Bachelor’s Degree in Translation and then a Master’s Degree in Interpretation.
I fell in love with Spanish after taking courses at Mount Allison. I was lucky enough to be able to take a course through MTA in Havana, Cuba at the end of my second year where I quickly developed a strong fondness for Latin America and learning about Hispanic culture. I spent my third year on exchange in Strasbourg, France and was able to travel around parts of Europe and learn about different cultures over there as well. In my third year I also traveled to Honduras with fellow Mount Allison students through an organization called Global Brigades. We traveled to remote villages and provided the people of those villages with medical care. Since I was learning Spanish at MTA one of my tasks while in Honduras was to translate for the medical professionals that came with us and for fellow students. I learned a lot from this experience and because I spoke Spanish I was able to communicate with the locals and listen and learn more about their lives and culture than other students.
Traveling to Cuba and Honduras has opened my eyes on how there is a vast difference in cultures and has made me realize that not everyone has the same resources available to them. I am glad that I am able to volunteer in Chiclayo in order to share my knowledge of the English language since knowing new languages such as English can be very useful in culture exchange but also for business, travelling and mainly to communicate with others who know the language. Language is an extremely important part of one’s culture and I see the importance in learning new languages in order to fully understand other cultures. I am very grateful that I have the opportunity to go to Peru and teach English to Peruvians and in return I hope that I will be able to learn from them as well. I believe that it is really important for there to be an exchange among people when traveling around the world and look very forward to my placement in Peru.
Maura Riordon
