My family is from Hong Kong, but I was born and raised in Vancouver, Canada. I was enrolled at a young age in French immersion school, so by the time I was 5 I could speak 3 languages: English, French and Cantonese.
When I was in high school, there was a large immigration of Taiwanese people, and I learned Mandarin through them. Karaoke was popular back then, and that's how I taught myself to read and write Chinese as well. I developed an interest in Japanese anime and taught myself the Japanese alphabet by deciphering candy packaging.
I earned a B.Sc. in computer science at the University of British Columbia and took several years of Japanese, but I still say that 90% of the Japanese I speak is through speaking with all the Japanese friends I made. During this time, because immigration from Hong Kong, Taiwan and China was still strong, I helped fund my university education by tutoring ESL students not only in English, but also math and physics. I also helped them proofread and edit their essays.
I'm fascinated by languages and love understanding their nuances and differences and seeing how they are reflected in the culture. This actually applies to programming languages too! (I'll explain if we meet.) I've even studied a bit of neurolinguistics.
I'm an enthusiastic person and you'll find that I can talk about anything with interest. I think you'll find time with me fun and you'll learn a lot about language and culture that you couldn't from a textbook.
When it comes to proofreading, I'm not so nice! I might be one of the most pedantic people you've ever met (probably because I'm a programmer), even correcting documents down to the correct number of spaces. So you can be sure that I will do a thorough job. But of course, more importantly, as an amateur writer, I also have a good sense of tone, eloquence, clarity, and artistic flair. You can take a look at my food blog to get a sense of what I do: https://www.publish0x.com/asia-polka
I'm offering the following services:
-English lessons (100)
-Conversational English, French, Japanese, Cantonese, Mandarin (100)
-Proofreading/correction (50 per page -- discount available for longer documents)
-Basic programming lessons (200)
-High school level math and science tutoring (100)
Both remote and in-person meetings available. (%20 discount for remote meetings)
Proofreading and corrections can be done by e-mail.
Hope to talk to you soon!