Diplomatic Dance: Learning English in Kalorama

By Kareen Kakouris

Tatiana Chirtoaca, student at Language ETC and wife of the Ambassador of Moldova with Kareen Kakouris, teacher at Language ETC and wife of the Ambassador of Cyprus. (Photo by Tony Powell)

Growing up in New Jersey, I remember my mother telling me how she and my father, along with my grandparents, immigrated to America. They came from Hamburg, Germany and didn’t speak a word of English.

My mother arrived first and not long after married my father, a Scotsman whom she had met in Germany. When my grandparents came to the United States a couple of years later, my mother’s English was so good she was able to help her own father on job interviews.