I grew up in West Yorkshire, England, and have finally come back there to settle down after roaming the world. 

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I always liked to be different; studied Chinese at Cambridge when hardly anyone was doing that (a grand total of 3 of us graduated that year in Chinese), and that sent me off to China, first of all. China in the mid '80s was quite an adventure. I was asked to do some teaching, found my vocation and went on to work in Bavaria and Japan, the latter for 7 years.

 

Returning to the UK, I became a Senior Lecturer at Leeds Beckett University, working mostly with international students. In addition to English language I've taught linguistics and modern history; if you read my books (and of course I hope you will) you'll see that language and history are my great loves.  

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