About Us
Hi, my name is Erika Tomotaki Chee. I am of Japanese descent, born in Lima, Peru. Like many families, we moved to different parts of South America, the US, and Japan to study and seek better work opportunities.
While I was still young, my immediate family moved to Mexico and Brazil before moving to Dallas, Texas. It’s funny; I am a prime example of how kids learn languages quickly and effortlessly at a young age. I remember quite vividly moving to Brazil at the age of four and have very fond childhood memories of Brazil, but I have no recollection of having had to learn Portuguese. It really just happened naturally. Our family and friends would always joke how my brothers and I spoke Portuguese better than our native tongues. I do, however, remember having to learn English when I was eight. Though it took about a year to be truly fluent, I was still young enough not to pick up an accent.
As an adult, I graduated from Texas A&M University with a bachelor in Business Administration/Management Information Systems (I was one class short of minoring in Spanish). I also received a master in Psychoanalysis from the Boston Graduate School of Psychoanalysis. As part of my studies, I had the chance to really learn about child development from infancy to the adolescent years.
During my professional career, I worked as a consultant for Arthur Andersen LLP where I was fortunate to fulfill a childhood dream to travel throughout different parts of Europe. From there, I worked at some start-up companies including a subsidiary of the Stanford Research Institute. Lastly, I took a position as a Sr. Project Manager at Houghton Mifflin, an educational publishing company for grades K-8, for five years.
Now, I am married to a wonderful husband of Chinese descent, born in Honolulu. We have three beautiful young children, Ethan, Samantha, and Kaitlyn. They are on their way to being bilingual and they are one of my main motivations to start this program. My husband and I believe very strongly that our diverse backgrounds have really benefited us in life, and would like to make sure that our kids have the opportunity to explore different cultures and languages in their journey through life.
We welcome you and your family to join our family in this exciting adventure. Who knows? Our kids can become Language Buddies.