SME Chamber President meets MDB Officials
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Malta Chamber of SMEs President Mr Paul Abela met MDB Chairman Leo Brincat and CEO...
Interview with Agnes Upton – Maltaqua Dive Centre
14 August 2012
Why
did you become an entrepreneur and how have you come to choose your line of
business?When
I look back it seems that it was decided for me. I was a teacher, we were
actually a group of teachers at University, physicists, biologists, etc… and we
started a club as amateurs learning how to dive.
The Manager of the Mellieha
Bay Hotel used to help us out when we were still learning and he asked if I
could help him by getting a licence and start teaching tourists that wanted to
learn how to dive. I helped him and I loved doing it and was successful so it
developed into a business. My children were very young at the time and it was
not normal for teachers to return to work when raising a family and this gave
me the flexibility I required.
Bay Hotel used to help us out when we were still learning and he asked if I
could help him by getting a licence and start teaching tourists that wanted to
learn how to dive. I helped him and I loved doing it and was successful so it
developed into a business. My children were very young at the time and it was
not normal for teachers to return to work when raising a family and this gave
me the flexibility I required.
Where
did you go on your last holiday?
Thailand
for diving. For diving some places were really nice while others not as much. I
have been to a lot of countries diving and what always strikes me is how much
the Governments of these countries help them and they operate without any kind
of problem, no red tape, no complication just easy accessible diving. This is
something very far from our reality in Malta.
What
is your earliest memory?
I
remember always loving the sea. I was a bit of a tomboy when I was young. Me
and my group of friends would cross the harbour in Senglea from one buoy to
another. Today I realise how dangerous it was. We were little dare devils.
If
you could chose to be someone famous who would you be and why?
Jacques
Custeau probably. He was a pioneer in diving. I admire people like him. I would
also have loved to know how to sing properly though. I love singing but I'm not
good musically, can't tell a note from another.
