Jen Parlin has lived in more than six cities across the United States as well as in Greece--experiences that have shaped her global perspective and deep appreciation for culture, community, and connection. She spent two years living on the island of Paros and now travels to Greece twice a year, with a particular love for Athens, the Cyclades, and discovering new destinations with each visit. Professionally, Jen has worked in the restaurant industry and in sales for a sustainable, fair-trade company, cultivating a strong commitment to ethical business practices and sustainability. These values led her to create a Greece-focused travel consulting business, where she helps others experience the country in a thoughtful and intentional way.

Jen lives in Oakland, Maine with her Greek pup and is a Board Member of the Hellenic Society of Maine, where she also participates in the Greek Table conversation group. She has a lifelong passion for music and enjoys writing and recording purely for fun.

Mary (Vallas) Kiernan is a director of the Hellenic Society of Maine and the administrator for its Greek language program, Greek Table. She is a second-generation Greek American whose grandparents emigrated from the islands of Mytilene and Samos. Most of her career was in Maine in the financial services industry, primarily in the area of compliance. Mary has traveled three times to Greece since her retirement to Florida and strives to improve her language skills. She participates through Zoom in many of the Hellenic Society’s programs and travels to Maine once a year to attend events in person.

Mary Snell is the founding president of the Hellenic Society of Maine. A writer and poet, she is a former staff writer and theater critic for the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram. She earned her B.A. in English Literature/Creative Writing from the University of Maine and an MFA in Poetry from the Stonecoast MFA Program at the University of Southern Maine (USM). Before retiring she was the Promotions Director for the School of Music (and for a few years for the Department of Theater) at USM for 25 years. While at USM she was awarded a Kennedy Center Medallion for her work with the American College Theater Festival Critics’ Institute. She lived in Greece from 1973 to 1975 when she first learned to speak basic Greek. Years later, for 20 years she and her husband, Prof. Novak, brought USM students to the island of Lesvos for summer courses in Environmental Geology, Greek Culture, and Creative Writing. In 1991 she founded the USM/Aegean Arts & Cultural Exchange with the Greek Ministry of the Aegean, a program that exchanged professional Greek and American artists for over two decades. Through HSoM she helped found the ongoing Sister City Relationship between Mytilene, Lesvos, and Portland, Maine. In November 2018 she and her husband were honored by the Governor of the North Aegean Region for their contributions to Lesvos and Hellenism. She and Irwin have lived in North Gorham and on Lesvos for more than three decades.

Irwin Novak, Professor Emeritus of Geology at the University of Southern Maine, serves as secretary to the HSoM board. At USM he taught Oceanography, Geomorphology, and Glacial Geology, among others. He was at one time the Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and a member of the Russell Scholars Faculty. His research focused on the geology of Maine, landslides, and the geology of Greece as viewed from space using satellite imagery. He earned his Ph.D. from Cornell University, an M.S. from the University of Florida and a B.A. from Hunter College of the City University of New York. He taught summer courses for many years at Cornell’s Shoals Marine Laboratory on Appledore Island, Maine as well as a variety of courses offered by USM on Lesvos Island, Greece. An avid film buff, he coordinates the annual Greek film series for HSoM.

Angela Bournakel is currently Vice-President of the Hellenic Society of Maine. A first generation Greek American, and growing up in Maine, she first traveled to Greece in her teens, to the Kynourias, Arcadia region of the Peloponnesus, where both of her parents were born. After attaining a B.A. degree in Economics from Tufts University, she lived a number of years abroad, including two years on the island of Crete, and several years in the Middle East. After her return to the U.S., she settled in the Boston, MA area, and pursued a career in the investment management and trust business. Since her retirement, she has resided in Yarmouth, ME, enjoying many classes at Midcoast Senior College and spending her summers in Greece, in Livadi, a coastal hamlet near Leonidion. Angela attends the Greek Table Conversation and Grammar group regularly. She is also the coordinator for the “BIblia Mazi” (Books Together) events and helps maintain the HSoM website.

Chris Ziagos grew up in Lowell, Massachusetts, as a second-generation Greek American with grandparents from Arcadia, Peloponnese, and the eastern Aegean island of Mytilene (Lesvos). He has served in several offices on the board since its 2009 incorporation, including currently as treasurer. Many of his visits to Greece in the last 25 years focused on the Hydra Rembetiko Conference which drew musicians and fans from all over the world. Another major interest has been in Greek wines and their producers. Chris was instrumental in organizing HSoM’s last several live music events featuring Boston-based Greek musicians. Now retired, his work experience in Portland included the restaurant and wine businesses. A favorite moment: completing the Athens Marathon.

Judith Allen-Efstathiou was born in Athens, Georgia, and grew up in Larchmont, New York. She studied sculpture at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, received a BFA from Tufts University, and a master’s degree from the University of LaVerne. A one-year traveling fellowship from the Boston Museum led to a three decade stay in Athens, Greece, where she became a naturalized Greek citizen. She now lives 6 months of the year in Portland, Maine and 6 months in Athens and on Kea Island, Greece. She exhibits her artwork regularly in the US and Europe, most recently at Cove Street Arts, Portland (2023), the Maine Botanical Gardens, Boothbay (2024), the Benaki Museum, Athens (2023), Goulandris Museum of Natural History, Athens (2025), Gennadius Library of the American School of Classical Studies, Athens (2026), Naxos Island Summer Festival in the Vasaos Tower (2026). Her 12-year-long botanical drawing project, Mapping the Walk in support of historic preservation of an ancient footpath on Kea Island was published in 2022 by Kapon Editions, Athens. Thirsty-six of these drawings are in the permanent collection of the Gennadius Library. She is a member of the Greek Artist Union and the Greek artists collective AFI. In Maine she has completed four Maine Percent for Art commissions using vintage copper salvaged from the Maine State House dome. One acid cut copper sculpture hangs permanently in the Maine State House. Her artwork is in the collection of the Portland Museum of Art, and the Farnsworth Museum. She taught in the study abroad program at the Athens Center, Athens, and the contemporary processes of printmaking at University of Southern Maine and Maine College of Art & Design. (www.judithallenstudios.com)

Cynthia W. Shelmerdine is Robert M. Armstrong Centennial Professor of Classics, emerita at The University of Texas at Austin, and Research Affiliate in Classics at Bowdoin College. She has lectured and published extensively on Aegean Bronze Age archaeology, and the language, history and society of Mycenaean Greece. She was educated at Bryn Mawr College, Cambridge University, and Harvard University (PH.D. 1977). She fell in love with Greece in the fourth grade, and has spent many summers there, doing archaeological field work and lecturing to tour groups. She has worked as a ceramic expert with the University of Minnesota Messenia Expedition (1970’s), the Pylos Regional Archaeological Project (1990’s), and the Iklaina Archeological Project (1999—). In addition to serving on the board of the Hellenic Society of Maine, she helps teach the Greek Table lessons and conversation sessions.