- Current position: Head of Customer Experience
- Currently hanging out in: Colombia
- Passions, loves & hobbies: journalism, photography, travel, shedding a light on stories that need it
- Thankful for: family and all that life has taught her, in many more ways than can be counted
- Amazing traits that stick out: resilient, fast paced, good with words, thoughtful, can fall down and get back up with style, a great listener
Some amazing things about Christina are:
Always on the move, she became the master of adaptation.
Since a young age, Christina has always been on the go from one place to another, living in Bogota & Medellin in Colombia, Philadelphia & Miami in the USA, and China. That, along with attending 11 different schools, always being the new kid, and being in new cultures constantly, gave her all of the experiences necessary to try new ways of being out, see the world with new eyes, and learn an extraordinary amount about the world around her, and herself. Maybe because of this, she was drawn to journalism. In college, she taught herself photography and after college, ended up capturing captivating stories for multiple magazines, including Vice! Through all of this, adaptability was key. Adapting to new schools, new surroundings, cultures, learning environments, attitudes, people. With these changes also comes instability, and what she found is that she doesn’t need outside stability to be strong, capable, and successful. She is her own stability.
To read Christina’s articles in Vice, go here: https://www.vice.com/es_co/contributor/christina-gomez-echavarria
Moved to a new country at 18 years old, not knowing the language and still getting to know herself.
At 18, she moved to China without knowing a phrase in Chinese, unable to read, write or speak it, and without any friends in the country. Bold, adaptable, young, and shy, she was used to (and good at) blending into the background and generally fitting into new situations. After all, with so much experience on the move, you’re bound to know how to blend in. Within the first week, she got put into a scenario that stretched her comfort zone to the max. Imagine that you just moved to a new country where you know no one, nothing and can’t talk to anyone – and now you have to get to a hospital because of a broken pinkie toe. Yeah, crazy. In pain and with trepidation, she hopped outside and asked the first person she saw if they spoke any English and if they knew where the nearest hospital was. Eventually, after some interesting tries at conversation and direction, she made it to the hospital to get her toe fixed up. Besides expanding comfort zones, being in China helped warm her up to speaking up, and made her more comfortable making new friends, and showing her true self to others. Courage through the discomfort.
Went on an expedition down the Magdalena River for a magazine piece that changed the way she saw her country.
There is a river that runs through the majority of Colombia: the Magdalena River. And though she’s traveled all over the world, seeing her own country in a new light was something she hadn’t done. An opportunity came up to write a piece on the lives and livelihood of the people of the river – that lived near it, were affected by it, and whose daily endeavors depended on it. So, she took it. Let’s be clear: this river is over 1,000 fluvial kilometers, spans over 12 different departments within Colombia, and they were on the canoe for 11 days. On the journey, she saw so much more than ever planned on. She and her crew slept on boats, in hammocks, and were always cautious of their surroundings because the risk of kidnapping was a small, but a real thing. They documented everything along the way: the harsh realities of the river, the pollution and its effects on the vegetation and inhabitants of the river, the conditions traveling on the river, and why many haven’t done it. By stepping out of some more populated and privileged areas, she got to see exactly how much more help the rest of the country needed. Though she loved her country before, after all of this, she fell in love all over again, wanting to fight for it to be better. There is always more to see than what’s around you. Explore beyond your comfort zones, and expand your mind in return. Once you do, you’ll not only be more aware of the vast intricacies that exist outside of your personal world but become a better, more aware, and more compassionate being on this planet.
Golden Nugget: When you dare to stretch yourself through your zones of comfort, you find that you are more than you ever thought possible.
