There are some moments, people, places or even smells and flavors that somehow impacted me in such a way that changed my way of thinking and living…
While I was a second year student of biological sciences, for example, I had a professor of zoology-entomology, Prof. Onore, who always encouraged me to “think outside the box” and challenged me by taking me out of “my comfort zone” without even noticing it. He had a particular way of sharing knowledge with his students. He mainly relied on the power of story telling and personal experience. He was teaching us about insects, and for every single family of insects he had a special story to tell, a particular anecdote to share or a funny joke to laugh about. He was very engaging! Soooo engaging that I became and entomologist, just like him! You would probably think I liked insects, but actually nooop! I didn’t. I was planning to study neurobiology before meeting Prof. Onore, and I was pretty convinced that was my way!
After converting me into an insect lover, he kept challenging me to move further and further away from my comfort zone. As one of his students, I always felt his support and encouragement, and we developed very quick a nice friendship based on shared values and ideals. In 2005, he invited me to collaborate with some activities concerning environmental education, reforestation, and biodiversity conservation in a cloud forest located in the west slopes of los Andes in Ecuador. He is the executive director of a small NGO that aims to protect the biodiversity of the forest with the active participation of the surrounding communities, especially children. It was my first real experience working in the field and I loved it. The incredible work that he has done in the area, really inspired me to follow his steps and work toward the same goal, protecting the forest by helping people to help themselves.
Since then I’ve been collaborating with several initiatives to preserve one of the most diverse endangered ecosystems in Ecuador, but the most important, since then, I keep my eyes, heart and mind quite open to let the magic of life happen…
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