Year of birth: 1988
Profession: Information Manager
Place of residence: The Hague
A warm welcome
The diversity of people at WuDae made me feel welcome right away. The nice thing is that there are also many people here who speak Spanish. People from Colombia, like me, but also from Puerto Rico and other Spanish-speaking countries, and people who are learning Spanish and want to practise the language. The fact that I am still learning Dutch is not a problem here either. There is a lot of understanding and both the trainers and the members help me with this.
Because people feel at ease, everyone treats each other with respect and kindness. Rules are implicit. It's not like you walk into the school and immediately see a big sign with rules of conduct; here, you understand the rules intuitively.
For me, those manners are very important. I suffered from a shoulder injury for years and had surgery for it. So it was essential for me to be able to train safely and without too much strain. At WuDae, that's possible. You follow your own rhythm, train at your own level, and others respect that.
Wing Chun is something I’d love to master completely one day. Not just to be able to protect myself and my family, but also because it’s such a beautiful sport. Maybe I can even teach it to my little boy in the future. That sounds like great fun.
Getting the most out of life
As clichéd as it sounds, the best moment of my life was the birth of my son. As soon as he was born, I already felt the urge to do things right. As long as he was healthy, everything would be fine. He is now 8 years old and I am incredibly proud of him. As my son grows up, I find myself entering that mid-life crisis that people between the ages of 27 and 40 often experience. I find that the older I get, the more afraid I become of things I wasn’t afraid of at all before. It makes me reflect regularly. Then I wonder what my younger self would think of this.
I used to be quite the activist. I wanted to make a difference for others, especially for the less fortunate in society, and I was involved in politics. Now I sometimes wonder: am I doing enough? Am I getting the most out of life? There’s still so much I’d like to do. My political interests are still there, and I still want to be of value to the society I live in.
Coffee!
Another dream is to set up my own coffee empire in Europe. In our family business, we’ve bought coffee plantations in Colombia. Close to where I grew up and 1,950 metres above sea level. We have 5,000 coffee plants here, and we hope to sell the first harvest in early 2026. We’ve also purchased the necessary machinery to process the coffee straight away.
Over the coming years, we hope to build a network across Europe of outlets where our coffee will be sold. If that goes well, we also want to sell coffee from neighbouring farmers who do not yet have the machinery to process the coffee themselves. In this way, we are creating a transparent coffee supply chain, meaning that you will soon be able to buy ‘speciality coffee’ whose exact origin you know. The term ‘specialty coffee’ refers to coffee of outstanding quality with a unique story, produced with a focus on sustainability and high-quality production methods.
I’ve worked in this industry before. About 10 years ago, I worked with thousands of farmers in Colombia. We collected their coffee and sold it in our own café in Bogotá. It was a café owned and run by farmers – something quite unique. That’s how I was introduced to speciality coffee, and that passion has never really left me.
Life motto
I don’t really have a life motto, but there’s a Spanish quote that will always stay with me: “Siempre que pude fui todo lo libre que quise. Siempre que quise fui todo lo libre que pude”. Roughly translated, this means: Whenever I could, I was as free as I wanted to be. Whenever I wanted to, I was as free as I could be. It’s a phrase that a Basque/Galician punk singer wants engraved on his gravestone. To me, they seem like lovely words to live by.
Since I started practising Wing Chun, I’ve noticed that my self-confidence has grown, which has been a great help to me both in my daily life and in my work in information management. It means I’m more self-assured, less likely to back down for the wrong reasons, and better able to communicate my views clearly. I’ve also noticed that I’m more flexible and find it easier to seize an opportunity when it arises. Apart from that, the natural and dynamic movements of Wing Chun mean that I now rarely have any trouble with my shoulder.
