Ever since I have memory I have been amazed by the sky and the stars. When I first studied the Kepler laws for planetary motion to participate in the physics Olympics, at the age of 12 I got delighted by the mathematical beauty of it. But I didn't know this could actually be a career path: I was born and raised in Bolivia, where higher education in the space engineering field was (and still is) not available after finishing school. But electronic engineering was, and I so I decided to go for it.
I was about to finish, when I obtained an scholarship to go to China and study space system design for a semester. This was the tipping point in my life in all possible ways. I knew this had to be my path, so I searched tirelessly for opportunities to specialize in the field. One nigh while googling, I found a program for a double MsC. in Science and Space Technology in Sweden and France. I will never forget the moment I received the notification email saying I was accepted: I was about to cross a busy road in the city center of La Paz (yes those with actual people dressed as zebras), but I stopped for several minutes to read the mail and zoom on every word written on it.