Writing Her Own Story
Gretchen Chi has always felt the need to follow her own path. That desire led her from her home in North Eastern China to Loyalist College in Belleville, Canada.
Gretchen started her career at Loyalist in the Advertising and Marketing Communications program. She already spoke English but this program pushed her to become an expert communicator. After graduating from that program, she stayed at Loyalist to study Photojournalism and that has pushed her communication skills to a new level.
“Photo journalism is all about finding stories and talking to people,” Gretchen said. “I want to continue to do my documentary work because that’s the part I find is really fascinating about photography. I like to get to know my subject. I like to know their story and I like to tell that story to the public. I like to tell everybody what I saw that resonated inside of my heart.”
Gretchen was naturally nervous about moving to a new country and learning new customs and how to speak English fluently but she said that her father always told her that she needed to expose herself to different cultures to be able to make wise decisions about her life.
It turned out to be great advice for Gretchen.
“I don’t even know what is waiting for me in the future,” she said. “I’m doing that all by myself because my parents are not here so it was scary, but it definitely turned out great and proved that my dad is always right.”
