Katherine grew up in Peru, a country shaped by inherited violence since colonisation, and saw how racism, gender violence and a lack of opportunities affected her own family. She explains how many people facing violence learn to stay quiet and shrink themselves in order to be safe. After migrating with her mother at 12, she took on the same lesson of assimilating and meeting society's expectations, even though what she faced was inequality, exclusion and institutional discrimination, which cannot be solved by being „good“. On her path to healing, she began to ask why she was hurting and who was hurting her. It helped her to see that the pain was not her fault, but the result of systems of oppression that shape families, histories and relationships. She came to understand that she would never be "good enough" for society to stop hurting her, and that she deserves love, care and dignity just as she is. In 2019 she attended her first "iParticipate" event, a movement that gives second generations a voice and values their knowledge, and she felt seen and empowered. Today she wants to help young people free themselves, be proud of who they are and where they come from, and understand that healing inside is part of changing the world outside.
