About

Up Close & Personal

To read more about how and why I went vegan, check out the about section of my vegan food blog. Here are a few more things about me (“fun facts” if you will) that are unrelated to veganism:

• I was born in West Berlin, two years before the wall fell. My dad was one of the people who rushed to the wall that day, hammer in hand, and joined the crowds in tearing it down. I still have one of the pieces of the wall that he took with him that day.
• My parents were both avid travelers all throughout their late teens and twenties. My dad would work as a waiter at night and on weekends while in school full-time so that he could spend months at a time hitch hiking and riding his bicycle through the U.S., Sri Lanka, and all of Europe. It’s during one of those trips that he met my mother (who was an au pair in London). They became penpals for years before eventually moving in together.
• They always encouraged me doing the same. I worked in hotels in a few different countries (including Egypt, Italy, and France) for a couple of years before starting college and have continued traveling and moving every few years since.
• I can neither whistle nor snap my fingers!
• I adopted a rescue dog in December 2023 and named her Leila (after the song “Leila et les Chasseurs” by Francis Cabrel). I was inspired to adopt after meeting some of my friends’ rescues (especially my friend Joanne’s dog Lulu) and after seeing another friend, Tedi, foster over 23 dogs over the years. Even though it was so much harder than I expected at first, I now can’t imagine my life without Leila.
• I’m obsessed with languages and before starting my vegan business, the plan was to continue going to school in order to one day become a professor. I got my BA and MA in modern languages and literatures and was considering getting my PhD as well, but changed my mind after reading a book about non-conformity. I moved to New York City instead and while I often wonder what life would have been like, I don’t regret my decision.
• Before studying languages, I had started a BA in psychology, but quit after 2 semesters. I realized that what I really needed/wanted was therapy, not a degree in psychology. Before that, I had dreamed of going to art school. Art is still a passion of mine, but I now try and incorporate it into my work when I can.
• I have ADHD. I didn’t get diagnosed until I was in my thirties, but once I did, my whole life suddenly started making A LOT more sense. I had always felt like I’d missed an important memo that everyone else got and could never understand why other people seemed to have lives figured out when I didn’t. Now that I know what ADHD looks like, it seems so obvious, but back then, I had no clue! I had the hardest time focusing on mundane tasks, no matter how simple, and would procrastinate endlessly. I’d constantly look for a new system to help me manage my life, only to switch it all up weeks later. If something fascinated me, however, I was able to focus for hours without ever taking a break or seeing time pass. Since being diagnosed, I’ve been able to seek treatment and it’s made my life so much more peaceful and enjoyable.
• I left New York City during the pandemic and moved to a small town on the Belgian Coast. I was meant to stay for a month only and then go to Portugal before moving to Vancouver, BC. My flight got cancelled, however, and I ended up signing a longterm lease here instead, with the end goal of making this my home base to travel from. I love being so close to nature, but having only ever lived in big cities, I’m still adapting to this new life. Luckily, I still get to go back to New York and Los Angeles regularly, so it’s not always as quiet.
• I’m an introvert (INFP for those who are familiar with the MBTI personality test) and can spend endless time alone (which isn’t always good for me!)
• I’m a Gemini sun, Leo moon, and Scorpio rising (if that means anything to you!).
• I did a Yoga Teacher training with my friend Prasad in India in 2014 and am, technically speaking, a certified Yoga teacher. I don’t actually teach though and only did the training to improve my practice and study Yoga philosophy (beyond the physical postures) more in-depth.
• I’m not planning on having children. I’ve never felt a desire to and have finally accepted that that’s OK. I spent years struggling with this decision, wondering if I was missing out on one of the greatest things in life. But today, I feel very much at peace with it.
• I can’t drive. Having only ever lived in big cities, there was never a need for me to learn. I may still learn one day though, never say never!
• I lived in Auckland, New Zealand, from 2003-2004 and did part of my junior and senior years of high school there.
• I was raised in a multilingual household. My dad spoke German (he was of Scandinavian and Frisian descent and raised near the Danish-German border in both German and Low German (Plattdeutsch). My mom spoke French and they spoke English with each other. Over the years, I went to school in all three languages, but mostly in French. English is, however, the language I feel most at home in.
• My father died unexpectedly when I was 22 (he was 53). Even though I loved him dearly, we didn’t always have the easiest relationship and so much was left unsaid. Interestingly, I have a better relationship with him now that he’s gone. Grief allowed me to dig deep and understand him and his life decisions so much better.
• I’ve struggled with weight and body image for most of my life. After going vegan for ethical reasons, I ended up also developing a passion for nutrition and healthy foods (which I had previously despised). I wrote a book about it and have since spent years reading about body positivity and the anti diet culture movement (which I have many thoughts on). The personal conclusion I’ve come to is that we each need to do what we feel is best for us and that healthy eating is something worth celebrating as long as it doesn’t require you to demonize everything else. I’ll be sharing a lot more about this on the blog at some point as well.
• My mother, grandmother, great-grandmother (and all generations before that) were all born in the Congo. It’s a long and complex story that I’m hoping to tell in a book one day.
• I was once almost on a train that ended up crashing. I already had my ticket and it was a train I’d often take, always sitting in the very first wagon. That day, my gut feeling told me to leave earlier, so I did. The train I was supposed to be on collided with another one and it turned out to be one of the biggest train crashes in recent history. Everyone in the first wagon, including the conductor, died instantly. It feels incredibly bizarre to be grateful for escaping the crash knowing how many people didn’t.
• I don’t love being on camera. It’s something I became anxious about after starting my online platforms (I spoke about this at length on a podcast once). That is why there are no videos and barely any photos of me on my social media channels. I’m working on it though and hoping to change it at some point!
• My first name is Kim-Julie and for the first 10 years of my life, that’s what teachers and almost everyone else called me. When I switched schools in 5th grade, someone forgot the hyphen at registration and I was too shy to correct them, so it just became Kim for many years. I started going by Kim-Julie again when I started my online business in 2013. I prefer people calling me Kim-Julie (Kim or KJ are OK too), but hate being called just Julie (the best way I can describe is this: imagine your name is Amanda and people start randomly calling you “Da”).
• My middle name is Maggie, which is also my mother’s middle name and my grandmother’s first name.
• I have an older brother, John, who is the smartest and most rational person I know.
• My paternal grandmother, who died when I was 15, was a Mennonite and a descendant of the Mennonites that fled Friesland because of religious persecution centuries ago. Her last name, however, was a derivative of “O’Brien” and my Ancestry DNA test has since confirmed that I have both Frisian and Irish ancestry thanks to her.
• Rumor has it that my father’s family was related to the Danish writer Hans Christian Andersen. There were documents to prove it, but I’ve since heard countless other people say that they were told the same thing growing up, so I have no idea if it’s actually true or not.