Welcome, glad to have you here!
Get a short impression of me, as the author is this webpage, by learning about my background, passion and motivation for the content I am sharing. Leave a comment or get in touch, if you want to know more, have questions or simply want to have a chat.
About Me.
Nice to meet you!
My name is Sinja and I come from a small, pretty village called Walluf, situated in the beautiful Rheingau region of Germany. Since my childhood I have been an adventurous, travel-loving and above all curious person who loves to learn languages, travel the world, whilst getting-to-know and learning about the cultural diversity of people, their stories, peculiarities and customs.
How it all started
Since I was a child, my parents would taken me on various trips, mainly within Europe or the USA. At the age of 16, I decided to do an academic high school year in San Antonio, Texas, and after my graduation I went further on a one-year around-the-world backpacking trip, combined with Work&Travel experiences in both Australia and New Zealand, covering a total of 11 countries.
My travel experiences paved the way to studying “Intercultural Management and Communication”, which has opened up additional doors for intercultural training encounters, business scholarships and an unforgettable semester abroad in Puebla, Mexico.
To this day I have travelled to more than 30 countries, some of which I studied, worked or temporarily lived in. I am a certified Intercultural Trainer and am passionate about discourses, trainings, courses and teaching activities on Diversity (Management) and Interculturality.​
Professional background & voluntary engagement
Concerning my professional career path, I have over 7 years of work experience in an international pharmaceutical and medical supplies company, where I have been working as Business Development Manager, Product Manager and part-time moderator in Global Marketing and Sales.
During these times, I have also been blessed to be part of an initial Tasks & Teams group which laid the foundation for a globally-connected and operating voluntary engagement initiative, called "4Diversity". Aiming to uplift and anchor (personnel) diversity into the DNA of the company culture, this pioneering grassroots-movement has by now found resonance throughout all hierarchical levels, leveraging the multiple facets of diversity management in theory and practice on entrepreneurial ground from a bilateral bottom-up and top-down approach.
Why I travel solo
Most of my trips I undertake alone, as they give me independent scope for action and present me with recurring, emerging challenges that need to be mastered and reflected in differently occurring intercultural contexts. This might not always be a cup of tea, however, the promising aim is to continuously grow, adjust and newly build upon my set of intercultural competencies. At the same time, these experiences help me examine and re-adjust intrinsically anchored, sometimes even not aware or biased, assumptions towards cultural scopes and hence help me to create my own, individual reality by first-hand experiences.
How this page came into place
At the start of 2024, I decided to take a break off work by going into a 12-months sabbatical year. A developed a bucket list on things to do and places to be seen, reflected on what really matters to me in life as a person, evaluated how much time I am currently dedicating to these activities and how I want to change my daily prioritization to actually become the person I want- and am meant to be. It was clear to me that I wanted to re-focus on my passion of intercultural matters in- and outside of the entrepreneurial world with a strong focus upon Asia (as this was also my major at university). And so I finally decided to become a freelancer in moderation and consulting.
Whilst traveling through China the idea came up to not only speak in theory about my travel experiences but rather make them tangible via blog entries, video- and photo impressions for people to inform- and learn from, get inspired and take these insights as back-up support for own travel preparations and arrangements. I know the sometimes occurring struggle when wanting to travel to a country you are not certain about or hesitant to go to due to constraints of the yet unknown. Consequently, the idea and project of this website was born. Connected with it, the aim to have a space for cumulated memories, intercultural encounter stories and possible training material to get back to for real-life-examples.
​
Let's move forward together on this journey!
I my website is still in its children shoes, I am looking forward to periodically developing and expanding my blog with content, impressions, videos for- and with you. Hence, I am also excited about your comments, suggestions and an happy to have a discourse with you.​ Drop me an email whenever you desire and feel free to share your own experiences and/or recommendations!
Questions, recommendations or any requests? Get in touch with me!
info.experiencingintercultures(at)gmail.com