Why My Name Means a Mountain

There's a mountain on the border between North Korea and China called Baekdu.

It sits where two worlds meet — ancient, volcanic, and stubborn. It has survived ice ages, empires, and wars. Its mountain range runs from that northern peak all the way down through the spine of the Korean peninsula to the south. And for reasons my parents have never fully explained, they named me after it.

I didn't think much of it growing up.

A name is just a name. I was too busy moving — seven schools across twelve years, eight years of living out of a suitcase in the United States through high school and university, a decade of chasing deals across four continents. You don't spend much time thinking about what your name means when you're just trying to keep up.

But I was fortunate. Extraordinarily fortunate.

There were people along the way — teachers, mentors, strangers who had no obligation to care — who chose to support me anyway. People who opened doors I didn't know existed, who believed in something in me before I believed in it myself. I wouldn't be here without them. I say that without exaggeration.

That kind of goodwill leaves a mark. It also leaves a responsibility.

But somewhere between my thirties and a quiet Sunday evening staring at a laptop screen, something shifted.

What This Site Is

This is not a blog about productivity hacks.

It is not a business newsletter. It is not a personal branding exercise, though I understand if it looks like one from the outside.

This is a record of what happens when someone who has spent a decade learning how the world works decides to stop being a passenger in their own life.

I've spent years helping other companies grow — closing deals, building teams, finding markets. Now I want to find out what happens when I apply that same intensity to building something for myself.

Every week I'll write about what I'm learning. About business development and what it actually looks like from the inside. About what it means to grow up Korean, work globally, and carry a name that means something bigger than you're ready for. About the gap between who you thought you'd become and who you actually are — and what you do with that gap.

Some of it will be useful. Some of it will be honest in ways that make me uncomfortable. All of it will be real.

And some of it will be for the people who are where I once was — uncertain, moving, trying to keep up. If anything I write opens a door for someone the way doors were opened for me, then this is already worth it.

That's the obligation I carry. That's the debt I'm trying to repay.

One Last Thing

Baekdu Mountain is still divided.

You can see it from the North Korean side or the Chinese side, but the mountain that gave its name to the entire Korean mountain range — the range that runs all 1,500 kilometers down to the southern tip of the peninsula — sits outside the reach of most Koreans today.

I've thought about this a lot lately.

Maybe that's not a tragedy. Maybe that's exactly what makes it the right name for this project. Something that holds two worlds at once. Something that exists in the tension between what is and what could be.

That's where I'm writing from.

From the 1,500km spine of Korea, reaching toward the 7,000km spine of the Earth.

If this resonated with you — even a little — subscribe. I write every week. No noise. Just the real stuff.

— The Andes