From the Chilean coast to the world: how PacificVibes was born

Setting up my home office in front of the Pacific Ocean acted as a tremendous life reset. I started waking up earlier with natural light, doing much of my daily life on foot, and dedicating more time to sports. The environment deeply conditions our behaviors, and this new space gave me the mental peace and clarity I needed to focus and create.

When I arrived in Concón, I knew very few people in the area, but I intentionally focused on building networks with people who also prioritize quality of life in the provinces. This led to co-creating initiatives like “Run & Coffee” at Playa Amarilla, an activity designed to get tech professionals and entrepreneurs away from screens, connecting in person through jogging, walking, and conversation.

Additionally, I joined Amanda II, a mixed sailing team that promotes gender equality in water sports and fosters leadership and teamwork. My bond with this local community became even more apparent during the devastating mega-fires in the Quinta Región, when, together with friends and neighbors, we mobilized to directly help women, pets, and colleagues who lost everything.

Paradoxically, moving to the coast improved my relationship with the capital: today I spend more quality time with my friends from Santiago when they visit me than we did when we lived in the same city.

However, I recognize that many of the major professional events and the industry's pulse still happen there, which sometimes makes me feel that not much is happening at an industry level on the coast. To not lose momentum or isolate myself, I started applying a behavioral design tactic: throughout 2025, I forced myself to travel to Santiago with a certain frequency. I went to facilitate workshops with clients, teach classes, and have many in-person coffees that allowed me to keep hallway conversations alive.

Living by the sea in a small city has not meant disconnecting; in fact, since I moved, I've connected with the world more than ever. Remote work and my nomadic identity allow me to start the day with a video call with my parents in Romania while making my coffee, have a Meet meeting with a client in Europe, go to the gym at lunchtime, and finish with a live podcast on my YouTube channel.

Likewise, good access to Santiago's airport makes it easy for me to travel constantly to give international conferences or execute projects.

At the end of the day, consciously choosing or modifying our environment is perhaps the most important strategic decision to facilitate the life and behaviors we truly want to develop. Because everything is designed.

The thing is, despite everything, professional connection with the area was sometimes missing. And after talking to many entrepreneurs on the coast and people working in technology who moved here in recent years, I've realized that I'm not the only one who misses connecting a bit more locally and not having to go to Santiago for an event, conference, or talk.

And this isn't just my perception as a newcomer: there's data behind it. According to a study by the UDD Data Science Institute, during the pandemic, approximately 4.7% of residents of the Metropolitan Region left Santiago, which extrapolates to over 350,000 people, an internal migration that the authors themselves compared to that of New York. And the driver isn't just expensive rent: studies by the UC Cities Observatory show that more than 40% of those who changed communes did so for well-being, not economic necessity. That is, migration for lifestyle. A good part of that wave landed right here, on the Valparaíso coastline, and brought people working in technology or remotely. Translated into my life equation: for many more people than I thought, the environment went from being a given to being a decision. And when there's a critical mass of people who made the same decision, there's a community waiting to be activated.

At the same time, my YouTube channel became a true social experimentation lab. There, I interviewed Iván Wolf from SaludTech, a Chilean telemedicine company based in Concón:

Then I interviewed Luka from @alukaideas, the creative engineer behind the viral phenomenon @alukaideas, who also settled in Concón:

Fast forward to April 2026, when I became an Ambassador for Lovable, an artificial intelligence platform that allows you to build websites, applications, platforms, and digital products without knowing how to code (in natural language). Taking advantage of the moment and people's interest in AI topics, I thought it would be a good opportunity to start getting together in a more organized way.

There I bought the domain, and in May, the first coworking afternoon was organized at Philia, a cafe where I always go to work.

And that's how several conversations, the first and second coworking afternoons, the Founder Series x Lovable hackathon, and the Hackathon: Building Solutions with AI, along with some social runs, gave rise to PacificVibes: a glocal initiative to connect local talent —and particularly those of us working in technology or remotely from Chile for the world— with AI and entrepreneurship projects.