Christopher Wizda
Mongolia, United States
As seen in:
Trade Finance Global,
Equestrian Life Australia
Covers:
Turkmenistan, Central Asia, energy security, critical minerals, Belt and Road Initiative, Middle Corridor, national identity, cultural heritage, GIS analysis
Doesn't Cover:
Politically sensitive domestic topics, opposition politics
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Christopher Wizda’s Biography
Read Full Bio →Christopher Wizda is an independent researcher, analyst and writer specializing in Turkmenistan and Central Asia. Based in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, he brings more than fifteen years of regional engagement to his work, including a country directorship for American Councils in Turkmenistan, Peace Corps service in Mongolia, six years in Russia and a study year in Kyrgyzstan.
He is a Listed Researcher at the Oxus Society for Central Asian Affairs and a member of ASEEES. He authors the Karakum Brief, …
Christopher Wizda’s Journalist Portfolio
Interview
See all 4 answers →How do you prefer to be pitched on stories?
I cover Central Asia, so the fastest way to reach me is to lead with geography. Open by naming the region or country the pitch concerns, then the sector or topic it falls under. From there, a few short bullets on the specifics of the story let me see at a glance whether it fits my beat. A pitch structured that way, place first, then theme, then detail, gets read and answered quickly.
Why did you become a journalist?
along two tracks, international development and education, and somewhere in the middle I found I loved researching a country exhaustively, the way one subtopic always opens onto another, then another. The educator in me wanted to pass that on, to bring people into what I'd found interesting. Writing was where those two instincts met. So today I research and analyze the region, and I write to bring others into it.
When's the best time to pitch you?
Evenings work best for me. A pitch that lands then gets to sit overnight, which is when I do my best thinking, and I tend to come back to it the next morning with a clearer sense of the angle and whether it fits. Time-sensitive items are the exception, but for anything that benefits from consideration, end of day is ideal.