On April 16, 2016, a magnitude 7.8 earthquake hit Ecuador. Pablo Cordova was buried under the rubble. Desperate, he made an emergency phone call. Following his rescue, Cordova found work with ECU-911, the emergency response service that had saved him. The service had been set up with Chinese support and when, later that year during a state visit to Ecuador, Xi Jinping stopped by ECU-911’s headquarters, Cordova was keen to thank the Chinese president in person.