Christopher Bao profile of Xavier Latimer
When Xavier Latimer speaks about topics as diverse as his career aspirations (finance probably, but working as a pilot would be cool) or a superpower he wished he had (the ability to communicate with Princeton’s squirrels), he seems to have endless words. When someone is talkative during an interview, ready to spout off words with little prompting, it can sometimes be a sign that they just enjoy hearing their own voice. For Xavier, though, it’s as if his ideas couldn’t possibly be expressed in tight confines.
When I first started interviewing him, I was somewhat worried that Xavier would take some coaxing to start speaking. He seemed relaxed and mellow, content with being present and observing silently. Yet when he started talking, it took very little to get him to continue. At one point, he got into great detail about the tourists in New York, the city he calls home.
“They just walk slowly,” he said, mildly exasperated. “They’re just kind of walking around aimlessly.”
While we chatted on the grass in front of Nassau Hall, Xavier kept smiling and waving at friends passing by. One of them was Ashlena Brown, a sophomore at Princeton who met Xavier when they participated in Princeton in Beijing together. She remembered her first impression of him as “laid back, nice, and open and friendly to a lot of people.”
Later, when the two of them worked more closely together as Outdoor Action orientation leaders, she said that he was always willing to lend a hand to people: not because he had to, but because he wanted to build a human connection.
“He seemed very willing to be a friend and connect with a lot of different people, which was a bit surprising,” Ashlena said. “Not a lot of people are really like that.”
Xavier comes to Princeton from Clinton Hill, Brooklyn, around the corner from where Biggie Smalls grew up. His mom pushed both him and his younger brother (Xander — his parents went for alliteration) to have the best education possible, and so he eventually ended up at Regis High School, a competitive Catholic high school.
“I always kind of had three different worlds.” Xavier told me. “[There are] my worlds at home, being Filipino, half-Asian, being Jamaican, half-Black, not being fully either one of those, and navigating that and also navigating school. I’m amongst some of my peers who, you know, use summer as a verb.”
It was in high school that he met one of his closest friends, Ethan Klimczak, who now goes to Notre Dame. The two of them became close friends when they played on the basketball team together in the winter of their freshman year.
One of Ethan’s first impressions of Xavier is that he’s “a genuinely happy kid,” he told me over Zoom. “I think positivity is infectious, and he certainly embodies that.”
The two often hung out at Ethan’s house, which was right next to their school. Ethan quickly found Xavier to also be honest and straightforward in conversation, whether they had them late at night before a basketball game or while riding Citi Bikes uptown.
“He is someone who will tell you what he likes about you, and he will also tell you what he doesn’t like about you as well.” Ethan said. It takes a real friend, he thinks, “ to be able to tell you what they mean to you.”
Yet Xavier, despite his “go with the flow” personality, is someone who is always up for a challenge. Ashlena noted that in Beijing, Xavier would “push himself to say more challenging things” and embrace language immersion. He’s currently preparing for the New York Marathon, which according to Ethan is borne out of a desire to do a “really hard thing this year.”
He seems particularly drawn to trying things off the beaten path. He’s travelled to over 20 countries, but wants to go beyond, in his words, “the Parises, the Londons, the Madrids, the Romes.” He seemed to have endless ideas on how he wanted to spend his time, but he didn’t seem hassled or uncertain.
“He always figures it out,” Ethan said. “There’s never a doubt that Xavier will figure it out.”
