Gelila was born in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and raised in Ethiopia, Kenya and Canada. Gelila earned a Master in Environmental Studies from York University, and Bachelor of Applied Science in mechanical engineering from the University of Toronto in Canada. She confirmed her passion for working at the nexus of poverty reduction and environment sustainability during the year she spent living in rural Ethiopia in 2000-01 among subsistence farming communities conducting ethnographic research for her graduate studies on resettlement as a food security strategy for drought-affected populations. For the past 18 years since, Gelila has been working at the United Nations based in New York City 2001-10 and 2013-16, and based in Addis Ababa 2011-12, and 2016-19, in policy advisory and project management roles in the areas of climate change and biodiversity, handling portfolios at global, regional and country levels. Among her notable professional contributions has been working in the U.N. Secretary-General’s executive office with responsibility for managing part of the process that enabled 195 countries to reach the Paris Agreement on climate change in 2015. After graduating, she hopes to continue the good fight against climate change, focusing on energy policy, globally and in the context of an economically integrated Africa. Gelila enjoys gardening, wine tasting, traveling to dramatic landscapes, spotting game in safari parks - especially the rare and enigmatic kind like the black lion, rhinos, the Ethiopian wolf - and live music, including hosting jam sessions.