Born in Brooklyn, bred in Long Island, Nechama works as a curatorial research assistant for the Leonard Lauder Postcard Collection. She is a devoted yogi, who enjoys going to museums, watching films, and checking out festivals and art exhibits.
When and where did you join Justifi?
I signed up for my first trip in Nicaragua, December 2013. I saw an ad on Facebook and applied right then and there.
Globetrotter record:
Nicaragua, Peru, Bolivia, Colombia, Israel, and Greece. Upcoming later in December: South Africa
Favorite Justifi moment?
It was on our last day working in Satellite, a rural community outside of Cusco. While everyone was wrapping up and started walking down to the bus, I stayed behind to take photos of the area. I was trying to figure out the best way to capture the landscape as the sun was setting over the Andes. Suddenly, I noticed two brothers playing between a wooden fence that circled around their home. They were so cute. I started taking pictures of the younger one, all bundled up in a panda coat to keep warm as the temperature began to drop. Several minutes later, I felt someone behind me and discovered the older brother trying to look at my camera. He spotted me photographing and was curious to see what I was shooting. I showed him and went through some of the pictures I had taken earlier. He smiled and asked me to take more of him and his brother together. When the younger one had enough and wanted to go off and play again the older brother asked me to take more. He started posing for individual portrait shots on his own. Before I ran to catch up with the group he gave me a hug and waved goodbye. These last moments were the highlight of my day (See photos here: http://bit.ly/1yhlCG5 )
What’s your dream occupation?
I'd like to be able to have a job that takes me all over the globe. My dream is to segue into cultural journalism, writing about and photographing projects that cover art, community, and social justice.
After finishing school and spending some time in the art world, I began to observe a certain disconnect between what I love and feel passionate about and how it relates to everything else I would see and hear going on in the rest of the world (current events, science, technology, natural disasters, politics, human rights and social justice issues, etc). I want to do something that helps to bridge these connections and contextualize all the wonderful, intelligent, cutting edge projects being produced by the creative sector for the general public to learn and know about.
If you could choose a superpower, what would it be and why?
I sometimes wish I could blend into certain environments as someone or something else, like a chameleon. I'd get to observe and learn about many different versions of the same person as they reveal alter-parts of themselves while they are essentially not -- or think they are not -- with "me." By having the ability to transform I'd adopt (I would imagine) new abilities, skills, and talents I wouldn't normally have, which would be pretty cool. On the flip side, I say all of this with caution since I might discover some traits or personalities in certain people -- even within myself -- that I may not like or expect to find.
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