Ana Santos Travels

My Scholarship entry - Brazilians and Landscapes in Rio de Janeiro

Brazil | Monday, November 24, 2014 | flickr photos

As the daughter of immigrants, I always believed I was born with the same aspirations for exploration and learning as my parents were. Therefore, while I was a student, I used photography to challenge myself to see things in a different way than everybody else. I lived most of my life in suburban and urban environments of the continental United States, never really having the chance to explore something as vast, green and unique as the Amazon.

The closest I got to the Amazon was when I studied abroad in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. My parents are Portuguese, hailing from the former European colonizer of Brazil, but living in Brazil for ten months was a culture shock that challenged me both mentally and physically. I adapted to my surroundings and immersed myself in this new culture by taking pictures of Brazil’s people and landscapes.

Photography is a profession I wish to pursue professionally. Studying in the Peruvian Amazon with experienced wildlife photographer, Jason Edwards, would give me a solid background in a critical area of photography – wildlife and natural history – and enable me to document the world that we live in and share my knowledge with readers around the globe.