I love the mountain. My father is a passionate mountaineer and our family trips climbing the mountains remain some of my best vacations and most cherished memories. The feeling you have when you are on the top of the mountain has no comparison. For me, there is nothing that can beat that. Without much effort, you empty your thoughts and what you experience is absolute freedom. I understand why, for some people, the mountain is their life. All these emotions came back to me when I saw this photograph of Nadya Zim and especially after I read the story behind it. Here it is below, in the words of Nadya herself, a born storyteller.
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“This is my first sunrise in Torres Del Paine, Chile. This is the moment when I understood I would never fully come back from Chile. I will be forever gone with the wind of the mountains of Torres Del Paine. Forever. When I was there at sunrise with the 70 mile an hour wind in my hair, in front of the lake that like an ocean covered me with the blue cold waves, it was so freezing, I was mesmerized by the mountains, the light slicing through the clouds, and the rainbows, and the moon. It all was rolled out before me like a celestial parade. Can all of it exist in one minute, in one second? Yes, it can! It’s indescribable… I felt so small in front of all of it. I felt like suddenly I am a galaxy myself. And there were tears on my cheeks non stop. The whole world was mine. It’s a strange feeling. But it was there. For me. For us. Alone. Together. And I stayed on the edge of the cliff while wind was pushing me all around. And there was nothing to protect me from falling far into the icy lake and, honestly, I wish I was brave enough to jump. No fence, for once. Pure freedom. I was melting in every drop of water, in every beam of light, in every breath of wind. Time was surreal.”
More photographer interviews: One Day That Summer: Camel Safari, Kenya / My San Francisco/ One Day That Summer: Rome
