Okay! Okay, so I have been wanting to start a blog for like ever!! I mean, I actually had one before a couple of years ago (umm okay maybe like 10 years ago – I’ll have to find the link for it), I loved it but then life happened, I got married, I moved across the country, I opened a chocolate store, closed it down, had a child and now here I am trying to build my dream career in Photography! That is why this is so exciting for me I’m writing my “first” blog post and I’m here to stay! And because of that, I want to introduce myself.

My name is Neha Kotecha!

Geez! This is harder than I thought but let’s see what I can tell you about myself, where do I start? – I was born and raised in East Africa, in the capital city of Tanzania, Dar-es-salaam! This usually gets people excited so let me tell you a little bit about my once upon a time home. I was born in 1987 (you can do the math for my age), I at that time was an only child and as much as I LOVE my little brother sometimes I wonder what life would have been like if my cousin and I had gone through with the threat to toss him into the dumpster. Don’t worry we obviously didn’t and I have worked through these urges and come to learn that it’s way more fun to annoy my little brother. Back home was amazing, I have a really large extended family and we all lived pretty close to each other, we spent our time meeting up and playing in the community, and we went to the beach every single weekend and even during the week sometimes (Dar-es-salaam is right on the east coast).

Now you’re probably thinking, come on Neha give me the good stuff! So let me answer some of the questions I’ve been asked before. No, we did not have pet lions (although my hubby did have a pet monkey!). Elephants and wild animals don’t just roam around the city, but I’ve been on more safaris than I can count, and seeing wild animals in their element, out in the open and in the jungle is something everyone should do! Yes, I speak Swahili the spoken language in TZ (okay I should add I’m not as fluent as I used to be but I can get by) but I can speak/understand 5 languages. There is so much more I can tell you but I’ll create some mystery here and do another blog post about my life in Africa. I miss my once upon a time home for its beauty and peaceful life but I now call Charleston, South Carolina home.

We moved to California as a family 20 years ago! I went to middle school and high school in Moorpark, California. Then I went to SDSU for college and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in finance (a degree I tucked away in the closet literally the day after I walked for my graduation ceremony). Here’s a fun story for you (prepare yourself for some serious run-on sentences) – In 2010 I took my last final at SDSU on a Friday evening, I finished and drove straight home which was about a 2-hour drive, my ENTIRE family was home I mean house full! (You’ll see why in a second) but so back to my story I finish my final and drive home where my family, aunts, uncles, and cousins have gathered with my boyfriend and his family, now I should mention when I say my family and my hubby’s family I’m saying the family that lives in the States but I’m also talking family from Africa, England and India. I was getting engaged that Sunday soooo it was a major celebration.

I digress so, I get home hug everyone, and meet my in-laws for the first time then the next morning bright and early on Saturday I drove back to San Diego for my graduation (my cousin and I graduated at the same time, the same cousin I hatched plans with about tossing my little brother if you can’t tell already family is a major thing for me). So we graduate and then drive back home and start prepping for Sunday. Sunday comes it’s the day after I graduated college and I’m getting engaged! (I’m Indian so we have a traditional ceremony and a HUGE party). Now you’re thinking oo okay that’s cool but wait I’m not done yet!! So finals on Friday, graduation on Saturday, engaged on Sunday, Monday morning we’re all at the courthouse cause my boyfriend turned fiancé is about to become my legal husband! We literally got legally married the same weekend I graduated college! And then to top it all off on Tuesday my husband and I with our families drove out to Vegas (all 28 of us)!!! It was a pretty awesome time!

Now if you caught that I said “legally” married and not just married then you’ve been paying attention. I actually got married again traditionally a year later! Don’t worry I won’t start telling you all about it just yet but let me set the scene. I had 98 international family members fly into California for our wedding, it was a week-long affair (yes literally 7 days!), and in our house, our actual home we had 23 people living together during the wedding festivities.

So after marriage, I moved from California to Charleston SC and I absolutely love it out here. I opened a chocolate store and let me tell you that is another blog post altogether but as you get to know me, you’ll learn that I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE chocolate and dessert and NUTELLA!! Guys, I have an obsession with NUTELLA! I owned the store for 5 years and then when I was pregnant with my daughter Diya I decided that I wanted to be able to spend as much time with her as I humanly could and that meant I had to close my little sweet spot down. Diya is now 3 and as much as that makes my heart do flips I am at a point in my life where I want to go back to the core of who I am and what my passion is and besides my family, chocolate, and socks that’s PHOTOGRAPHY!! I love pictures I love looking at them, I love being in them and I LOVE taking them.

So that’s me in a few paragraphs, on my first blog post!

If you’re still reading thank you so much! I look forward to sharing my life, my passion for photography and hopefully meeting you so I can take your pictures or even just chat with you! Head on to my Instagram and see me in my stories, check out my work and while you’re there message me to say hello!! Cause I really would love to get to know you! — Neha Kotecha on Instagram!