My very first story to tell about my relationship with the ocean always makes me have a belly laugh just from thinking about it. When I was the littlest person on the beach, still walked funky, my dad used to take me body surfing under his arms on the shore breaks of Leblon.

He tells me this story laughing so hard the tears run down his cheeks, because apparently he would avoid at all cost looking at the beach, where my mom was panicking yelling at him to get me out. I LOVED it. But he says if he made eye contact with her, we’d have to get out of the water. 😂 I grew up in the ocean because of his froth body surfing though, I body surfed my whole childhood and as soon as my big brother got himself a new surfboard I inherited his old one and got out there to actually surf for the first time. Nothing changed about mom. As a grom, I’d got out of the water after making eye contact with a panicking mother many times.“You’ve been surfing for so long!”.

This is my favorite story for sure. Dad tells me with laugh crisis pauses. Mom tells me about to cry saying I was way too young and dad way too reckless. I never stopped surfing, and I carry this folklore in my heart as I always base myself as close to the ocean as I possibly can. 

This is a hard one. And my answers are usually unconventional, out of the mainstream surfers crew.

Leah Dawson @leahloves is my girl crush. I love her style and diversity, she rips on every board she surfs with.

Gabriel Nascimento (@surfereditor) is one of my favorite longboarders of life as well, I’ve known him since I was 7 (he was 5, my friend’s little bro) and all of a sudden the kid is ripping all over the globe. 

The ocean is my best friend, my temple, my confident, my source of life. Nothing inspires me more than the ocean.