Erica is a world traveler with Bahamian and American heritage that was born and raised in Miami, FL and studied Architecture at Design and Architecture Senior High (DASH). Her travel bug began at a young age for her 16th birthday she decided against the traditional “Sweet 16” party and asked for a trip to Jamaica instead. After graduating from DASH Erica earned her B.A. in Political Science with a minor in African-American Studies from Rutgers College at Rutgers University. Erica has professional experience that covers a wide range of industries and fields including teaching, community work, fundraising, project management, event planning, social media, visual arts, financial services, city government policy, journalism and pharmaceutical sales. After getting married in fall of 2010 Erica and her husband Matthew Nelson made a life altering decision to leave their traditional American lifestyles and in the summer of 2011 they began their journey living abroad. Erica has lived in multiple cities and countries such as Miami, FL; New Brunswick, NJ; Newark, NJ; Philadelphia, PA; Lima, Peru; and Bangkok, Thailand. Through living and teaching in Lima and Bangkok Erica has developed a love for teaching adults and children and has had the amazing opportunity to visit North/East/West Africa, South East Asia, the Caribbean, Central America, Europe and South America including over 20 countries and counting. Through her travels she has expanded her perception of self, others and how she is perceived by others and how she affects others; gained invaluable knowledge about multinational people and culture via direct experiences; modified her acceptable way of travel in terms of transportation and accommodations (she’s been couchsurfing and riding in tiny buses y’all); learned extremely valuable travel tricks and must; and has become a highly proficient travel planner.
Getting to Know the World 