Welcome to our first in a new blog series, “Who are They?” where we interview current staff members to find out a little bit more about why they come back year after year to work for Wayfinder. Today we welcome Maya Ziv to the proverbial hot seat! Just like at camp, this interview was opened with a morning-circle-style question, an open-ended question that gives you a chance to express yourself or tell the community something special about you. Today’s silly question is “What three ingredients mixed into a potion would make you?”
Maya’s answer:
“I think one would be strawberries, because I love them and they’re fun. One would be just a sprinkling of computer code, just a dash, you know, not too much. It’s not that much of me, but it’s there. And then just a little bit of electric guitar, just a little riff going on in the background. That would be me.”
Maya currently graces us at camp as our Overnight Camp Director, but her connection to Wayfinder goes further back; last summer marked a decade since Maya first came to camp as a fifteen year old. She immediately knew she wanted to help make the magic she had experienced, so after just one summer as a camper, Maya became an apprentice, then two years later became a staff member. Now making magic is exactly what she does.
Like all our staff, Maya brings magic to life at camp, but she also makes magic with her skills as a coder and all-around computer wiz. In the summer of 2020, Maya designed and coded an in-Game starship battle for our virtual camps. She also made our magic system into a digital format that can be customized and printed for each Adventure Game (it’s a big deal). “I like to be on computers, so it’s fun to have a skill that I use out in the world also be applicable at camp. It doesn’t come up all that often, so when it does I’m very excited about it.” We always are too, as well as grateful for her generosity whenever we want to make our spreadsheets function better.
As you may have picked up on, when Maya is not at camp, she is doing computer magic, across the country in CA. “I lead a secret double life as a software engineer…. Much of my year is spent computer programming.” Maya found a love for computer science in college, though it seems that passion might have been built into her programming; her father was a computer scientist and she knows her mathematician grandfather would have been, if computers had been around. After college, Maya tried out a few different fields: “I worked in games for a while, then I worked in cybersecurity, now I work at a civic technology company…, basically making tools for people who work at local government agencies to make their purchasing easier when they are buying, you know, road paving equipment or disaster relief supplies or like helping communities to recover from hurricanes, whatever services they’re providing for you.” Maya really enjoys being able to serve a good cause. “I feel very lucky to be able to prioritize working on a mission that I really believe in and at a company that I think is doing good in the world and to have that be something that guides my career.”
Like many young people that come through our doors Maya picked up a thing or two about working through her time at Wayfinder. “Wayfinder has always been one of the most profound work experiences, especially working in directing. I have done a lot more management work than any software engineer has any right to.” Directing a summer camp might seem like fun and games, but it comes with a lot of responsibilities, like managing a team of people, having difficult behavioral conversations, and exhibiting best practices around all types of communication. “I didn’t even realize I had this skill set until I was interviewing for jobs and they were like, ‘You’ve done what?’ and I was like, ‘Oh yeah, I’ve absolutely managed teams before.’”
Besides practical career skills, Maya has also taken our community practices out into the world, like our golden rule: “respect others and their feelings.” For Maya, these have been words to live by. “It’s a life philosophy, something I hold very dear to my heart. It matters to me a lot that I move through the world in a way that is caring and that makes space for all people. I feel so very lucky to live as fully as I do at camp and then try to bring that to spaces I inhabit elsewhere in the world.” This philosophy has become important in her career too. She says, “I think it’s an ideal that a lot of companies strive for but is very difficult to achieve because it requires a level of trust. But it is necessary, because we are people in the world and you cannot have only the work parts of yourself at work. That’s just not how it works.” Maya strives to create space both at work and in all her communities for people to build that trust, openness, and respect. “It’s nice to be a part of shaping space because at the end of the day, we’re all people. So it matters.”
Outside of work, Maya has a range of hobbies and interests. “Games and play are a huge part of my life and I try to have that feature everywhere. I play a lot of D&D with friends. I have done some LARPing on the West Coast. I’m a very active swing dancer. I’m very into rock climbing. Music is also something I love. I play guitar – not particularly well, but I do play guitar. Art is also something that matters a lot to me.” Her passion for her hobbies has also been inspired by Wayfinder, where she’s gotten to learn about and see the passions of others. “A really special part of Wayfinder’s community is what people bring in. Some of my most memorable camp experiences were staff teaching one-off workshops of skills or practices that they just really cared about. Like a contact improv workshop or a capoeira workshop. Just all sorts of random assorted things where you can just really see the love that people put into everything that they do.” Maya has done just that, frequently teaming up with a crew of other staff to teach swing dance at camp!
Maya and so many others keep coming back for so many reasons: community, adventure, a space to be free, and of course, the magic! She has found all of those things and more in our Adventure Games. Maya has so many amazing memories from different Games, from her first horror game, getting attacked with our play-safe chain saw, to being the safety person when another staff member lit their hand on fire for an in-Game ritual (with proper precautions). “Oh, it was the coolest thing I’ve ever seen, and I held the bowl of water that she dunked it in at the end, which I took very seriously as a 19 year old. As you should, that was real fire. On her real hand. It was blue. It was crazy – watching every child’s mouth drop as they were like, ‘Oh, magic is real.’ “ And that is what we love about camp, finding out that magic is real. It might look different than we imagine it as children but if you are able to find magic as an adult, then life can become truly joyous.
Written by Trine Boode-Petersen from an interview with Maya in 2024