Chanda Santana was born in Asheville, NC and moved to Atlanta when she was 12. She lived all around Atlanta before coming to Athens 17 years ago. She came to Athens via Project Safe, fleeing domestic violence with her six children. Chanda is a public speaker, author and activist. She is the Founder and Executive Director of DIVAS Who Win Freedom Center, which she started in 2018. The DIVAS Who Win Freedom Center is an Athens-based nonprofit that helps women in the community find freedom from addiction and the sex trade through wellness-focused support services, peer-led coaching and support, and providing a welcoming space for refreshment and rest. DIVAS stands for Develop Intentional Victory and Success. Chanda is also the author of The Genesis Xperience: He Knew Her End From Her Beginning, about her quest to free her daughter from sex trafficking. Chanda is a recent graduate of LEAD Athens. Chanda has six adult children, ages 20-30, and lives off Hawthorne Avenue with her cat Snickers and her oldest child, Naobi, who will start art school in California later this year.

 

 

 

 

What do you love most about the work you do?

 

I think what I like most about the work is just that redemption journey that I get to be a part of as women take that road towards freedom. I love that the most. At times it can be heartbreaking but that is just part of it. Definitely the ones that are able to find their way back just lights my heart up so bright.

 

When you are not working, what are some of your favorite things to do in Athens?

 

To get a cup of coffee inside of Barnes & Noble. I am just still old school. I am fifty so I still love paper in my hand and the smell of new books. So, that is one place that you can find me: in the bookstore with arm loads of books, all of which I walk out with, but for some reason I find it necessary to read a chapter or two of each as I sit there with a cupcake (my guilty pleasure) and a cup of coffee.

 

What band or musician or show would you see if you could see anything and where?

 

I would time travel back to see New Edition, my favorite boy band. More present day, though, would be Mary J. Blige. I keep promising myself that I am going to go see her live in concert and I have not honored that commitment to myself so just speaking these words out may just have me click on and see where she might be. I have a son who just graduated nursing school in Alabama and is moving to Manhattan this summer so maybe I will be able to catch Mary J. in New York some time in the future.

 

What advice would you give your younger self?

 

Really in just one word: heal. That is what I try to say to other younger people, just the importance of healing, especially before you start creating a family and really even embark upon a career. But, I’d give myself permission to heal at a much younger age. It is kind of the trendy thing to say now with self-care and all, but I’d tell little Chanda to really just heal.

 

Do you have a favorite book, or a book you find yourself rereading, referencing or regifting most often?

 

One book I really love is, Year of Yes: How to Dance it Out, Stand in the Sun and Be Your own Person, by Shonda Rhimes. I told my children about it and then my son who is a nurse he actually bought it and told me the next year that he loved that book.

 

Do you have a favorite movie?

 

This dates me again and is so cheesy, but I just loved E.T. I have a great variance on the scale of the movies I liked as a child so I loved E.T., but I also love The Five Heartbeats, which I was probably way too young to watch. But still, The Five Heartbeats is a favorite. I love the music and the storyline. I didn’t know I was going to need that storyline in my life! But, that movie goes down as an all time favorite for me.

 

If you could travel anywhere in the world, where would you go and why?

 

It is a toss up between two completely different places. Iceland, I have just heard lots of wonderful things about Iceland. I actually do enjoy the winter and I have been told how beautiful it is there. Another place I have always wanted to go has been Italy. I just have always thought about cooking fresh pasta with people in the community there and the architecture and all that. So probably Italy would win out over Iceland because I have wanted to go there now since I was sixteen years old.

 

What is something interesting about you that most people don’t know?

 

I landed in Atlanta at twelve because as a child I loved theater. I was a theater actress and started getting into some commercialing. So, I filmed a Maxwell House coffee commercial. We were coming to Atlanta quite often because I had an agent there. We ended up making Atlanta home because of that. So, that’s something that is always a great evening conversation starter, talking about being this little person on a stage that just enjoyed bringing joy to people in various forms.

 

If you could have lunch with anyone, dead or alive, who would it be and where?

 

It would be my grandfather and probably be back in Asheville, North Carolina. My granddaddy had his favorite little place to go, which was The Hot Dog King, and that was kind of our sneak away to spot. My grandfather passed away thirty years ago; I was twenty. Right before he passed, my life had started unraveling a bit, and I remember one tearful conversation with him where he said, “Baby Girl you’re better than that. Baby Girl you’re better than that,” and that one tear went down his cheek. He didn’t live long enough to see his words come true. And he was the funniest man ever! He was just so hilarious. So, I would love to have lunch and let him know I finally discovered the truth in what he said to me when I was nineteen and then just to laugh and talk about all his great grands. That would be pretty amazing.

 

What three words or phrases come to mind when you think of the word “home?”

 

My Half Dozen (my kids). Wherever they are feels like home to me. We have been many places, and if my kids are there it feels like home. Second, I am a very sensory person, so just the smell of mango honeysuckle candles always smells like home. It is part of my ritual when I wake up in the morning and open up my windows and light those. Those are like my favorite scents, so it always smells like home. And then, fried apples always feels like home. My grandmother would burn up everything, she was not a good cook, but if by chance you were lucky enough to get something that did not reach burn stage, it was always delicious. I have so many childhood memories with my grandparents when Mawmaw (I called her Mawmaw) would fry them and you could just smell the wafts of those apples, which were from her apple trees in the backyard, and so delicious. Even burned. I loved burned fried apples because that is how they normally turned out. Those smells remind me of home.