About Nelson🇺🇸/Roberto🇸🇻
Hi, my name is Nelson de Witt, but it's also Roberto Coto.
I was separated from my birth family during El Salvador’s civil war and was reunited with them in 1997 at the age of 16. I'm working on an auto-fiction novel and a documentary film about my life as one of El Salvador's disappeared children.
If there has been one consistency throughout my varied and unconventional career, it’s that I thrive when I’m working on complex, multi-dimensional problems that have no simple solution.
My work and story have been featured on The BBC World Service, The NACLA Report, The Christian Science Monitor, The Los Angels Times and The Huffington Post. Besides appearing on several podcasts, I’ve also spoken about my story at a number of high schools and colleges, including Dartmouth College, Yale University, Wellesley College, and University of Chicago.
On this page, you can learn more about me and my background as a:
- 📖Author
- 🎥Filmmaker
- 👨🏽💻Developer
- 📷 Photographer
📖Author
For nearly two decades, I’ve been writing and publishing online in various forms. Over the years, my writing has evolved from blog posts and personal essays to how-to books and, more recently, full-length narratives. I’ve written about topics such as reuniting with my Salvadoran family, crowd-funding, and coming to terms with being forcibly disappeared as an infant.
While these pieces have varied in size and scope, many have provided me with an outlet for examining my family’s complicated history and processing the difficult emotions resulting from it.
Author: Waking From Innocent Dreams
Jan 2016 - Present
With themes similar to Hades, Argentina, and Solito, my first novel, Waking From Innocent Dreams, combines memoir with magical realism and historical fiction. It explores the phenomenon of forced disappearances and asks the question, “Can a family reunite in the aftermath of war ever truly heal their broken bonds?
Crowd-funding Consultant: Ana & Isabel's Reunion
May 2015 - Jul 2015
In 2015, two Salvadoran friends of mine needed to raise funds to reunite with their birth mother. I volunteered to oversee their GoFundMe.com campaign and helped them raise over $5,000 for the reunion. This project was intended to start the foundation named after my late grandmother, Mama Chila, that would help facilitate more reunions. Unfortunately, I did not have the time, resources, or experiences to make the foundation a reality.
Crowd-funding Consultant: Operation Ninja S.T.A.R.
Apr 2013 - Jan 2014
In 2013, Article One Partners approached me to help them run a crowdfunding campaign to combat patent trolls. Not only did I play a prominent role in developing the project’s scope and strategy, but I also wrote the script for, directed, and edited the campaign video and wrote copy for the project page.
Aug 2011 - Dec 2013
In 2011, I had the idea to write a how-to book about crowd-funding that was based on my experience running a successful campaign, research, and interviews with other creators. I raised funds to help cover the cost of publishing on Kickstarter, and since its release, it has been downloaded over 3,000 times. Through my book, website, and consulting, I’ve helped independent creators understand how crowd-funding works and the challenges they face when launching a campaign.
Editor-in-chief: Anasmiracle.com
Jan 2007 - Dec 2013
Ana's Miracle was a blog I started in 2007 to help my adoptive mother with her memoir Missing Mila, Finding Family. My siblings and I shared our thoughts and experiences about reuniting after El Salvador’s 13-year-long civil war. The site was my first online publication and the genesis for several other projects, including my documentary film, an auto-fiction novel, and my web hosting business. After writing there for six years, I decided to move on, but I have kept the site running for posterity.
🎥Filmmaker
Cabin 23 Productions is a joint venture between director John Younger and me. Our first project is a documentary film titled Identifying Nelson/Buscando a Roberto, which focuses on El Salvador's Disappeared children. In addition to being the film's subject, I played a pivotal role in developing its storyline and am responsible for all the business and marketing aspects of the venture, including writing our newsletter.
Chief Storyteller: Identifying Nelson/Buscando a Roberto
Feb 2011 - Present
In 2011, sixteen years after reuniting with his family, Nelson/Roberto gets invited to El Salvador’s Day of the Disappeared, where the country’s president might acknowledge their existence for the first time in the nation’s history.
The event, which is taking place nearly two decades after the end of one of the bloodiest conflicts of the Cold War, could be a turning point for the country.
Despite the skepticism voiced by some attendees, Nelson/Roberto is hopeful that the government will take meaningful action to help the families of the Disappeared, who are still searching for answers about their loved ones.
Producer/Host: Inside The Journey Podcast
May 2013 - Dec 2017
During the research phase of the film, we produced 87 episodes of a podcast called Inside The Journey Podcast, where we interviewed members of my family as well as other Salvadoran Adoptees who, like me, were forcibly separated from their families during the war. We also spoke with people who have done significant advocacy work for and in El Salvador, such as Representative Jim McGovern, Professor Aviva Chomsky, and Dr. Angelina Snodgrass Godoy.
👨🏽💻Developer
My enthusiasm for programing began in elementary school when I used to copy simple programs that were printed inside copies of 3-2-1 Contact Magazine and run them on my Apple IIgs. Slowly, by changing bits and pieces of code, I taught myself how to program.
Below is a sample of one of my earliest surviving programs, written in QBasic. It draws lines of varying length and color from the center of the screen, which was my attempt at making a screensaver.
SCREEN 12
DO
C = INT(RND(1) * 15) + 1
COLOR C
a = INT(RND(1) * 1040) + 1
B = INT(RND(1) * 1040) + 1
LINE (320, 240)-(a, B)
IF INKEY$ = CHR$(27) THEN 142
LOOP
Demo of my screensaver program
Web Developer: Coto.Studio
Mar 2015 - Present
Since 2015, I have been helping artists, authors, and independent creatives with their websites. I help my clients troubleshoot technical issues, keep their sites online, back up their data, and protect them from spammers. In 2022, I formalized the work I had been doing on the side as Coto.Studio.
Full Stack Developer: S.B.C. Panama
May 2007 - Aug 2012
For roughly five years, from 2007 to 2012, I worked with Servicio Bordado de Coto (SBC) to computerize its business and improve its operations. I designed and developed several Ruby on Rails applications that streamlined its production process and dramatically increased productivity. My efforts saved the company over 1,000 hours of labor, allowed it to cope with substantial growth, and helped triple revenue. All this was accomplished with a minimal budget using donated computers and open-source software.
Software developer: The Village Bank
May 2004 - Aug 2006
From 2004 to 2006, I designed, developed, and rolled out several Microsoft Access databases for the commercial and residential lending departments of The Village Bank in Auburndale, Massachusetts. The bank used my programs to close over 700 loans, representing over $200 million worth of business.
📷Photographer
I've been doing photography since high school, where I learned to develop and print my own negatives.
I believe there is profound yet often overlooked beauty in the world around us. My photography is an attempt to capture and expose the splendor I encounter. For me, these photographs are a physical reminder of life's evanescent moments.
Photographs by Nelson/Roberto
I primarily shoot fine art and street photography. While I have worked at events in the past, I am not taking on any gigs at the moment. You can read why on my event photography page.
Most of the photography on this site is mine and was shot with an early production model of the Leica M6 from 1985 that shoots 35mm film. The M6 is a unique camera because of its compact size, quiet shutter, and because it is a rangefinder.
Rangefinders, unlike traditional SLR cameras, do not show you the world as the lens sees it. Instead, you see white frame lines that approximate the final image and allow you to see objects moving in and out of the frame. There is no preview, and you have to use your feet to zoom.
In a world that is obsessed with overproduced, fanciful, magazine-style images, I stick with film as a way to say real life is textured, messy, and beautiful.
