First off I had to get married. Not that I did not love my husband. I adored him. I had to be head over heels in love to try for a second time to move to a man's country, and believe me, I was adamant I would NEVER do that again, for any one under any circumstances. The first time,- in my stupid 20's-was a disaster and I even fought with a good friend of mine a few years back when she decided to follow her sweetheart in the states. I berated her about everything she would encounter and of course she got mad at me.
I don't blame her.
But when I followed my husband I had to eat my own words. She was classy as ever and not even gave me a look. You know, those looks that imply you are a hypocrite or a moron.
I was honest in my beliefs. I believed moving to someone else's country puts you at a disadvantage. When you fight, you go out, blow some steam, go to a friend. If things are bad, you go back to your apartment or your parents, depending on what is available. When you are in someone else's country you have no where to go, no one to talk to. And if things were not bad enough, the other person KNOWS it. And that changes everything. No more apologies required. No more efforts. You lose your value in their eyes, and then you lose your value in your eyes.
But... as any woman in love will tell you, "my baby is different, I hit the jack pot, he is wooooonderful".
So, after losing my steady job, and having huge problems with my ex, I decided it was a sign, packed my dogs, my child, my life and my personal history and moved to Denmark.
But it was hard. I could not read anything in the supermarket. I needed my husband for everything. I felt I had to be a home maker, to compensate the fact I was not earning any money, which is something that I hate by nature. I was raised by a man who felt women were only good for the kitchen and the bedroom and that had an impact on me. I was NOT going to be a Steptford wife and I was going to do something with my life. Something meaningful.
I landed a job as a presenter in a Tv channel. I became an executive producer, and a producer. I dabbled with subtitles and I interviewed celebrities of my time. Real ones, realities did not exist and being on TV was no easy task.
I wrote two books. Not self published.
I had a good singing career for most of my life and had no day job to support me.
I was a successful columnist.
I think I had proved I was doing ok. Or, that I was pretty. The verdict is still out on this one.
Working in Denmark was not an easy task. I started teaching Languages privately as I did since 1989. I tried to reach out to the Greek and French community but left pretty quickly. I did not really fit in either. I baby sat, and pushed cinnamon buns in a school kantine. I taught in a school in French and English, the beauty of pop culture, arts, and poetry. Dance and kinesiology.
I worked as a voice agent and thought I had found my niche. As a voice artist I knew how to speak to my peers, when not bring them an offer that was beneath them, and they felt they could trust me. Of course I would have to deal with the occasional pompous ass that thought he was still living in the 80s, time of his peak, but I learned pretty fast to avoid them and work with the ones that were good and humble.
Clients appreciated the budgets and my explanations as to what they should expect. All in all I was good at what I was doing, so, in January 2015, I opened my own agency.I earned my living as a voice artist, but I felt that I needed more "partners" in several languages, in order to get to those clients I could not get for myself. Indeed, I voice in French, English and Greek but my Danish is not voice over material.
To my surprise I realized most voice artists do not own their own studio, which was limiting them in time but also, sky-rocketed the budget. So, I decided to offer my own facility to my talents. That would reduce the price considerably and make the talent more available for the client.
The idea took off and I had actresses coming and going, and business was slowly picking up. I went to a sporgskole, where I met several people from Portugal, Brazil, China, London, Germany... Some of them had amazing voices, but needed some form of training. So this was the moment I realized I could help them and help myself.
I created a seminar.
A simple 2 days program where I show them the basics of sound engineering, and where I teach them how to read and how to discern the differences between a narration, a commercial, an e-learning material, an application, or a video web.But more about this seminar at another time.
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