Illegal modeling, Big Gulps and the fax machine
Leaving Japan was a relief. At the end of my trip, I was counting the days to get home, crossing them off in my calendar. I was the happiest person boarding the plane to Budapest, despite the fact the airport security took my pepper spray away - really not nice of you guys. I even have this vivid picture in my head sitting on the plane and looking down on Tokyo, thinking how happy I am that this is over. You see, back then I was clearly not good with the "live in the moment" thingy.
I landed in Budapest. My whole family was waiting for me at the airport which was a tradition by then already. I was so happy to see them even though my parents were still mad at me for leaving University. Slowly everyone at home started telling me how much weight I lost. I found myself stuck in this circle, where my friends and family would always tell me I'm too skinny and my agency would push me to lose even more weight. I wanted to live up to everyone's expectations which was clearly impossible. Because I've spent summer at home, living on grandma's cooking, listening to everybody telling me to eat more, I gained weight again. In the meantime, I changed my agency because the other one fell apart completely. I was ready to move on and start fresh. This guy contacted me and told me all nice things, pulled down all the stars for me. So I decided to go with him and joined his agency. All went well and they placed me in Singapore with the best agency - which again is a very important step in a models career.
In September of 2006, it was time for me to fly to Singapore. After one missed flight on a Sunday, I was boarding a plane the next day off to Asia again.
Every time I traveled to an Asian country, my agency gave me instructions about what I had to tell to the officers at the border to get into the country I traveled to. I had a paper on me with the contact of a "friend" - who in real life was my booker or sometimes the cleaning lady - and I had to tell border security that I'm just here for a short visit. Yes, girls traveled to work to most Asian countries illegally. And sometimes it is indeed suspicious that 14 or 19-year-olds travel by themselves without anyone surveying them, so on rare occasions, they stopped us and asked questions. I was always very nervous when I did these illegal immigrations, but I never had trouble. It was mostly the Russian girls who had difficulties with getting through immigration, because us, Europeans, we got the tourist visa for 2-3 months, the Russians only got like 2 weeks sometimes. Nowadays more and more agencies organize working Visa's for models, but I know for a fact that there are still a lot of girls traveling illegally.
I fell in love with Singapore the moment I landed. It was (and still is) a very neat, organized and clear city. The apartment was in the middle of the city and it was home for 8 models at a time with three bedrooms and three bathrooms, which was a luxury after all the apartments I stayed in previously. Models were always rotating in the apartment, but I was lucky enough to have the best roommates during my stay. There was for example one American girl, already married to a US Marine Sergeant, a fellow Hungarian guy, who was in love with himself, a hippie from Seattle who smoked weed subscribed to her by a doctor, two very nice Brazilian model guys (probably the nicest I ever met), another Brazilian girl who I met several times after around the world, and two very young Slovakian girls to whom I was basically a stepmom for a month.
After arriving, I met the agency, who immediately saw that there is something wrong with my weight. Again. So they told me that I have 2 weeks to lose it, otherwise, they'll send me home. There was no way I wanted to leave Singapore so I started my worst diet EVER: a plum and a coffee for breakfast, mashed potatoes and a Big Gulp of diet coke from 7eleven for lunch and some disgusting, low calorie powdered soup for dinner. Sometimes I even allowed myself some pineapple - what a life! Despite my "weight problems" I worked quite good in Singapore. I took part of the fashion week, I shot an AXE and a Motorola campaign, and lots of catalogs for local designers. I even did an underwear catalog despite the fact that I basically have no boobs for jobs like that, but there is, of course, the right amount of tissue that you can fill up the Bra with... I never saw the pictures. Wonder why.
Every time we had a casting or a job, the agency would send it to us via fax. We had a fax machine located in our model apartment. At around 7 PM we were all waiting for the fax to arrive, some of us got nothing, some of us got tons of work or castings. This could be a nerve wracking thing for models because everyone would jealously check what the others got, even if it was only a casting. There is this mental spiral that you can get into while modeling. There will be someone always working, and you might have days where you don't work and then you feel miserable because you think something is wrong with you. The reality is, that models don't see whats going on behind the scenes. How agencies try to sell each girl, sometimes, for example, there are girls who are "cheaper" because they haven't worked enough yet, so the agency pushes their price down, in order to get the money back that they have invested in them. So yes, not only cheese can be discounted in the supermarket. Models can be purchased for a discounted price too! Or sometimes the clients only ask for specific girls with brown hair and blue eyes. But the models don't know about this and then they don't understand why they don't have the same casting as the other one, why can't they go to that "job interview" as well so that they'll get a chance to earn some money too.
Singapore was very good overall. I didn't eat much, but I made some very good friends, went out a bit and made some money that I could live off for the next year. When I left and landed in Vienna, my mom started crying when she saw me. I didn't know what was wrong. Apparently, she has never seen me so skinny before, little did I know that this will also affect my health for quite a long time.
I landed in Budapest. My whole family was waiting for me at the airport which was a tradition by then already. I was so happy to see them even though my parents were still mad at me for leaving University. Slowly everyone at home started telling me how much weight I lost. I found myself stuck in this circle, where my friends and family would always tell me I'm too skinny and my agency would push me to lose even more weight. I wanted to live up to everyone's expectations which was clearly impossible. Because I've spent summer at home, living on grandma's cooking, listening to everybody telling me to eat more, I gained weight again. In the meantime, I changed my agency because the other one fell apart completely. I was ready to move on and start fresh. This guy contacted me and told me all nice things, pulled down all the stars for me. So I decided to go with him and joined his agency. All went well and they placed me in Singapore with the best agency - which again is a very important step in a models career.
In September of 2006, it was time for me to fly to Singapore. After one missed flight on a Sunday, I was boarding a plane the next day off to Asia again.
Every time I traveled to an Asian country, my agency gave me instructions about what I had to tell to the officers at the border to get into the country I traveled to. I had a paper on me with the contact of a "friend" - who in real life was my booker or sometimes the cleaning lady - and I had to tell border security that I'm just here for a short visit. Yes, girls traveled to work to most Asian countries illegally. And sometimes it is indeed suspicious that 14 or 19-year-olds travel by themselves without anyone surveying them, so on rare occasions, they stopped us and asked questions. I was always very nervous when I did these illegal immigrations, but I never had trouble. It was mostly the Russian girls who had difficulties with getting through immigration, because us, Europeans, we got the tourist visa for 2-3 months, the Russians only got like 2 weeks sometimes. Nowadays more and more agencies organize working Visa's for models, but I know for a fact that there are still a lot of girls traveling illegally.
 |
| Motorola Campaign |
I fell in love with Singapore the moment I landed. It was (and still is) a very neat, organized and clear city. The apartment was in the middle of the city and it was home for 8 models at a time with three bedrooms and three bathrooms, which was a luxury after all the apartments I stayed in previously. Models were always rotating in the apartment, but I was lucky enough to have the best roommates during my stay. There was for example one American girl, already married to a US Marine Sergeant, a fellow Hungarian guy, who was in love with himself, a hippie from Seattle who smoked weed subscribed to her by a doctor, two very nice Brazilian model guys (probably the nicest I ever met), another Brazilian girl who I met several times after around the world, and two very young Slovakian girls to whom I was basically a stepmom for a month.
 |
| Gang in Singapore |
Every time we had a casting or a job, the agency would send it to us via fax. We had a fax machine located in our model apartment. At around 7 PM we were all waiting for the fax to arrive, some of us got nothing, some of us got tons of work or castings. This could be a nerve wracking thing for models because everyone would jealously check what the others got, even if it was only a casting. There is this mental spiral that you can get into while modeling. There will be someone always working, and you might have days where you don't work and then you feel miserable because you think something is wrong with you. The reality is, that models don't see whats going on behind the scenes. How agencies try to sell each girl, sometimes, for example, there are girls who are "cheaper" because they haven't worked enough yet, so the agency pushes their price down, in order to get the money back that they have invested in them. So yes, not only cheese can be discounted in the supermarket. Models can be purchased for a discounted price too! Or sometimes the clients only ask for specific girls with brown hair and blue eyes. But the models don't know about this and then they don't understand why they don't have the same casting as the other one, why can't they go to that "job interview" as well so that they'll get a chance to earn some money too.
I wasn't so clever about these things back then. I only saw the whole picture after I stopped modeling, but it would have been a big relief for me if someone told me this before, because for some reason I didn't even think, that these things exist.
Singapore was very good overall. I didn't eat much, but I made some very good friends, went out a bit and made some money that I could live off for the next year. When I left and landed in Vienna, my mom started crying when she saw me. I didn't know what was wrong. Apparently, she has never seen me so skinny before, little did I know that this will also affect my health for quite a long time.
 |
| Bori leaving Singapore |
Megjegyzések
Megjegyzés küldése