2016 has been by far the best year since I moved to Austria in 2002. I arrived in Vienna with a morning flight, on the 5th of October 2002. I didn’t plan to stay here for the next decade and even longer, but I also knew that Bucharest was not offering me the future that I wanted. The following years were a constant struggle but I was prepared for that. Being a Business Management student at that time in Bucharest, coming from a middle class family with both parents being intellectuals, I had no problem nor didn’t feel any humiliation to take all the little steps / jobs from working in a tea & coffee shop, cleaning a lady’s apartment, bar-tending in a nightclub and a wine bar, sampling for a promoters company (offering perfume samples to passers-by in department stores), babysitting, modelling for students at the Applied Arts University... I didn’t have any help or support from anyone just, of course, a handful of friends, that were very kind and heartful.
