What do you want to be when you grow up?
“Fill up the form and return it tomorrow” those were the words my class teacher uttered in primary school. It’s one of those forms which you fill out stating what you want to be when you’re older. And if I remember correctly my choices were
1. doctor
2. teacher
3. lawyer
go ahead… laugh, cause I am.
I wanted to be a doctor only because there was this documentary show on our local tv station that featured a medical segment which would have a patient in the OR. They’d cut open the unfortunate patient and poke a lil’, cut a lil, draw some of the blood that was oozing out and stitch them back up. And wa-lah…. The patient would be cured. So I thought that looked easy to do. Little did I know that it’d take 6 to 7 years of your life just to be able to slice someone up. So that dream when out the drain accompanied by the fact that I didn’t actually enjoyed science or physics that much.
While waiting for 3 months to go by for the Business Admin course results which I took in college, my sister suggested that I work just to keep myself busy plus I could earn my own pocket money to buy all the clothing that I liked. And so I agreed. She came across a job opening in the newspaper looking for a “Casting Assistant” at a production house.
Got dressed in my favorite blue dress…… got into a taxi and off I went for the interview. It turned out that the guy who came before me got the job but they’d still like for me to work with them as their receptionist. Hey…. I saw it as still money coming in regardless and my results wasn’t going to be out in a couple of months time anyways. The pay wasn’t that much, but to start earning your own cash was already a BIG thing for me.
After 2 months working… it was clear to me as to what I wanna do in my life to come. So, I build up my guts to face my father telling him that I don’t wanna continue studying the course I was taking and that I think I’ve found what I’m interested in doing as a career. To my surprise he was okay & supportive with my decision.
My journey working started from a receptionist to a casting assistant to a casting master. Soon after I decided to go freelance. Told myself that it would be good to experience working with other film directors and experience different working environments.
And so my life as a “Freelancer” started. Continued being in charged of the casting department, worked in the wardrobe department and was used as a talent a few times.
I managed to gain the confidence of one of the producers I was working with to hire me as a Production Assistant. It was a bigger scope of job that I truly enjoyed. But soon after I got bored with the routine of the job and made sure that everybody knew that I was ready to climb up the Production ladder to become a Line Producer. As a Line Producer you’d deal with negotiating with suppliers and making sure that you don’t blow your Producer’s budget. Now we’re talking…. That’s a challenge.
Worked with several production houses as a Line Producer till I was asked to produce a RM1.3 million tv commercial, which freaked me out!!! I was not prepared to handle my first producing job that had a budget enough to buy your own house. But seeing that the production house and the director had faith & believed in me… I could not disappoint them even though I was shit scared.
Since then I’ve produced a number of tv commercials and had several job offers to work in-house, to work solely with one of the recognized film directors in KL. But my heart didn’t wanna let go of the idea of being a freelancer. But after much persistence I joined a production house, which didn’t last very long. Soon after I was back being a freelancer.
Opportunity shows up in strange places. One day while filling up petrol, I was offered a job as a Producer in a post production house. My time studying in college didn’t go to waste as I had to handle running the office too. This was somewhat new to me in making sure the office is running smoothly, staffs are happy working, purchase orders are received, payments are made by clients, on going jobs are in order. Boy, did I learn a whole lot here for sure but I wasn’t happy working there. So, I decided to leave the company.
After a short while I landed myself handling the post production & music for a local movie. This was one of those jobs which you'd be in for the next couple of months straight. A wonderful experience once again but I could feel that something was missing in my life. Once my contract working on the movie was done, I made a promise to myself that I’d take this time to explore the areas that I’ve only spoken about but never really got my hands on it. I started writing again….. started painting and my love for photography blossomed.
Here’s to a beginning of a new path in which I would soon have to make a turn again….
