Jojot’s Causalities

It went on like this: Do you remember the great soap

To me, it would be a great opportunity to meet a great

I gave up, I stopped researching about it, I stopped

I ran to my Facebook

Exactly two weeks later, the 23rd of August, 2011 -I

I met with Laura, she told me Marcos was opening a new

She thought that was great. She told me that with my

Did you see what happened there? Crazy, huh? And to think

Here I need to do a small parenthesis to link it with

As I was telling you: In 2011, first year of Uni -my

In april 2011, I took a one-month acting workshop facilitated

At the same time, I was acting in independent film

Besides, that TVc was produced by the best Production Company

What I am going to tell you now is one of the craziest

Well, back to my story: I did plays and shortfilms at school that year, as well we created with my class-mates and colleagues some amateur shortfilms. We did this to learn, to grow and gain experience. To seek out for our own opportunities, to create them. That’s how I spent all of the year 2010. Growing and learning in both acting schools and building up my resumé…

Since I was 18, I dreamed of moving to Los Angeles -The film capital-, and to live my life acting, in one of the biggest film cities in the world. -I even see myself at the Academy Awards Ceremony, I see the dress I’ll wear-. I set my goal to save up and move up there when I turned 21, as soon as I graduated from my acting career.

By September 2010 I was about to graduate from High School and I was studying acting. But I had to do something else -or so society said, so much so that I started believing it-. Since I was a little girl I was curious about being a flight attendant, I found it quite exciting. I never saw it as my goal but it definitely caught my attention. I only let it to be a remote fantasy because every time I said something about being keen to do it, my Mum would say something negative about it. What she said the most about it in a very demeaning way, was:

+”To be a flight attendant is like to be a waitress but on a plane”. -So what?-

So, all those comments when I was a little girl, limited me. But now that I am a grown-up I think about it, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with serving people, getting to know them, helping them…

Just when I was making a decision about my future -I don’t recall how but I ended up with the information about how awesome it was to flight with Emirates- All that admiration I had for that profession rushed back in. That company happened to be scouting in Paraguay next month, for new cabin crew. It was a big company and a huge salary, so my parents didn’t think it was a bad idea anymore. They bought me a nice suit like the flight attendants use, and drove me to the Sheraton Hotel for the interview.

That lounge room was filled with young people -like me- that dreamt about flying across the globe. That first group talk was awesome, they showed as videos and photos of where we would live in Dubai, they told us about the beach front apartment we’d be given, besides the high salary and all that world-traveling. Wow! It was a dream indeed. They measured my height -I am quite tall, so first test checked-. When it was my time to have a one-on-one interview, that’s when my dream fell apart like a balloon that’s been bursted. They told me the mínimum age requirement was 21 -I was about to turn 18-, that I should come back in three years time. Bummer!

Few days later, my dad -now excited with me being a flight attendant- showed me an ad from a big South American airline that was going to be scouting for new cabin members soon. -This time I made sure my age was within the requirements- I signed up. I arrived to the meeting at the hangar, we were so many people there. Again, group interview, then onto the next round and the next one after that. In each round, there were fewer of us left. I made it to the crucial round, the swimming test. My dad was so sure I was going to be eliminated because I never was a good swimmer. I only swam to survive and not to drown. Neither I was so sure I’d be able to overcome it.

I had hopes though, I trusted in myself and I was 100% willing to overcome my own limits. I went to the swimming club where the test was being held. I looked at the massive olimpic swimming pool with respect. -We had to go across it without stopping for even a second- I got into my marine blue one-piece swimsuit and jumped into the shallow part of the pool, to warm up with some of the girls I met on the previous rounds. 

By the beginning of 2010 whilst I was doing my last High School year, I started studying acting for films with her. As I hadn’t graduated yet, I had to do a pre-University year. It’s like in other careers, when you take classes to get ready to start the career. I loved doing that extra year. I learnt a lot and I also met awesome people like Luz -who ended up becoming my best friend, and still is today-. Besides starting Uni more prepared, my Pre-U acting-in-front-of-the-camera teacher taught me something that imprinted my soul:

“You ought to create your own opportunities. Research, knock on doors, don’t sit on your couch waiting for Hollywood to suddenly call you and hire you for their next movie. They won’t, not if you are not making it happen”.

Wise words! They go hand by hand with what my sister Micaela told me few years back, about being independent; and with what a friend who I care about deeply, would later teach me: “It’s meant to be if you make it happen”.

Yeah I know, it seems obvious, right? But I feel like sometimes we forget that little detail “To create our own opportunities”, and we get frustrated and mad because our dreams are impossible. Of course it won’t be possible if you don’t set it as a goal, as a life plan. Because your dreams won’t go towards you without you beginning your way towards them first. Got it?

In regards of people thinking and having opinions about it, saying that “our dreams are impossible”, let me tell you they are wrong. “Impossible is just an opinión” as Paulo Coelho said -Brazilian author that inspired me a lot- Of course, it’s way easier to deny it than to fight for it. Shield ourselves behind the “I can’t do it” without even giving it a shot. This is what happens to the majority I’d say, it’s easier to say “I have no dreams”. What? That is in fact, impossible. Are you alive? Then for sure you have dreams and passions…We live because we dream. If we don’t dream we are dead alive. The fact that you don’t dare to say them out loud because you think you don’t deserve them or that they will never come true, that’s a different thing. Believe me, that happens way too much. It breaks my heart when I notice it.

It’s also easier to say “It’s an impossible dream”, than to write them down, set it as your goal and go for them. In love too actually, it’s easier to say “it’s complicated”, or to try to deny a feeling…than to give in and dare to love.

We think we are smart people by lying to ourselves with those silly fake affirmations. In reality it’s impossible to lie to ourselves. We can say one of those affirmations a thousand times, but we still won’t buy it. Deep down we know. That ends up frustrating us, making us miserables and unhappy. So, what’s the point then?

Stop trying to convince yourself. I extend you an invitation to go get it. Visualize your dreams and make them come true, but for real this time. Don’t half-ass it. One thousand kilometers are reached by doing one meter at a time. Step by step, but with your sight on your horizon. Start today with the first step, with all the faith in yourself. Set up deadlines to each dream, to each step and project. As I heard in a film that I can’t recall the name of: “Those ‘One day…’ never arrive, we ought to set a date for it”.

Everything is possible! Believe in yourself, get that in your head. You are capable of doing everything you dream of, if you do it so whole-heartly. The only limit exists in our mind, in our fears; and fears aren’t even real. We unconsciously set our own limits. We are our own obstacle. Our mind is stronger and more capable than we think. We can be our own enemy and self-sabotage our path.

Jump over your own barrier, overcome your obstacles and turn them into steps to get you closer to your goal. The same way you convinced yourself it’s impossible, you can change the mindset to: “It’s possible. I am capable”. 

By the end of 2008, watching Gastón Gaudio play the final round at the Roland Garros, we all -my brothers and I- decided we wanted to play tennis, so we started going to play between the five of us. I was just back from the U.S. and had about three months off before the next school year started, so I signed up for a tennis class in the social club. That’s how I met Catalina, my tennis coach. As training and weeks went by, we got closer and closer. We became friends, so she started coming home, meeting my brothers and hanging out with all of us. Until she fell in-love with my brother Máximo and they started a serious relationship.

So, on one of those movie days at home, Catalina played for me the precise movie at the right time of my life. Do you want to know what film changed my life?: The Secret- the law of attraction”. It’s impressive the impact that documentary had on me. It was a before and after in my life, another thing unlocked in me. You didn’t watch it? I think you need to go straight away, google it and watch it. Urgently! If you did watch it, do it anyways…it’s always a good idea to remember such a magical secret. It truly changed the way I see and live my life. How fantastic! Right? I did watch it a few more times during the years after that day, and on each time, it gets me in a different way. I see it differently and learn new things.

You may think this is crazy, but that’s the magic of arts, am I right? A film, a photo, a frame, a theatre play, a book or a song; can get to you so deeply, that you are a different person ever since that piece of art touches your soul… That movie was meant to come to my life at that exact time. -I will eternally be grateful with you, Catalina, for gifting me with it-

Another awesome film that I watched with Catalina during those weeks is “The Pursuit of Happines” starring Will Smith. What a film, oh my God. I am fascinated by it, I love it. It has taught me so much. It inspired me to never give up, no matter what. To go for my dreams even if the whole world is against it. -Will Smith: You are a role model as an actor and as a human being, if I have to choose one person in the whole world to admire, I choose you. Thank you for all your magic-.

I experienced all of this at that time of my teenage years where one decides whether to dream and go for it or to give in to the deadly society routine and rules. At the right time where one finishes forging the personlaity, values and own horizon. Even John Lennon with “Imagine”, Bon Jovi with “It’s my life” and Frank Sinatra with “My way”, among others, reached out to my soul imprinting it with their beautiful lyrics, guiding me towards the most beautiful path: To be a dreamer. What an awesome path that is! I am so happy. In fact, I learnt that happiness is a choice and comes from within. Being happy is not a mood nor it’s an utopia, happiness is not a final destination. It’s the journey, the way we see and live life.

Every day we are more dreamers in this world, though I wish every single human being was a dreamer. Can you imagine it? As John Lennon said:

“But I am not the only one

I hope some day you'll join us

And the world will live as one”

How beautiful that would be, right?

Something that gets to my nerves in big cities are the unhappiness-faces people have on their way to work. Today, something as simple as going about the city smiling is rare. Stands out, they look at you weirded out about it, but…damn it feels so good.

During my time in the U.S., I kept in touch via chat with my friends from Paraguay, specially with Ana, one of my best childhood friends. I noticed how she became very good friends with this new girl in school, Victoria. They seemed unbreakable together, all the time the two of them, in every photo. I felt curious about who she was. Funny thing is that Victoria heard all about me and felt curious too. She added me on Orkut -old social media platform kinda like Facebook, before it existed-. We started chatting a lot and we got along pretty well. And she lived two blocks away from me! That brought us closer and we became inseparable throughout our last two High School years. Now we don’t even live in the same contintent, but I will always be there for her.

I went back to Paraguay in December 2008 and started my High School paperwork, validated them from Spain and started school again with my same classmates. I must confess I felt a bit iffy about going back to the same people that were so racist towards me all those years. But I had friends there too, just a few though but I prefered to continue with them. After all, that school was like my second home for so many years.

************

To my surprise, almost daily I got one or two comments from my class-mates and from the other classes, things like: “Hey, I love your eyes”, “What a lovely smile”, or “I love your curls”. Those flattering comments plus those ten guys back in Florida, could not have been a coincidence. They saw something in me I wasn’t seeing, so I realized there was more to me than what I could see. Little by little, that ugly image I had of myself, started vanishing. I started seeing my true self, and not the one I created in my head. I started accepting myself, loving my body, my lips, my eyes and all of me. I started loving myself, and no one could ever take that away from me…

Funny thing is that my curls are part of my identity today, I love them and it’s the part of me I get the most compliments for. I decided to look at myself with eyes of love. Never again would I let someone else’s comments about me, condition or affect the way I see myself. You shouldn’t allow it either, because nobody can define you, you are the only one that can define yourself and can decide who you are…

Fortunately, my former class-mates grew up and were nicer to me than before, they still were a bit close-minded when it came to foreigners though. It was all good until, out of the blue, they started insulting me as a group again. Sometimes they were kidding, sometimes they really meant it.

Beyond those little teenage jokes out of ignorance, what I am never going to forget is how the teachers let the bullying happen and even laughed at it with them instead of making it stop. There is one particular day that hurt me more than the sum of all those years. And I am going to tell you, so I can finally let it off my chest because it’s something I‘ve never talked about with anyone, I never said out loud how bad that made me feel. But not only that, I’ll tell you, to as well rise at least a bit of consciousness on the subject; and if you ever witness an abussive behaviour of any kind…you could intervene and not be indifferent, because indifference hurts just as much:

It was very nice and subtle what we had. On my last week in the country, it was Thanksgiving day. We both travelled 150 kilometers away from the city with our families, but in opposite directions. My last weekend there and we were apart by 300 kilometres.

After dinner, we were chatting like always…when suddenly he was crazy to see me. He told me he was willing to drive for over three hours during the night, to come see me for a bit. He told me he wanted to see me and needed to. I told him that it would be a beautiful madness if he came. He gave me one condition: For me to confess my love to him. He’d come straight away if I was able to say how I felt about him…

I was a teenage girl, I was terrified of exposing myself that way. -And I still felt terrified for years- I was the most stupid back then because it was pretty obvious what we both felt, and it was in both directions. We were kinda exposed already. I said I wouldn’t say a word about feelings. That what we lived together during those three weeks should suffice as proof of how I felt. -I remember even having on my status something indirectly directed to him- I thought to myself that my status on Messenger said it all. He insisted, he asked me to please say it, he told me he was all-in but that first he needed to make sure, he needed to hear it from me. I kept playing dumb and didn’t give in. Stanley didn’t come to see me… -Gosh, what a baby I was- Thinking back, I cringe at my reaction, I swear. What was I thinking? Dumb indeed.

The following morning, Stanley broke my heart with his text:

+“I was thinking and you are right. This makes no sense, it’s pointless to let all these feelings between us grow. You are leaving in two days, there is nothing else to say”.

Stop! What? Then it hit me, he really meant it and only needed my verbal confirmation. I f*cked up. Damn. So silly of me! Why am I even surprised with his reaction? He was being completely rational, I screwed up. What else could he have said to that?

That’s all he needed from me to come running to my arms, to dive in. But I couldn’t handle it, I wasted such a magical moment. And I wasted it for being a coward, stupid, a baby, for playing it cool, just to not “expose myself and suffer”. Little I knew, I ended up suffering because of that and losing him to it. One of my most stupid acts in my life. I was only left with regrets when there was nothing else to do, wondering again and again: “What if I had dared?”, If I had let myself go with it, If I had let that love in, if I had let the bloody fear behind. What did I have lo lose by confessing my feelings anyway? That’s what he needed to give himself to me. On the contrary, choosing fear over love made me lose…

********** 

It’s been over ten years from that story. Even now that I don’t think about him anymore, it’s inevitable to think of him as something pending every time I remember it. Regret my cowardice, keep wondering “What if…?”. In one way or another, I kinda am still waiting to see him again. To look at those blue eyes and give him a big hug. Even though it’s beyond late, I’d tell him how I felt back then, how it hurt me not being able to have said it when he needed it.

*********

So I went to live to Palm Beach, Florida, for three months. Actually the plan was to stay for six months, but causally there was a mix-up when I entered the country, therefore I only got granted three months. Thanks to not being able to stay longer, I was able to finish up the paperwork in time to go back to class at the same school with the same class-mates and to not lose one year of study.

To me, going back so early was awful at the time. But oh well, it’s better to seize those months and be thankful for them, that to whine and complain because I got less time than what I had planned. Right? Once again, when I understood what I came earlier for, I said to myself: “Thanks, God” -for having made me come home earlier, or I would have lost one school year-.

Those three months were like a beautiful dream I didn’t want to wake up from. When I was told we were leaving Spain, I never imagined I would be living such an amazing experience in the U.S., two months later. -Which wouldn’t have happened had we stayed in Spain-. We went back at the right time. We never know what’s coming tomorrow or next month, and that’s awesome. Makes living way more thrilling hey.

To be in The United States was like being in a Hollywood movie. Life and High School were exactly like in the movies. I went to High School to improve english. It was such a spectacular trip that wasn’t in my plans, but everything turned out perfectly. As they say, the best experiences are unexpected, non-planned at all. I was very happy there and had a great time. I grew and learnt a lot.

************

At the time I was taking the pill, a very strong one. I had to take it for six months due to my anemia. Iregular period worsens the whole anemia situation, and this would set it straight. Yes it helped on that, but it destroyed me. I hated every minute of it. It dried my hair up so badly that it didn’t grow for two whole years. My breasts grew quite a lot and I gained ten kilos in few months. And I was a teenager, all I did back then was to eat lettuce and exercise a lot. I never again took the pill, I know it helps some women, but definitely not for me.

Honestly, that was the ugliest I’ve ever been. I’ve never felt so disgusted with myself, so horrible. Funny thing though, during those three months, I had more guys throwing themselves at me than I have had in my entire life. I am not exaggerating when I say that I had at least ten guys from different countries trying to get me -I was shocked, so I counted them- and it was kinda at the same time during my months there. I remember I didn’t understand why, and kept thinking: “What are they seeing in me?” Those guys helped me rise my self-steem up. Somehow, as ugly as I saw myself then…for the first time in my life, I have felt sexy, desired.

To add a little something to that amazing movie-like trip, I fell in love. -Well, not exactly, but it was what a 15 years-old girl can think of as love, I just had a crush really- A love story had to happen to make a trip completed, hadn’t it? The cherry on top of the cake -as we say in Argentina-. But as always -or as most of the time- love arrives late, it arrived at the end of my stay. I stayed there for twelve weeks, but I only met him for my last three weeks…

It was very random: I met a friend of said uncle, and each day I met more members of her big family. I ended up meeting everyone but Stanley, whom everyone kept talking about. I met his parents, his step-mum, siblings and step-brothers, uncles and grand-parents. Everyone but him. I kept hearing his name so much that I started to be curious about him.

One day we were all together, -my second family and his family- watching a soccer game in preparation for the World Cup South Africa 2010. Suddenly a set of blue eyes pierced mine. Those eyes were standing behind me. I had no idea who they belonged to, I had never seen him before...

I did my research on where to study next, so I started an intensive acting-for-films course. Two weeks only, five hours a day. It was hectic, full on. I must confess that when I started I sucked at it, I sucked badly. Of course, I had never done it before, besides I was super shy. How could I not have sucked? But from that first day onwards…I confirmed that my true passion was to act.

Actually, people that met me after I started studying acting, don’t even believe me when I say “I used to be shy”. But I was. Acting transformed me, it gave me life. I started to loosen up a bit by the last few days of the course. And every day I liked it more and more. I was happy at each class, and I felt more alive than ever. I had found something that made my soul beam with passion, and that’s freaking beautiful.

A week after that class started, my parents decided that the best -for the family business- was to go back to South America. Our cycle in Spain was finished. Just like that…One June afternoon, as I laid sick in bed -with the chicken pox- we’ve been told about our new destiny:

+”In ten days we move back to Paraguay”.

In that moment, it was the worst news ever to me. Like someone just pulled the rug below me. My life in Spain was just so perfect. I was happy, I was doing good in High-School, I was finally studying what I loved and had lots of great friends. I loved Spain -And I will always do- What else could a teenager ask for? But all that amazing life would vanish in ten days! Not even with enough notice to process it, on top of that, me being sick and not able to spend every one of those ten days out and about, seizing it and saying good-bye. A bit over a week and my life will do another 180º turn. Could you imagine how -15-years-old-me felt? I felt my world crumble, I felt my world being taken away…

Well, that’s part of being a Zamora hey! Nothing I could do about it but accept it with good vibes hoping it’s for the best. We have two options when we are faced with a situation: Either we sink in a hole, or we look for the best way to see it, adjusting and finding the silver lining to it. So I think “Luckily, we had to go back”. Why luckily? I don’t think luck is the word, I don’t believe in luck. I mean, thanks to this amazing life, we had to go back. Why? Because  everything we lived after that -I will tell you as we go- we wouldn’t have lived it had we stayed. And every year was better than the previous one. Now, knowing all that, I can look back and say: “Thank God we left Spain”.

I was able to finish up the course just in time. -All my videos with the chicken pox face though- I went back with a clear goal, I dared to try acting and I absolutely loved it. I would never give that up, I was 100 per cent sure that’s what I wanted for my life.

We arrived in Paraguay by the beginning of July 2008. I was organizing my quinceañera party for November with my Mum -though it’d technically be my sweet 16- I have booked the venue, made the guests list, we were working on decoration and the dress.

Few weeks later, something wonderful and unexpected shook my plans up again. Pedro arrived, my dad’s friend, that six years ago had hosted my brothers in the US. And straight up causally, without thinking about it, I joked:

-“Uncle, When is it gonna be my turn to go to the States with you?”

I remember that day vividly. We were in the car. My dad and him, front seats; my mum and I, back seats. Pedro turned to me and said:

+”Let’s go Paolita”.

Oh boy, my heart just skipped a beat. I wasn’t sure if that was a really bad-taste joke or a damn beautiful dream.

I said:

-“Really, uncle? That is my dream”.

He smiled at me and said:

+”Of course honey, if your dad says yes, we get your visa and we depart in two weeks”.

I was raised with my four brothers, that implies constant insults to bug and offend each other. But on some specific days all of them took it against me and in a sort of a chorus, called out to me: “Fat”, “black”, “Ugly”. Throughout my childhood and adolescence my brothers called me that so many times, that they distorted my reflection on the mirror, when I looked at myself on the mirror, that’s what I saw: An ugly, fat and black kid. Besides, at school people called me “lion” because of my big hair volumen, and eight out of ten people made a comment regarding the size of my breasts.

My boobs and my curly hair became my biggest complex. I wanted to reduce them with surgery but my dad didn’t allow me to. My hair I could handle though…on an insecurity outburst, I went to the hairdresser and got rid of that lion’s mane. I left it very very short. -Needless to say I regretted it within a week-.

I’ve had a very distorted image of myself by listening to other people. So distorted that if the guy I liked came onto me, I rejected him thinking he was making fun of me or was betting with his friends. I was 14 years old, the entire high school was french-kissing everyone or even having sex; whilst I was pushing away every guy that approached me. My best friend at the time constantly said to me to get it over with and kiss guys already. She even explained how to move my tongue when french-kissing. But I couldn’t even make it to the flirting part…

***************

My 15th birthday party was happening soon. In few countries in America it’s a tradition to throw a massive party or to have a big trip on your birthday number 15. I was organizing my dream party in Spain when my brother Enzo announced he was getting married few months later. My parents and I decided to wait and celebrate it when we travelled to Paraguay for the wedding because in Spain it wasn’t a tradition and I had more friends and family in South America. When the time to travel was arriving, Enzo and his fiancée broke up, no wedding. That idea of travelling to Paraguay floated in my parents’ heads…

After that talk with Mica something changed in me. There is a before and after. I approached my dad and told him how I felt: That I really wanted to be an actress and I felt less important for not playing soccer. I think he finally understood a bit more about my dream and that it wasn’t just a typical kid’s dream. He said:

+“Honey, I don’t like that career for you, but if you feel so sure about it it’s for a reason. If you want to act, do it”.

So I asked him why he wouldn’t lift a finger to help me make it happen. He replied:

+‘’If you really want it I support you, but I cannot help you. I work in FIFA, soccer is my thing. I know exactly what and how to do it. But I have no clue about the film industry, have a look and tell me where you want to study and I’ll drive you there and pay for the monthly fee, deal?”

He hugged my tight and I smiled. I went online as fast as I could to research my options. I found a workshop being held at the adjoining city, where they travelled to every day for my brothers’ soccer practice. Lucca was injured so he wasn’t going to practice, I took the chance of the spare seat and went with them.

We arrived to the workshop, my parents joined me in it because they liked the idea. I went to the classes every day during my brother’s injury. When he recovered, he needed to go back to practice, in the car could only travel five people so there wasn’t room for me. I had to give my acting classes up for my brother to go practice. 

That broke my heart. I felt that my brothers’ dreams were more important, they were the priority in my house. It was sad, unfair and discouraging. I got to my sister’s house and told her about how I had to quit for them to do their thing, I felt with no support from my parents again.