This is the Three Mile Bridge.
It connects the world to a small peninsula in Florida called Gulf Breeze. It connects the 5000 people who live here to the rest of the world. It is the gateway to the “Redneck Riviera.” It is the bridge my Filipino parents used to immigrate here. It is the bridge I used to get to orchestra practice, band practice, and theater rehearsals.
This is the last view I saw before I moved to New Orleans.
I planned to be a music teacher, but I changed my mind. In one semester, I went from playing clarinet concertos to writing creative copy. After four years of drinking hurricanes and evacuating hurricanes (yes, it was that one), I built my portfolio at VCU Brandcenter.
The summer of 2008 was a pivotal point in my life. I interned at Mother London. I didn’t sleep much, nor did I eat much, but I wrote a lot. A month later, I found out I won a Cannes Future Lion award. I partied on the French Riviera like a broke intern, which by the way, wasn’t difficult because there was free food and booze everywhere. It was the most lavish week I’ve ever experienced in my life.
And then the recession hit.
I dropped out of grad school, because it made no sense to pay tuition for a career path with zero job security. I couch-surfed across the country from D.C. to Denver and finally San Francisco. I couldn’t find a gig and I almost gave up. I started to regret my decision to quit school. I was so desperate, I even went to a casting call for The Real World. Nevertheless, I persisted and I finally landed an internship at AKQA. I was hired within a month.
AKQA taught me how to be creative with technology. I learned about this new thing called “Instagram” and later, a hot new site called “Pinterest.” I gave my millennial point of view on brands like Gap, Visa, and Audi but then I did something radical…
I went to a traditional agency. I wanted to write scripts and relearn the craft of copywriting. So I started at Leo Burnett Chicago where I spent most of my days in a writer’s room setup writing and reading absurd scripts for Sprint and McDonald’s. Script 1: Open on Kevin Durant having imaginary tea time with his multiple backpacks. Script 2: Open on an astronaut in space. He’s craving McDonald’s fries. I didn’t know if big agencies were for me so I tried a small shop in Minneapolis. It was too “Minnesota Nice” for me. I wanted a shock to the system, I wanted the opposite of Midwest politeness. Be careful what you wish for.
I got a call about a job in Paris. Working with Parisians? Will they be snobby? Difficult? American hating? Oui et non. Ça depend. Now I know what it means to be a global copywriter and the importance of simplicity. Now I know what it’s like to win a Cannes Lions. I discovered the secret to French taste while working with historic French fashion houses - I also discovered that most of it is a myth. French taste is all about conviction, and you don’t have to be French to have a strong belief in a vision.