I quit my job in the bank when I was 19. I took a chance. I went to Milan to study opera and singing. My father really supported me economically.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Upon graduation, believe it or not, I had no job. I had no interviews. I had no prospects. I had no worries. What I did have, I had passion. I had enormous passion. I had passion for financial markets. I had fallen in love with financial markets.
The main reason I wanted to be successful was to get out of the ghetto. My parents helped direct my path.
I led a comfortable life, went to good schools and was privileged in many ways, but my father worked hard. We never considered ourselves rich.
When I was younger I was completely without money - when I was studying in Budapest, when I was a refugee.
When I was 19, I made my first good week's pay as a club musician. It was enough money for me to quit my job at the factory and still pay the rent and buy some food. I freaked.
I had given myself a sort of early retirement when I left the scene in 1985. All of the people in my family worked until they dropped, including my father. I decided to take a little time to enjoy life. I traveled, built my dream house, rescued a few dogs. My return to music, and acting, was deliberate, part of my musical arc.
My father, who was jailed for stealing on more than one occasion, just abandoned his fatherly responsibilities and disappeared. I grew up working from the time I was nine years of age. Money was a big issue everywhere I lived.
Due to a big bust in Cuba, my father's business suffered badly, so I was free to choose my own career. I became a professional dancer, and I went on the road and started making real money.
At 19, I was in the streets making money. I was surviving.
I worked in the family business, which was my father's shoe making company that he had inherited from his father, and that led me to become interested in what could be achieved by a great Italian brand. That became my ambition as a young man.