Episode Transcript
Hello, my name is Aziz and I'm the son of a divorced mother.
She is really my superhero.
That's why it's important for me to support women to share their uniqueness, their personalities,
perspectives, and emotions about this world.
In these difficult times in human history, we need to bring the people of the world together.
And when we hear the voices of women, when we listen to real lives of women from other
countries, we connect our cultures without differences or stereotypes.
And we get inspired by their stories to live a better life.
That's what this podcast is all about.
My guest today is Laura Ruchenko.
La Ruche is a singer, songwriter, performer, comedian, actress, and the number one Gaga impersonator.
She is also the very first Argentinian woman in this podcast, so it's a very special episode.
La Ruche was a flight attendant for almost 10 years.
She resigned and became a full-time singer.
She is now a published singer.
She writes and produces her own songs.
And she also does a stand-up comedy
and opened her own comedy night show in Dubai.
Larouche has performed in the best venues in Dubai
and made the name for herself.
Larouche, how are you today?
Hi, how are you Aziz?
Thank you so much for having me.
I feel great.
Thank you so much.
I feel honored, lucky, happy to spend this time with you and very curious about you as a person.
So I'll begin with this nice first question. Sure. If your friends and the people who know
you best could describe your personality, what would they say about you? Oh man,
I think the first thing they will say is crazy. But I would say creative.
Yeah, and I am quite honest, so I'm not afraid to, you know, to say the things that are on my mind,
especially with people that I love, because I feel like if you love someone,
you should, you know, always be honest with them and tell them what you think
so they can be the best person they can, right?
Thank you. And you mentioned that you are crazy, which to me is associated with being free,
with being open, with being unstifled by the thoughts of others and society.
What makes you be able to show your craziness without fear and judgment?
And what would be an advice or inspiration
for some women who might have their crazy side, but they keep it inside
because they worry, oh, no, people will judge me too much.
Yeah, that's a good question.
Actually, since I was younger, I was never afraid to show who I am
to be myself. However, I understand that when you're younger and you're an adolescent and
you know, I think the older you get, the more you get to show yourself and not to
care about what people say. But for older, for younger girls, I would say that's going
to come to them. Just know your value and know who you are and know what you do.
and people will talk either way.
People will talk if you do something good
and if you do something not good.
If you're pretty, if you're not pretty,
if you're fat, if you're thin,
they will talk either way.
I always say, you know, haters will hate
and there's nothing you can do about that.
And also I am not interested on being liked by everyone.
You know, that's not my goal at any point.
My goal is to reach people, to inspire people,
and those people that will follow me,
then those are the ones that matter.
The ones that don't follow, the ones that don't care,
or that doesn't mean it doesn't matter.
It's just not for, you know, for my career, I guess.
It doesn't add up anything, so yeah.
I love this.
And I have a deeper question about it
because I know that some people will hear that,
but they will not really get it fully.
So what is it about the few people or the lesser people
that follow you that makes them resonate with you?
Because many people think,
oh no, if 50% of people or 80% or whatever
don't like me, it means people hate me.
But that one, when you said impact,
resonating with people, et cetera,
is it that those people are your kind of people? Are they similar to you? Are people different
in different ways? So the right people resonate? Is it energetic? I just want to understand both
when most people don't agree with you or don't follow you. Why is that a good thing?
And what is different about the people who follow you? I think that people that follow me
are interested on different things, like on a different sound, different kind of artists,
you know, because I feel like nowadays we are hearing the same voices everywhere, you
know, we are seeing the same things, everybody dresses the same. I feel like there is not
much personality going on. And some people are followers, some people just follow what's
safe. I always say that I am not a safe artist in the sense of that if you come,
If you ever had the chance to come to my show, you will understand what I mean.
I follow my instincts, my passions, I make all my costuming and I dress in a way that
I express myself the way I do that.
I don't do it to look pretty or to sound pretty.
So to answer your question, when you say what's wrong about people that don't follow,
there's nothing wrong about that.
I actually love the fact that not everybody loves me, because you need to have your people.
If everybody loves you and everybody follows you, then you might be doing something wrong.
I always compare myself with a different kind of ice cream.
Maybe everybody loves vanilla ice cream, but I don't want to be vanilla.
That's not my flavor.
It's too flat for me and you know, it's too basic.
I don't like that.
So I'd rather be something more spicy,
something more edgy.
And you know, so people will,
whomever likes those kinds of things
and whoever wants to try something new
and listen to a new kind of sound,
have a different kind of energy,
then those are the people that are gonna follow me.
And the other ones that like vanilla ice cream,
they will stay with other vanilla ice cream.
I really, really love that.
I understand it very well.
So to you too, you feel more alive when you are unique and your own unique version of
how you look, how you sound, that you're not similar to others, which makes you you
uniquely.
Some people too might wonder and say, I love that.
I love how crazy you are that you're very edgy and unique, but is Dubai the
place to be that kind of person? Maybe they don't know. What is your opinion
about that? Because they'll think, well, if you're so edgy, maybe you should be in
New York City or California or somewhere like that. Is Dubai the right
place for people who are extremely unique? Well, I actually think so.
Dubai is expanding. You know, Dubai is changing. When I came to Dubai 12
years ago, as you mentioned before, I used to be a flight attendant and I
like everything was a bit safer. Everything was safe in the way that, you know, self-expression
was not very well seen. I'll have to say maybe as a performer, you know, you have to cover up more
or, you know, when I do my stand-up comedy, I am not a clean stand-up comedy person. I swear a
lot and so, but now that is okay. I feel like before you couldn't do that, but now it's fine.
So, I do agree with you that I should be doing this in New York, that's for sure, and that's
my goal.
Ultimately, I want to go to New York and the States.
But I do think that there is something special in Dubai and the fact that people are so
used to having safe artists or, you know, maybe seeing the same kind of shows or listening
to the same kind of music or voices.
I feel like my show gives a little bit of something else, you know?
It gives something that a lot of people have told me I've never seen or I've never heard
someone singing like that or seeing someone doing what you do in your shows.
So I appreciate that because I feel like Dubai is growing in a good way.
We're evolving.
We're getting there.
So yes.
Thank you.
That's absolutely wonderful to know and I know and see that so many creative people are moving to Dubai
and to ask you even further you mentioned that you love creativity and
Now you said that you create your own unique sounds things that people are not exposed to before
Even your own costumes and it's about your unique expression. Well
Creativity normally requires inspiration
what inspires you to find things that people haven't seen or heard before
because that sounds like it could be very difficult but you do it
consistently. Do you have a ritual for that? Are there specific things? Are
you born this way? I know it sounds very... I don't know how to put it in
words but I think I was born this way. I just don't want to sound like you
you know, cliche, but I do find inspiration on artists.
That's for sure.
I find inspiration, obviously,
my favorite singer is Amy Winehouse,
but I do find inspiration in a lot of other singers.
I love, for example, you know, Evanescence,
and I love Amy from Evanescence.
And I get, I take some of like that goth
from Evanescence and the glam from Lady Gaga.
I love Lady Gaga's aesthetics. I think she's fantastic. She's an amazing persona. Like,
you know, on the stage, she has this character that's insane. And I love her outfits and
she's always well put together. Also, you might laugh at this. A lot of people know about this.
I take most of my inspiration when it comes to makeup and outfits from drag queens. I
I love drag queens and I always say that I am a female drag queen.
I am a female that does drag that has nothing to do with my sexuality.
It's just an art form that I adore.
I love the fact that you can transform
yourself into a different character, you know, and you can look like anything
you want if you have the skills to do it with the makeup and with the hair
and, you know, your outfits and stuff, you can be whoever you want to be.
and it's just so much fun.
And that surprise, you know, for people,
that's the thing, the fact that you can surprise people
in your shows by the way you look.
And, you know, when I changed my outfits,
I changed from head to toe, so I'm a different person.
And I love the look in their faces and the confusion,
but amazed, they're amazed and confused at the same time.
And I love that, I live for that.
So, yeah, I would say those artists and mostly drag queens.
I love that and I never heard that before that you're the female drag queen.
So I love the uniqueness of all your inspiration.
And I agree with you, it's a great art form.
And to you as well.
You mentioned that you live for the surprise and the reactions of people.
On stage, whether doing comedy, singing, interacting with an audience, what gives
you the most energy? Are you the one who's like, given the energy to the
audience? Is the reaction of the audience, what gives you the energy? Is
it an exchange? Because some people are saying, I express myself, the right
people will love it. If the audience hates it, doesn't matter. I'm having
fun. Other people will say, if I have the wrong audience, I cannot
really have fun because the energy is not there. What is it for you?
Because you express both sides. Sometimes you're like, I'm expressing
myself, the haters gonna hate, lovers gonna love. And other times
You're like, oh my God, I love the reactions of people,
how they look at me.
They say I never heard things like that before.
So what is, to understand your experience
of being on stage, how does it work?
Well, first of all, as an artist,
you need to put yourself out there.
If you don't put the right kind of energy,
people will not be receptive of that.
I take, when I go to the stage,
for me, it's the same as any kind of relationship,
as you know, with a partner or with a friend,
It's a give and take right? So I give them and I take so you have to read your audience as well
because I don't do all the time the same is depend depending on the audience even the songs
that I do because I can understand what they want to hear and I can understand what they
want to see and how you they want me to um you know interact with them so I would say
to give and take, but as a performer you need to put yourself out there and put the energy.
And even if I don't get that energy back, you know, the show must go on and you need
to keep yourself doing it.
And also I always say that if people don't like my sound, they're going to like my
outfit and they don't like my outfit, they're going to like my sound.
Maybe they like both.
So I try to tackle my audience from everywhere, like from my looks to, you know, my hair,
my makeup, my outfit, all those things put together.
The selection of music, because on my shows I try to do
some oldies and some new songs, some funk, but at the same time some pop.
So I mix and match a few of the sounds so I can get the attention.
You know, we're all different. We don't like the same music, right?
Some people are kind of like, oh, I like this song that she did, but I
don't like that one, but that's okay because I did both.
You know, so I feel like I always try to tackle them somewhere.
So there is also an experience.
They're not going to remember what you were or what you sang,
but they're going to remember how you make them feel and how they felt in their,
you know, watching you and stuff.
So I want them to remember me somehow and have a memorable experience.
So, yeah, that's actually very, very wise and very, very true.
and you spent 10 years being a flight attendant,
if I understood correctly,
and then later on, did you become an artist after that?
Did you do it meanwhile?
I'm just, I want you to share your journey
of becoming someone within the Dubai art scene,
as well as your advice to some women
who have their crazy side,
they want to do the art, become an artist,
but at least at first or whatever,
They see too many doors are closed to them. So how does that journey work so that they don't give up hope?
Well, so yes, as you said I came to Dubai when I was 21
I was hired by one of the biggest airlines in Dubai
I'm sure everybody knows but I'm not gonna say the name. So I flew for almost 10 years
I've always been an artist. I actually well now we are doing a kind of like a video
people will not see this but this what you see behind me I painted it. So I've always been an
artist in the sense of like I love all kind of art I used to paint I was always a singer I was
actually doing this back home between like singing and music like theater and so when I came here
and I started working as a flight attendant I feel like my creativity sort of I wouldn't say
faded away, but I will say I was tamed for a few years,
even though I was still doing my music,
and I loved all the experience I had,
I wouldn't change a thing,
and also that job actually helped me to pay for my music.
So I did my album, I wrote all my songs,
and I did my first album called Feathers,
which is on Spotify, iTunes, and all the music platforms.
That was my first album,
and I wrote it and recorded it while I was flying
because I knew that I wanted to leave that job
so I could do what I actually love.
You know, when you start thinking,
look, I'm not getting any younger,
I actually have a talent.
A lot of people have been telling me before
that I should follow my dreams,
I should follow my talent and share it with the world.
And my husband was the one
that actually pushed me to do it.
So after I finished my album,
it's sort of like a CV for a singer
to have your own album and your own sound.
I also have my music video on Vivo.
And so yeah, I resigned finally
and I started going to some auditions
and interviews and stuff,
and from working one place
and then I worked in the other
and then people talk and then you replace someone here,
but then they liked you so you go back
and that's how it happens.
So I'm very happy.
And to the girls that want to follow their dreams,
I would say, if you have a dream,
always I would say follow it and do it.
However, also like if you feel like you have a talent,
you need to know what's your talent
and you need to know how to explode it
and how to, if you wanna work from that talent,
how to do that because you don't want to you know start a new life or leave what you're doing and then
Like you realize that you actually couldn't do it somehow and then you get
Yeah, I feel like you get heartbroken for not be able to follow your dreams
I think that practice makes makes the master
So if you want to do something if you have a talent
Practice practice practice do it do it do it show it to your friends share here share it there
And then once you're sure, just go ahead and do it.
You know, I agree 100 percent.
And it makes me wonder because of the way you speak.
Are you a person who is spiritual?
Do you believe in destiny that you had to go for this because it's your
destiny or do you believe you create everything in your life?
If you don't manifest your destiny, it won't happen.
Like what how do you view the world?
Do you see yourself as being protected
by a higher power or that it's all up to you, what is your approach?
I am a spiritual person.
I don't have I don't follow any religion.
I do think that my energies and everybody like we all we are all energy.
Right. So you need to put the right energy out there.
And that's going to come back to you.
I just for me is the more the best I do for people and the better,
I treat people, then that's going to come back to me.
I don't think anybody is going to come to me and be like, oh, you've been a bad girl,
then you're going to go somewhere else.
I don't think that for me, it's like, do good and good is going to come back to
you.
That's it.
But I do have a lot of crystals, actually.
I have a little table with a lot of crystals.
I put some incense when I wake up in the morning,
I have also a nice salt lamp
that I feel like it gives me energy.
I put on Palo Santo, I put on sage, I clean the house.
So yeah, I also love to read the tarot, the tarot cards.
So yeah, I'm a very energetic person
and I think this is the reason
why sometimes it happened to me
that I just, let's say I'm working with someone
and I just don't get along,
I feel like I can feel people's energy
and that energy really affects me.
So sometimes I'm like, look, this is a very nice person.
He or she is really good or whatever.
I can't work with this person
because I feel like the energy I'm getting back
is not matching mine.
And you know, some people like,
they suck the energy out of you.
So yeah, so I'm very aware of that.
when I meet new people, when my surroundings,
I try to surround myself always with people
that have the same vision, the same energy,
the same good vibes,
people that actually love what I do,
people that I support them, they support me.
It's a flow, it has to be a flow of energy.
The moment that energy gets stuck somewhere
and you send good energies and it doesn't come back
to you, I feel like that's the moment
that I can be with that certain person
or something like that.
Really, I love that.
And it's always part of your attitude
of the right people will resonate with you
and the wrong people.
Nothing goes wrong with them.
They're just not your people.
And to ask you two, you're originally from Argentina.
Did you feel that you fit in within the culture there
or even anywhere in the world?
You felt like an outsider.
And so you embraced it
and wanted to show your uniqueness even more.
How was your life as a crazy creator growing up?
Are you crazy creative in an Argentinian way
or in your own super unique way
that even in Argentina was not fitting
within the common culture?
You know, I think Argentinians are very creative.
Like we love music and arts.
We were born doing things.
Like I was always doing theater, dancing, painting,
and I studied fashion design.
I went to fashion school when I was back home.
But yes, I do think that sometimes,
even when I was going to fashion school,
I was a bit of an outsider
because of the way I used to dress.
I remember I loved vintage clothing
and I remember going to uni
with a very long vintage gloves, beige gloves.
this, oh my god, I remember this, a hat and a very old bag, you know, with my things for
uni. And I would just walk like that in the streets, like I belonged to another kind of era.
And everybody would look at me like, who's this girl? Like, where did she come from?
I feel like Argentines are also very judgmental. So yeah, they used to look at me weird.
Also, because the fact that I never ever listen to the music that we listen at home, it's
fine.
The music is fine.
I never found it myself.
I never found that I connected with that music.
I always loved jazz and blues.
On my birthdays, I would put music of my taste.
My friends were like, oh my God, where are you going to put this?
It's such a bummer.
And then they wanted to put the music, you know, cumbia,
which is the original music from Argentina.
And I was like, if you guys gonna play that,
you're gonna have to leave.
This is my birthday, I'm not listening to that.
But then when I came to Dubai,
it was hard because as I said before,
I feel like Dubai is growing now
and is being more accepted and receptive of things
like, you know, people coming from other parts
of the world, people wearing shorts,
people showing more skin, you know.
But when I came here, for me it was a bit of a struggle
because in Argentina, we are very free
in the way of dressing.
And here it was a bit like also not well seen.
Like if you go to a mall with the shorts,
they will kick you out.
So, and that happened to me actually.
Yes, and yeah, that was just a little bit,
I would say hard at the beginning.
Same with the food, it's not much related, but the food here was very spicy when I arrived
and you know, we don't eat spicy at all.
So those were things that took me to get used to the place.
Now I feel like since the market is changing and you know, we are mostly expats in Dubai,
it's fine.
I feel like every time I get celebrated now because I am myself.
every time I go out people actually compliment my outfits and when I do my shows they all take
pictures with me because they love it so I feel like now I'm getting celebrated for my weirdness
and that's great. I agree that's absolutely great and to finish this because you mentioned
for example how you were dressing absolutely uniquely in Argentina and people were judgmental
and in Dubai in the beginning you needed like to contain yourself a little bit, but there are many
women and even girls who are yes now you can go in shorts or whatever anywhere you want in Dubai
and they don't stop you or kick you out of the mall. But what I mean is there are some teenagers
especially like girls who grew up in the pandemic with a social isolation and an age
where they worry about social media
and whether people will like them or not.
So the judgment of other people
is very influential on them.
What's your advice for them
so that they can be themselves,
express themselves fully,
put themselves out there
and not worry or how to deal with
if they feel bad because other people judge them.
Look, as I said before, even when I was younger,
I've never cared about people what people say and I actually thought at first thought that
That was normal. You know, I thought like the way I took other people's
kind of like view on me or
Whatever they think of me. It's not on my business. I
Thought that was normal that everybody could think that way and then I realized that it's not like that and a lot of I
Have actually mostly women that comes to my show
they find it very inspiring because it's like it gives them
you know, like strength and this kind of like passion for life
and be like, yes, I want to go home and I want to put on my makeup
and I want to look like that. I want to be great.
And I love that. I love to be able to inspire women.
So I would say to young girls, don't believe everything you see on social media.
don't because people will share the, you know, the best parts of who they are,
the best part of their day.
And then the problem is that you're home and you're like, oh, my God, look at her.
She looks great all the time.
Oh, my God, she travels.
Oh, my God, she sounds great or this or that.
But nobody shows you the downsides of their work.
Nobody shows you, you know, that they woke up not feeling great.
sometimes I wake up myself and I'm like I just don't want to do the show or I just don't feel like
doing it but I push myself and I push myself because of the people so I will say in this era
of social media and every I feel like everybody is so concentrated on the phone and and like
what everybody will think and every like is um you know is somebody actually validating you
That's all I don't want to say what it is because I don't want to swear.
But no, you can this podcast.
I put it on purpose explicit so that some people will say,
we'll say like, fuck Putin or whatever it is.
So I want everybody to say what they want because I was I was being very
careful not to to use swear words.
Well, let me tell you that for me is bullshit.
I don't think that you should use
that kind of validation from social media.
It's like, well, if somebody has 20,000 followers,
then she's better than the one that has 10.
No, maybe the one that has 10 is, I don't know,
she's doing more work or she's even a better person.
She's just not showing what she does all the time
or she's more loving.
Maybe that person that's charitying, you don't know.
There's so many things that we do behind cameras
and you know not showing to social media that yeah like they don't get seen by people but at the same
time everything is valid you know. So yeah I've seen a lot of young girls today and I am actually
very happy I was I grew in an era where social media was not existent because I feel like at
that had a normal childhood you know now it's like
childs and all the kids have you know instagram and they all have phones
and i feel like it's i feel sorry for them you know
to grow in this in this era so yeah it's uh it's a bit sad i would say but
just be yourself be yourself because people
feel uh inspired and people feel the ones that are haters they feel
threatened by you. They feel threatened by people that are inspiring, that are doing,
you know, being who they are unapologetically, like they don't care what other people say.
And at the end of the day, you only have one life. You only have one chance to prove
yourself, nobody else but you. It's just you, yourself, and whomever you want to
be in life. So it's just to prove yourself that you can do it. And the only way to
that is just keep going forward there is no other way thank you so much it was my
privilege and my honor to have you here it's absolutely great to hear your
thoughts share your voice and your perspective I wish you all the success
I wish you in the future to make it a to that maybe Broadway show or whatever
in New York, and thank you again for participating.
Thank you so much for having me, Aziz.
Really, this means a lot to me,
and really, every time I get contacted by people
to do podcasts, especially with this kind of like
premise of rare girls, like,
because it's such a beautiful message,
and it just helps all of us to empower ourselves.
You don't have to be a great speaker.
You don't have to be like the prettiest girl in the room.
But as long as you're yourself and you share yourself with the world,
I think that's what was worth it.
And also, if you only reach one person,
you know, I don't mean to reach to everybody.
I don't think I want to do any mainstream
kind of like music.
But if I can reach one person, that's that's what it's all about.
I think that's yeah, that's what that's what matters.
Thanks for watching!
