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 life. Too many women in this world feel alone. They worry about the judgment of others and they struggle with their mental health but when they listen to the Rare Girls podcast where empowered women share their voices and tell their stories, many women will feel inspired to live a life of freedom and to overcome all insecurities. They will feel it is a safe space to find their confidence to remember their unique beauty and to feel their self worth and they will connect with the sisterhood of rare girls who encourage their success and support their dreams. That's what this podcast is all about. My guest today is Camila Olmas Koulova. Kami lived her whole life in Dubai, united Arab Emirates, but she is originally from Russia. Kami previously finished study in hospitality when she realized that filmmaking was her passion. Currently, a film student at SAE, her hobbies include acting for short films, modeling for brands and companies and creating her own small content online. Kami, how are you today? Hello Aziz, hello everybody, doing good. I feel happy, blessed, lucky to have you here, very curious to know much more about you. So I'll begin with this nice first question, which is Kami, if your friends and the people who know you best could describe your personality, what would they say about you? I feel like they would definitely say that I'm ambitious, confident, and energetic. I love that and at the same time, I want to ask about something else because it's very important, of course, to support all women to go for their potential and big dreams. At the same time, you have a lot of girly feminine energy and you're dressed like Barbie even today. So how does that work within your femininity? I have interviewed a girl who lives in Dubai as well and she said she is ambitious and always working hard, but she feels it's almost like a burden that makes her forget her feminine side. So how do you keep yourself in your feminine while being ambitious and going for your big goals and working hard? For me personally, I love to work hard, of course, and every day that goes by, I definitely never waste it. For example, I know that I can fill up my time with something during the day. So I'll definitely do it. That's why I feel like I have a lot of energy, but also to balance the feminine side, I love relaxing at home, making myself a lovely long bath, basically taking some time, like relaxing as well. So I absolutely love taking time to myself. And I feel like this balances really well because then the next day I'm energized for the day. - Thank you. And you specialize in hospitality before going to filmmaking. I like such stories because often you bring a unique perspective instead of being blinded by the same assumptions as everyone. You as someone who came through the path of hospitality, what do you feel it gave you in terms of a lens or a perspective or an eye that helped you in filmmaking? - So I studied hospitality and I finished the degree, so in hotel management, and I actually loved it. I loved having a professional job, so it was really nice to work there for an internship for my degree. But one thing while working there for my internship that I realized was how much passion that I actually have in this life to do something more than just a regular nine to five job. So I was thinking, yes, right now I'm hotel, like working in the hotel, managing the hotel, but could I do something more? Like the mentality which helped me shift into the film side was I wanna do something to be remembered for, but also known for. I don't wanna just sit in an office and do this like documents every single day. I wanted something more. So it was like, I don't wanna receive. Basically, I don't want to provide the service, but I want to receive this service. That was my mentality going into filmmaking. And then I thought, which other way could I earn a good income, but at the same time, like love what I did. Of course, I love hospitality and I loved it, but at the same time, I felt like I was destined to make something fun, something creative, and something where I would go into work every day, not knowing what we're gonna do, like a creative idea. But in hospitality, I knew everything that I was supposed to do. I was supposed to check the documents, basically help the guests out, everything like this. So I knew how every day worked and it got sort of like boring to me. So I knew I wanted to do something way more. Thank you. I love that you're mentioning passion, creativity, as well as being remembered and known for something which is related to legacy. My own belief is that we live in a time where there are eight billion people before when people were in small villages, they needed to compromise themselves to fit in. But today we can fill our own small universe with people who are supportive, non-toxic, passionate. That's one of the criteria that I believe are very important. But also nowadays, too many people live a quiet life in the sense that their passion is being subdued, that their passion is dead. What makes you or allows you to go after your passion? While many other people do not dare because they think, "Oh, maybe it's crazy to go for that. Maybe I will fail." And then all the people that told me, "Don't do it," will be justified. It's for you to ask whether this is something that you are born this way. It's something that other people can cultivate. What is your advice for other women who might be living a life that they're not loving, so that they move towards their passion? I feel like it's very important to take time to yourself and discover what you truly want. So for example, for me, it took some time to discover what I was passionate about. And it was completely random, something I never expected. For example, I never expected to do film at all. I thought it was this crazy idea like, Oh, I would love to do photo shoots one day for work. But no, like, I can't do that. Like, it's so far fetched. It seems far fetched. But I feel like it's really important to set the goals that we truly want to live the life that we have. And of course, it's really important to enjoy what you do for work, not just go into this routine, right? So I feel like the best advice that I could give is to take time to yourself and just basically to figure out what it is that you want. For example, start a hobby. Through hobbies, we can discover what we are truly destined for in our work environment. Thank you. And I have a question that I want to ask about your filmmaking interests, but let's focus on your own small online content. Or for you in general, the thing that makes you most excited to share is that content where you use your filmmaking skills, something where you are given a slice of your life, like a piece of your heart, is it different that you are representing the best version of yourself and your ideal life? Is it about storytelling and you feel people are bored and you want to be the ray of sunshine that gives them a smile or makes them feel an emotion? Or for you, is it practice? You're like a Karate kid. You're like practicing practice and each time with each piece, some skill in order to feel that growth because if you're not growing, you're dying. or for you specifically, filmmaking as it is applied to your own content, what does it give you? What rewards as well as emotions does it help you convey? So for my content online, I love making reels. And of course, applying my film knowledge into Instagram helped me lots with becoming a better filmmaker and editor as well in my university and for my studies as well. So for me personally, I love doing it and I love editing. I found that, yes, in university we are given pieces to edit, but I find that it's also very important to edit what you would want and to share with the world of course. So for me what I see my content as is of course practice, but mainly sort of like a blog for myself, not necessarily for an audience. I I don't have that many followers to begin with. So it's mainly for myself to see how far I'm going to come in the future, how far I'm going to basically achieve my targets and from where I started to where it is building up. For example, even now with the account and the reels, I can see a huge improvement in my editing skills and everything that goes into that. Thank you. And you spoke about your desire to be memorable, to be remembered and to be someone who people people can recognize or at least they feel you were there and you impacted their life some way. Can you share a bit more? Because I encourage this, this even within Greek mythology and ancient times, to live forever and to be remembered forever was like the greatest glory. But nowadays people will say, "Oh, it's not important. Why should you care? Why is that important? I want you to like defend your position, but in the sense of share. How does that make you feel? Does it make you feel Like without that life was insignificant in the sense that it passed away and you didn't leave your mark in the world. Is it that you feel you bonded with people and connected and you exchange the peace together so that part of them is within you and part of you is within them? Or in general, just for you, maybe just emotions. You're like, I feel like a star, a celebrity. I was daydreaming about it all my life and that's what I want. It's OK. What does it give you that sense of being remembered forever or at least for a long time? So for me, I always want to be remembered for something that I do. And my main motivation for this is, of course, when I have my own family in the future, I would love my children to look up to me, and they would be able to know what I did. For example, all of these years that I'm young, they can literally see my progress, of course, as a woman, as a filmmaker, and as the person that I So I also want in the future my husband to look up to me in some way and be proud of who I am, of course. So my main motivation is for my future family to be proud of me and of course to be proud of the person that I have become and see my progress. So I feel like this is a really good motivation that makes me want to basically be known and remembered for something that I do. I do. Of course, yes, I want to spread positivity to the people and spread and share a piece of my life to them for film, but main motivation is so that in the future I can definitely look back and be proud of who I am. I love that mindset. That's a very empowering mindset. And just to finish this, because I believe you have a lot of wisdom related to this topic, what is your advice to women who might be struggling with anxiety, maybe struggling with self-doubt, and that keeps them within a smaller life not reaching their potential so that they will finally there go out of their comfort zone, build the life that they will look back on in the future and be so proud of rather than stay in stock ruminating about what could go wrong or what would people think or anything like that. What's your advice to them so that they break free and reach their potential? My biggest advice is for change, you need to make the change. So whether it is visually and internally is equally as important because I feel like as a woman, you want to change visually as well to become a new person. So I feel like start with something small within yourself that perhaps you would want to change. I don't know, dye your hair, do something crazy and fun. It will inspire you to to do something better within your life. Because if you want to change, then of course you do it internally first as well. But visually is also equally as important for there to be more change within you as a person. But with anxiety, I feel like everyone struggles with it. So sometimes we do have doubts, am I gonna be good enough? But yet again, for our passion, whatever it might be, I feel like if we set our mind and just relax, I feel like for me, I definitely had some anxiety within the projects that I've been filming with and doing work with as well. I feel like the more anxiety I had, the worse it was. But as soon as I let things go, even as an editor for editing basically in my university, I noticed that the moment that I would get anxious is the moment where I would mess up. So I feel like you just drop the burdens, just let it go and completely do things out of a free mind. I feel like that's the easiest way to strive because as soon as I realize that I'm relaxed and I would just count to 10 is when I would do the best work that I can. Thank you so much, Kami. Honestly, it was my privilege and my honor to feel your energy, to hear your perspective. I encourage all your success, the constant growth and development that you notice in in your filmmaking skills. And I wish for you to create that track and that almost autobiography of your life work so that in the future you can share it with your children and everyone that you love so that they have something to notice how you are growing more and more always into the woman that you desire to be. Thank you so much. - Thank you so much for having me. I truly enjoyed it. And of course, first interview, so I'm really excited about it. Thank you so much for the opportunity. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music)
