Chasing the American Dream: Why People Move to Los Angeles

it's at all the security guy come up to me like said hey kiddo gotta get out of here oh how did you come to this like you were sitting in a small town in Russia never having been to America and you have this dream of coming to Hollywood hello my dear friends and welcome to Silicon Valley girl show by the stars that you see around me is amazing bright Sun you might have realized that today I am filming an episode in Los Angeles and I was thinking what kind of topics should i film about and then I realized that when I grew up I was watching all those movies and all the TV shows from Los Angeles and they were all talking about one concept the American dream the American dream that immigrants pursue when they come here people from all over United States immigrate to California to become actors to build their companies because there are a lot of new companies here in Los Angeles even in tech so I decided but I'm gonna meet people who came here to Los Angeles to pursue their American dream I'm gonna ask them if they've achieved it or not and I'm gonna ask them what it takes how long it takes to achieve an American dream so if you're interested continue watching this video [Music] the Greater Los Angeles area is the nation's second most populated urban area with eighteen point seven million residents by the way California is the most populated state in the US boasting a population of 39 million people and it's not surprising that the majority of immigrants also want to come here they're roughly 44 million immigrants in the United States and 10 million of them which is roughly 24% came to live in California all of this people who reside in California make 12% of the entire nation's population and they all came here to chase their American dream [Music] just had tossed my husband what is the American dream for him but what he doesn't speak English so when we came to the u.s. first you didn't like it right yes I had this smell in the airport it was like sandwiches but somehow I know the smell of sandwiches you know very old-fashioned and for me America is like high-tech technologies all the stuff you know and after that after I passed a custom the security guy come up to me like said hey kiddo girl get out of here it wasn't friendly at all and I just like move like ten steps from this place oh yeah he was waiting for me because I was at the passport control and she came to me one more time and said I told you go away like something me and I was shocked like this wasn't polite it wasn't like delicate and I want to fight with him but I know that I can do it but in the morning we met with the one guy intrapreneur and we're chatting with him like killed 3 a.m. in the bar about the business of and next day he introduced us to his investors and understood what doesn't mean American like King preneur spirit or suffer bad and I start understanding why America is so cool and it was so bright in Miami like the colors were so like juicy is amazing right it's brighter than others yeah yeah so and I started like to find the places do you like it now yeah for sure do you think so what is the American dream for you for me it's when the talent that you have and the hard work it's enough and it's all that you need to be successful that's out like any I don't like an action it's like knowing different people's etc so if you talented only if you work really hard you will be very successful even if your English is not like a right yes so what is your dream yeah as you mentioned like to know in 30 years probably I reach my go on that's it that's it for my life you know know like to be honest like I'm probably sounds crazy but I'm pretty ambitious I want to have an Oscar I want to have a Nobel Prize in science I want to have like the most powerful company I wanna be a world champion in racing so I have a lot of it's probably even for American dream it's probably too too much job here but we'll see you know how close are you to your American Dream point zero zero zero one percent problem right but do you think I'm still focusing on learning English do you think that this place is gonna help you achieve all your goals honeybee science already is because for example if we didn't have investment to language 15 three years ago four years ago we wouldn't be where we are now yeah hundred percent listen us our small American dream well first like a two-step buying your iPhone without any financing just get it in cash no and open the bakery is why I marry the one I wanted to immigrate to the states I was thinking maybe I'd serve a curry that's why I hate the states at the beginning because I didn't want to move permanently here and I know that marina is Marino's dream that's why I when we first came to America I try to find like disadvantages you know yeah yeah we just checked out you g-wagen is everywhere here in Beverly Hills we just checked out how much how is this cost here in Bella Hills and you can actually get a very nice house for three million dollars and maybe maybe we could go in in the year yes let's come here hey guys please subscribe to see I have chosen Los Angeles to talk about American dream not only because so many people want to come here every year but because it's getting more and more diverse if 10 years ago somebody told me like why would you come to LA I would definitely say like movies and cinema and all of that today I would also say that you're coming for a tech stuff because snapchat is here tinder is here Google is opening a huge office YouTube la is here like a lot of tech companies I'm moving from Silicon Valley from other places in the u.s. to Los Angeles and a place in Los Angeles which is really close to where I am right now it's called silicon beach and a lot of companies especially those that are connected with media and consumer products are establishing their headquarters here one of the districts that I wanted to feature in this video is called Playa Vista like if you're thinking is there a perfect place on earth I would say but fly visitors like utopia it seems like everything is perfect here dogs don't smell like dogs and they only pee in dedicated places kids never cry they're always smiling people are always happy everyone is wearing yoga pants and everybody's so healthy and yes Google is here in Utah this year just take a look la is very diverse but this is one of the places that are really loved whenever I'm in LA I have like 12 people living in this area I hope my friends I'm just staying with them whenever I'm here [Music] I like to include real life in my vlogs whenever I'm in LA I'm staying with amazing guys Lieberman's I know if you've heard of them but they're like everywhere they're in tech they're in media they're in production they're an investment they know everyone here I'm super happy to stay with you guys and yeah what I wanted to say is that for me American Dream and American freedom is also in like daily small stuff like I found this shop here and you can buy basically anything like this is a coconut smoothie like the best movie I've ever tried you can find bottled water but bottles will be glass bottles and I'm struggling to find them like in that such in the great variety outside alley and you know freedom to eat wherever you want and if you want some kind of food you go to like thousands of shops that are here and find that stuff for every city I have a person that's associated with the city and when we think about Los Angeles we think that this area is just one big city but actually no Santa Monica barely hills hollywood west hold different entities they have their own administration their own police station fire station and the city of Beverly Hills is a seat where I met my friend we collab so much together we're working in linguae trips together now we're doing a lot of stuff his name is Vania Pike and I'm gonna talk to him now but he is American dream at the exact same place where we met three years ago welcome to Beverly Hills three years ago on the exact same spot I met Vania for the first time it was amazing I would sit in San Francisco and sometimes you do things and you don't know why you're doing them but I somehow decided to check comments under one of my videos and I was checking the comments and it was coming from Vania and I'm checking us out and he's like no you hold like three hundred thousand subscribers but I think so yeah I think so yeah I was like wow this cold foggy area he's like whenever you're in Italy reach out to me let's meet up and I'm like oh I'm going too late tomorrow and I texted him and we met right here created a first vlog and there was a first collab that yes or everything for your managing our company's channels we're creating a lot of courses together it basically the heart of the online part of of language eV and you know we're doing so many things together so what has been just like major change for you since we saw each other here back in 2016 I guess since then the biggest thing that changed for me was that I'm just comfortable here now comfortable in the best way meaning that I feel like la is my home now I feel really good here and it feels like home it feels nice and whenever I travel home home to Russia yeah that doesn't feel like home anymore so I guess that's is that's the biggest thing because that's what I always wanted and even coming here that was my main goal to not to be super famous or successful or anything like that I just wanted to you know successfully move here yeah like not just change locations but actually move move how did you come to this like you were sitting in a small town in Russia never having been to America and you have this dream of coming to Hollywood and becoming whatever you studied Performing Arts like how did you come to this it was a gradual process like there there was no one moment where it clicked and I was like that's what I'm gonna do no I first I always wanted to do I always wanted to do something creative with my life and be able to off of that but I just never allowed myself to think like that and have those dreams because where I come from it's it's kind of crazy it's absurd to have dreams like that because it's nit it's not heard of mm-hmm dad oh I'm gonna move to LA what how long is the flight from there like 18 hours it's three and a half hours to Moscow and then about 12 hours to LA yeah and then I talked to someone and they told me something that I still live by to this day they said if you really want something you can get it you just have to put everything you have in it you know if you have the urge to do something if you really want something to the point where and like you have this like little tickling feeling in your chest you know and like burns your chest and it's like a funny feeling when you want something that bad that means it's already yours so I still remember that and I said that's exactly how I feel then I allowed myself to have those dreams so that's nothing kind of how it is it [Music] did you ever have this notion of American dream because for everyone it's like a different thing some people's like buying a house in Beverly Hills for some people it's like becoming an a-list actor have you ever had this American dream you know I guess I would say a very typical standard American dream is you know our house white picket fence two dogs two children in the minivan that's an American unlike a typical my American dream is and always has been just enjoying life basically you know just living being able to make a living off of something that I love and being able to go out there and create opportunities for myself to pursue it and just be able to kind of build myself up from from nothing you know kind of just by my own effort my own desire my own passion and my own work ethic and have you achieved this American dream buddy I'm working on it I'm working on it I try not to put myself in that mindset I think it's very dangerous I'm you know trying not to get too comfortable with what I have and what I achieve awesome and when people like what do you do for a living because some people don't know you you do no vlogging you have teach English in music and many other things but those will be the main ones I guess there was yeah I just can't pick one and put it above everything else you know I loved everything I guess you know it would be logical to just go with the thing that I have the most success in but I don't really measure like how do you measure success it's I think by your numbers money like how do you you know I don't know it's it's silly so I don't know I just can't pick one so I just say everything when I was buying a suit yesterday and the guy ringing me up he was like so what do you do Bennion sounds like everything and that's my answer to everyone always I just say everything and uh can you give advice to people I know there is a lot of people watching from other states who may be dreaming of coming to California and making something here and then there are people from other countries what would be your advice for those who have this American dream but they don't know how to start acting don't listen don't listen I still remember as if it was yesterday I was in school senior year of my high school in Russia and I was I was in class actually and I was talking to one of my friends about my plan and what you know what what imma do and my former classmate she kinda turns around and she laughs at me she's like you're gonna go to California and you're gonna come back in two months a failure and I still remember that and I still think about it almost every day not every day yeah I still think about it and I really appreciate it thank you so much you made me stronger you made me that at that moment you made me want to prove you wrong and I feel like I've done that when they hit two months of you being here but yeah just allow yourself to go there and allow yourself to get absorbed and get get obsessed with it and because if you really want something you'll do everything to get it and if you are not ready to do everything to get it that means you don't want it that bad so that's what you have to work on you have to work on your mentality first before you do any actual steps I feel like because when you when you know you want it you know what to do it yeah that's amazing thank you so much of course thank you the links below subscribe to me as shown thank you thank you [Music] Beverly Hills is a place for people this American dream of becoming a successful singer actor editor filmmaker has come true because this place just smells like being a celebrity or whatever if you drive five minutes or seven minutes from the place where I'm now you're gonna see houses off Christina Aguilera Taylor Swift Ashton Kutcher Madonna like a lot of celebrities own their houses here the average price for house is from 1 million to 1.5 million dollars but of course if you're a celebrity the average house price is like 20 to 30 millions I'm talking about houses in Beverly Hills some celebrities still prefer to live in hotel behind me is fairly wheelchair Hotel Elvis Presley used to live here and he spans us still sending letters to the hotel to just remember one of their favorite singers and if you've seen the movie pretty woman it was shot right there and I just checked on Expedia the average price per night in that hotel it's seven hundred twenty dollars Beverly Hills is amazing really expensive and really inspiring [Music] the Beverly Hills Hotel one of the most famous hotels in the world think number one why it is famous the zip code here is 902 one else who has watched the TV show BH Nano - I know comment down below I used to watch it was back in Russia I was like nine years old and I was looking at all of these celebrities and like American youth that are living in Beverly Hills and it felt like a real dream you can be a part of this dream and night in this hotel costs a thousand dollars and I think if you made it in barely heels if you made it in Los Angeles California celebrating your success by spending just one night here would be a good landmark in your life this hotel is also famous because of Whitney Houston has died here John Lennon spent a week in a room with Yoko Ono without leaving it and Marilyn Monroe had her favorite bungalow number seven in this hotel and we don't know whether that's connected with the fact that John Kennedy actually stayed a lot in Bangalore number 24 in this video I wanted to showcase not only immigrants who came to Hollywood from outside the United States also wanted to show Americans who came to Hollywood to pursue their dreams of becoming actors filmmakers and musicians right now we're in the center of Hollywood and we're going to see my friend takea who moved to Los Angeles from New Jersey to pursue her American dream and we're gonna ask her how does it go for her did ya when did you come here to Hollywood I moved here February 2016 to study yet what was it acting war yeah so I studied musical theater so singing dancing acting all of it nice and you came from New Jersey right do you remember that day when you realize that he actually wanted to come here and pursue the American dream or I always wanted to live here since I was a kid really my I've been here I have so after like years of me trying to convince my mom or my dad to bring me here for vacation my mom finally brought me here when I was 14 years old it was just her and I ever been here we have no family here so it was like a new experience for both of us and we came for like 10 days and as soon as we got here we did like all the tourist stuff the Hollywood Boulevard the Stars the Chinese Theatre everything and I was like I'm gonna live here my mom my mom laughed she thought it was like a joke she's like yeah sure she's not moving out here across the country and sure enough however many years later I didn't did you have this goal of coming here to study or was it like a spontaneous thing I did I wanted I originally wanted to move here for school when I was 18 when I first graduated high school but my family didn't want me so far away from home so that's why I did my two first two years in New York mm-hmm oh and then you transferred and Haley or I took a year off and then I transferred those credits over here and then finally did it and made the big leap and moved here cool and did you have a dream of becoming like cootie what did you want to become like what was the ideal image of yourself still working on it but no I'm I've always even though I studied musical theater I've always loved like TV and films so that is still my goal that I'm still working toward yeah but that's honestly just being able to do performing I think I'd be happy if it were like a supporting role on a TV show like I'm doing it you know I mean as long as I'm doing it on a regular basis like I'm happy because I feel like but you've done I have right yeah but I won't not on a larger scale so that's why I'm like hoping to eventually get to where it's like a series regular kind of thing mm-hmm but I think it's this is what happens to like a lot of people who come here and they have this dream in mind but then you find something else and then you gradually get it's not like a spontaneous right it takes time and do you have any graduates like from your college who got straight into like acting career whatever I don't think anybody's like straight away to my knowledge that's gotten anything it's it's always been like I have friends that I went to school in a school with in New York and that was back in 2013-2014 just now on Broadway mm-hmm and 2019 you know and we just finished yeah six years ago and they're just now first making their Broadway debut that's like a supporting character yeah I think it's actually a long way like yeah some people think yeah I come here and then into and then it's gonna happen later baby yeah yeah it's not and so you were starting a new life right yeah that's good your full-time job dude do you know what you're gonna do I am gonna just honestly on a date like I'm just gonna keep working toward my goal like the whole reason I moved out here and that's why I did leave my job is because I feel like it happens to a lot of us especially for performers you get caught up in working a day to day job so till you forget between any kind of your dreams kind of end up on the backburner mm-hmm so so you're doing a procedure you have time that's amazing do you have an American dream like how would you define American dream for yourself Oh oh my god an American dream for myself I feel like it's success just success in whatever it is you want out of your life like your dreams you know stability for sure and just making sure you're happy with what you're doing on a daily basis and you love and you're doing what you love I feel like that's the American Dream is that you are doing what you love and you have a sense of stability with it I like how everyone is kind of similar we're talking about similar things I'm asking a lot of people who what I think the American Dream is and everyone is talking about like doing what your love yeah that's amazing can you give one piece of advice to people who are outside of California dreaming of coming here and pursuing their American dream dedicate yourself to it it's not that like I think dedication is a key thing that you need to be able to pursue your dream at your American Dream and especially when things get hard because it's not always gonna be easy that is for sure nothing ever nothing good is ever and nothing worthwhile is ever easy so definitely just remain positive and keep pushing forward amazing thank you so much thank you love it thank you so much got hey let's do it all right we just thank you so much for agreeing to talk to me about your American dream and how your help helping people achieve the American trees here in barely Hills Los Angeles can you tell me what exactly you did so I do a lot of things but I do mainly three different things right now the first thing I did when I came here is I started a tech company so I've created a mobile payments app called circle plus payments you know I know okay but why not Silicon Valley by the way LA for me was kind of like where I wanted to be because I felt like it was more up-and-coming I was want to be in the film space and so the reason I kind of want to start a company was I had this whole like three-part vision where I was like I want to get the film business but I'll never just make it on my own if I just come out here and be an extra hour edition so I'll start a company and maybe I'll make money in that and then I'll be able to survive and so I came out here and I was like six months later I was like the most depressed state I was like I could barely afford an apartment I was like what am I gonna do out here and then I was like you know what my friend like I go on Facebook and this guy writes for a magazine like but hey can still write for your magazine I'll do for free just to like learn I want to write about like tech and entrepreneurship I see a lot of people on the street and like I bet I can just interview them and there's some amazing stories I see just being in LA and it sounds like he's like cool yeah you can send me some articles I sent him an article and then I used that and I got into a conference right there's like this really good conference in San Diego and I like all these all of my heroes like that entrepreneurs were there everybody I always want to see is there and just so amazing people talk about AI and all this like new stuff and I was like well I can you know cover this conference there's no way I could like you know afford to like you know go out to you know all these things and you know so I was like I could do journalism and kind of just like learn and I'll do it for free so I go out there in November completely broke and I go to this conference and at that same time you know I borrow like $2,000 from a friend and I was like bill a nap and I just have like a basic prototype and my idea was I just want to go and learn from entrepreneurs and not have anything that I want I want to ask for anything so I go there and within five minutes like I get my badge I sign up and walking to the beach just you know just seems like a nice day out and I walk away I see another guy with the badge and I was like hey what do you do and he's like oh well you know I'm here for this conference I'm like a venture capitalist and an investor what are you doing it's like well you know I write for this magazine I'm just here but I just started this company too and I'd like to learn from people that's sort of why I decided to write and you know long story short we didn't like five within I'm kidding out with like five minutes he goes well you know what's your company let me see what it is I showed him disaster that's that's amazing what stock let's have lunch together today we had lunch for an hour and I don't know what I said to him within that hour he got back to me like four o'clock he texts me like hey I want to meet you again as I cool it'll meet like somewhere in the back yeah and he goes I want to invest you're coming how much do you want how much do you want he's like I'm an angel investor and I think I like what you're doing I think it's the right time and literally like long story short within a week I had money in my account right now you're doing in completely different things out there yeah I like all the Taylor Swift and their wild photos what are you doing now so how that started was that's funny story like you know how I got into entertainment so my dream was always to get into entertainment and it was just like how do I get this I went after this company was somewhat successful like you know I was going to this point where how about promote my company so then I just go around LA and I'll be like well what do I do and I would sit in like restaurants empty celebrities and I'll just like see let me take pictures and I put it up and then what I do is a sort of like wait for me like growth hacking my company was I would just go out and like take pictures and then I'll put it and then I would strategically like add people like reporters or people are interested in so you followed that follow them or else and I'm a DM and then I have all these pictures up and so these pay attention to that and I'm like so what do you do and I'm big I have this company you're interested in this piece and then it's like I kept doing that and then it's like it slowly like got more and more attention I end up like on Fox Business but who are you trying to kill Apple Google square into it PayPal I mean we're really trying to destroy everybody out there and how did you take those pictures with like I mean I would just literally go to events here well I mean that is like when I was here like I meet so many friends of mine that like worked entertainment it's just kind of an organic thing so I either go to van so I just go to the right restaurants with like weird celebrities and go just like you know like taking pictures with celebrities if I spot a celebrity like yeah some people like you know they don't want as much space or this or that but I would do it feels like the right time or whatever just to get the contact I'm like I'm like here like why not you know but you would just reach out to journalists and say hey I have this startup check out my no I just reached out to them and before it was just like trying to pitch myself I wouldn't pitch myself I'll just say hey like I'm doing this stuff if you're never gonna let me know they're just like go through my page later and they're like hey what do you do can't write a story I think it's just like what have you on TV he's like I was like so sort of like this unconventional way of doing stuff that's amazing write it down like seriously this is so cool yeah it's just like you know because everybody fight for the same attention and one of my mentors told me no 10/10 is like the most valuable like currents are commodity do you still have you startup yeah so somebody's company is it you're a number one thing that you're doing right well now I'm more transitioning doing film stuff so from that you know from doing the film stuff which is funny so that's how I started like you know once I start getting this press and attention I went to meet a friend of mine who who like sort of mentoring me about the whole film business that was like working Universal yet no one my friend the universal and so and so he basically kind of taught me the entire film business of like how a distribution were tax credits works like you know and so so it's really interesting for me to like learn that entire thing just for like a couple years and so with me and him we'll just like you know after two years of just having that friendship and meeting all these people in my rolodex in the film business office like it's time to do something where I have an organic friendship with them and it's like in with this idea for doing like boxing for film financing how does it work with your company so for example I made a movie and I come to you and I tell you any distribution sure how does it work through a blockchain so what we're doing is well the blockchain aspect of it is really to like democratize film financing so what we are doing is with our company we create a token call the real token which will be coming out soon on exchanges and that basically enables anybody in the world to be able to buy into our coin and then we're able to invest into film but in a different way so we're doing collateralized financing so that would mean films that already have really good cast attached like so there's like a movie with Chris Evans attached or Keanu Reeves or like Bradley Cooper that maybe already has a sale you already had such movies we had just a couple moves like that yeah that we can pretty cool you know and I think we're about to announce all this pretty soon so you're gonna really exciting so you're getting kind of getting like an exclusive a lot of stuff that you know you also have you a third company right real estate roast it yeah in terms of real estate I mean when I came out here like the reason I kind of got my real estate license was sort of like a Hail Mary like fall back like you know if everything else fails at least I'll have it just in case and what we do here with a Californian estates and you know in terms of real estate is we have a niche where we look at just properties that are undervalued or underdeveloped or under built we call it so like properties that let's say there's like our 6,000 square-foot piece of land in Beverly Hills or Bel Air and just like a 2,000 square foot house on it but you can probably build 4,000 or 6,000 square feet so now we go in and find those properties you know probably get the plans and permits on it and then sell those because you can buy that house for maybe two million dollars spend and do you do this for your clients or the clients you're like yeah if I come to you and tell you hey I need something undervalued undervalued yep so that's where the value is is it's like you know why not build a house for yourself that housed equity and the upside already built into it it's the worst case you can flip that house and get you know a couple of million dollars profit or you can keep the house cash flow it and now you're like you can charge a higher rent but you know you spent very little so your percentage of your capitalization rates much higher do you think that your American dream has come true or you're still working I think the American Dream in a way is something that's like an ongoing thing right I think I'm living the American dream I would say the dream is like every day it just gets better and better and so the dream is like something I think that lasts forever and the American Dream is not like an endpoint or a goal but it's a way of life exactly I love it that's pretty cool thank you so much that was really powerful thank you so much thank you everything's thank you would it get me far American dream for me has been changing throughout my life I guess initially it was a dream of living in a place without snow because I grew up in Russia I was so tired of winter that lasted for six months and I felt so unproductive and so depressed when we had those long nights in st. Petersburg that lasted for like 14 hours it was really dark and when I finally achieved it when I finally moved to California and I realized this is the place where most productive I actually started digging deeper in myself and started asking myself what is happiness for me and last year in October 2018 I realized that um my motto for this life is to do things that I love the most and if I don't like something I either dump it at all like stop doing it if it's making me some money i delegate it and the goal is to be able to make money with activities that I love so I can delegate the rest so if I have to work with the documents a hiring assistant who does it if I have to travel somewhere I just buy the first ticket that is most convenient for me and I don't have to think about ways how to optimize everything and I remember when I was 20 years old still back at the University my mom would give me like a limited budget that I could spend on food and I had $5 every day that I could spend on meals and I remember always being hungry and always trying to fit the maximum amount of most nutritious food into $5 because otherwise you know if I just been a little like sushi or rolls or whatever I would stay hungry for the rest of the day having this opportunity to invest energy in what you really like creating content for you guys creating courses running a company instead of wasting my energy on trying to optimize my daily life like what is the cheapest grocery store that I could go to what is the fastest way to go to San Francisco from Los Angeles without spending like a ton of without spending a lot of money this is the goal like to invest energy in my superpower to invest energy and what I really love and yeah I think this is an American dream for me thank you guys so much for watching this video up to the very end quick question for you the top person in LA may be connected with media may be connected to running a business that you want me to interview in my next life I'm trying to reach the tile opus we're back and forth with let me know if you want to see an interview with tile opus expecially interviewed his friend Alex Muir a couple of blogs ago the link will be below and yeah so let me know who you want me to interview if you not yet subscribe to silicon valley girl the red button is below hit it and I will see you very soon in my next videos bye [Music]

Channel: Silicon Valley Girl

Views: 58,884

Rating: 4.9065332 out of 5

Keywords: silicon valley girl, marina mogilko, linguamarina, la, la life, life in la, the American dream, hollywood, Hollywood dream, california, California dream, silicon beach, playa vista, startup story, success story, Beverly Hills, beverly hotel, hollywood b, hollywood boulevard, Venice Beach, Los Angeles, use life, moving to the use, move to California, business in la, la startup, success tips, linguatrip, startup life, startup idea, rodeo drive

Id: VW2sn-xpwCY

Length: 36min 4sec (2164 seconds)

Published: Tue Aug 20 2019