Anna's story
Photo by Karin Leubbers
Acclimate, May 2010
Across the net, Anna, fit and 40-something, chased down every tennis ball our team attempted to get past her. No such luck. The woman was full of boundless energy.
Like the pink Energizer bunny banging the drum in those old TV commercials, she just keeps going and going and going.
Equally energetic off the court, she manages, however, to find balance in her frenetic life as wife, mom of three, volunteer, teacher, jewelry designer, and entrepreneurial businesswoman, while making time for new personal interests.
Anna, this issue's cover model, agrees to squeeze in an interview with me between teaching an afternoon jewelry class and dashing back home for dinner, hopefully before her teenage daughter heads off to the school dance.
Most likely, this is the first time Anna has had a chance to sit down all day. Oozing with Bohemian style in her flowy top and self-designed, chunky jewelry, she relaxes, sinks onto the couch, and tucks her legs under her slender frame.
Many women in Bangkok monitor busily spinning plates, but Anna is the only woman I know who, over a post-tennis latte one day, casually mentioned her Bali boats. It turns out, she designed them, had them built, runs a charter boat business in Bali, and, oh, from time to time, she even captains one for her family and friends. That piqued my interest. Eager to learn the secret to her balancing act, my interview began.
Tell me a little bit about yourself.
I am Dutch, but I have lived half my life overseas. My given name is Annebe, but people find that hard to spell or pronounce. Eventually, I just adopted my "expat" name. For the last 18 years, I've been Anna.
Tell me a little bit about your family.
My parents always encouraged me to "spread my wings," so in college, I focused my studies on less developed countries. Honestly, I think my parents regret that advice now as I've been gone from Holland for so many years.
My husband, Niels, and I met on a train in Holland while we were both students, studying different subjects but with an emphasis on development work. My first practical time as a researcher was in Khon Kaen, Thailand, in 1991. Niels visited me there and I guess I saw that we were aiming for the same things in life. Niels is now working for USAID, where his specialty is sanitation and water projects.
We have three very different children, all Bangkok Patana School students. Mirte, 14, is independent, social, and our rolling stone of the family, with more than 600 Facebook friends. Our nurturing, grounded child is Shanna, 10, and she plays the piano and enjoys gymnastics. Tim, 7, is a gold medal gymnast who enjoys street dance and soccer, and is so fit, he sports not a six-pack, but an eight-pack of abs.
Being Dutch, surrounded by water, I assume that you grew up sailing?
As strange as it may seem, we weren't into boating or sailing. My first overseas job after college was in Indonesia doing consulting work for a Dutch company involved in development projects in family health and nutrition.
Living and working in Jakarta, I felt trapped in an office. After three years, I realized that I am better out in the field than I am behind a desk in a dusty, Indonesian office building.
I was looking for a change of pace and stumbled upon a job as a cruise director working every other month for a guy who operated traditional boat charters in Bali. Knowing the islands pretty well came in handy and speaking fluent Indonesian Bahasa helped, too.
You're fluent in Bahasa?
In Holland, at my university, it's common to study foreign languages. I'd say about 80% of the students in my field studied a foreign language, hopeful that work in those countries would follow. Working and living in Indonesia, I used a stick to point at objects and made it a practice to learn five new words a day to improve my vocabulary.
How did you make the leap from cruise director to boat owner?
My cruise director job was a good balance for me at the time, working one month on the boat and being home for a month. But, when I became pregnant with our first daughter, I realized that I couldn't live the nomadic kind of life any more. I needed a more stable job and began thinking about the charter boat business.
The boat I had been working on was one big adventure and a great formula. However, so many things were not working properly and I saw things that were missing or that could have been done so much better. For example, I wanted each berth to have its own porthole, air conditioning, and bathroom.
A popular charter boat had just sunk, creating a void in the charter boat business. I realized there was an opportunity to build a four-star ship from scratch, rather then converting an existing cargo ship into a passenger ship. I started to figure out what I wanted and what was needed. I'm pretty observant and have technical engineering work skills. I worked closely together with a captain I knew, a descendant of a long line of seafaring Buginese boat-building people, and he transformed my sketches into a plan.
In 1996, my husband and I built our own 42-meter, traditional wooden Indonesian schooner to launch our own charter boat business.
Do you believe in fate and being in the right place at the right time?
Absolutely! Once we had the design, we needed to finance the project. I needed around US$500,000 at that time to build a boat. Within a week we had four more friends and family members who came on board investing their money. Then we started building. It took 16 months from keel to having the first 24 guests on board. I felt like I had two babies at that time: our daughter Mirte and our boat, the Ombak Putih, which means "White Wave."
Since the boating business was booming, we built a second boat in 2000, and our second daughter, was born. Then, in 2002, we had Tim. I was pretty busy juggling being a mom and managing our boat business.
Our dream to have our own Buginese schooners, to operate them for adventurous travelers, and to sail around with our family as much as possible came true. Operating the boat (a floating hotel and restaurant) for up to 24 guests, doing the marketing to promote it, training the crew to be first class—that was my job. I loved it and learned so much during this time. (For more information, visit: www.ombakpuith.com)
How did you and your husband manage the long-distance marriage?
The boat was being built in Kalimantan and the plan was to operate it from Bali, a good starting point to explore the Eastern islands.
Niels stayed in Jakarta to work and he also had to travel a lot. I lived in Bali with the children. It was not always easy to live separated, but we both had our careers and we just made it happen.
Over time, we realized that this situation was not ideal—you miss too much of each other's lives, habits and dreams. It was very difficult and things could have gone so wrong.
I guess we loved each other so much, respected each other's destiny and world, and trusted each other. It was hard, but we made it work based on those values. I believe that if you do something you really, really want and do it with passion, you grow and build so much positive energy in and around you that it must work for the other party as well.
But, then, you moved to the United States, right?
Yes, the separate households and careers worked for a time, but as with all families, and relationships, it just wasn't best for our growing family.
In 2003, Niels accepted a job in Washington, D.C., and I agreed to try this new adventure. That took some adjustment: when I moved there it was cold and snowing! I missed the warmth of the islands, the rock of the boat, and the sand between my toes. But, we were together as a family in one house, in one place. We made it work. And, actually, that is how I got into my jewelry design business, "AnnA."
AnnA Jewelry is certainly a very creative outlet, completely different from the charter boat business. How did it begin?
We lived in the United State for three years. Away from our boats, I wanted to start something again. This was a different role for me, a different side of being a wife and a working mother. Initially it was very difficult to adapt to this new lifestyle, but my husband and I managed.
Back in Indonesia I had collected trade beads from the islands, and my husband suggested the idea of transforming the beads into jewelry. I was basically self-taught, occasionally asking friends for practical advice. I started to experiment making something out of this bead and this piece of chain from an old piece of junk jewelry I'd found in the market.
It became a nice hobby. I started creating and making jewelry and the first one-of-a-kind designs were suddenly successful among my neighbors and friends. In no time, I was back in a new business. Feeling happy and satisfied is the key for a pleasant time in a new location.
People liked my work—they wanted to buy my jewelry off my neck! I didn't always know exactly what I was doing at that time, to be honest, but I knew what I liked. If others liked my designs, too, I'd make them original pieces to their specifications and colors. An opportunity presented itself. I don't know if they thought I was exotic because I was Dutch, or because I had lived in Bali, or if I was just a bit hippie enough to be intriguing, but it worked.
My first sale was a necklace I was wearing. Another parent at the kids' school asked if she could buy it and I set a price of US$40. When she asked if she could get a matching bracelet, I agreed to make it. I dropped the set off at her house two days later. As it turned out, she was a writer. An article about my jewelry "collection" appeared and my business grew by word of mouth.
My jewelry was very successful. I could make new things out of old objects and each one was unique. I sold on eBay and in the Georgetown area. More importantly, I was happy. I met my clients' needs and I fueled my own creativity.
And then, you moved to Bangkok in 2006…
Arriving back in Asia felt like a warm blanket! My three children were born in Indonesia, so it was like coming home.
Tell me about the jewelry business you've built now in Bangkok.
In 2006, Niels accepted his current job in Bangkok and I found that I could continue the jewelry business. I was asked to do more designing for a kids' accessories brand and I also worked for a kids' clothing label in Holland—all jobs I got by word of mouth from friends of friends.
I also host open houses to display my current collections, but friends are welcome to stop by to browse and have a cup of coffee. In Bangkok I found myself designing more on a higher level in order to grow my jewelry business for export. I could also continue the charter boat business from a distance— the best of both worlds.
Tell me about the group of ladies you employ to make the jewelry.
To grow the business, I needed help, but I also wanted to do it in a fair way. I found a cooperative in a slum community only a five-minute bike ride from my house in Sathorn. Around 18 to 20 underprivileged women make jewelry and paper boxes, sew clothes and bags, or make homemade soaps and spa products. A very driven New Zealand friend who lives with her family in the Suan Phlu neighborhood runs this project.
Over the years this project has proven to be a huge success due to the women's creativity, hard work, and tenacity in meeting their daily challenges. I am very proud of the work our ladies produce. Being active in these two different worlds gives me such satisfaction.
I know that you've also helped with other charitable activities, right?
I think we all have a responsibility as expats to do charitable work for groups and communities in the country where we live. I call it my own community social responsibility.
There are so many things you can do to help. I love to use my creative skills to help the ladies who work in the cooperative. I design and they produce while earning a fair income.
Every Monday I teach a water aerobics class. All the participants pay 200 baht and when we have collected 25,000 baht, I give the money to the American Women's Club or to the International Women's Club for their scholarship funds that help send underprivileged girls to school.
We also support the educational needs of our employees' 11 children in Bangkok and Bali. My goal is to send them to university one day.
How long do you plan to stay in Bangkok? Any other goals or projects on the horizon?
This kind of expat lifestyle has a lot of open questions. My husband and I often talk about what we like and what could be our next step, not only for us, but also for our kids. For now, we all really like living here.
My life motto is simply, "Live and let live." I don't care about analyzing my life under a magnifying glass. I try to live each day, to be open to everything around me, and to be positive. I try to teach my kids to do the same.
At the moment I am getting to know more about Reiki and have just finished a two-day course. I feel that finally, after living many years in Asia with all the beauty and peacefulness, I have to know more about these holistic lifestyles and really start implementing this for myself and my family.
As our interview concludes, I'm exhausted imagining what it takes to be Anna. But, I am also impressed by the ease with which she seems to find the perfect balance that works for her and for her family.
Assuming she must be one of those people who hits the ground running the instant the alarm clock jolts her eyes open, I finally learn the secret to her success.
She laughs. "My secret is, I start my day very slowly."
As it turns out, Anna eases into the day leisurely, civilly with a cup of hot tea and a plate of cookies, served in bed by her husband. A little quiet before the storm.
I guess even the Energizer bunny needs to make time to charge up the batteries before starting each day.
To learn more about AnnA Jewelry and jewelry-making workshops, check out: www.annajewelry.biz.