Custom essay on My Life

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That night we began our first gig.It did not sound good and I could not keep a beat. We were awful. We played the first hour through and it was very rough.
At the break, I was called over to a table by a guy Gordon. He was the drummer for a group called Una Valli and the Domino’s. He asked me straight out what we were doing up there. I told him it was a long story. He offered to help and teach me if I came to the Lonsdale Hotel, where they were performing. Next day, I went there and started lessons and strenuous practicing. I had never seen daylight for almost 6 months. I went to lessons five days a week. I came back and practiced seven days a week. The only time I had never played was when I ate and slept. Pretty soon I became quite good in playing and in a while I became one of the best drummers around.
We stayed in Durban for a year. Then we went back to Johannesburg to get ready for our next job which was in Salisbury, Rhodesia, now known as Zimbabwe to play at a club called Le Coq D’or. We were there for a year and then we came back to South Africa, while there a few guys decided to quit playing music and to start doing different things.
The following week I got a call and heard that Gene Rockwell and The Falcons were in Rhodesia at the Discotheque. They needed a drummer. I found myself on a plane the next day.
I played with this group for almost two years. I had a lot of fun but it was a bit too much. We could not go any further as we were at the time the top selling group in the country and were had never been able to penetrate into the international market.

After about a month I got a new job. I worked in a movie rental store (in that time it was 16MM Film, Reel to Reel)

I had met my first wife by then and got married at a very young age (twenty one). We had two children, your sisters Dee and Chantal. I worked seven days and seven nights per week. After a few years, I started my own business with Tubby and we started to distribute movies. It was illegal in those days and today our business would be called pirating.custom essay
Our business was the sale of Playboy Films. Sale rates grew over and over again. Eventually, the entire family was working in the company and we were still not able to manage. The business just got bigger and better. We ran this until VHS machines came in and our business just faded away as the new thing was VHS. I had bought a house in Highlands North and, with business being slow, I had to do something to keep the house. I began a small business called Telewide that was copying and selling VHS tapes of movies and TV shows. Tubby opened a company called Family Home Entertainment and Basil started one called Artistik. These businesses became very, very successful and we were all making a lot of money. I sold my house and moved to a better neighborhood, Morningside Manor. It was a very expensive house and a very big one. We had two maids, a gardener, and a driver. That was the best what happened in that time were two things. The worst things that happened in that tome were: the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America), which started clamping down on piracy, and a place called Sun City Casino, which was opened. These were the two worst things that could happen. We had to cut back on business as it was now difficult to pirate and I was losing money at the casino every weekend. I was losing thousands upon thousands of Rands. In those days a Rand was equal to a dollar. I had to downsize my house and move back to Highlands North, again in a smaller house. Then I lost that one and rented a place around the corner. After that I managed to buy a fixer upper in Athol. I spent money fixing and upgrading it. I lost more money at the casino. I sold the house and moved to Northcliff. I stayed away from gambling and made enough money to buy a place in Highlands North again. I continued pirating and gambling. While this was happening, I had become friendly with the head of the Local MPAA (Ed Askew) and he told me to get out of the business as the large companies were closing in on me. Once, early in the morning (5AM) there was a knock on my door.
It was a raid. The courts had ordered all my equipment, movies, tapes and books seized.
I was out of business and out of luck.
After my day in court, I was not allowed to be in the movie industry for myself for 3 years. At the same time, a huge television station (Bop TV) was shut down for the same thing – piracy and showings without permission. They were in a serious trouble but had a lot of money. They went to the MPAA for a consultation to get back into business as they were losing millions in revenue.
Edward Askew recommended me for the job of turning them into a legal network. They hired me and I was in the business again. That time I was wearing a different hat. The business was legal and I was in good grace in the industry once again. I traveled to all the film markets: New York, Los Angeles, London, Italy and France. I spent a lot of money and bought a lot of movies. BOP TV was up and running again. Within a year, they were totally stocked up and running. I was out of work once again.
Then I decided to open my own company using Basil and Tubby for the licenses and so on. I contacted someone in Los Angeles and New York, bought some copyright movies and began a company called Telewide. It proved to be very successful and grew very fast. I had a huge staff of people and business was very good. So I got more money to gamble with. We were doing very well for a few years and we kept growing.
When I was not traveling, I was gambling. It was quite a whirlwind. My marriage went sour. I lost a lot of money. My brother died and I lost interest to life and business. It just wasn’t funny anymore and I was sinking fast. I neglected my business and my life. Very soon I lost it all, everything. I moved in with my mother, your granny. I had no money no car, nothing.