I need someone who is willing to invest in me as a rsponsible person with a future. January 13/14th 2000, my landlord attacked me with two men at my flat on a Friday night. They forced me inside where I was cornered, hit and bullied. One woman is no match for three men. Somehow I escaped to the street, but they had the door off hte flat and changed the locks. I was locked out with very little other than my thin jacket on a freezing January night. I live in Prague as expat American-- so this was disaster. During the night while I was locked out, they stole everything of value that I had fom earrings to computer to walkmans, dictionaries, eyeglasses, wine--whatever their fingers wanted. Apparently during that time, they also tried to kill my beloved cat in my oven.
I escaped, but not unharmed. In my desperation I called more thn 36people for help as it was late night and I had nowhere to go. When the men came out, I was again attacked by the big thug who jumped me and bashed my head against the pavement and stole the binder that I was holding in my arms. It contained all my legal documents... This was just the beginning of a nightmare and crisis that is still ongoing in my life.
A month later-- February 10th, I was attacked the second time by a professional thug who took my purse, the newly replaced telephone and passport and month's income and the last shred of my identification. I didn't even have a birth certificate or pictutre to identify me and the US Embassy was the least helpful organization in the world. It wasn't until October that finally I had a passport sstamped with the full extension of time because without that, there was no way for me to replace the stolen documents. So the US Embassy with its refusal to help me in crisis added incredible stress, emotionally and financially, to my life.
The third attack came in March when a car ran me down. It threw me across the street and did some unpleasant damage to ribs and gave me nice contusions to internal organs. I had no money and all my properties of value had already been stolen from me. I was rather in permament state of shock and the poor do what they always do: they work. So despite cracked ribs on both sides of my body and severe trauma, I went back to work within 24hours and taught 12 straight hours... The trauma made it impossible for me to function very well as I had suffered a series of serious concussions and could not remember very basic things. The students had a great time ridiculing me because when I wrote on the blackboard, gibberish appeared. My knees were smashed to hell and I had to go to a doctor three days later because I ws in agony. He could not believe I ws able to stand, much less walk. A doctor told me I would not be able to see to rad for about 6months as a result of postconcussional syndrome. In that time I was stalked and terror really ruled my existence and I disappeared into silence.
I have CFS and no medical insurance.
So as a result of pain and trauma and stress, teaching English was not exactly viable-- I never understood what an opera singer was doing teaching English, so at least it relieved me of a very schizophrenic existence. Photography is only silent singing.
My life became a vicious cycle of hardship after that.
I don't know how I survived these things, but I try not to think of anything-- I try to ignore all the hardship and pain I have suffered and go on becasue I don't know what else to do.
A year ago, a Kodak franchise owner brought me a writing project to do :to develop a community newsletter for expats that would contain travel articles, restaurant reviews, business profiles and free community news note and ads such as birthdays, weddings etc-- The newsletter was to be bi-weekly with pictures and links that would be set up on his website. I would have all the writing and pictures to do initially and tp set up a monthly photo competition as well. Okay this is serious work and I calculated that it would be over 27pages in length to about 40pages which is a great deal of work for a person to produce and mount on the internet every two weeks, but on the other hand I am a very good writer and this could be the foundation of new life. However, before you start the circulation of such a newsletter, you must prepare the first 6-10 issues so that once it starts it continues.
So I did-- and he disapppeared with nonpayment. He didn't want to pay for the articles. He didn't want to pay for the pictures. He didn't want to reimburse any fo eh expenses and after all I'm native English speaking person so English must be easy for me. There was no regard for my university education or my past portfolio as a writer. When I sat him down to show him the amount of work it takes just to set up basic web pages on a blog with hyperlinks, he didn't want to waste his time on me, but he wanted to claim "all rights."
And in the end he just disappeared after months of my work with sampe articles mounted on the internet at Gather.com
This left me in serious crisis. He angered me with his comments that I could just copy the articles off wikipedia.org and my phyotgraphy wasn't worth payment. Anyone can take pictures.
This truly angered me-- I started submitting my pictures to photo contests in October 2006 and started winning Picture of the Day Awards with a dysfuncitonal, crappy Kodak camera that he had given me because he didn't want to pay me anything. The camera had been used when I opened it, so it really wasn't new, but it was discontinued product. It was also technically faulty and he did not maintain the guarantee on it. Two settings worked, but not the light meter and the shutter often didn't shutter or rather it shuttereed/ shuddered things to a smear.
Through the images winning picture awards, I realized that this was serious competition and I was very good at it. I started studying how I could use these skills and reading the legal stuff and technical specifications on Stockphoto sites because I am really good at-- I have the self-discipline and critical skills to work at a subject or to produce a subject after hours of effort. I do still life very well even with a bad camera, but I haven't a professional instrument to sell my images off to good stockphoto companies like Getty or Corbis.
The best way to help someone is to invest into their profession and their future, I can't pay rent right now and I havenn't an acceptable camera to do stockphoto, but it's really what I'd like to do. The computer died in December which added complications to expense and life. I have the skills, the tenacity and self-discipline that's required to achieve this. I understand problems of copyright and as a writer I can exploit this skill for writing articles, but I haven't money right now for basic things like rent.
I need help and I wish to have establish myself and repay myu debts to those who can help me.
I have a portfolio of winning photos, but none of them could ever be sold on the commercial market. The camera is technically faulty and professiional photgraphy requires a minimum of 8MP camera with RAW data files. Getty accepts a list of 4 cameras starting with the lowest model of the Coanon XT Rebel, but not for commissioned assignments. However with such a camera, I would be able to sell off the images and recover the money invested and stabilize my life.
I am exceptionally good at macro, still life and I want to do architecture in Prague-- I took an interest in Czech butterflies and found out that very few people are tracking them or identifying them. Butterflies are difficult subjects because they don't pose for the camera and require tremendous patience. They also sell for good prices if the photography is technically excellent.
All three are good for stock photo but architecture requires property releases whch I can obtain through an attorney for real estate. This would be a good niche for editorial a nd commercial stockphoto because of all the beautiful art deco in Prague.
I want to open a storefront on a site like Shutterfly where I can sell off the small images (4MP) privately at my own prices, but again I don't hae the money to pay the annual fees of 200USD or I would have done it before.
It would be nice just to have a decent keyboard.
I need help for rent and help for the future to establish myself. I am very hard worker, but I have CFS and in 2002 both shoulderss were broken and I had no medical care: it was agony to endure. My right arm is shorter than my left bu about 4cm as a result of an overlapping fracture and this causes problems for typing and my hand can be quite spastic at times. I just try to get on with it.
I am looking for a partner who can help me begin a ne life and invest into me as a worthy venture for the future. I need the help and faith of someone who can understands how hard it is to always be on the bottom and be given inferior products but demanded to produce the best.
I wish to establish myself and be able to have medical care and go to a doctor when I suffer serious injuries and feed myself.
I wish to regain my personal sense of dignity and value to society. The work I do is good and I wish it always to improve, but for me to escape this crisis I need a future and a camera will provide it. I need to pay the rent, but tht's short term-- the profession though is all important. This gives me my sense of dignity and self-worth. It will also pay the rent and return the investment.
Tthank-you for reading this. The police reports are in Czech and seriously I just tried to survive the attacks.
