“El Café del Futuro”- WIN A SCHOLARSHIP WITH CAFE BUSTELO

Friday, February 10, 2017



Today I’m very excited to be partnering with Café Bustelo, not only to tell you a little bit of my education story, but to encourage you to enter “El Café del Futuro”  scholarship program.  This scholarship, in partnership with HACU (Hispanic Association of Colleges & Universities) is an essay contest for all students of Hispanic descent living in the U.S. All the details on how to enter are below!

As many of you know, I was born and raised in Venezuela #ProudLatina. My father, 7th of 9 children (yes, big family), graduated first of his class- and moved from a small country town to the big capital to go to college where he graduated Summa Cum Laude. He taught me about the importance of education; that with long days of work, passion, sweat, and sometimes a few tears, anything is possible.

I’m not going to lie, I always felt the pressure of following his footsteps. I definitely wasn’t #1, but I was a great student. I also enjoyed after class activities; I did gymnastics, ballet, dance, tennis, swimming. During my junior year in high school, I decided I wanted to study in the U.S. My country started going through a difficult situation that still continues today and I realized the “anything is possible” had to be thousands of miles away from home. 

The following 12 months were full of after-class advanced English classes. My English was good, but not good enough to share a classroom with native-speakers. It was a difficult year where I spent Biology & Chemistry classes reading SAT verbal essays (hey, imagine all those fancy words in another language), taking practice tests every other afternoon, going to dance class, and making sure I was keeping my grades up. But the hardest part was about to come: starting over alone at the age of 17 in a foreign country.

I was very lucky to meet my now-husband the second week of college. He played a big role in keeping me motivated and he gave me that extra push to always go after my dreams when I was away from my amazing family. I  studied Business with a specialization in Marketing. At that time, I had no idea how this choice would help me with the business side of making blogging a career. During my senior year, I wrote my first blog post and I instantly realized I had found my passion, what I really wanted to do. 

After a year of working at a Marketing agency and blogging (when I had the chance after work), I realize I wanted to go back to school for Fashion Merchandising. I knew the competition in the Fashion Industry is extreme and I knew education in the field would give me the tools to go even further. Thankfully the University transferred all the credits from my general and business classes and I could get my second degree by taking what I thought were “fun classes” (Styling, Fashion Magazines, Product Development, etc).  At that moment everything changed. I wanted to go to class every day, I went beyond the requirements (if we had to do a collection of 6 shoes, I would do 12…just because I was enjoying it so much). All this passion got me a Summa Cum Laude (Yay I did it, papá). I finally understood the saying “Choose a career you love, and you will never work a day in your life”.

I’m proud to say I absolutely love what I do.  We opened Nany’s Klozet LLC a few years ago. I’ve worked with the most amazing brands in incredible campaigns. I’ve designed capsule collections. I’ve spoken at conferences. But most importantly, I hope I’ve continued to inspire you throughout the days to go after your dreams.



To enter, you must write an essay of 800 words or less (in English or Spanish) describing how your Hispanic/Latino heritage, family, and the community in which they grew up has inspired their desire and motivation to obtain a college degree and how they plan to give back to their community.

Deadline to enter: May 26th, 201













5 comments

  1. Hi! I'm sharing this on twitter. Besos desde Barcelona,
    Marta

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  2. Love your outfit!

    http://martasfashiondiary.com/sheermetallics/

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  3. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  4. Love your style. expecting more good blogs from you.

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  5. I love Cafe Bustelo! You guys are adorable by the way. Besos.

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