what was Venice Beach before May 1944 in
occupied Belgium a young girl aged 22
gets arrested because she was doing his
distance and bringing fake papers and
gets transferred after four days in
cattle train she arrives in Auschwitz
she is 22 years old the war is almost
over everywhere but she goes there is
then the work camps then there is a
famous death walk that she goes to
another camp ravensberg and then another
camp as the German we’re losing the war
by the time she arrived at the third
camp she was very very bad she could
hardly move she weighed 49 pounds one
day they woke up and the German had gone
and the Russian came and the Russian
raped them and then they God and then
the American came and they were put in
hospital she weighed 49 pounds but she
went back to Belgium and her mother fed
her little by little a little bit by
little bit every 10 minutes so she grew
like a balloon and six months later her
fiancee who was in Switzerland came back
they met and they got married and the
doctor told them you can get married but
you can absolutely not have a child
because if you have a child you won’t
survive and the child won’t be normal
well sure enough nine months later I was
and that was the story of my mother my
mother used to say to me she used to
write and tell me God saved me so that I
can give you life by giving you life you
gave me my life back
you are my torch of freedom so this is a
lot for a little girl and there I was
with the torch of freedom so the three
lessons that my mother gave me that are
the most valuable to me one is fear is
not an option so she would actually if I
was afraid of the dark she would put me
in the dark closet and lock me in the
dark closet today she would probably go
to jail but anyway what happens if you
are in a dark closet first of all after
a few minutes you realize that it’s not
dark it doesn’t stay dark and even if it
did you shouldn’t be afraid so fear is
not an option was something that was
really put into me the other one was no
matter what you can never be a victim it
doesn’t matter
she used to say I looked at the German
in the eyes and anyway never be a victim
when they arrived at the camp she always
said that one of the worst thing where
those cattle train that they were for
four days going from Belgium to Poland
so she became friendly with a woman who
was in her 40s and she said no matter
what I will never leave this woman I
will never leave this woman this woman
spoke a little German
so she’s just stuck to this woman when
they arrived they were shaved and they
were put in a long long line and there
was a soldier who would say you go right
you go left you go right you go left and
then behind this man in an elevated
something just like about this there was
another man of a higher rank all dressed
in white
and he didn’t move and so when time came
to for the friend of my mother the
soldiers say you go right and my mother
did not wait she went right following
and the soldier let her do that this
other man who hadn’t moved the entire
time when she took my mother hit her
I mean whipped her and threw her on the
other side and she looked at this man
with such hate and such hate and why why
do you have to do that she’s never hated
anybody so much well the truth is that
this man actually saved her life because
the people who were going on the ride
went to the gas chamber so the reason
I’m telling you that is we all go
through situation that something
completely goes wrong and we think it’s
the worst thing in the world so maybe
it’s not so this is a very dramatic
example of it but it works it’s a friend
of yours complains so I grew up feeling
a little bit like an alien in Belgium
everybody has blonde straight hair and I
had a little black curly hair and I was
born after the war I didn’t have a
brother a sibling until I was six so I
was very much on my own so I had books I
love to read and I love to imagine
things I started to write my diary and I
really wonder will anything ever happen
to me I mean Belgium is so sad and it
rains all the time and the more it rains
the more my hair gets curly and I really
did not know what was going to happen
but at that time really early on I had a
revelation and my revelation what
happened watching myself in the mirror
my mother had a big vanity with a mirror
and I was looking at this mirror and
it’s not that I thought I was pretty
because I didn’t but what I liked about
this mirror is if I made moves she would
make the same movement and I could stay
hours doing this
mayor will do this I would like them and
that’s the day I realized that I
actually had control over myself and
it’s probably being the most useful
thing I’ve ever had and that’s why I
always say the most important
relationship in life is the one you have
with yourself because after that any
other relationship is a plus and not a
mas so my mother wanted a big life for
me so she put me in boarding school in
Switzerland and in England I was
starting to live my adventure I went to
university in Geneva Switzerland and I
met this wonderful beautiful
good-looking young Prince Aegon
Furstenberg and I was dying to be
independent more than anything I wanted
to be independent I wanted to have my
own life design my life know what I
wanted to do and when you start in life
you don’t really know there’s all these
doors in front of you which which is
going to be your door and my door
happened to be meeting a man who had a
factory and he had a printing factory in
Italy and there he used to be print he
used to print scarves for Gucci and
Ferragamo and all these places and there
I was just watching him screaming at his
workers it was quite obnoxious actually
and but I learned everything and with
the workers in Italy you learn
everything because a color is their
father was a colour is this the
grandfather was the colorist so I
learned everything about color and I
asked the man please please may I make
some samples from your factory and we’ll
try to go and sell them in America then
he said okay my boyfriend stops to raw
in Rome I go and visit him in Rome we
get engaged
goes on to Southeast Asia I go back to
the factory
my friend manufacture drives me from
factories factory I arrive in Milan I’m
not feeling well I think it’s because
he’s driving a Maserati no I’m pregnant
so I find myself pregnant with this
wonderful attractive rich man this was
not the way I had planned it I wanted to
be independent everybody was gonna say
why this little girl got him because she
was pregnant
long story short marriage was decided
for two months later and so I made my
first collection I absolutely wanted to
be independent and I came to America I
came slowly I decided to come by boat
because I wanted to dream about my
future life of course I was so nauseous
that I dreamt about nothing and and I I
arrived in America and I I didn’t know
what I was doing I had a suitcase full
of clothes I had one baby 13 months
later I had another baby going back to
the fact I took a hotel suite I showed
my first dresses I had miserable little
orders I would go back to Italy begging
for this man to make me the dresses and
he said I don’t have a room I have a big
factory please please please
anyone on and then little by little
there was a little rap job there little
rap job became a wrap dress and the Rob
dress was born in 1974 and I lived an
American dream it was the most amazing
thing I went through I mean I had a
great salesman who knew all the stores
and he would send me everywhere I went
from store to store and I was selling
confidence I would sell as I was getting
confident myself I was selling
confidence and because what I was
selling was addressed it all made sense
I related to the women I it was just an
incredible adventure and it was also the
women’s liberation it was so fun to be a
young woman at the time we were so free
we thought we invented freedom so you
know everybody says that I made that
dress but actually that dress made me
and my dream had always been to live a
man’s life in a woman’s body
and I did it by then I’m separated from
my husband but in a very very friendly
but I’m feeling free I am independent I
made a lot of money I had two children I
was like at the top of the world I
remember one day and it’s a wonderful
story one day I was because I had small
children at home so when I travel I
tried to take early plane in the morning
and then I was going to Pittsburgh from
New York in an early plane and no man
old man and I’m the only woman in the
plane and I’m you know kind of cute and
wearing a little dress with legs and
things and that that day I was on the
front page of The Wall Street Journal
and so I had all kinds of magazines and
newspaper and on top of it was the Wall
Street Journal and so there’s this guy
next to me and he’s trying well he’s
looking and he’s trying huh what what is
he gonna say to start a conversation and
then he says to me why does a girl like
you really read The Wall Street Journal
so I looked at him and I thought jerk
and and and I say I obviously was so
easy to say but look I did I am on the
but I actually decided to say nothing
and that was one of the best best best
satisfaction I ever had in my life that
I said nothing of course every time I
make a speaking engagement I tell the
story alright but of course not not
everything goes right not everything and
what goes up must go down after the huge
success I had you know everybody in
America had one two three five ten
twenty wrap dresses and so overnight
it’s saying you know it kind of sank and
I had to sell my business meanwhile I
had started a cosmetic business and so
my children grow up they went to
boarding school I fall in love with a
writer in Paris I moved to France and I
think fashion business is over for me
and I stay in Paris and I do a
publishing house for five years then the
love affair is not so great anymore I’m
I miss my children I miss America I come
back to America and there I had a really
really hard time because I realized that
what I had done my work my brand at the
time you didn’t even call it a brand new
you didn’t was my identity and I had
lost my identity and as a matter of fact
within two years
I got a cancer of the tongue and at the
base of the tongue and I do think that
the reason I had that is because I had
lost my expression I couldn’t express
myself anyway I had to face that and I
did and I learned how to meditate I
learned what the doctor could do and I
learned what my own power and that was
22 years ago so we’re good so anyway
today I am act as you watching me today
everyone tells me why you still
everybody you’re 17 and I said I don’t
understand when some oh you’re 5 years
old you ate already you’re 12 you’re 18
and then all of a sudden nothing I don’t
understand I mean I said I’ve lived so
fully I should be hundred and twenty
years old so anyway I am now as I was
turning 70 a few months ago I wanted to
take time and think what kind of woman I
was going to be for my third act what
how do I stay relevant and I was doing
Tai Chi I have a very good instructor of
Tai Chi and when you do Tai Chi he said
focus on the intention and I stopped him
and I say intention tell me more about
intention and he said well if you focus
on on force you will fail or break if
you focus on energy you will stagnate
but if you focus on intention and think
about it a lot you will achieve your
goal and your power so this was a
wonderful gift that he gave me and so as
I am today
and my age I decided that that what I
want to do is I want to use my voice I
want to use my experience I want to use
my knowledge my connection in order to
engage more and more the conversation
especially with women I have never met a
woman who is not strong or women are
strong but sometimes it’s a brother a
religion a father or sometimes it’s just
themselves oh I don’t want to make him
feel small oh I don’t want to do this we
all are like that but yet if there is a
tragedy somehow always the woman takes
over becomes a lion and saves the
situation so my advice is don’t wait for
the tragedy to
know that you are strong work on
yourself work on that knowledge of
you’re strong if you know you’re strong
you don’t always have to show it but
that is very much
what I want to spend the rest of my life
to do is to capture to use my voice to
capture voices of other women and weave
into fabric of strength compassion and
impact to make this world a better world thank you
occupied Belgium a young girl aged 22
gets arrested because she was doing his
distance and bringing fake papers and
gets transferred after four days in
cattle train she arrives in Auschwitz
she is 22 years old the war is almost
over everywhere but she goes there is
then the work camps then there is a
famous death walk that she goes to
another camp ravensberg and then another
camp as the German we’re losing the war
by the time she arrived at the third
camp she was very very bad she could
hardly move she weighed 49 pounds one
day they woke up and the German had gone
and the Russian came and the Russian
raped them and then they God and then
the American came and they were put in
hospital she weighed 49 pounds but she
went back to Belgium and her mother fed
her little by little a little bit by
little bit every 10 minutes so she grew
like a balloon and six months later her
fiancee who was in Switzerland came back
they met and they got married and the
doctor told them you can get married but
you can absolutely not have a child
because if you have a child you won’t
survive and the child won’t be normal
well sure enough nine months later I was
and that was the story of my mother my
mother used to say to me she used to
write and tell me God saved me so that I
can give you life by giving you life you
gave me my life back
you are my torch of freedom so this is a
lot for a little girl and there I was
with the torch of freedom so the three
lessons that my mother gave me that are
the most valuable to me one is fear is
not an option so she would actually if I
was afraid of the dark she would put me
in the dark closet and lock me in the
dark closet today she would probably go
to jail but anyway what happens if you
are in a dark closet first of all after
a few minutes you realize that it’s not
dark it doesn’t stay dark and even if it
did you shouldn’t be afraid so fear is
not an option was something that was
really put into me the other one was no
matter what you can never be a victim it
doesn’t matter
she used to say I looked at the German
in the eyes and anyway never be a victim
when they arrived at the camp she always
said that one of the worst thing where
those cattle train that they were for
four days going from Belgium to Poland
so she became friendly with a woman who
was in her 40s and she said no matter
what I will never leave this woman I
will never leave this woman this woman
spoke a little German
so she’s just stuck to this woman when
they arrived they were shaved and they
were put in a long long line and there
was a soldier who would say you go right
you go left you go right you go left and
then behind this man in an elevated
something just like about this there was
another man of a higher rank all dressed
in white
and he didn’t move and so when time came
to for the friend of my mother the
soldiers say you go right and my mother
did not wait she went right following
and the soldier let her do that this
other man who hadn’t moved the entire
time when she took my mother hit her
I mean whipped her and threw her on the
other side and she looked at this man
with such hate and such hate and why why
do you have to do that she’s never hated
anybody so much well the truth is that
this man actually saved her life because
the people who were going on the ride
went to the gas chamber so the reason
I’m telling you that is we all go
through situation that something
completely goes wrong and we think it’s
the worst thing in the world so maybe
it’s not so this is a very dramatic
example of it but it works it’s a friend
of yours complains so I grew up feeling
a little bit like an alien in Belgium
everybody has blonde straight hair and I
had a little black curly hair and I was
born after the war I didn’t have a
brother a sibling until I was six so I
was very much on my own so I had books I
love to read and I love to imagine
things I started to write my diary and I
really wonder will anything ever happen
to me I mean Belgium is so sad and it
rains all the time and the more it rains
the more my hair gets curly and I really
did not know what was going to happen
but at that time really early on I had a
revelation and my revelation what
happened watching myself in the mirror
my mother had a big vanity with a mirror
and I was looking at this mirror and
it’s not that I thought I was pretty
because I didn’t but what I liked about
this mirror is if I made moves she would
make the same movement and I could stay
hours doing this
mayor will do this I would like them and
that’s the day I realized that I
actually had control over myself and
it’s probably being the most useful
thing I’ve ever had and that’s why I
always say the most important
relationship in life is the one you have
with yourself because after that any
other relationship is a plus and not a
mas so my mother wanted a big life for
me so she put me in boarding school in
Switzerland and in England I was
starting to live my adventure I went to
university in Geneva Switzerland and I
met this wonderful beautiful
good-looking young Prince Aegon
Furstenberg and I was dying to be
independent more than anything I wanted
to be independent I wanted to have my
own life design my life know what I
wanted to do and when you start in life
you don’t really know there’s all these
doors in front of you which which is
going to be your door and my door
happened to be meeting a man who had a
factory and he had a printing factory in
Italy and there he used to be print he
used to print scarves for Gucci and
Ferragamo and all these places and there
I was just watching him screaming at his
workers it was quite obnoxious actually
and but I learned everything and with
the workers in Italy you learn
everything because a color is their
father was a colour is this the
grandfather was the colorist so I
learned everything about color and I
asked the man please please may I make
some samples from your factory and we’ll
try to go and sell them in America then
he said okay my boyfriend stops to raw
in Rome I go and visit him in Rome we
get engaged
goes on to Southeast Asia I go back to
the factory
my friend manufacture drives me from
factories factory I arrive in Milan I’m
not feeling well I think it’s because
he’s driving a Maserati no I’m pregnant
so I find myself pregnant with this
wonderful attractive rich man this was
not the way I had planned it I wanted to
be independent everybody was gonna say
why this little girl got him because she
was pregnant
long story short marriage was decided
for two months later and so I made my
first collection I absolutely wanted to
be independent and I came to America I
came slowly I decided to come by boat
because I wanted to dream about my
future life of course I was so nauseous
that I dreamt about nothing and and I I
arrived in America and I I didn’t know
what I was doing I had a suitcase full
of clothes I had one baby 13 months
later I had another baby going back to
the fact I took a hotel suite I showed
my first dresses I had miserable little
orders I would go back to Italy begging
for this man to make me the dresses and
he said I don’t have a room I have a big
factory please please please
anyone on and then little by little
there was a little rap job there little
rap job became a wrap dress and the Rob
dress was born in 1974 and I lived an
American dream it was the most amazing
thing I went through I mean I had a
great salesman who knew all the stores
and he would send me everywhere I went
from store to store and I was selling
confidence I would sell as I was getting
confident myself I was selling
confidence and because what I was
selling was addressed it all made sense
I related to the women I it was just an
incredible adventure and it was also the
women’s liberation it was so fun to be a
young woman at the time we were so free
we thought we invented freedom so you
know everybody says that I made that
dress but actually that dress made me
and my dream had always been to live a
man’s life in a woman’s body
and I did it by then I’m separated from
my husband but in a very very friendly
but I’m feeling free I am independent I
made a lot of money I had two children I
was like at the top of the world I
remember one day and it’s a wonderful
story one day I was because I had small
children at home so when I travel I
tried to take early plane in the morning
and then I was going to Pittsburgh from
New York in an early plane and no man
old man and I’m the only woman in the
plane and I’m you know kind of cute and
wearing a little dress with legs and
things and that that day I was on the
front page of The Wall Street Journal
and so I had all kinds of magazines and
newspaper and on top of it was the Wall
Street Journal and so there’s this guy
next to me and he’s trying well he’s
looking and he’s trying huh what what is
he gonna say to start a conversation and
then he says to me why does a girl like
you really read The Wall Street Journal
so I looked at him and I thought jerk
and and and I say I obviously was so
easy to say but look I did I am on the
but I actually decided to say nothing
and that was one of the best best best
satisfaction I ever had in my life that
I said nothing of course every time I
make a speaking engagement I tell the
story alright but of course not not
everything goes right not everything and
what goes up must go down after the huge
success I had you know everybody in
America had one two three five ten
twenty wrap dresses and so overnight
it’s saying you know it kind of sank and
I had to sell my business meanwhile I
had started a cosmetic business and so
my children grow up they went to
boarding school I fall in love with a
writer in Paris I moved to France and I
think fashion business is over for me
and I stay in Paris and I do a
publishing house for five years then the
love affair is not so great anymore I’m
I miss my children I miss America I come
back to America and there I had a really
really hard time because I realized that
what I had done my work my brand at the
time you didn’t even call it a brand new
you didn’t was my identity and I had
lost my identity and as a matter of fact
within two years
I got a cancer of the tongue and at the
base of the tongue and I do think that
the reason I had that is because I had
lost my expression I couldn’t express
myself anyway I had to face that and I
did and I learned how to meditate I
learned what the doctor could do and I
learned what my own power and that was
22 years ago so we’re good so anyway
today I am act as you watching me today
everyone tells me why you still
everybody you’re 17 and I said I don’t
understand when some oh you’re 5 years
old you ate already you’re 12 you’re 18
and then all of a sudden nothing I don’t
understand I mean I said I’ve lived so
fully I should be hundred and twenty
years old so anyway I am now as I was
turning 70 a few months ago I wanted to
take time and think what kind of woman I
was going to be for my third act what
how do I stay relevant and I was doing
Tai Chi I have a very good instructor of
Tai Chi and when you do Tai Chi he said
focus on the intention and I stopped him
and I say intention tell me more about
intention and he said well if you focus
on on force you will fail or break if
you focus on energy you will stagnate
but if you focus on intention and think
about it a lot you will achieve your
goal and your power so this was a
wonderful gift that he gave me and so as
I am today
and my age I decided that that what I
want to do is I want to use my voice I
want to use my experience I want to use
my knowledge my connection in order to
engage more and more the conversation
especially with women I have never met a
woman who is not strong or women are
strong but sometimes it’s a brother a
religion a father or sometimes it’s just
themselves oh I don’t want to make him
feel small oh I don’t want to do this we
all are like that but yet if there is a
tragedy somehow always the woman takes
over becomes a lion and saves the
situation so my advice is don’t wait for
the tragedy to
know that you are strong work on
yourself work on that knowledge of
you’re strong if you know you’re strong
you don’t always have to show it but
that is very much
what I want to spend the rest of my life
to do is to capture to use my voice to
capture voices of other women and weave
into fabric of strength compassion and
impact to make this world a better world thank you
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