Thao Brinkschulte moved from Vietnam to a boarding school in Germany when she was 16. Now, Thao works two jobs that she loves, one as an editor and the other as a marketing manager. Thao wants to bridge the gap between Vietnamese and German culture and helps publish bilingual books for children. This is how she made it.
00:00I grew up very traditionally my parents were quite strict so just doing my
00:28homework having my extra curricula I have one sister and one brother they are almost like
00:3720 years older than me they are of living in Vietnam with their families I work as a marketing
00:45and communication manager learning human rights and responsible business so we are a human rights
00:52consultancy we advise business to integrate human rights to make human rights an important part in
01:01their operation sometimes people are not confident because they come from another country they do not
01:10speak German very good or do not speak English very good but let's use your skill in the best
01:20way look for jobs that need people who speak Vietnamese who speak Chinese who speak Tamil I
01:27don't know you will be the one for that opportunity I always try to bring my identity to my work
01:39Harami is a publishing house focus on bilingual books German Vietnamese I didn't look for this job it
01:56was it was such a coincidence Harami made a Facebook post hey we are Harami we have published these two
02:05books books and have a look and I discovered on the cover two typos and I was texting the publisher hey I
02:17discovered some typos on your cover so next time if you have other books I can I can help with editing
02:24I'm very happy to contribute because it's something you can do for the community and you can see the impact direct in front of you
02:43I came to Germany with 16 so that's the age you want to be
02:54independent you want to be on your own so all that excitement helped me a lot I I didn't really have the feeling of homesick
03:24actually um it was my dream but it was not my decision so my father he was here on a business trip on that trip he was at my school and he thinks that it's a very good school and he just paid the fee and then we apply for the visa
03:45my family my family was very supportive in the first month they call me almost every day yeah because
03:54my my mother was very worried I managed to get C1 in eight months so I am very proud of that
04:01I have two sons one is still in the kindergarten it is quite a challenge to have children
04:10sometimes they ask me when's the best time to have children and I always make a joke so have children early
04:21so you can still open the milk bottle
04:28there's a very big Vietnamese community in Berlin but somehow they all live in the east part of the city
04:38so it's quite an an adventure it's like a trip home when I go from Charlottenburg to Dongsun center in the east
04:47takes me like one hour it's like a small trip and I go there into this hall and getting my food and having my time
04:56uh go to the hairdresser so it feels like a bit like a trip home
05:02so my big passion um over the last years is uh foraging and cooking but now this is just winter and I need to find something I can do inside
05:16so I started with uh coloring because my my son he he had this face where he really enjoyed to draw
05:27and watching YouTube tutorial how to draw dinosaurs so I start to buy pens and more pens so that's how I start with coloring
05:41I really enjoy Germany I really enjoy my life here
05:44I think my home is here so yeah I don't really miss home I have the home here
