“The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity.” — Amelia Earhart
Back in the days when I was studying at the University of Technology Sydney as an international student, my school tuition fee was a lot higher than local students. In order to make up for the education cost, I worked in many service jobs: My very first job was waitressing in a dumpling house (this perhaps set up the foundation for me to design the dumpling 🥟 emoji). I also worked at a sushi shop, an ice cream shop, a donut house, a salad bar, and I even had a job as a door-to-door bilingual interviewer, where I knocked on doors of many neighborhoods throughout the city, asking hundreds of people to fill in questionnaires… I learned a lot from working in service jobs: it helped me to be humble and have more empathy for people, as I understood how hard it was to make a living.
In my 2nd year, I decided to do something relevant to the work I have created in my 1st year: I’ve made the Angelfish, Lion Fish, Sea Horse, Pineapple Fish, Sting Ray, Octopus mask designs after my visit to the Sydney Aquarium.
当我在澳大利亚读书的时候，作为国际留学生，我们的学费比当地学生要高出很多(一般是5到10倍)。 为了弥补昂贵的学费，我从事了很多服务性的工作。我的第一份工作是在饺子馆里做服务员 (这也在冥冥之中为我最终设计了饺子 🥟 表情符号奠定了坚实的基础)。 我还在寿司店，冰淇淋店，甜甜圈店，沙拉吧工作过…… 都是些与吃有关的行业。我甚至还做了一份很神奇的双语问卷调查的工作。那份工作需要我在悉尼7个不同地区，挨家挨户地敲门，和数百名双语家庭成员沟通，让他们填写问卷调查…… 现在想来，这种工作完全可以用互联网的问卷调查表来代替。服务行业虽然比较苦比较累，可是我从与人打交道的过程中学到了非常宝贵的经验：它们使我懂得了谋生的艰辛，更教会我理解和尊重别人。
在学校二年级的时候，我决定做些和设计有关的事情。 在我大学一年级时，我设计了一系列海洋生物的面具设计：神仙鱼，狮子鱼，海马，菠萝鱼，黄貂鱼和章鱼
My above designs got good school marks, yet they don’t pay my expensive tuition fee.
What if I publish or market them? I thought.
虽然我的上述设计作品在学校得到了的优秀的成绩，但他们却无法抵我下学期昂贵的学费。所以我想：那让我来试着推销自己的作品吧!
Utilizing the interpersonal skills I’ve learned from my freshman year, I was able to get a hold of the marketing department of the Aquarium. The team said they were impressed by this artwork and expressed their interest to commission me to create new designs for celebrating its 20th anniversary and creating more awareness for the public for ocean conservation.
So I created 4 more new designs: Clownfish, Shark, Dugong, and Seal and licensed to the Aquarium.
我把这些设计带到了悉尼水族馆，凭着我在大学一年级的社会工作经验中学到的人际交往能力，我很快地识了水族馆的营销部门的主要负责人。 他们都很喜欢我的作品，并决定聘请我创作4件新的海洋生物作品：鲨鱼，儒艮，海豹和小丑鱼：
These new designs were licensed and printed onto 15, 000 masks to give away to every child who visits during school holidays in 2008, to celebrate its 20th anniversary and create more awareness for marine animals. The designs made into The Sydney Sunday Telegraph newspaper and license fee helped to cover my school cost, Hooray!
悉尼水族馆把我的设计制作成15, 000个面具，赠给每个在2008年暑期来水族馆的孩子们，来庆祝水族馆成立20周年。与此同时，这个活动也提高大众对海洋生物的认识和喜爱。 这些设计荣登“悉尼星期日电讯报”首页，同时我得到的设计费用也足够地支付了我下个学期的学费。
若不是生活所迫，谁愿意把自己弄得一身才华。
This was my first Artrepreneur story.
这是我的第一个用艺术创业的故事。
“最难的事其实是果断地采取行动，剩下就是坚持。” — 阿米莉亚·埃尔哈特
This article was originally published on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-i-became-artrepreneur-yiying-lu/?published=t
