’65. Okay, so ’72, I would be seven years old, eight is ’73, nine is ’74, 10 is ’75, 11 is ’76, 12 is ’77, 13 is ’78, 14 is ’79. Yeah, 14, 15. About 19… Okay, back around 1979, 1979, 1980, around that time I was around 13 or 14 years old.

I was already taller (6’2″) than many adults by the time I hit my very early teenage years

I had met some people who suggested that I should do some modelling. And I was very tall already, I was already 6′ tall, 6’1″ at that age, lanky and long legs and all that stuff. What I was told was with some grooming and fixing up and haircut and training and all that, and a little bit of weightlifting, that I could be a model.

That’s never occurred to me ever, to be a model or to do modelling because at that time, it was more for girls. Of course, there were male models, there were a lot of male models because with female models, you have to have male models. But it never occurred to me because I’m from a little town – Howell, New Jersey – and I was just a small kid and I don’t really look at fashion magazines and all that stuff.

Anyway, someone had suggested that to me and told me to contact Barbizon Modelling Agency… Modelling and Training Agency that was in a bigger city of New Jersey. So I’m going to do some research before we put this up. It was either in Trenton or Newark. N-E-W-A-R-K, Barbizon Models 1979, we’ll have to Google later.

So a letter describing me and pictures of me were sent to Barbizon Models… Modelling Agency and Modelling Training Center in New Jersey. You have to realise we’re just one hour from… one and a half hours from New York so it’s very nearby.

And a few weeks later, we got a letter back. We got a letter back from Barbizon and I had been accepted to be trained as a model, which means I would have to go to Barbizon and sign up there, and also pay a fee and train to walk, exercise, hair, grooming. Barbizon would not be responsible but they will also sign me up perhaps, they said, to be sent on jobs to do modelling. Send on jobs means what? That you have to go there and you have to go for auditions for modelling.

So I had remembered that a few weeks back and someone was talking about that, and I had… it completely slipped my mind.

Myself back in Los Angeles when I was in my teens

And so when the Barbizon letter came back, I was quite surprised. Because you know, we don’t have Internet, we don’t have a lot of communication that time but I had been accepted by a modelling agency which, on the East Coast, was big. It wasn’t massive but it was pretty big. It was pretty well-known because they have commercials on TV all the time farming for models-to-be. In any case, I had gotten the letter and I was to go there in the summer – because in the winter, I will be in school – and to live there for, like, six weeks, seven weeks to train, and I would have to stay there.

I wasn’t so much interested in the modelling for modelling but I thought it would be a good way for me to get away from home. Because it wasn’t very easy at home for me. It wasn’t very easy with my mom and my dad, they had a lot of arguments, there was a lot of fighting and disharmony.

I was 16 here and standing outside of my apartment on Sunset Blvd, Hollywood

And as a result, I would receive a lot of the tail end of that which is, you know, a lot of punishments and shouting and beatings and all that stuff. So living at home was quite a frightful experience for me, being a kid. Literally, I didn’t know if I came home from school, would things be calm or there will be violence or there will be shouting, there’ll be screaming or my mother leaving or things broken? It was almost a weekly affair and that was how I grew up. So getting away to a bigger city in New Jersey and to train to be a model, and perhaps make my own money, and to live on my own was really a huge opportunity for me to get away legally. That was really part of my motivation.

The other part would be nice to have my own money and to do what I wanted. So in the US, if you’re under 18, you need your parental consent, signed. Without that, you can’t do anything in the US if you’re under 18, at that time. I don’t know about now. So I told my cousins and my cousins told me they were happy for me and they were congratulatory, because I have another cousin who also was doing modelling in Philadelphia and she looks spectacular. I don’t know how much she had done because I wasn’t in close contact with her. So I just thought it’d be an opportunity for me to get away from home.

Many years later in Los Angeles with my model cousin. At the time Barbizon accepted me, I was still in New Jersey and this cousin Sonia Waskin pictured with me was modelling in Philadelphia. She was stunning. After I had run away to Los Angeles, she came to visit me along with another cousin of ours, Sara Andreyev. It was nice to be with these two cousins. We were almost around the same age.

And so my cousins were happy for me, the ones that I’d spoken to and they were a little taken aback because you always hear sordid things about the modelling world. At least, you do when you’re in a small hometown.

But in a small hometown, there’s a lot of sordid things happening too that, you know, people don’t realise that are happening in the small town. In any case, I went to my mom, I didn’t go to my dad. I waited for my mom to be in a really good mood. I waited for her to be, you know, on a more lighter mood because you kind of have to wait for her to be in a better mood to approach her with things. Her moods were quite affected by my father and the things he would do to her.

I was around 14 in this picture. On the left is Susie my cousin and on the right is Susie’s good friend Audrey.

In any case, so one day, one fine day, my mother was in a really good mood. She was chirpy, she was happy and we were in the kitchen together and I showed her the letter. And she read a letter, she couldn’t read too well because she couldn’t read English that well, but she got the gist of it. And I read a letter to her and I told her basically, I got accepted into Barbizon Modelling Agency, I have the height and I have the build, and I have to build up and, you know, I can make some money.

She thought about it and she says, “Definitely not” and my whole world sank.

And so I got up the courage, which I usually dare not, I asked her, “Why not?” Because you see, in our household, you’re not allowed to ask ‘why not’. Your parents tell you, you just do it. You’re not allowed to talk back or question in any way. I wasn’t allowed to. If you question, then there could be a very big slap on the face.

So I got the courage up and seeing my mother was really in a good mood, I asked her, “Why not?”

Taken in Asbury Park, I was around 13 or 14 years old. I was already around 6-foot tall, lanky, with long legs and all that. So I was told by someone, I can’t remember who, that I could model and sure enough, Barbizon accepted me but my mother (wearing white) did not allow me to go.

She says, “Because models have to do a lot of dirty things. They have to sleep with a lot of people and a lot of people do bad things to their bodies, and it doesn’t matter if you’re a boy or girl, they’ll do very bad things to you.” And she doesn’t want that to happen to me.

I said to my mom, “But look, you can be there with me.” I was hoping she won’t come but parents are allowed to come along to the training. Parents are allowed to, it says that. And my mom was like, she can’t leave her responsibilities at home to be with me for six weeks, or whatever weeks it was at Barbizon. And I said, “But you know, it’s an opportunity.”

I was hoping that, you know, she would not come along and I’ll just be sent alone. I said to her, “But mom, I can take care of myself, you know, I can watch myself.” She goes, “No, you can’t. You can’t watch yourself. You can’t take care of yourself. Those people are smarter than you. They’re older than you. And they’re basically not good people. Because people who do modelling are not good. People who do modelling agencies are not good.” That’s what she said. “So modelling and modelling agency people are not good and they’re going to ruin you, ruin your body and ruin your life. So you can’t do it.”

And so when she started saying that, she started getting a little excited so I decided not to pursue it anymore because when my mother starts getting excited and you pursue her, it will not be a good turnout and I didn’t… I was afraid, I was always afraid of her.

A German lady student of Zong Rinpoche’s took this picture of myself at Thubten Dhargye Ling Dharma centre’s backyard in Los Angeles. I was probably around 18 at the time in 1983.

So I just saw my opportunity disappearing and kind of going away. But it was interesting because it’s something that I’d remember recently. And it just came to my mind and so when I finally left home, that was when I was, I think, around 14, 13, 14. When I finally left home and I arrived in Los Angeles at 15 and 16, I was again asked to do modelling in Los Angeles, but it was different types of modelling and it was also pornography, which of course I never got into. But that’s a whole different other story.

Tsem Rinpoche

At the time I was accepted by Barbizon, I had the great fortune to study under a direct disciple of His Holiness Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche. My first Guru was the Most Venerable Kensur Rinpoche Lobsang Tharchin: https://www.tsemrinpoche.com/?p=4612

My life in New Jersey was not easy but having cousins my age, and also loving aunts and uncles definitely helped. You can read about them here: https://www.tsemrinpoche.com/?p=8201

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