Monica Perna: Building a Business and a Life in Ras Al Khaimah

RAK & ROLL | Episode with Dr Monica Perna
Host: KAAN Bozoglu | Guest: Dr Monica Perna
Recorded at Innovation City, Ras Al Khaimah
Running time: 63:38 (timestamps match the cleaned audio file)

Speakers: KAAN = KAAN Bozoglu (host), MONICA = Dr Monica Perna (guest)
Machine transcript with speaker labels, proofread for names and places. Short interjections
("yeah", "sure") sometimes sit inside the other speaker's line.

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[00:00] KAAN: All right, hi guys, it's KAAN Bozoglu from Innovation City again. We're gonna, our guest today is Monica Perna. She's originally from Italy. She has built multiple businesses and she's an author at the same time. Very interesting personality and interesting thing story. Hi Monica. Thank you for coming.

[00:24] MONICA: Hi. Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure being here.

[00:28] KAAN: Let's dive in right away. You are originally from Italy, right? Yes. So this is what I want to know. How was life in Italy before everything else before the whole adventure? How was life in Italy?

[00:44] MONICA: Yeah, sure. Sorry, I didn't want to cut you off. I have to honestly say that my life in Italy was pretty decent. I mean, I was happy about my life. I didn't have a pain that then was driving me to the desire of moving abroad. However, there was an episode that took place. My husband and I bought the house of our dreams. It was this standalone villa in the middle of a very big green space. We have four dogs, four Jack Russells. So if you are familiar with dogs, you know that they have this great energy, they are really my whole heart. And so we wanted this huge house with a big garden for them to have fun and spend time outdoor, especially in summer. So we bought this house with all our savings plus we of course started the mortgage. And then we started the renovation. We wanted it to be renovated because it was the house of our dreams and in our previous mindset it was supposed to be our house forever. So we started the renovation and all of a sudden the contractor started asking us some money a little bit ahead of time because he was saying that he was facing some challenges and he was having some issues with some suppliers so he was in need of big amounts of money guaranteeing us that the delivery would have been faster so we trusted this guy and we paid him but unfortunately or fortunately because now I'm very happy that all of this happened he disappeared so he left the house completely destroyed because it was in the middle of the renovation so imagine that there were holes no floor I mean it was a disaster and all this money was gone We started the legal case but we found out that basically this guy was so clever that there was basically nothing under in his name. So it was impossible somehow to get the money back. We were so disappointed that we started the legal case. The Italian let's say bureaucracy was continuously letting us down and so all of a sudden we said you know what maybe we do not belong here any longer. We have to find another place to call home. In that period, the best friend of my husband had basically recently moved here in Dubai. He was in Dubai and he was always telling us, guys, come on, let's leave the past, come here, spend some days in Dubai, just have a moment of relief after all these big, very bad stories. We said, okay, let's go. We spent a week, I think it was in downtown and I said I can never live here, where can my dogs, of course, enjoy. There are skyscrapers. It's a disaster. I cannot live here for them. But then we found this amazing place in Dubai South called the Green Community that is made of villas with big gardens exactly like our dream with expats having three, four, five, six dogs per house. so it was like the dog paradise. And so we said, yeah, maybe here we could leave. The vet was Italian and they said, okay, bingo, this is the place where we can move. We signed the tenancy contract. It was nothing basically was decided. We said, okay, let's let's commit. So we started all the paper, the company and everything, the tenancy contract, the first deposit, then we went back to Italy, arranged the moving and after three months we were here.

[04:31] KAAN: But this is very interesting like in multiple reasons is very interesting for me. First thing what you're describing is multiple dogs That sounds a lot like Philippines where I lived Mind you in Philippines dogs are everywhere like you can't take your dog to restaurant to shopping mall as long as you put a diaper Sure, sure. Okay. Okay. Okay, but There it is kind of a status symbol. Uh-huh to have dogs. Oh, okay Okay. In here, I see the same thing. Like I, in my place where I live here, there are people with huskies. Normally husky is not a dog for here. I see the same thing in Philippines. They have huskies. They should not.

[05:12] MONICA: Yeah, yeah. I totally agree.

[05:14] KAAN: There's a status symbol. So I wonder if what you discovered in Dubai was like that. That's my first question. The second question is a huge decision to hit a reset button in your life. How was business life was like in Italy?

[05:29] MONICA: This is a very good question that also of course supported our change by that time. I started my career as an educator, so basically it was a training Italians to become fluent or more confident in speaking the English language. I mean, Europe is not super famous for having these super high scores when it comes to foreign languages, we are so attached to our language and I mean I experienced somehow this very strong culture in Turkey. I was in Istanbul back in September. I loved it also because I am a big fan of Turkish food and I felt the same strong connection with our culture, with the old culture. So basically I had started this business in in Italy, delivering classes face-to-face.

[06:19] KAAN: For somebody else, for an institution? Or as an independent?

[06:22] MONICA: No, I started my own company. And then as a freelancer, I was hired by... We had Expo 2015, Milan. So I worked for Expo. I started working for universities, academies. So they called me out to deliver some classes. But I was having my own business. So I had an office. I was welcoming students in my office. And sometimes I was also traveling from city to city in order to deliver masterclasses or seminars, whatever. But that activity was not scalable, because the limit was my time. The moment that I hit like 15, 16, I mean, I come from a hard worker working family, so I am not scared of doubling down the amount of hours that I can work in a day. But after you reach 15, 17 hours, it's not humanly feasible to go on working. So there was a limit. And so we said, OK, maybe it's time to understand how we can make what we are doing scalable. And this friend that I was mentioning before, the one who had moved to Dubai, he was starting an online business by that time. And they told me, you know, Monica, maybe you should start teaching English online. I said, oh, I think that I barely had a Facebook account by the time I was not a tech girl at all, but I started learning online marketing, copywriting, sales pages, lead pages, everything from scratch. And I basically launched this business at the very, very first business that I had. It was Learn English with Monica SuperBasic. People were afraid at the very beginning because, you know, especially in Italy, people were saying, how can I learn a language online? It was before COVID, so back before COVID. And so they were even scared to put the data of their credit card to buy a course. But time after time, I started gathering trust and reviews and of course comments by people. And I created my whole academy online. So basically, I was before it was like 80% offline, 20% online, and then the ratio started becoming the opposite. And so when all this big issue with the house happened we said you know what we really don't have to stay here because our business is online we can leave whatever we want of course we just have to keep up with the time difference but Italy UAE it's two hours or three depending on the time because we changed the time in Italy every two times per year not apart from that I could run my company my company basically from everywhere. So that's how we managed to say, okay, let's do it and we just moved.

[09:09] KAAN: One thing is very interesting here. The teaching is not for everybody, right? Not everybody is capable of doing it. It's a skill set, but I would say it's even a talent. So how did you come up with an idea to convert your talent into a business? Because you might have a talent of great singing and you'll sing while you are cooking. It doesn't mean that you're going to capitalize on it. So you must have discovered your talent of teaching at some point and did you have like some sort of a aha moment to convert your talent into a business model?

[09:45] MONICA: Yeah, sure. I totally agree with you. I think that feeling the how can I say the inclination to teach is a kind of gift. I come from a very modest family. I mean, I had the need to make some money since I was very young. If I wanted to go on a holiday with some friends, I mean, I could not expect my family to pay for it. So I always had to make some money. And the perfect time for me to make money was the summer because I was very fast at studying and completing my homework, doing my homework and then I had all this free time that I could spend somehow or invest somehow in something. So I started giving private lessons since I was I think 16, 17. I was like going around with my bike from town to town, rain, sun, whatever, in order to deliver these private classes, especially to the students who had failed the English subject at school.

[10:47] KAAN: Oh, you're doing English from the beginning. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So you weren't like teaching today's sociology?

[10:55] MONICA: No, no, no, because it was, I mean, Italians in general, in our DNA, maybe, we are very proud of our culture that everything that comes from abroad, it's like a danger. So we also have a very poor presence of the English language among subjects at school. So it's very easy, let's say, to fail, because we don't have enough time to learn practice it is kind of okay it's a subject that must be there but at the end of the day we don't care much so there is this type of attitude especially in public schools in private could be a little bit different but in private in public sorry it's not the very best subject that they would basically English is considered less important than Latin yeah But I mean, Latin, nobody uses it. Yeah, but you know, it's part of our...

[11:49] KAAN: But it's a religious route to it.

[11:49] MONICA: Yeah, so you got the point. Yeah, sure. So I started tutoring very younger students from summer, in summer, since I was 16. And then when it was time, then I, of course, I went to the university. What can, which type of course can I attend? I decided to attend interpreting and translation. So I became an interpreter and translator, even if I have never... Yeah, I just had some freelancing, I think, gigs, let's say, but I have never started that career specifically. And then when it was time to understand what can I do with my life? I said, okay, you know what, maybe teaching can really be something for me. This is the basically the only way that I knew by the time to make money. So I just scale up.

[12:33] KAAN: Basically, it's evolved naturally. Aha moment. And you said, okay, from here on, I'm going to do this. It wasn't like that.

[12:41] MONICA: You just Yeah, it was when I was very young because you know necessities the mother of invention I Every kid wants some money to go to the cinema Just to you know You if you want to go to the mall and then you cannot buy and your friends can buy something you feel a little bit I want to be like them So I needed to somehow take some money because my my parents were very clear We will pay for your books for anything that is related to your education on, leisure is not on us. So if you want to have fun, find out a way. I remember that one of my experiences was to work in a bingo center in a town close to my village that was paying me something like $0.20 per hour. So basically nothing. And I remember that I was going there by bike because I couldn't afford the train because otherwise the compensation would have been killed. And my mom told me okay, let's pretend that you stay at home. How much money are you gonna make a zero? Okay, so 20 cents are better than zero go. So this is the type of environment where I have been Where I have grown so kind of military

[13:56] KAAN: I will say that's more Mediterranean because I grew up something similar You know what I mean? I think it's mentoring in the language of pushback. I kind of understand Italian as Italian as a language has a rhythm. Like it is even if you don't understand Italian, it has a rhythm. It sounds good to hear. English is not like that. English is more like it's like a train train cars going after. So I understand the like connection to Italian is fun. It's I understand that then okay, so you decided to come here to UAE. You have your Idea of what to do. You said I'm gonna switch to online. Yeah, they'll do the same thing Physical presence is not important or relevant What he surprised you when you came here was it surprising? I'm not talking about culturally business sense Like was it surprising for you to adapt here or it was a like smooth transition?

[15:05] MONICA: Let's say from my experience, it was very smooth because at the very for many years of my staying in the UAE, I've always served and catered European customers still online. So I didn't feel the need to somehow putting some roots here because my main source of income was coming from an existing business. I started here other business types of business like they're the one in real estate, so I started investing in properties. So yes, in that case, I faced some differences. And initially we have this kind of we are obsessed by the concept of quality. I don't know. I think that it's part of our DNA that everything has to be top notch quality. So the way that maybe you write to an email, you reply to a message. And here, sometimes I faced that people have different ways of being professional, some of them are more freestyle, let's say. So yes, that was a type of difference that I recognized the moment that I started having business here in the UAE. And then recently, when I opened my latest company in Ras Al Khaimah, that basically was a kind of step within my experience in this Emirate, because I lived five years in Dubai, and then recently I'm hitting the fourth year here in Ras Al Khaimah. I also started having some meetings, and especially meeting locals, and I understood, yes, that maybe sometimes we, as Italians, we are a little bit loud. This is something that I noticed. I mean, especially in meetings.

[16:50] KAAN: I'm half Greek, half Turkish. Both sides of me are loud. Fantastic!

[16:54] MONICA: So basically, you represent the best combination of my favorite foods. Greek, 50% Turkish, 50% Greek, really. In fact, that's why somebody say, are you sure that you are from Italy? Because you have a very nice food there. yes, but I am also a big fan of Mediterranean foods. Yeah, these are maybe yes, the type of things that I have noticed. Also, I studied a lot from the United States. In Europe, basically, we always look at the United States, if we wanted to be prepared for what is coming next, because something happens first in the USA, then comes to Italy, to Europe, sorry, and then to the rest of the world, basically. So I had all these years with these mentors that gave me the idea that I have to follow up, be very fast, scarcity, urgency. I mean, this very American style, here it didn't work. People were looking at me saying, you are aggressive. This type of approach, come down. But in my end, it was, oh, yeah, it doesn't work here. So this is the type of aha moment that I had here, yes, if I have to identify some.

[18:14] KAAN: And you're also an author, how did that come about? Is it from here? It's not from Italy, I assume, right?

[18:22] MONICA: Yeah, yeah, yeah, from Italy.

[18:24] KAAN: You started in Italy to write?

[18:27] MONICA: Yes, I was here already because my first book was written in 2023, so I was already here and it was in this emirate in Ras Al Khaimah. It was my first year in Ras Al Khaimah. Basically, it was a project that I always had in my mind. And then I a friend of mine who comes from Italy and moved to the UAE basically in the same period when I moved has a self-publishing company. And so he told me, why don't we? I mean, don't don't you start writing a book? I can give you some pieces of advice than to launch it. And I'm very happy that I did it because writing has always been one of my passion. I was very good at school writing essays. In Italy we like to assign very long essays every week or multiple times per week. Most European education systems. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's more of writing rather than speaking. So I thought it was very natural for me, it was kind of, yeah, it was something that I can do it, I want to do it. By then, I was very far from knowing AI and all this stuff, so I wrote it 100% because now people say, yeah, maybe you wrote it with AI. No, because in 2023, I had no idea about what ChatGPT could do, so I wrote it.

[19:49] KAAN: And it wasn't that good. but I mean AI for long, this is like the fourth year I've been here, so I've been since the beginning, but AI wasn't that good.

[19:59] MONICA: You would have never recommended me to use it as a partner or a writing buddy, yeah. So I had it written, I launched it, and it's still making me very, very proud because now I think we are hitting more than 25,000 copies sold, and I'm still very proud of it. I mean, it is still among the most sold books in Italy, in Amazon, when it comes to how to learn a foreign language from scratch, especially for the Italian market. So yeah, I'm very happy about that.

[20:32] KAAN: In North America we have Rosetta Stone.

[20:34] MONICA: I know it. Yeah, I know.

[20:37] KAAN: Is it the same concept for you? Or is it a little different concept?

[20:42] MONICA: Let's say my, my concept is to simplify, simplify, simplify. So again, there is this very strong limiting belief among Italians that English is very hard for me to learn. So my chances to succeed are so thin that I am basically doomed to fail. In order to encourage my audience to flip the script and approach a different mindset, I said, okay, guys, you know what, let's simplify everything. Let's go back to the roots and make everything super simple. There is this gentleman, because he's still alive, this gentleman in France, Mr. Nerrière, who back in the 80s came up with the concept of Globish, that basically is the simplified version of the English language that is spoken internationally and globally, especially in business, where maybe I may have a meeting with a Japanese manager and the Korean executive, we don't have the same level of English because maybe I attended an MBA, he didn't or he did something more than me. So Globish is this kind of common ground where misunderstandings are dropped to zero because we cannot misunderstand things especially if we are talking about business, right? Maybe you misunderstand the number or my offer.

[22:02] KAAN: Or even frame of reference like I see in marketing we see that a lot frame of reference because you don't have common frame of reference yeah like you cannot import a North American strategy or marketing campaign to UAE or even to Europe

[22:18] MONICA: Because in Europe yes because we are very open to their

[22:22] KAAN: Things humor like

[22:23] MONICA: Yeah yeah humor you know I agree yeah yeah yeah

[22:27] KAAN: I see that over and over again, including UAE. So in your case, it makes a lot of sense. You strip the frame of references that assumptions basically, remove assumption, take it down to basics so people can communicate with the fluency. Yeah, this is my understanding.

[22:49] MONICA: Yeah, this is exactly what it is. Yes, it's the perfect point of start. And then of course, we can build up the fluency. But at least we have a very clear framework work in which I can basically turn my thoughts from my native language into the English language and have this common ground that allows me to communicate with my guests or client, supplier, whatever it is.

[23:17] KAAN: How this is online thing, one of the like, because I'm in online business, you know, I help people is strengthening their online presence. One of the hardest things to do is to instill trust in people so they can basically give you money and expect something to gain from it. Yours is very interesting because you're trying to make them, you're not selling tomatoes, you're trying to have them evolve, right? Improve their standing with a language or even understanding and certainly even there there's a cultural part of it that they need to understand the cultural part too. How did you manage to instill that trust in people, especially online? Because like, I you can't dismiss me sitting side by side, walking face to face. But online is much harder. Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure. How did you manage that? How what was your success? Do you think? What was the reason of your?

[24:17] MONICA: Yeah, the recipe for sure is. First of showing up, showing up. Now it's, I started in 2017, let's say. So it's, it's gonna be 10 years next year in 2027, it's gonna be 10 years. Showing up every time, be present, be there, even if I was scared, even if I didn't want to, I always showed up and, for example, at the very beginning when I launched this Facebook group that people had to pay me monthly in order to be part of the group where I was going live and deliver classes, I remember that one of the ingredients was to over deliver. So maybe basically I was saying, okay, I will deliver classes almost every day, charging quite a small amount of money. So the value was such big compared with the amount that they were asking to invest. And I always remember that there were days in which there was a voice saying, you know, maybe today you feel a little bit tired. Just write a message saying, sorry, guys, let's skip for today. No, I have never skipped one lesson in almost 10 years. Never. Because that is the way that you show up. Online doesn't mean that our commitment is lose. No, it's strong, especially because I am demanding when it comes to my students to be disciplined, motivated, show up, do what is needed to get results. I should walk the talk. I should not do the same. Oh, sorry, I should do exactly the same, not the opposite. So showing up, over deliver value in order to make the investment so basically silly to say no, and then collecting stories, successful stories. We count today something like almost 7,000 five-star reviews across the platforms. 4.9. We are obsessed, because I am Italian, we are obsessed by over-delivering, getting positive feedback. If there is a negative a feedback. Of course, it is a lesson we call the student we understand. Please tell me what you didn't like. Was there something in the process that upset you? Let me understand. And then we try to take the experience as a growing opportunity. At the end, it's nine out of 10. These people then change the review maybe from two to five because they appreciate the time that we invest in them. And then number one ingredient of the recipe is, even if nowadays my academy has almost 40,000 students, for 40,000, for me, every single student is not an email or a random user, is a person. So I treat and I want my team to treat every single person as the one million own dollar, in my case, euro customer. So you are special to us, because it's thanks to you that the entire boat is cruising the sea.

[27:40] KAAN: And also it's I assume it not only serves your ego to be successful on something. And there's a satisfaction to it, right? Being achieved something is a satisfaction. watching somebody achieve something because of you is a different type of satisfaction. Yeah. So there is a like feeding your soul part of it. It's not only the money part of it, it's not only monetary. Sure. It's not only money. Did you notice anything that failed like you tried, okay, oh that was a good idea type of thing.

[28:17] MONICA: Oh my god, yeah, so many. Yeah, yeah, sure. I honestly can say that nowadays I am really doing the job of my dreams, that is style, being a student, being a learner. I turned 40 last February and I don't know, I thought that now I am in a completely new phase of my life. I feel that I want to be wiser, I want to give, I am more into now the biggest source of satisfaction is in giving. So I totally got the point when before you told me, I don't know why I'm doing all of this. But I really get your point. Sometimes it's hard. Sometimes I launch projects that don't work. The response is not what I was expecting. Or maybe some comment really hits my heart because after you put so much effort and maybe a negative comment can really have an effect on me, especially I'm talking about my my personal experience. So what I do, I screenshot these nice successful stories and all the moments in which I always asking myself why am I still doing all of that? I mean I could really retire. I could retire and go to a nice town in Bali. I'm a big fan of Bali but I cannot go because I cannot bring my dogs there so that's why you can go to Boracay. Yeah, but the Philippines are in fact my plan B. I totally agree with you. I could retire. So why am I still doing this? Because of what the type of impact that that I can have on people? Yeah. So yeah. So this I totally agree with you.

[30:00] KAAN: Think about the same thing too. Like you can go where I'm crazy for Boracay. They have a sand like salt powder. Okay, it doesn't first time I went there. I thought I got painted. I like stepped on a paint. It was sand. It's dead. Wow.

[30:17] MONICA: Crazy. Manila is the only airport in Asia that does not know as far as the quarantine for dogs. They don't require you

[30:27] KAAN: Could I move there during COVID. Okay. You can quarantine your dog at home.

[30:34] MONICA: Okay. Okay. Like here also here in the UAE. It's the same. Okay. Okay.

[30:38] KAAN: But like I when I brought my dog here, it's difficult to bring here. There's too much bureaucracy.

[30:44] MONICA: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that was higher.

[30:46] KAAN: Yeah, in Philippines, the cost is so low. And the bureaucracy is so easy. And like, you get the import permit like you do. Okay, you land, you go have your paper stamped. Thank you very much. Go home. And Filipinos is one of the countries that I love the most.

[31:06] MONICA: Yeah, I mean, I am in love with Philippines and the Filipino people in general, they're very helpful.

[31:12] KAAN: They are always smiling. They try to help you all the time. And the cost of life is very, very different than anywhere else I've been to.

[31:24] MONICA: Yeah, yeah, sure.

[31:24] KAAN: Anyway, I think the same thing. I can go to one of that places. Then I'm going to be hungry, not food wise. Like, I sleep three, four hours a day. The rest of the time I have to work, I have to create something. I do like two thousand things. If I live a isolated life, I'm gonna be like...

[31:51] MONICA: So you are a short sleeper. You're I mean like me. I also sleep. I mean I sometimes six Five to six. This is my average because I started this amazing miracle morning that for me it's a miraculous in which I wake up at 2.50 a.m. every morning and I have six hours just for me because the rest of the world is sleeping and so I am very I totally understand you that you have then this chunk of time that you can use

[32:22] KAAN: I don't have the same luxury because I have still companies in the US sure so they book meetings sometimes at 3 a.m. in Philippines it was harder because it was instead of 8 hours 12 yeah yeah of course.

[32:34] MONICA: Yeah, it's what they call the graveyard shift when you work at night,

[32:39] KAAN: At night, you have to work for here. Yeah, for North America. So anyway, I'm still not complaining. You know, it's my life. I love it. It's no problem for me. Let me ask you one thing. Now, we established that this everything developed for you organically with the teaching then converting your talent into a money-making machine or that sounds so cheap.

[33:05] MONICA: Okay, converted my source of living.

[33:10] KAAN: Then you moved to UAE, different life, reset your life, and had a smooth transition. Then what happened? Why did you move towards Ras Al Khaimah? Because Dubai is an interesting life too, right? Yeah.

[33:27] MONICA: Yeah. Yeah. I love the living in Dubai. Yeah. Yeah. I really had a great time there.

[33:32] KAAN: For me, it looks like a spaceship the whole city. From the architecture to everything and all the facilities, all the possibilities. Ras Al Khaimah I would say more like a summer town. Yeah.

[33:44] MONICA: Yeah. Yeah. It is.

[33:45] KAAN: Yeah. So how did you decide to move into Ras Al Khaimah? What was that transition like?

[33:50] MONICA: Yeah. I am super grateful for what Dubai did for me because I think that the results that I achieved during the five years that I lived there, I would never achieve those results back in Italy. In Italy, the mood, the energy is very calm or yeah, we think in Milan, I come from the northern part of the country that we run, but compared with Dubai, no, we are not running, we are having a nice walk, let's say. So the energy of Dubai was really giving me what I was in need in order to boost my business and move it to the next level. Then what happened was that I rent by choice, I mean I have properties but I am more Kiyosaki school so I rent by choice. The landlord of my villa gave me the notice. I have always lived in that villa so for me it was my house then it was the house of my dream so I really wanted to stay in that house. So I had, I went through these crisis, let's say, I know that it can sound silly, but for me it was a disaster by the time of my God, I need to move out. And so I said, okay, let's look for opportunities. Now it's my opportunity to move my dream to the next step. What was my dream was to have a nice villa with a big garden for my dogs, but also to have what? The sea. The beachfront villa, that was my dream. I mean when I was a teenager I was saying I would like to live in a big beach front villa so I started looking around Palm Jumeirah very let's say aggressive prices by that time so I started looking at other Emirates and they found out that there was Ras Al Khaimah that I had never been here before that research on property finder and I discovered the existence of Mina Al Arab and I said Okay. I arranged a staycation for my husband. I said, okay, next weekend, we're gonna go to Ras Al Khaimah. There is a nice Ritz-Carlton. I want to spend a couple of days there so that we can relax and have a nice time. In Al Hamra. Okay. So I was the one driving, I said, at the GPS, but the destination was not the Ritz-Carlton. It was a villa in Marbella, so the opposite side, because I had secretly taken an appointment with a real estate agent to show us a couple of villas in the community. So as soon as we entered the community my husband starts asking, are you sure that there is a Ritz-Carlton here? It doesn't look like the entrance of a hotel. Then we stopped in front of the villa, we entered this villa and really the first house that I lived in here was really the house of my dream 2.0. I don't know if you have ever seen a Malibu Marbella Villas. Yeah. Yeah. Have you ever entered one of the they have these floor to ceiling windows beachfront the pool? Oh my God, everything that I wanted was there like, you know, you have a dream with ABC and ABC were all there. So I told my husband, would you like living here? Do you like, I don't know, where are we? I mean, he didn't even know where we were. Okay, we started the negotiation with the real estate agent. Then we went to Ritz-Carlton because we had the booking there. While we were having a nice time at the Ritz-Carlton, we went to the beach. We said, oh my God, here the sea is much nicer than Dubai because it is, I mean, it is a reality. We can see the mountains, nice. how green is the vegetation? It's so nice. It's so quiet. So we started leaving the dream. We went to the mall, some coffee shops. By the end of that weekend, we had made the offer. So the agent came, okay, let's sign it. I can come to Dubai tomorrow so that I can collect the check. No worries, we can do everything. And so because in Dubai, the landlord was very happy. The faster I was moving out, the happier he was because he already gave me the notice. So we arranged the moving and we came up living in Ras Al Khaimah. I really liked the atmosphere. I really loved the entire vibes. And then we found out that the casino was coming up. So we said, ah, great. This is our opportunity to leave what we didn't live in Dubai. Because with my husband, every time that we were making a real estate investment, we were basically telling, if only we were here 15 years ago, nowadays, this would have been a great deal, right? If you resell it, whatever. And we said, this is our opportunity. This Emirate wants to basically follow the step, keeping up with Dubai, following its steps, and become a new tourism attraction. So we started making some research, all the projects, Marjan Island. So we started gathering information, having seminars with real estate agents here. There is one very good banque in Al Hamra. They are very good. So they really gave us a lot of knowledge. They toured us around. And then we started again entering the second phase, the 2.0 phase of our real estate company here, making some investments in the Emirate understanding how things were moving and so we felt deeply involved because here what is very cool is that it is a very nice small community it's very I mean in Dubai I was living in Dubai South in Green Community so I was not a downtown girl and I come from an area that is called Brianza is between Como and Milan so I was not used to live in the city With four dogs, I really value big spaces, big garden for them, so it's very rare that you can find such a setting in the city. In urban life? Right? So also in Dubai, I was living in a smaller environment. I was an active member of the community. I was basically spending the majority of my time in the community. Here it was even nicer because the Emirate itself is a small community, right? Even if you move from an island to another, still you see the same faces. I find the vet at the supermarket or the doctor when I am running along the beach. Doctor, hi! I like these small things because they make me part of a community that usually in the big city is a little bit hard to achieve. So that's how then we found our dimension here, but yes, you're right. here vibes are very calm so also we felt that we were not getting lazy but we were kind of losing the vibes of Dubai and we said okay no this is not the right direction that we want our business to take so that's why I opened another company naming with the same name of my companies but 10x because we said okay let's change the game no more online only let's higher people here, let's have an office so that we are committed to go every single day. So we also increase or change our productivity levels. We have a team in place, we start new project that we give us a new adrenaline, let's say, injection. Yeah, so that's how I decide why I decided to open my company

[41:30] KAAN: In terms of business approach, major difference between Dubai and in terms of business relationships?

[41:42] MONICA: When I opened my companies in Dubai, I asked an agent to help me out. So basically, I just signed a paper. I was not involved in the process. So for me, everything was pretty easy, because you know, there is a person who comes sign, everything is done. When I decided to open the LLC here, I said, you know what I want to do by myself. Yeah, it was pretty hard because I didn't, I had some meetings with RAKEZ and basically RAKEZ only. I didn't know about the existence of this place because maybe it's very new. I opened last year, September 2025. The main language, the main barrier was the language. Here, the ED, I don't remember what the acronym stands for, but it is basically the economic department. They speak mainly Arabic. If you enter the website, the words are everything is written in Arabic. So, yeah, it was a little bit hard for me to understand how to move through to basically yes move through the bureaucracy but at the end of the day I did it so it's not impossible.

[42:59] KAAN: Yeah nothing is impossible when there's a will, when there's a will, right that's the saying nothing is impossible but I see I saw I was having a meeting with another company from Dubai yesterday, that's what I was looking for actually if you have the same experience. Today's Friday. Yesterday we decided with my friends and they're all from different nationalities, Lebanese, Syrian, whatever, Emirati. I said, okay, you know what, tomorrow after work we're gonna do barbecue. So they're gonna come to my house, we're gonna have barbecue tonight. Nice! In Dubai it doesn't exist. Okay, let's go barbecue.

[43:46] MONICA: Yeah, you mean no, yeah, I understand what you mean.

[43:50] KAAN: Let's go to a restaurant, it does exist.

[43:52] MONICA: Yes, but also you're totally right. This is one of the things that I was missing. I mean, I really don't miss Italy, but this was exactly the scenario that you are depicting. One of the things that I was missing. like you know what let's go for a coffee tomorrow morning no in Dubai with my Italian friends okay let's meet this month next week no because we have we go live on that day this other no because we have an event okay so maybe you know what let's move to the first week of the next month

[44:24] KAAN: Long-term planning so

[44:26] MONICA: Yeah I mean every time that I was arranging a dinner at least three to four weeks of notice and it was pretty rare that we were hosting dinners at home. Let's try out this new restaurant. I mean in Dubai they open a new restaurant, I don't know, every minute, every hour. So there was this long list of restaurants that must try, you know. We have to try this, we have to go to the DIFC, we have to go to Pa. So no, there was not this smaller dimension. Here, yes, you're right.

[44:58] KAAN: That's what I see and another thing I noticed with you that tell me if I'm wrong you actually I'm a little bit like you too. I don't know if it's something metering your decisions are more impulsive than long planned. Like think of how you decided to come to UAE think of how you decided to come to Ras Al Khaimah there. I'm not saying impulsive in a second but they are kind of impulsive. you say, let me see. Oh, okay. Like I do the same thing. I just look at it feels right. I don't need to plan whatever whatever comes with it. I'll deal with it. So this you have that type of personality as far as I can understand. And that long term planning like, let's meet 50 week from today. That's not satisfying.

[45:48] MONICA: Yeah, you're totally right. My husband is not not exactly like me, but as I developed the ability of selling, I'm able to send my ideas. But I totally agree with you when you say, if it feels right, I trust my feeling. So if I do the same, I basically say no, even if I have this gut feeling that it doesn't feel right. But if it feels right, I say, yeah, I mean, I do not like to overthink. It makes me it bores me to overthink.

[46:21] KAAN: I think it's a little bit of confidence, too because I'll tell you why I think that because you decide fast with a feeling then there's a confidence behind it saying that you know what if something goes wrong something doesn't work I can't deal with it yeah and what I think is because you started what you are doing early that means life like everybody else goes up set down yeah down up down that means you were able to deal with the downs. It gives you the confidence thing that you know it something goes wrong. So what I'll deal with it. Yeah, that makes you more impulsive because there's a confidence behind it. You can back it up. Alright, that's that's very nice. That's that's very nice. And let's talk about your company a little bit. Yeah. I just please introduce your company. The name of it. I asked you.

[47:12] MONICA: Yeah, I would say I would say that basically sounds

[47:16] KAAN: To tell you like there's an E at the end.

[47:18] MONICA: Yes, it's Latin. It comes from Latin and it is apogee, is acme, acme. It's top, basically. So the idea was, if we have to do something on our own, let's do the best of what we can do. Let's try to be our best, deliver our best and serve at best. So basically, this is the entire philosophy summarized in a sentence.

[47:45] KAAN: And what does the company, what is the main activity of this company now is the education?

[47:51] MONICA: Yeah, I have a group. I mean, basically, what I do is running a group of multiple companies. I am in education. I mean, nowadays I do not consider myself any longer in education, because I consider myself as an entrepreneur nowadays running this group of companies. one of them that is my my first baby let's say it's the the longest one the the one that is now in still in its childhood face you would want to say but it has a little bit more history is the one in online education yes so we have an academy where students can basically attend the classes online every day. We deliver a very intense schedule based on level differentiated by levels. There are many activities, seminars, workshops. So it's a kind of online academy where people can join every day. There's an ecosystem basically. There is an ecosystem. There are of course everything that says now. I can say automatic even if of course my intervention is needed. I need to still supervise it. I don't just open the tap and money flows out, not yet. But there is a system, there are funnels, everything. There is a system that works and attracts leads, convert the leads that become customers. So once they become customers, then they receive, they start a journey through which they can then go on acquiring new skills, buying new courses or upgrading their membership. So this is a kind of ecosystem that we have built. I just for this company, we have a team of 45 people that work internationally speaking, and they work some of them. There is a small group in Italy, and then there are some groups in Asia. I have people working from Singapore, the Philippines, that's why I know some people from the Philippines because I have developed such a strong relationship after many years. Japan, so we have, let's say, some from the United States also, so we cover, our team is widespread all over the world. Then I have the company that is 100% in real estate, so I manage properties, but I'm not an agency. Here, here, yeah, I have multiple properties that I I rent long-term, short-term, so this is another type of company that goes, basically, walks by itself. And then recently, the company that I have opened here is the company that we decided to create to 10x what we are doing with our companies, 10x-ing how, basically, with AI. So that's when AI came into the picture. we decided to create a team basically created of AI engineers in order to make automatic many flows that now no longer but before were done by humans, increased the quality, increased the speed, do something more and better using AI. And the same type of services that basically we tested on ourselves first can be also given or served to any given company that may need to make the system more effective, faster, attract more leads, convert them, them more effectively, and improve and increase sales.

[51:32] KAAN: Very nice. Very nice. Let me ask you another something personal that I ask myself often. And I ask people I me too. Did the criteria or your perception of what quality of life is and what success is? Did it change from your, you started making money early too, earning money early too. From that day to the day, did that change for you? What quality of life is or what success looks like?

[52:05] MONICA: Yeah, yeah, of course, it changed a lot. It changed a lot because now being successful for me nowadays is to have a pizza, of course I am Italian so I eat pizza, at 6pm on a Saturday with my dogs, with my husband watching a movie, whereas maybe before coming here, success was going to a super fancy restaurant looking on the Burj Khalifa with this super fancy environment. Now I really value the little things, the walk that I have with my dogs every morning at 6am. That's for me a kind of explanation of success or the chance to hire young talents and mentor them. On Monday at the office we spend basically the entire day mentoring. So I try to tell them whatever I know and I try to transfer my knowledge to them. They are very young, so they just graduated, so there is a gap of 20 years, more or less. And I want to be for them the type of mentor that I would have needed at their age.

[53:23] KAAN: I write about this often, you know, I publish daily, I don't know if you ever see them, mostly I publish about philosophy, marketing, and stuff like that daily thing about how crazy it is. That's why I sleep three hours. Anyway, I write about this very often. You know the mentorship and because I started to my business life earlier and I screwed up a lot in so many things, I wouldn't have if I had a mentor. That's why I think mentorship is very, very important. I agree. You have something very interesting, like not many people have, a lot of people have talents for multiple things, some of them they don't even realize that they have talents. You're one of the people that realize you have a talent and you converted that talent into not only a lifestyle but also a business. What would you suggest younger people to first analyze themselves if they can determine what their talent is and how to take their talent from hobby to lifestyle and even a business.

[54:29] MONICA: Yeah, I realized too late, but better late than ever, that everything, the bottom line, what can really make a big change in your life is discipline. I became a big fan of discipline. I mean, I come from a family where my dad, now he's retired, but he used to work as a lorry driver. So he used to wake up very early in the morning at 3am because he's shift, let's say, was starting around 4. So for me now, waking up at 2.50, it's not so crazy because it's something that was normal in my family. And as you understood, I came from a type of environment where comfort was something that you have to deserve or somehow it's not given for granted. Yeah, you need to earn it. Yes, you have to earn it. However, now looking back at what I did in my 30s and yeah, in my late 20s after university, my late 20s and my 30s is that I was so, I really wanted to make the, how can I say, I was aiming for the reward. So I wanted to, I don't know, I was earning a small amount of money and I was immediately spending it at the mall. Why? Because I was saying, oh my god, now finally I have the chance to buy whatever I want, do whatever I want. But then I realized that you can have really a easier life in the long run if you learn how to postpone a reward and if you keep being disciplined on the things that you know will make your future different. so if I could go back in traveling time and talk to my younger version I would tell her learn of course learn the ability the skill to invest but as now you don't know maybe you don't have the money to invest learn how to save money first save money whatever you start earning save it and as soon as you start how to invest invest because at the end you don't don't don't want to live a life where you have to trade your time for money. You want to create systems that can allow you to basically do whatever you want with your time, like having this conversation today. We have this gift or this pleasure that we earned, that we don't have to know I cannot take the Friday the morning to deliver or to host a podcast. This is something that we earned because now we learn how to trade. I mean, how to avoid the trading our time for money. So learn how to save and then learn how to invest. Learn how to create systems that can generate a source that can be a source of income. Don't be afraid to make mistakes. I was so afraid to make mistakes because I was so afraid of being judged, but then I really you realize that the more mistakes you make, the faster you grow.

[57:57] KAAN: You know why I'm smiling? I give classes or speeches in universities. You know what is the first thing I tell students? Go make mistakes. I tell them the opposite.

[58:09] MONICA: Amen to that.

[58:09] KAAN: Go make mistakes now because it doesn't cause you anything. Yeah, yes. You make a mistake, you say oh I didn't do it right? You know what you have a chance to do it right? Yeah, mistakes now. Yeah, if you're postponing your mistakes, it's gonna cost you to the mistakes now.

[58:27] MONICA: Yeah, I totally agree with you. I was so afraid when I was younger than then. It's like a snowball, right? I mean, the fear becomes bigger and bigger. But then when you make mistakes when you are grown up, maybe there are more things in stake. So you can lose more money, or you can disappoint more people. So yeah, this is a great advice that I do hope that the young talents that you are mentoring will then take and execute.

[58:56] KAAN: I think it's a good idea to make mistakes. People don't understand in the beginning, but there's a reason for it. That's why I always say go make mistakes. And I think parallel with you, because I tell the young kids start a project, you know, everything is great, you're telling start a project and fail, then fail again, then fail again, then fail again, by the time you finish university, you failed everything you can fail on.

[59:24] MONICA: Yeah. I am reading this book, I don't know if you read it, that I'm loving it. It's Ready, Fire, Aim by Michael Masterson. And the philosophy is amazing because basically usually we get ready, we aim and then we fire. But these philosophies, no, because if you fire after aiming it's too late. So fire and then throughout the process you understand how to adjust. At the beginning I was so scared in launching new products because you know I wanted to be perfect and know what we have to change. My husband is much better than me in that and he was telling me if we wait till it is perfect, it's too late. Launch it and then the customers will tell us how to make it perfect or perfect. I mean, then I'm not even any longer a fan of perfection because what is perfection? At our best, the best that we can do, the best value that we can deliver. But at least get ready and do it. Then you find out throughout the way. This is something that also I have done in my When I was a teenager, I remember, as because I was in need of money, because I needed money to buy things or at least to have a holiday or whatever, I remember that once I was in my 20s and there was this guy from a very, now I don't want to mention just because maybe he's still working for this company, this very big huge company selling watches, super luxury. Everybody knows this company. He somehow reached me out via email, because it was 2015, maybe, telling me I am looking for a translator for a manual for our store. So would you be interested in doing this translating gig? I said, okay, we met, I remember, at a McDonald. He showed up with this big manual and he told me, I need it in one week. how much do you want? I don't remember. I told him an amount of money. He said, okay, this is the manual. In one week we meet here, I give you the money and you send me the translation. I had no clue about what I was doing. But he said, oh, now I don't remember. Maybe he was giving me 500 dollars. So it was not a life changing amount. But for me, it was, oh my God, that's big it's a big amount of money. I remember that by this time I was doing an internship so on the train I was sitting on the train with my laptop with this big huge manual I was trying to translate then during the lunch break all my colleagues were saying are you coming for lunch no no I have something else to do so I was translating because I had the deadline to of course to meet but somehow I jumped so this is something that I would recommend every young person to do jump and then they find how to aim but don't be scared to make mistakes. I totally agree with you.

[62:25] KAAN: Okay thank you so much Monica. Thank you. We know a lot about you now and if anybody wants to learn English in here from the locals how they can reach out to you? What is the website they can reach out to?

[62:43] MONICA: Okay I have a little a gift for you. I mean, I didn't know if you knew some Italian, I brought you my first book. Because it's my name, basically on social media, I Speak Globish is exactly how people can find me when it comes to my educational company. Thank you so much for having me. Thank you.

[63:04] KAAN: Thank you. This is the book and the links and the book, everything is gonna be on Spotify. So you can get it from Spotify or from RAK & ROLL site, and Monica, all the links are there too. So if you want to get in touch with her, get enrolled. I suggest that and as you can see, there's a very pleasant person and we're taught a process. All right, thank you so so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks again. Hope to see you again.

[63:33] MONICA: Of course. Thank you.

[63:35] KAAN: Thank you. Thank you.

[63:36] MONICA: Bye guys. Bye bye.