Last week I cried.
I went to celebrate the business launch of my very first friend in Denmark.
Inga Bodiu-Bentsen is the first Moldovan woman I met when I landed in Denmark 13 years ago.
Back then, we were both working in a warehouse, packing boxes. Two young women from Moldova, a long way from home, figuring out a new country one shift at a time.
Since then, I’ve watched her:
- finish a master’s in Innovation and Entrepreneurship
- become a wife and a mother of two adorable boys
- build a wine import business
- and, just last week, take everything she learned and open a pottery painting and art studio
That’s not a straight line. It’s the kind of path you only see when you’ve known someone long enough to watch them build it, one decision at a time.
Why this matters to me
As expats, we often start at the bottom: in warehouses, in kitchens, in jobs nobody back home would brag about. Then the years pass, and suddenly the girl packing boxes next to you is cutting the ribbon on her own business.
Go visit Studio 24
If you’re looking for a cool place to bring your kids on a rainy Copenhagen day, a date idea that isn’t another dinner, or just an afternoon of making something with your hands, go to Studio 24.
Go for the pottery and the art. Go for a conversation with an inspiring, resilient woman. And of course, go to see the carpet Inga’s grandmother wove by hand in Moldova.
So proud of you, Inga.
Irina
