Back in my Los Hellas hotel room, hours after arriving in the country, I was beyond exhausted; tired from flying across the world, tired from fighting with the Derch, tired from fighting with my Swiss ex boyfriend, just….tired.
It seemed anywhere I went I was somehow a burden or a threat, moneybags or not rich enough. I was not feminine for business or too flirty, I couldn’t win.
My body and its circadian system was letting go… Pierre my ex boyfriend just called me but if felt like a blur.
Instead of Pierre’s naive European face or having romantic feelings of Europe —
all I could see in my mind wasthe gap-toothed American politician Bogdan Brown sitting there in my hotel lobby, basically telling me to come up with $200,000.
American political corruption machines run 24/7 and my arrival was right on time for collecting upon some *dues for me to pay
*dues = otherwise known as #blackmail
In America Bogdan’s requests are considered “donations” not payments nor bribes you can even deduct these payments from taxes to an extent.
Donations are considered friendly and “voluntarily” given to political candidates in the United States, however, even the U.N would consider Bogdan’s “requests” as bribes since he was now threatening ruining my reputation online AND jail time if I DID NOT contribute to his political campaign.
To make the whole thing sting worse—I was not even able to vote in his district! Talk about zero taxation without representation.
Before my Los Hellas hotel, like literally twenty minutes before, my hacker friend Brad and after I had already sent a computer virus to Amsterdam in the Pacific Taco Bell parking lot, before tossing a burner phone in the ocean.
Yet within a half hour Bogdan Brown (the dirty politician) had cornered me in my Los Hellas hotel lobby asking for a cool $200,000.
Buying myself a couple weeks, I negotiated with a local and sleazy attorney a deal for $35k now, $35k later. If sleezeball attorney could buy me a month to figure out a long term plan, even better because the whole thing caught me off guard.
What should have been a happy arrival ‘back home’ was more like walking into the mouth of the devil.
For all intents and purposes I was on a blackmail layaway, or installment plan which is a bit ironic. I was rich enough to be blackmailed; but not rich enough to pay for everyone at once. Poor people always pay more in interest.
I wired over the $35k to my middle man and knew I had maybe eight days before Bogdan would be itchy again.
Spreading all my girly stuff on the hotel bathroom counter I started my facial routine. Each time I wiped my face I was expecting to cry. Yet with every facial wipe I oddly felt, STRONGER.
Fuck Bogdan, the east coast trust fund baby for moving to Los Hellas while I was in Europe and thinking somehow I owe, HIM.
Typical entitled white-privileged man that thought somehow my labor was due to him. Whatever happened to “fruit of THY labor” the classical definition of capitalism? Not in America. And not like this. I was surely on my own and without a husband to call upon some ‘boys club"‘ Fuck Bogdan and his murderer parents and trust fund.
Fuck Pierre, my Swiss ex who likes to send me manipulative loving notes when he knows I have the least amount of time to process them, and calls us “off” when I need him the most.
Fuck Prince Johan, who stole all my files in Amsterdam and then constantly killed deals of mind behind my back (I don’t even care that I’m back in America now, I can still hate someone from afar. And quite frankly, I wish the Derch would get into the office SOONER from their summer holidays to see how many of their files are gone.
Now that Brad and I hacked into the Derch’s sh*t and deleted all my files and reports they stole) it was only a matter of time until the Prince and everyone else figured it out.
For now though America was my priority.
Anyway. Fuck. It. All. My mood went from Taylor Swift to Lizzo, real real quick.
Bogdan First, Ask Questions Later
First things first, was Bogdan. When it came to enemies he was both the least important and more important—he was the least smart of anyone in my life, yet he could make my life painful and he could do it easily. It was scary.
Whereas any fund manager in my industry if we wanted more than $10MM in money we have to fill out forms, quizzes, tests. Certified by this department or that. Not American politicians, they could just like run for office and get FREE MONEY.
Bogdan had it made—he came from out of nowhere winning a political election in Los Hellas nearly none of the city voted on. Something like 10%. And now here he was with over $70MM a year operating budget, a free $2MM ocean viewing home purchased by a donor and essentially living the dream.
If Bogdan wastes all the public funds, worst case is he gets fired and has a retirement plan and online brand. If anyone in my industry blew or lost $70MM a year we’d be in jail.
And despite Bogdan’s parents being in prison for murdering police officers, he was somehow highly regarded in Los Hellas now? Omg how much my home town had changed in a just a few years.
In Los Hellas, there used to be startups bustling the streets and now nothing, you could barely see a human soul walking around downtown.
No one dared to walk outside and politicians had become so greedy they were shaking down any “techie” or person making over $200,000 a year they could find.
People’s homes were being broken into, yet the police would never come.
The city had become a pay-to-play or society-as-a-service only people were hitting “unsubscribe” by the day.
Los Hellas as a city was a mess and Bogdan Brown as a human or politician had zero intentions of making it bette— he was going into national politics and this was the laziest and richest American city he could find— the worse the condition of the city the better for his campaign to “save American” this guy.
Why was he blackmailing me? I think I was easy local prey, roadkill or “fresh off the boat as they say”
Keep Your Enemies Closer
After two days in the hotel and massive amounts of delivery food orders I stuffed my face with every American meal for a solid day while catching up with email in a hotel bed.
The first day I slept. The second day I eat. The third day I FIGHT.
Messaging Brad we decided to grab iced coffees nearby my hotel. I needed to figure out what I was suppose to do with this list of haters (aka the list of papers from Brad) and ultimately Bogdan Brown.
Brad: So the people on that paper list, not so important, and we can often do weird stuff even virtually to them.
I just wanted to capture-shot their haterade that way if they change their tune when you are back here in Los Hellas, you know. B*tch has receipts.
Everything he was saying made sense, however it just occurred to me BRAD HAS NO CLUE ABOUT BOGDAN.
The creepy politician had left messages for in Europe it was so under my radar, I only got the first Bogdan voicemail while checking phone messages in Brad’s Tesla on the drive up from Pacifica to Los Hellas while Brad was on an all-hands conference call, and then Bogdan only presented himself in my hotel lobby AFTER Brad dropped me off there.
The hairs on my arms started to stand—not because Brad didn’t know about Bogdan—but because it was clear Bogdan didn’t want anyone to know about him. It felt, dirty.
The whole situation made me feel, dirty.
Me: Brad. We have larger problems and by we, I mean literally only me.
Since we’re homies I’m hoping you can help?
Brad looking down on his iPhone, I could tell he was in four different tech FAANG slack groups. This guy had to be making almost $2MM a year in various tech salaries for companies thinking he was ‘full time’ Brad was legit a 10x engineer with a good heart and the laziest person I knew.
This is part of Brad’s superpower—fights that took me longer he could didact in minutes.
Brad nods at me listening to key words to spark his interest.
I begin to start my crazy story about this politician who became obsessed with me as a scapegoat while I was in Europe, some dude not even from Los Hellas and well, where do I start?
Me: So there’s this local politician. I do not personally know him, but he’s come into office in Los Hellas and is basically a total pain and is of recently asking me for money and large amounts too.
When you dropped me off at the hotel the other day in downtown, he was literally sitting there in the lobby. Like How? You’re the other person who knows I’m back and all our communications have been secured…
Brad: Ella??!?!?!? What the F—-?!??!
Brad beyond mortified that he picked me up from the airport, gave me a unlisted burner phone and done his best to make me ‘safe upon return’ was irritated to hear that a U.S politician was somehow out-beating-him.
Mouth layed open, his hands motioned… please tell more…
Me: Yeah sorry long story but he was there in the hotel lobby. He wants $200,000 from me or he’s going to tarnish my branding and name. Some kind of psycho with plans to run for national office. If I could explain it better I could but even I….
Brad: Name. Right, f**king now. I want his full ass, birth certificate name.
Me: Bogdan Chesa Brown
Brad: Shit.
Me: What?!
Brad: Shit, shit, shit
Brad takes his main cell phone with over 1,000 slack messages and slams it down. Furious and also perplexed
Brad: Shit Ella, I think I accidentally funded this guy.
Didn’t he run on a platform of peace????
After a half hour of note comparisons Brad and I figure out that Bogdan recently was able to secure a bunch of funding, in additional to his free ocean house and $70MM a year public budget, somehow he had convinced the very techies he was now shaking down, that he was their best ally. Oomph. I could have it worse: I could have donated to his campaign and ALSO being blackmailed.
In the startup world of SaaS products its firmly believed that “freemium” is better. You start users off on free plans and get them hooked on features they need or like.
Here with this corrupt politician Bogdan Brown, we say this man was not only overcharging for his “Freedom-as-a-Service” he was double dipping: free public funds for personal marketing of Bogdan’s national campaign, political donations for local items, and now apparently his third business model of blackmail too.
This Bogdan dude was not only charging me once for freedom but three times.
Rechecking some of the files and things I was showing Brad from my phone, he looked diligently almost like a raccoon at my phones screen. He was calculating. Then. As if this human calculator already knew the solution, he said some of the sweetest words in English my ears experienced in many years, he said what every woman wants to hear.
Brad triple checked his files on his phone, the files on my phone and did some kind of mental calculation in his head
Brad: its okay Ella we will fix this. We just need a plan.
Fighting Fire With Fire
After an hour of explaining Bogdan Brown the corrupt politician asking me for $200,000 to Brad my hacker friend it became apparent that Bogdan wasn’t just my problem, he was an up and coming problem for American and loaded with public funds.
The venture capitalist in me couldn’t believe someone with such little experience and family background of criminal activity was so easily elected into an American city political office.
And yet my friends and I struggled, especially women and fund managers of color—we are DYING to get investor monies while this white guy of murderers was getting funding in the millions and for free…
Not convertible debt, not a seed round, not for equity of his future revenues… totally scot free. Bogdan also held the keys to the city jail which made his corruption combination even worse.
Brad and I came up with a plan. I was going to warn and tell all the local techies and hopefully at the same time as warning everyone, maybe make a name for myself as American. Two birds with one stone as they say. Couldn’t been more wrong. If the Dutch were good at hacking my cell phone and computers the American’s simply hacked better.
Bogdan texted me within minutes of me completing the online invite for “techies to gather”
“Nice Try Ms. Taylor. We see your event. Consider our payment plan still in place but starting Monday you must be put on an ankle bracelet”
Bogdan texted me the details of the Oakland quasi-government office I was reporting to in several days. This was my punishment for speaking up.
They would permanently screw on a device the side of a cassette tape to my ankle—purposely large, painful, and inefficient. If it every went off it would be my fault and it would cost $258 a DAY
I left a voice message to Bogdan Brown’s phone “$258 a day!?!? That’s absurd”
He texted back, “Well Ms. Taylor its that or we want the ENTIRE list of anyone who has ever invested into you, in your database or has more than $5MM networth we want THE NAMES…”
Realizing that, in most countries being on an “ankle bracelet” would be free or covered under taxes I saw the game this guy was playing. Bogdan was the smartest dumb person I ever met. He was now taking the highest tax payers, and threatening then into more payouts directly to him via any venue he could find in his department. For me that now meant an ankle bracelet paid to the state for $258 a day since I didn’t meet his financial demands and was becoming a thorn in his side.
The $200,000 in blackmail payments stayed in place too.
The ankle bracelet secured now Bogdan knowing where I was, at all times, and legally justified. It was painful.
Not being a snitch, I didn’t rat a single person out. As IF I would let Bogdan harass my investing and not even get a cut myself—if my industry you have to register in each state and become a “broker” while this politician had no laws, no oversight, gets to just ask for cash. No thank you. B*tches never work for free.
I took the daily ankle rate fee and let them screw the thing on my body on a normal Monday morning one day earlier than expect. Two months they told me. Sorta like a timeout but in this case a guarantee I would keep my mouth shut and pay a local politician all his the money he was requesting. Super smart.
Bogdan texted me after the ankle bracelet was installed on my body… clearly keeping personal tabs on me
“Just confirming, all set? How does it feel?”
I texted him back “Snug as a bug in a rug” yet little did he know, that I knew, even smart people find themselves at the bottle of canals.
Challenge accepted.