How do I quit my startup dream in a third world country

January 2012. I was finishing my summer vacations in Punta del Este with a couple of friends after having the worst year of my life, breaking up with my ex girlfriend and moving out from an apartment we were living in.

In that moment I was 30 years old, and I wanted to escape from that terrible situation so I have the oportunity to make a 6 months trip for entrepreneurs in Tel Aviv, and the scholarship was avalaible until my 30s, so I had to rush to make the trip before October 1st, my 31 birthday.

I was working and living in Buenos Aires for a software factory and I have to stay there until June, due that was the date for the trip to Israel, and I didnt have enough money to stay half a year there (and Israel is expensive). So when I left the apartment I asked my uncle to stay at your place but he refused because he was a sh*ty person, he didnt have kids, he hated my mom and he loves to see people crying a begging him for help to raise his ego.

That was hard for my soul but unfortunately I have a couple of good friends and I stay at a friend house 15 days, later on I will be living in a dirty hostel to save money for the trip for 3 months.

At that time, I was working for a big project for JP Morgan Chase and I was about to start a EA Sports project doing a Madden Site, in the same outsourcing company. That was one the best team and project I have been working on in there, but I was doing my papers to leave for the experience abroad.

I didnt get often recognition for my job, and thats equal to not get a wage raise (that company use to give a year 10% and in that moment the inflation in Argentina was close to 30% at that time, so basically I also was getting poor).

When I told my PM that in 4 months I will be leaving the company he and my former PM from JP Morgan, offered me a 35% wage raise, but dispite I felt good about, I already did my plans and I was leaving anyway.

I spent 4 months living in this hostel with 6 more random people every single day to save money and have a good experience in Tel Aviv, but I couldnt save too much, also because I have to pay around U$S1250 to make the plan (that money included housing, travels around the country and courses of social media, leadership, marketing, business, etc) It wasnt expensive but I need more money because in Argentina salaries are low.

After finishing my project in EA, the PM offered me a non-paid 6 months licence due they want me to be back and continue working with them, so I felt glad and accept the deal.

Israel, the holy land

It was my 3rd time in Israel in that time and I finally decided to spend o month working in Eilat as a chef or something due I dont have enough money and I also have time before the Tech Tel Aviv program starts, so I was working as a slave around friendly-hunbles african refugees, angry israelies and arabs, and me and a couple of cool US guys. That was a mess, in all areas..and of course working in an All-inclusive 5 start hotel was too, the customers were like animals leaving a lot of food in a lot of dishes so food was wasted in tons, something bad for my morality.

In there I was around by a really nice group of ucranians, russians, americans and a couple of europeans. We use to share our discontent with the work having some rest around the red sea.

The good part is that I make money and I didnt spend much because we got free housing and meals in the hotel, so I was close to my goal and to leave soon from that sh*t job.

Tel Aviv, the start-up nation

I arrived to Tel Aviv in September 2012, with a lot of expectation for the program and the people. In the first week we got interviews to choose the company we want to do a part-time intership, mandatory in the program. So I joined a soccer social network because I liked the CEO, I love soccer and there was people from all over the world, also another argentinian.

It was a great enviroment and everything seemed to be ok, but I was doing a pretty basic community management and, as a qualify UX Designer, they didnt give me the opportunity to show my magic, instead, they hire some 99designs contest to change the logo dispite they have a designer there for free!. That change totally my mind so I didnt “put the tshirt of the company” and stay only the 4h hours deal to do this CM thing.

Talking advantage of the time

While americans use to drink and have fun almost the entire day at beach during the holidays, I made a close friend from NYC and we brainstormed to maybe start an app.

I was doing apps back in Argentina and I told Aaron that I will probably get an iOS developer to make something..and after a couple of days I came up with the idea of making a Dream Social Network, was called IceDreamApp.

The idea was not to make a cheesy one, it will be prepare to save moods after waking up, tag friends on dream, then save and keep the dreams to analyze and also able to share them in a dream feed, like Twitter. It was an ambicious dream to help psychologists and mental health too.

So I convinced Aaron, showed him some graphic ideas and I took care on hiring my friend back in Argentina to make this happend. Due Israel has 6 hours ahead of Argentina, I was working mostly at night and late night, together with my developer friend.

After a couple of months, I had to get back to Argentina due my licence was almost over, so I came back to my old life, same bad paying job, same dirty hostel and in a couple of months I decided to left to my city, in order to buy time for my project, save stress from that sh*ty life, have more calm and space to be more creative and have free meals from my mother.

So after a couple of more months, in April 2013 we finally lauched the first IceDreamApp version on the AppStore. Was something amazing for me because I proof myself I was capable, and I didnt wait to make installs-app-ads on Facebook in order to get users (I was doing CM for a while before the launch too).

In that moment the store wasnt saturate so I could get install for U$S5 each, at the first time, sometimes U$S1, but after prooving like 50 different ads I nailed it with a short phrase and a simple couple image and I was paying U$S 0,02 each install! That was finding the holy grial, and of course I remember that day, August 4th 2013. In a couple of months I got more than 5000 install! I am attaching the graphic I already shared it on Angellist (the first picture is from install and the second from Facebook login into the app -we implemented later-)