KONSTANTIN GOLUBEV IS THE FATHER OF MAYA, HWYD AND WWGROUP CREATIVITY! A FANTASTIC LIFE STORY BASED ON THE SCRIPT OF "BIG FISH" BY TIM BURTON

HWYD: Tell us about your childhood, what kind of family were you born into?

Kostya: I was born in the city of Kherson into an ordinary, average family, but to extraordinary parents. My mom is an example of true femininity, wisdom and love, and my dad is an example of courage and character. My mother was a pharmacist by profession, working in the production of pharmaceuticals at a tuberculosis hospital, and my father was a master of sports in pentathlon, playing for Dynamo, and because back then, to be a Dynamo player, you had to be a police officer, he served and had a rank:

HWYD: How were your school years?

Kostya: I'm a real nerd and I'm not ashamed of it. I have loved learning since childhood and I still love it today. The best day off was to go for a walk with my mom in the city center on Saturday morning, make sure to go to a bookstore, buy a new book, and then celebrate this event in a cafe with a glass of milkshake and a cake. The book would be read in a week or two, and then a new one would be bought again. And so it was throughout my school life. Even now, unfortunately, when I don't have much time to read, I can't pass a bookstore without buying something and putting it in my library at home - paper books are a big fatiche for me.

From the first grade, I was enrolled in karate and swimming. I didn't have any extraordinary successes or stars from the sky, but I liked such a tight schedule of combining studying and training even then. I remember that the sixth grade was a record-breaking year in this regard: full of lessons, swimming on Monday-Friday, karate on Tuesday-Thursday, and basketball on Wednesday-Saturday. Although karate did not make me a fighter, it gave me many vivid memories - every summer we went to a sports camp in the city of Skadovsk - a regular camp, like everyone else, only with training. There was my first love, my first kisses, friendship and all the romantic things that little me lived and dreamed about.

HWYD: What did you dream of becoming as a child?

Kostya: "Up until the 9th grade, I dreamed of becoming a surgeon - I wanted to save people. But then the Orange Revolution took place in Ukraine, and the then very progressive Channel 5 appeared, broadcasting live reports from the Maidan, and I realized that my true calling was journalism.

Since then, I started preparing in advance for admission to Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv - I dreamed of Kyiv and this particular university, although most Kherson boys at that time chose to become sailors (like most of my classmates and childhood friends), but I, like a true Capricorn, persisted.

HWYD: Study is studying. And how did you rest? Was it just books?

Kostya: No, not only) We, the people from the South of Ukraine, are sea people. I am still indifferent to the mountains, but the sea is my everything. Every summer we went at least twice to the Arabatska Strelka boarding house on the Azov Sea - a shallow sea with waves like lambs, a thrill! By the way, as a reminder of those times, I have a tattoo on my leg in the shape of the coast with the inscription "Arabat Spit" - I love this place so much. Unfortunately, it is now under occupation. Music also played a big role in my life at that time-it was the heyday of subcultures, I was into punk rock, I loved emo, my friends and I attended rock shows that took place every 2 weeks. I remember the first time my parents let me go to such a concert-I had seen videos of concerts full of people, slamming, stag-diving, and so on, so I was a little scared in the bus and thought I would stand somewhere on the edge. But as soon as we got there, I saw that the stage was the stairs of some kind of a concert hall, and under the "stage" there were probably 15 people, and the fence between the "fan sector" and the "stage" was a stretched rope, but it was still cool.

My parents didn't allow me to stand out too much, no matter how much I rebelled, but we tried to look canonical-my friend wore a mohawk, I had emotional bangs, and the like. That's why we often had to deal with hooligans, explain something to them for a long time, sometimes fight or run away.

And there was also a period of passion for skateboarding, but not for long)) The pop-punk era gave rise to a trend of skaters in our country. I wanted to do it too, because they looked cool. We didn't have the money to buy a cool board, and try explaining to our parents that a wooden thing on wheels could cost so much. So my mom helped me save up a little bit, and we bought a simple skateboard at the Virage store. I tried to do an "ollie" and broke the deck in two on my first attempt. Then I hid the halves of the skateboard under the bathtub so as not to upset my mom.

HWYD: How were you brought up?

Kostya: I grew up a real dreamer. Perhaps this helps me to remain a child now and not limit myself in creative fantasies. My mother's love taught me to love this world, to respect and look for something good in everyone, to value myself and the people around me. My father taught me to be fair. Of course, it is somewhat difficult to live in such paradigms (that the world should be perfect), because every time something happens that is not in accordance with one's conscience or is dishonest and unfair, it seems as if everything on which your inner world is based is destroyed. But my faith in goodness and in people does not subside. And no matter how much it hurts sometimes, I like this trait in myself.

I remember a story: every summer, an amusement park came to our neighborhood and was located near my house-the neighborhood was new and there was a vacant lot nearby that was convenient for the amusement park. Accordingly, in addition to visitors, there was a variety of rabble hanging around. I was little, and I heard something happening in the kitchen-my mother saw from the window how some convicts came up to the boys and girls from our house, who were sitting on a bench under the porch, hit ours, and tore off a chain from someone's neck. My mom shouted at them something like "What are you doing?!" but they ignored her and walked toward the amusement park. At that moment, my dad came running home from training, sweating and disheveled. He saw my mom crying, quickly asked what happened, and left. That was the first time I saw my mom pray. As I found out later, my dad found them - he knocked one of them out and dragged the other one along the ground to the nearest police station for a broken finger. Then I thought that when I have a family, I want to give the same warmth as my mom and be as strong and reliable a protector as my dad.

HWYD: Let's talk about admission and student years.

Kostya: Ohhhh, we don't have enough space here to write about this) I'll try to be brief, although this is not my best trait))

I entered the Institute of Journalism at Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. I studied really well, probably only for the first year and a half, hoping to transfer to a state-funded program. I entered the contract, and then I had a conversation with my father: "Either you will be at Chevy, where you wanted to be, I will pay the contract, but we will limit your pocket money, or you go to the National Academy of Sciences (at the same time I entered the state-funded "banking" program at KNEU just in case, just to anchor myself in Kyiv), where there is a budget, a scholarship, and my mother and I will still give you pocket money." But I chose what I wanted.

There, at the institute, I met my best friends, with whom we are still friends to this day, though not as often as I would like. One of us was killed at the front, and this is an incredible loss that hit all of us very hard. Max is still missed and will be missed.

It was a real student life, and I'm not ashamed of it. I lived it the way I had to and the way I probably wanted my children to live their student life. Everything here is like Remarque's: friendship, love, sincere, genuine emotions, songs with a guitar in the dormitory. Oh, the nostalgia)

HWYD: Tell us about your first earnings.

Kostya: Literally the first time I took roasted seeds and a stool from home and started selling seeds next to the old ladies.) Business was not good, and then my father came and bought me a 50-kopek glass and took me home.

In my second year of study, I had a summer job as a secretary of the Lithuanian delegation during the anniversary congress of the Bank for Reconstruction and Development in Kyiv, and with the money I earned, I immediately went on my first ever European bus tour.

HWYD: After college, you worked as a flight attendant! How did you end up there?

Kostya: It was my fifth year, and my dad told me that I had a month to find a job, and he wouldn't give me any more money. I started actively looking for something, but what could I expect with no experience - either an internship or a job at a newspaper for a pittance. Then I saw photos of a friend on VK who was abroad almost every day. We messaged each other and he offered me a try. I came for an interview at Aerosvit Airlines, and then I took three months of training. I still consider that training to be the best and most useful in my life - from etiquette, knowledge of serving food and wine segregation to extinguishing fires, rescuing drowning people and organizing evacuation actions. I flew like that for 2.5 years. I flew everywhere - both long-haul flights across the ocean and short flights to Europe and Asia.

HWYD: Why did you decide to quit aviation?

Kostya: I have a lot of respect for all my colleagues in aviation, including flight attendants. But personally, I no longer saw any prospects for myself - yes, it was really cool, I was 21 years old, I had seen almost the whole world, and I was making good money. But unrealized ambitions were eating away at me. I started to remember why I moved to Kyiv and what I really wanted to become.

I remember we had a flight, and I was upset because on that day my classmates were celebrating their graduation from the university-the end of their 5th year. And I had a flight to catch. My colleagues found out about it, and to cheer me up, they arranged a surprise - on descent, I was called to the cockpit, and I spent the entire landing on the jump seat in the cockpit. The emotions and impressions were fantastic. So I was very grateful to aviation and my colleagues for such an incredible experience in my life, but I had to move on.

HWYD: Is the TV era about to begin?

Kostya: That's exactly right. I have already talked about this in many places, so I don't want to repeat myself too much. I was the first to be hired by "Facts of the Week with Oksana Sokolova" as a trainee journalist. I'm still grateful to Oksana Mykolaivna for her faith in me. And then it went from there: editor at "It concerns everyone", editor-in-chief at the New Channel and STB. Towards the end of my television career, my clients gave me turnkey projects - to develop a concept, write a season arch, conduct casting, recruit participants, write scripts, implement, edit, and get a finished show. Somehow I had 6 projects going on at the same time, and I was burning with it, not burning out.

It seemed that I had found myself and my place. Finally, I was doing what I loved, what I was good at, and I was getting paid for it. Poverty was over, we could dream and plan for the future... But the Russian Federation decided to teach us how to live and to denationalize us - before that, no Ukrainian went to bed or started the day without throwing a ziggy. Ugh, in short, a full-scale war came.

There was no time for entertainment in the country, and I lost my job. For some time, I helped as an information networker. Together with former Minister Borodyansky, we collected and recorded all the crimes committed by the Russian Federation, so that we could have a structured evidence base for The Hague or whatever else we needed. But the financial cushion was quickly running out, and I had to find something quickly, because I felt responsible not only for myself but also for my family and friends.

That's how I wrote to Inna Gagarin, my old friend from my college days and dormitory days. I thank Inna to this day - I believe she saved me at that moment, and also gave me a ticket to the world of affiliate marketing, and acted as my protégé, which greatly simplified my entry into the field.

HWYD: You've grown tremendously in this area as well, eventually becoming the Creative Director of Wild Wild Group! How do you feel about working at the C-level?

Kostya: I adore Wild Wild! I have my hands completely free here - I was called to this position as a qualified and experienced specialist, and I am given the opportunity to be so! This is the most valuable thing in my job! I remember our first communication with the CEO of the company - it was supposed to be something like an interview, but we were so enthusiastic and talked to each other about everything in the world so enthusiastically that we didn't notice that almost 2 hours had passed before we moved directly to WWG, and I was very much supported by Katya, Head of Sales WWApps. I've known Katia for a long time, she is a media person and a very respected person in the community, but she wrote and supported me so sincerely that I felt I would feel comfortable here. And so it happened. That's why it's only in such an atmosphere - I emphasize - EXCLUSIVELY IN SUCH AN ATMOSPHERE AS THAT NOW EXISTS IN THE WILD WILD GROUP - that all these crazy ideas with horses, stands where you can draw, westerns, and much more are born.

HWYD: It's clear about work merits. But what about your personal ones? You're a father - tell us about your own fatherhood.

Kostya: I am the father of a beautiful, best daughter in the world, Mayechka. She is my heart, my soul, my greatest love in the world! It so happened that her mother and I divorced when Maya was 1.5 years old, but we communicate well, maintain friendly relations, and I hope this will not affect the child in any way.

Since Mayusha was two years old, we have been going to the seaside with her all the time) this has always aroused genuine interest among the other vacationers - our company consisted of my grandfather (unfortunately, my mother died 8 years ago), me and a little girl. Everyone asked, "Where are your girls?" But we got along well with three generations of Golubevs.

Maya has become my best friend. We talk about everything like adults. We can fool around as if we were both 9 years old, not just her, we recently bought cherries and I showed her how to shoot the pits, as you can imagine, we were all covered in cherry stains, but happy. I really want to maintain this relationship with her in the future, not to be shy and to be the dad a girl dreams of - a friend, protection, support.

HWYD: And finally, about HWYD - how did you come up with it?

Kostya: We created HWYD together. One day I was walking with a friend and grumbling a lot about niche media - this is not so, that is not so. She suggested that I stop grumbling and create my own media. I looked at her in confusion and asked her how I would do it. She replied: "I'll invest in it - you're responsible for the idea, concept, structure, and content." And that's how we got into it. It looked like I was being weak.

At first, everything was going very slowly and it seemed like the whole idea was just an illusory fantasy. However, one minute the website was ready, the next the brand book was ready, the next the domain was bought... Pooh-pooh-pooh - there was no turning back. When I first clicked on the site and realized that it was my brainchild, I immediately wanted to improve, popularize, make it better and more recognizable!

This is how we became who we are. We have recruited a small staff - now we have about 10 people, each of whom is as talented as possible in their field - it's a kind of Talent League. That's why I can safely entrust all operational processes to the team and take on the role of an ambassador for recognition or engaging experts for our materials.