Autumn reflections

Two years after my IB exams and my life is again moving towards a crossroad. I am in the final year of my undergraduate study and although it may seem that this crossroad is hardly as dramatic as the previous one – which supposedly marks the coming of age – it isn't now any easier to choose the right path to set on.

One of the reasons could be that I have settled here at University of York so much that it's difficult to conceive of a different life. In our editorial committee of the Vox academic journal, I have already become the editor-in-chief, feeling heavily the weight of ultimate responsibility for every issue. I also succeeded in a very competitive application process for the position of an analyst in the university investment fund, in which students manage £10,000 of university equity, trying to make profit on it in stock markets. It is a very demanding extracurricular activity, but I learn a lot almost every day. What struck me most, however, are my new "colleagues". They are typically some of the brightest and most ambitious students, who see their future unambiguously in the City of London, one of world's largest finance centres. I don't think I am exaggerating much when I say that now I know, what the proverbial richest 1% look like back in these days, when all they have are great dreams and the resolve to conquer the world.  

I was never much interested in money, though, so I also joined York's Classics Society, where we learn and read in Ancient Greek and Latin. It is a very singular group of enthusiastic tea-loving intellectuals, ever so dissimilar to the aggresively single-minded bankers-to-be from the Griff Investment Fund.

Let's get back to the crossroad, though. Essentially, there are two options: continue studying or find a job. There are multiple reasons, why I would prefer the former. It's not that I don't feel ready for a next step to the world of adults; neither is it that I don't know what I want to become, nor that I could not find myself a job.

After all, I experienced what it's like to be a normal working employee last summer. Though formally a mere intern, I was performing the duties of an ordinary civil servant for the whole four months of my summer holidays. And it was the most interesting summer of my life. When the civilian aircraft MH17 was shot down in Ukraine, I wasn't reading about it in the papers, but was watching the speech of the Dutch PM in the EU Council and the following EU leaders summit, where international sanctions were agreed. And it was just as exciting to calculate the losses incurred to Czech exporters from the sancions two weeks later in the Economic division of the Czech Foreign Ministry. To see the Czech executive branch at work. To see the minister quote in TV the background material you compiled; the material that contributed to forming the position of the Czech Republic.

The real reason why I want to continue studying is more related to so far unsatiated hunger for knowledge. I want to get to the edge of human knowledge in one area – to become an expert in something. The academic track of my life does not feel terminated. I am still enjoying all of my university modules. For example, in philosophy, I am examining the possibility of human free will. In political economics, I am researching the relationship between the constitutional system and macroeconomic performace. I will most likely study economics in my postgrad study, but am also considering more narrowly focused fields, such as European Economics or Political Economy. I am also thinking about the location of my next studies, not ruling out the UK, but also thinking about Germany, Belgium or the Netherlands for a change.
 

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