Alexandru's story

"A desire for my life is ending up doing only what I love, so that’s work related but in my personal life as well."

People who inspire me, well starting with big names, I would say, Simon Sinek. He’s an entrepreneur and motivational speaker that I saw online a couple of years ago; he feeds my interest in wanting to motivate people to do more for the world. I would also say my brother inspires me. He finished studying here at the university and has got quite a good job in London now and he’s living the life. Then, it would be my family who I’m looking out for and am trying to do as much as possible to make them proud of me

I’m really close with my brother. For a while he was the only person I knew here. He was my motivation to come here. He would tell me stories about the university and the things he’s done, like volunteering. That’s kind of a big deal for me as well. I’ve been a Red Cross volunteer co-ordinator back home. I’ve also volunteered at music festivals and film festivals. Here at the university I’m part of the V-team. I’m a project leader for a music project – we go to schools and teach kids how to play instruments and trying to find different entertainment. Outside of that I am interested in volunteering that helps the community and environment.

Long term, my aspiration is to be one of those people who pop up on a screen and it starts telling you about my back story. Saying like, this is who I used to be, and this is who I am now – I can point you in the right direction and maybe encourage you to do what you like too. A desire for my life is ending up doing only what I love, so that’s work related but in my personal life as well.

For me, being who I want to be is really important. It kind of started a year before I came to Essex. I was struggling to find my place in the groups I was spending time in and the activities I was choosing to do. Along the way I was reading a lot of stuff on the internet, and seeing a lot of positive people speaking, saying ‘you should definitely try to be who you want to be’. I didn’t understand this really at the beginning, but there came a point where I just thought ‘do you know what, I’ll just start doing this’. So I started going and playing music in different places, piano mostly. And people started looking and asking me why I’m doing this – ‘are you doing it for attention?’ they would ask me. But no, I just feel a real connection with that instrument so that’s what I do. From there I started building up doing what I wanted to do, so volunteering for example because I want to help people. It gave me the confidence to choose this university. I’m looking for a bright future; I want to try new stuff and I knew that this university offers me exactly that.

To me, Essex is family. Being part of the Student Union, getting involved in sport, being part of the student parliament. So I’ve become a part of the university and it feels like a family. I’m not only pursuing my own career, I’m also trying to help others to pursue theirs.