Misha Syrotiuk

 

“Poland is 5th country in which I live. Thanks to many trips, I had a chance to visit 25 countries on 4 continents. I hitchhiked 5,000 km and travelled 200,000 km by plane.  When I came back to Poland, I started working for “audioteka.pl” in the marketing department. Also, together with my friend, we started working on our own online shop, which would offer hand-made products of Cambodia, made from recycled products. I wish Polish people got to know Cambodia and other South-East countries of Asia more. What I mean is not only tourism but also culture, history and Cambodians’ everyday problems. 

 

Global Mindset is the term which comes to my mind when I think of my studies at UITM.  Starting from the first year of undergraduate studies, I took advantage of many opportunities that studies offered. I took part in the “Work and Travel” programme 4 times, thanks to which I had a chance to visit the USA, Puerto Rico and Mexico. Then, I started postgraduate studies with English as the language of instruction. The main motivation for studying in English was an ability to be around English speaking students from around the world, i.a. from Germany, Spain, Greece, Poland, the USA, France, India, Ukraine, China, Nigeria, and Nepal.

 

I have been interested in different cultures and languages since I was a child. While studying at UITM, I took an active part in AIESEC – the International organisation, which opened its headquarters in Rzeszow at the time. My activity in AIESEC was related to international cooperation, projects, group work, as well as national and international conferences. As the chairman of the AIESEC local committee in 2011/2012, I represented UITM at international conferences organised in Estonia, the Czech Republic and Greece. My duties as the chairman included coordination of organisation activities, local projects, and managing 60 people. Within the scope of the AISEC University project, which was organised in cooperation with the Centre for Foreign Languages at UITM, a group of 4 interns from Philippines, China, Puerto Rico and Russia, came to teach a foreign language in Rzeszow. What is more, we sent a number of UITM students to training in Indonesia, Uganda, India, and Vietnam.

 

When I finished my 4th year of study I left for Taiwan, where I took part in a 3-week exchange programme which was sponsored by the Government of Taiwan. When I saw Asia for the first time, I realised I wanted to stay there a longer time. Having finished my postgraduate studies, I went to Cambodia for a year, where I was responsible for coordinating students’ exchange between Cambodia, South-East Asia and Europe, under AIESEC. Moreover, I spent half a year teaching Economics at Raffles College – a branch of the biggest educational unit in the South-East Asia, called the Raffle Corporation. While being there, I had a chance to visit almost every country in Asia, except for Philippines.

 

My plans for the future include spending some time in one of the Latin America countries and to learn Chinese and Spanish. Life is too short to spend it in one country…”