Greetings from sunny Singapore, which on the winter day Alex Krasavin wrote, things were far more pleasant than back home in Urbana.
“As I sit back on a typical January Sunday morning, basking in 80-degree Singapore sunshine, it’s hard not to think back fondly to my time in Illinois,” says the Urbana Uni High (’96) and UI (’00) alum, now an partner at Radford, and Aon company, working in the high-tech and life sciences industries across Asia Pacific, the Middle East and Africa.
“Some of the most enduring memories that I have had in the nearly decade spent in Champaign-Urbana are from the northeast corner of Matthews and Springfield. There, for five years, I attended University High School. It wasn’t just the pedagogy of the faculty, the camaraderie of the students and the trips around the state for extracurricular competitions that have been essential in making me who I am today.
“An additional, but essential, component in helping shape my world view, were the trips I took away from Uni for lunches. Walking across the wider U of I campus, up to the eateries on Green Street or up to University Avenue, opened up my eyes to the idea that there is always something to explore, that no matter how great it is where I am, there is always something exciting to get me out of my comfort zone.
“It is what, in part, led me to continue my studies at U of I, to spend my junior year abroad in St. Andrews, and since graduating spent 12 of the last 17 years living abroad.”
