Some people tend to search for the easiest and safest path in life, others – for the more difficult, but more satisfying one. “For me leaving my home country and moving to Bulgaria where I knew nobody was a very good experience,” Igor Gurkin, a second-year student at AUBG from Russia says. ”It makes you more mature in a way and I really appreciate that.”

Igor’s desire to get a bachelor’s degree away from his home country led him to participate in a program of the American Council allowing him to take the exams required to apply to AUBG in Moscow. Having been offered a full scholarship and having arrived at his new home, he was surprised to find himself in a place that would provide him with something “much more valuable than scientific knowledge – multicultural experience.” Igor considers this to be the main difference between AUBG and Russian universities and the reason why if he had to choose, he would choose AUBG over and over again. “I do not think that in any Russian university I would be able to make friends with Bulgarians, Macedonians, Albanians, Romanians, etc.,” Igor says.

Igor is pursuing a double major in History and International Relations and Politics and is not worried about finding a job after graduating. He is convinced that AUBG graduates have no problems getting employed in Russia. “What is good about AUBG is that after graduation you’ll have an opportunity to choose where to work and live,” Igor says. ”I think that students graduating from Russian universities would have more difficulties getting a job outside their home country than AUBGers.”

Igor believes that apart from the diverse perspective he acquires at AUBG, he also learns a lot through the liberal arts system of education, because it allows students to try and figure out what field of knowledge is most interesting for them. Moreover, he thinks that students have the opportunity to choose exactly what in their field they want to study and when. “AUBG students have the opportunity to participate in a variety of activities,” Igor says, believing this is also adding to the students’ knowledge. He is involved with theater.

For the year and a half he has spent at AUBG, Igor has helped with organizing and staging several plays, such as "Faryatiev's Fantasies" by Alla Sokolova and "Bald Primadonna" by Eugene Ionesko. He plans to continue doing it, because he believes acting teaches him teamwork skills.  “I like acting,” he says. “It allows you to communicate your thoughts to people around you in a better way.”

Another AUBG experience Igor enjoys is on-campus living. “I have a great time living on-campus,” he says. “We have a lot of fun with my friends and I think it is also an important part of multicultural experience at AUBG.” During his first year at AUBG, Igor shared a room with a Bulgarian and a Georgian, and now he is living with boys from Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. Igor realizes that the communication with people from different cultural backgrounds that AUBG offers has let him grow as a person and now he has begun to understand more about the way different people think. He believes the more you know about different people, the less biased you are. “Maybe tolerance is the main lesson. I feel that it changes me,” Igor says.

Igor finds Blagoevgrad, the city that AUBG is situated in, convenient for students and likes the fact it does not take you long to get from one place to another. “Surely, I miss my parents and friends. I miss my town and all the places I was used to going,” he says. “But I miss AUBG too when I am not there,” Igor adds.

Igor likes all the courses he is taking and hopes he will be able to go to a graduate school after AUBG. He thinks it is too early for him to sum up the results of him being at AUBG, but he hopes his biggest achievement is waiting for him in the nearest future. How does he imagine himself in 10 years? “I do not know, but I think that if you work hard enough, the results will follow,” Igor says. “I am not goal-oriented. I like the process itself.” Two things, though, he knows for sure. First, he would like to go back to Russia, and second, “AUBG is a great experience. My attitude towards it won't change.”