This day 10 years ago, I landed in London with a 65l backpack and a laptop bag. The original plan was to stay for a year doing my first year of Master’s Degree, then move to Prague for the second year before starting work for some big multinational company back in St Petersburg.

Thanks to the 2008 financial crisis things didn’t go to plan within two months, so instead I did a one-year Master’s and then – in no particular order:
* set up a couple of companies,
* taught Russian as a foreign language,
* published thee Russian language textbooks,
* prepared an EFL textbook,
* got married and divorced,
* survived cancer,
* bought a house and a flat, sold the house, struggling to sell the flat (anyone for a flat near Tower Bridge?),
* travelled to Ethiopia, the Himalayas, Hong Kong, much of Europe,
* spent 14 months travelling English countryside,
* got a project management qualification,
* got CELTA,
* volunteered at a charity boutique in Notting Hill,
* volunteered for Tibetan refugees,
* fundraised for a number of causes,
* turned vegan,
* got interested in health,
* moved into life and health coaching,
* gained 10 extra kg, then got back to my comfortable 72-74kg – same as when I arrived to London,
* became a member of Society of Authors,
* became a Chartered Linguist,
* won a few business and teaching awards,
* survived anxiety and depression,
* became a Reiki Master,
* walked two 100km walks (36 and 30hrs respectively),
* appeared in The Guardian, The Times, BBC, CNN, Reuters et al.,
* self-built a campervan,
* camped in Europe for 45 winter days to rid of radiotherapy side-effects,
* acquired a collection of 19-20th century English watercolours,
* mentored a few business owners,
* raised a police dog,
* got elected to the Management Committee of the UK Reiki Federation,
* became friends with a number of cats and dogs as well as a few chickens and a large number of humans,