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would happen next. | took high school graduation tests and then the college entrance exams (Russian system din not have SATs back then and every college required students to take particular exams to be admitted). My family has always placed a high value on education and the only option we thought would help me succeed in life was the Moscow State University of Foreign Relations, famously referred to as “Harvard of Russia” by Henry Kessinger. My entrance grades were excellent and | got the state scholarship covering my tuition and living costs. Most of the students studying with me were coming from a completely different “oligarchy” world, driving (or being driven) the most expensive cars in the world and being accompanied by bodyguards. Girls would fly to Milan and Paris to shop the latest Chanel collections. | was an outlier, a normal kid, taking a bus and commuting for 2 hours to get to school. And | was pretty unhappy feeling that just didn’t belong to this world and got there by mistake. Not having many friends, | focused on my studies, graduating Cum Laude top on the class with only “A” grades in my diploma. Now looking back, | am incredibly grateful for something | used to see as a traumatizing experience. | would have never grown up as ambitious and resilient had | been given all the opportunities my peers had at a young age. What's the biggest challenge(s) you're currently facing as you grow WE Talks - personally and/or professionally - and what are you doing to navigate that challenge(s)? WE Talks started as an idea and became a rapidly growing community. We were expecting just about 30 attendees at our first gathering, but ended up having over 50 guests. Consequently, we have been growing at a 50% monthly rate and just had an event in partnership with TOPSHOP with over 100 attendees, including more than 30 entrepreneurs. One of the major challenges would be to keep growing at a Sustainable pace and to turn the community into a business. When | was just starting WE Talks, many told me that the event space market in NY in very saturated and that without a significant experience | the event space it would be incredibly hard to create a quality community. And yet here we are, Anything else you want us to know? HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_022270