Meet Anna Chernenkova – the girl who came to the Netherlands to seek higher education and here she is now a few years later, working and living there.
- From Saint Petersburg to Enschede, what’s your favorite and least favorite thing about the Netherlands so far?
- The country by itself is really organized. The bigger cities are warmly welcoming experts in different fields and there are many career opportunities for those who want to seek them. Amsterdam, for example, is a city that has everything one could ever want – exhibitions on different topics, art and music festivals, job opportunities. It feels like everybody can find something for themselves there. I am also very used to the climate (laughing), I know many people complain about it but I am fine with it. As for what I do not like… hm maybe I am still not used to the countryside, where I live. Sometimes it feels too small for a young person, too boring. Maybe the city life of the bigger places is what I miss the most.
- Tell us a bit about your decision to move to the Netherlands.
- I studied Linguistics in Russia and enjoyed it a lot as it was not only studying but teaching in schools from time to time, as part of the education. But it was not exactly what I wanted from life, therefore, I pursued a Masters in the Netherlands, more business oriented one – Communication Studies in Twente University. But I didn’t go straight to the Masters degree, I wanted to have at least one year of working experience before that so I started working for a German company. It was quite a nice experience as we had very interesting projects, in Blockchain for example. Then I moved to the Netherlands and I relocated to the branch of the company there doing some sales and marketing support. Then I had to do my Thesis at the university so I had to concentrate on studies and stopped working for a while.
And this is how Anna met Strypes! She liked that the company she had experience with and Strypes had a lot of common things but at the same time it was something different. One and a half years at Strypes, Anna can definitely say that the people are what she loves the most about Strypes!
- I like that we are not only based in the Netherlands but in Bulgaria too and I managed to create friendships with people from different backgrounds and nationalities. I remember our Get Together in Borovets, Bulgaria last summer (2022) – it was awesome in every aspect, a party and team building to remember!
- And what are some of your hobbies?
- Travelling is on top of my list and living in the Netherlands gives me the opportunity to do it more often as it is much easier to travel around Europe from here than from Russia. In May I am going to a friend’s wedding in Egypt and I am very excited about it because they have a totally different culture. And after Egypt I am going straight to Istanbul to meet my mom who will come from Russia.
Apart from traveling, I like playing golf. It’s not the most played sport worldwide but it is a very nice one for socializing. I ran into it accidentally at university and signed up for some courses back then. I even met a friend there with whom we are still playing golf from time to time. Other than that I love drawing, writing and anything related to arts.
- Describe Strypes in 5 words:
- Teamwork. Visibility. Passion. IT. Future.
Do you want to be part of our bright team of individuals of different backgrounds? Read more about our People to get to know them better and check out our open positions here.