In my younger years, I dreamt of being Russia’s President.

Not a clickbait story. I dreamt of one day leading Russia. I wanted to. It was extremely naive and far-fetched. Well, wanting to be President of anything is necessarily far-fetched.

There is proof. I can’t find it right now and maybe I’ve lost it — my yearbook from Clare College, Cambridge University, 2002. But that yearbook sure exists. Contact Clare College! Say you’re a journalist investigating a curious case of a mental disorder, someone wanting to be Head of State of the largest country in the world.

Under my picture, in that yearbook, it says something like: one day I’ll be President of Russia! It was a joke of course, but, in truth, that insane idea was on my mind.

The fact that I was thinking about it while studying at Cambridge makes that idea — well, insane. I’d never stand any chance in Russia’s politics. Then and later a degree from a Western university would have been seen as a disqualifying attribute. And, in hindsight, I just never had the character necessary to navigate Russian politics (or business for that matter) — being well educated is absolutely not enough. You have to be extra tough, often extra rough.

But, oh boy, did I love Russia then. I was madly in love. Truly. Madly. Deeply. Seriously — in my younger years, I wanted to be in Russia, with Russia. For every school break, I’d home go and every day spent in Moscow felt like a dream vacation that I didn’t want to let go of. And this was before Russia became a…