On a shining Tuesday morning, I met with Maksimas (Max) Milta at one of the colorful tables on Beinecke Plaza. Max is here for his first year of a Masters in European and Russian Studies, through the Graduate School's MacMillan Center. He is focused on studying sanctions, and, more specifically, how to make them work!
Max comes to Yale with a wealth of experience and education already under his belt: he received a Bachelors in Cultural Heritage from a European Humanities University, a private liberal arts university “in exile” (meaning that the entire university literally up and relocated from Belarus to Lithuania), and a Masters in Political Science from Vilnius University. Max then worked for European Humanities University for eight years, as both a Head of Communication and Development and a Lecturer in late 19th and early 20th century European literature.
As we talked, I realized that I was speaking to someone who has really excelled in the art of living. There doesn't seem to be anything that Max does that is not done to the full. Take his interest in politics, for example. Not only is he pursuing a third degree in a politically-related field, Max also covered protests in Belarus in an on-the-ground reporting role, spoke on live TV with major news agencies like the BBC, and is the host of a new Russian-speaking ten-episode documentary that just premiered last Sunday on Lithuanian National TV about women activists from Belarus who were forced to flee their country, and are currently in exile (it's called “Talaka”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjcy2OQ3Ltg). Oh, and he has a podcast discussing Belarus, called Minsk Express (link in comments!) And he's a ReThink.CEE fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the US, where emerging activist scholars receive support and funding as they produce policy papers (his is about the use of higher education as a soft power in countries of Europe's East and Southern Caucasus). And he's on the Graduate Student Senate at Yale.
So yes, I think I would say Max is making the most of his time!
#humansofoiss
