Board Introduction: Bas van Wely
In the first volume of Nekst 2014-2015, you can read a special concerning the new board of Asset | Econometrics. Here on Nekst-Online, we give some more insights in the current board members. This is the story of Bas van Wely.
It is about eleven in the morning and I am sitting in the other room, because I had to escape from the terrible music in E1.10. For some reason, wedding songs were playing on a Thursday morning. Although I do not dislike weddings, I recently found out that I do not particularly like wedding songs. You might ask yourself where this is going, and in fact, I am asking myself the same question. So let me get to the point.
I would like to tell you something more about the things I like. Most of you might know that I like to play soccer, or take a ride on my racing bike. Those are all ordinary hobbies that could have been anyone’s. However, I think everybody has got a somewhat more peculiar hobby. What I might even like better soccer or cycling are the mountains, in particular high mountains. Ever since I was a little boy, my parents took me skiing. I loved it, but every winter we spent in the Alps, I could not stop imagining what it would be like to be on top of one of the summits, instead of skiing down the slopes in the touristic skiing parks.
When I was in fourth grade of high school, my stepfather gave me a book from Ronald Naar. Its title could be translated to ‘In search of balance’. The adventurous stories about his ascent of the Eiger North Face, the beautiful nature, sportive challenges and absolute tranquility in the mountains really inspired me. That summer I took a course on mountaineering with my all-time favorite mountain guides Thomas und Andreas. We learned how to belay your climbing partner, how to climb steep ice slopes, how to get out of a crevasse and more importantly, how not to fall into one in the first place.
It makes you feel very vulnerable and therefore really alive when being out in the mountains on your own
From this moment on I was sold and since then I have spent at least one week in the Alps every summer. I took two more courses in high school to convince my parents that I would not get myself killed when going without a mountain guide. The past three summers I have been to Switzerland with a friend of mine. Although my parents are still a bit worried, we have already climbed over fifteen summits and still have not fallen down. It makes you feel very vulnerable and therefore really alive when being out in the mountains on your own. This made it a nice variation from the beach holidays, where one usually feels less alive.
I cannot describe what it feels like to get up at three in the morning and to be on the summit five (or more) hours later, while seeing the orange morning glow rise over the serene snow covered landscape. In any case, I can tell you that the second part is much better than the first part. Nevertheless, I could recommend everybody to do the same. Then maybe one day, we can take the flag of Asset | Econometrics with us to the summit of Mount Everest. Well, I hope you slightly enjoyed getting to know something more about me.
It is now about twelve in the afternoon, or should I say morning? Let me just say the glass is half full and call it afternoon, or would this imply morning? While I am writing this, the digital clock on my computer tells me time has now passed twelve o’clock. As digital clocks are quite reliable nowadays, I think we should stick with afternoon. While looking at the word ‘afternoon’, I just realize that the word ‘noon’ would have solved our problem, but it is now after noon. Anyway, music has stopped playing in E1.10, so I can safely return. Have a great afternoon! (or morning)
Text by: Bas van Wely
