The Spark of Youth

 By Ana Vladescu

Albin Kurti circa 1997

A few weeks ago, I went home for the first time in two years and found myself flipping through old primary school yearbooks. The little kids I grew up with are completely different now, as expected. But as I looked through those old photos I noticed that we all had something in common. There’s this glint in our eyes that you don’t usually find in our eyes as the years pass. It’s what united us then, and maybe still does. As people age, we learn to suppress our expressions, speak more cautiously, carry ourselves like we’ve seen too much. But why is it that the older we get, the more we mock or dismiss the idealism of the young? I’ve heard it all my life: “You’ll understand when you’re older,” “the world doesn’t work that way,” or my personal favorite, “you only believe that because you’re still young.” I used to believe I’d be the exception—that I could get older without getting duller. But lately I wonder: is losing the spark inevitable?

Our meeting with UNMIK was very emotional for me; it made me feel small. When I was 16, I told everyone I would become president someday. It was overambitious and naïve, but I felt it deeply. I just wanted to make things better, to prove that politics didn’t have to be dirty. My family laughed, and I understood why, but this feeling of “smallness” lingered. Over time, I’ve been told again and again that my belief in people and peace is just a side effect of being young. And maybe they’re right. Sitting in that meeting, listening to career officials who couldn’t (or wouldn’t) answer basic questions about what motivates them now, I felt something close to heartbreak. They used to be passionate “when they were young,” one of them said, like youth was a condition they’d outgrown. It hit me hard: is this what adulthood looks like? Still working, still important on paper, but no longer moved by the purpose that brought you there?

When we met the prime minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti for our online meeting, something shifted. I’d done my research. I knew he had once been a student protester, politically outspoken and driven by ideals. And I was skeptical—wondering if power had turned him into just another polished politician who forgot where he started. My question to him was: “As an opposition figure, your voice was powerful because it stood against the system. Now that you are part of the system, how do you hold yourself accountable?” His answer surprised me. He spoke not just with care, but with conviction. He acknowledged the difficulty of accountability in a government without a functioning parliament, but said he holds himself accountable by staying adaptable—by not changing his social class. That struck me. Most politicians avoid this topic entirely, especially in my home countries (the U.S. and Romania), where power often comes with distance. Kurti’s answer wasn’t perfect, but it felt honest. He remembered. And that memory, I realized, might be the key. The spark doesn’t have to die—it just needs to be protected.

I’ve often felt trapped in this strange in-between: legally an adult, socially still a child. “Proper adults” (as I refer to them) talk down to me, assume I don’t understand how the world works. But what if I do—and I’m just not jaded yet? Our virtual journey through Kosovo has been full of emotional whiplash: UNMIK’s disillusionment, the dry hopelessness in the room during our NSI conversation, the passion in the voices at the Peace by Peace workshop, and the thoughtful optimism of Besa Luci from Kosovo 2.0. There, I saw humanities taken seriously, media used as a tool for empathy and dialogue. In their work—and in Kurti’s voice—I saw proof that some people carry their spark with them, even as they grow. Maybe being young isn’t about age at all, but about refusing to forget why you started. Maybe it’s not naïve to believe in change, just deeply, stubbornly human. And maybe, just maybe, the real work of growing up is learning how to keep your spark alive in a world that keeps trying to smother it.