I was once an eager student. In my early school years I have worked tirelessly to be the best in class and was often shut down for having too much initiative. Seems ridiculous today, but a statement "we know that you know, let the other students work" was something I heard often.

By the time I went to a boarding school I decided to try a different approach of doing as little as I possibly could. I got really good at it, in fact I got so good that I failed the entry exams to my super-competitive university. Nothing a bit of bribery couldn't fix though.

It was unexciting to go back to working hard, so I decided to embrace a new approach - politics. At some point in my second year we've heard that as students we could form something called "a student's council". It was meant to be a vehicle for conversations between the school and the students on important matters, such as scheduling, rules of conduct, extracurricular activities and most importantly for me - events.

My mind went "ka-ching" the moment I heard that there was going to be school budget allocated for events. So for the next six months we went back and forward with the school, that tried to make it sound like this was an unimportant bureaucratic matter that we shouldn't get to hung up on, which only made me push harder for it in a student forum.

Eventually the format was agreed, the composition of the group established and the election procedure scheduled for early next year. Little did I know that on my third year of studies I'm going to remain a second year student. It wasn't even due to my excess partying, I was just too smart for my own good. Following the core principles of "doing as little as humanly possible to pass" I've found a hack to my main exam. Turned out if you knew the most complex topic really well, one could pass with flying colours. Sadly for me I wasn't the first to notice and after a few years of abuse my year was the year they changed the format.

Anyhow, here I was in my second year again, figuring out all the ways I'm going to benefit from being one of the two people elected to represent my class in the student council, when I'm told that my class can't vote for me. Turns out in our original negotiations we set it up in a way that each class could only vote for its representatives.  As I fell behind a year, I had about a week to harness the support of classmates, whom I haven't really met. My attendance was never great, but after realising I had to wait a full year just to have another go at the exam I failed, I stopped going to the school altogether.

For a moment I thought there was no hope, but life handed me a lucky break. Turns out that the day prior to the election, there was a celebration of some anniversary and there was a student party. That party was hosted in a space where we used to organise events a long while ago, meaning I knew all the staff in there. After a short consideration I decided that simplicity is king and went for a very straightforward last moment campaign execute.

My whole campaign was literally a two step process.

1. Step one - announce on the student forum that I'm running for a spot in the student council and I promise to take great care of my classmates especially when it comes to parties.

2. Step two - buy enough vodka for my classmates to vote me in.

I didn't give it much thought, however my gut was telling me that it was a strong setup.

On the night of the party, I brought in three or four bottles of vodka. My history with the place allowed me to buy it in store instead of paying the full bar price. A strong politician is as efficient as his campaign and boy was I getting bang for my buck. As the night grew momentum I felt that the party was nearing its peak, after which the people were going to start bailing out. I asked the bartender to pour all the vodka into a battery of shot glasses that covered the whole bar.

As he was doing it, I asked my partners, who were famous in Moscow for their parties to introduce me. I was quite nervous so while my Greek friend was rambling from the stage about me, I downed 3 shots from that battery and stumbled upon a stage.

"Democracy is essential to a successful society and tomorrow we are having our very first election. We better not fuck it up." - was my opening - "Students of the second year. You might not know me very well, but I know you. And if you vote for me tomorrow, I promise to make sure that it's not just work hard in our school, it's also play hard. And to give you a glimpse of what's about to come I welcome all of you to the bar, those shots are for you." - to complete the cheese fest, I dropped the mic and walked off the stage.

The next afternoon the count got in and I was the second most voted student-elect in my class by a big margin from the third place. It secured both my position on the council and my understanding that democracy is easily manipulated.

Fifteen years later Donald Trump pulled off a large-scale reenactment of my straightforward approach. The day after the results were announced, I found LA residents shellshocked and in disbelief that his campaign worked. I observed them struggling through their day in disbelief and couldn't help thinking: "How could it not?"