Lucky Bird

I’m Daan van den Hurk, 23 years old and a self-proclaimed Lucky Bird. Somehow, saying yes to things has taken me to places and experiences I could never have planned myself. Often, I don’t even know exactly what I’m saying yes to — I tend to figure that out along the way.

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In 2026, I graduated in Communication & Multimedia Design with my video campaign Kut Geluk! (Fuck Luck!). My studies helped me discover how to turn my creativity into something meaningful. They also took me to some pretty amazing places. I interned at Sea Monster Entertainment in Cape Town, where I worked on animation, a festival trailer and social media content. Later, during my minor in Global Awareness, I interned at the Mother Earth Foundation in Manila, where we used Participatory Action Research to develop a manual for setting up Materials Recovery Facilities across the Philippines.

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Outside of my studies, I’m pretty much always creating something — from music and slightly crazy promotional ideas to documenting my travels. After graduating, another yes led to one of my biggest adventures yet: driving a Land Cruiser from Rwanda to the Netherlands with two friends, crossing twenty African countries in 4.5 months. We shared our adventures through videos on Instagram, while I also filmed a mini-documentary set to be released later this year.

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What started as simply being bad at saying no has become a way of looking at life: stay curious, take chances and see where they take you.

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So far, I’ve been pretty lucky.