Introduction
Many folks have one reason or the other why they started out in tech. For someone like me, it spans across many reasons. A number of things sparked my interest but the real wonder is in the fact that they happened almost at the same time. Please fasten your seat-belt as I take you through my journey in tech so far.
Life Before Tech
I am a graduate of Linguistics/Igbo from the University of Nigeria Nsukka. I graduated in 2015 like everyone else with high hopes of getting a job and starting out a decent life. I finished the one year compulsory national service, but there was no job forth coming. I couldn't get anything with just my school certificate. To avoid being broke and dependent, I went into fashion design, became good at it and started mine in 2017. I am good with this but I couldn't fund it properly as I had to borrow money every year end for rent and other little stuff. I became broke and deep in debt. For three years I struggled with the business but I still held on. Then one day, in December 2019 came the shocker of my life. My boyfriend ditched me. I watched my world crumble before my eyes. I have never experienced such pain before in my entire life. I cried, begged, blamed, shouted, all to no avail. I became depressed and even suicidal. I lost interest in things I loved doing. I couldn't stand the sight of my workplace anymore, it spelt doom for me. For months I stayed indoors not willing to associate with anyone. It was in this chaos that tech found me!
The Quest
Before now, I have always been amazed by how websites, Apps, phones and laptops work but always thought one needed rocket science knowledge to get started. After some time, still recovering from depression, I started checking out jobs online. I noticed most of the jobs with good pay was tech related and I needed certain skills and knowledge of computer languages to get started. I was in need of quick cash. I looked out for a lot of opportunities online but none suited me. I got into Facebook ads through a Facebook friend. Unfortunately, this required good money to run the ads effectively as to make profit which I didn't have. However, something happened to me when I installed the Flutterwave @getBarterApp for easy money transactions and conversions. The app swept me off my feet completely; the ui/ux, the way it synched information from my bank, everything was just awesome. It gave me this odd feeling of backwardness. I knew I had been in the dark for quite sometime. I kept asking myself "where were you when your mates were doing these amazing things?" (Now where I got the notion that it is my mates doing the app is what I don't know). I needed to be in the know!
Starting Out in Tech
My curiosity got higher after I watched the movie "The Internship", and just like Billy, I remember googling: "google jobs".
I told my brother (an engineering undergrad) of my intention to switch career and he became my first mentor. He encouraged me to start with my phone as I had no laptop. In April 2020, he introduced me to freecodecamp.org where I started learning to code with my phone and got my web-dev certification on completing the numerous HTML and CSS challenges including five projects. I must mention that freecodecamp has a great and supportive community ready to help newbies like me. I also started learning JavaScript as my first computer language. At a stage, I really needed a laptop to get the best out of my coding skills. I opted to sell off my business. I gathered the money and with support from my mum, I got a laptop. Since then, I have not looked back and don't intend to do so in the nearest future.
How Tech Has Impacted My Life
I am not a "big gun" in tech yet as I am still learning, but being in tech has impacted my life in so many ways:
- Being in tech gave me my confidence back.
- Tech has shown me my life is worth living.
- Tech has shown me I can be part of something unique and life changing.
- Being in tech has taught me to never quit.
- Tech has shown me a great community that I never imagined existed such as @shecodeafrica
- Tech has kept me in the know.
- Being in tech inspired a passion and zeal I never knew I had which writing is one of them.
For these reasons and more, I am willing to give back to the community as much as I can.
Conclusion
With this post, I really made myself vulnerable as some things I said here are my small secrets. Nonetheless, I shared it to inspire someone never to give up on oneself even when others give up on you. If I can get this far in tech without quitting, then you too can go beyond limits. You got this!!