Re:Post

For month and months I have strayed far enough from my track. Sure, I gained something worthwhile in attending multitude of events that keep popping on my schedule every week. Career Conference 2013 for example, opened my eyes to the employer's perspective, what they see in people and what they are actually looking for. Company visits to big firms gave me an insight of how an organization operates and volunteering in a highly regarded event such as Perdana Leadership Foundation or Malaysia Public Policy Competition teach me the essence of professionalism. Responsibility does matter and I will say I learned it the hard way by crashing here and there, committing mistakes that I still regretted as of today. It shaped me in a fashion of a hardly-tempered mineral, but we all know that "No pressure, No diamond" saying live up to its definition. I'm just trying to be a little bit better than what I could do yesterday, which resulted in my running threshold reached 7km as of today - the distance I could run comfortably without stopping. I regained this little passion of mine back in Xterra Malaysia when I witnessed people, young to old, male or female completed the astonishing triathlon challenge in Putrajaya. From there I joined various training and races with my fabulous teammates, improving my stamina notch by notch and could finally smiled to that little Leo in the past as he watched Marathon and Olympic Games coverage in awe. However until today, there is something that still doesn't feel quite right. I like programming, yet I hate it. It's a love-hate relationship that revolves around neatly-tabbed codes, behind-the-scene logics and the struggle of finding the correct people that envision the same goal as yours. I went to the extent of nearly dropping the back-end parts off while being focused on Sunway Echo Student Newsletter designing side, in which I truly enjoyed. The decision was heightened when a wonderful yet strong community existed in the particular side too - the surface side that concentrates on people, a hub, a bridge to the crowd. Afterwards, it was a close call. I joined the Google Developers's DevFest Kuala Lumpur 2013 which flipped the entire table, erratically changed my train of thought and reshuffled the pieces of puzzle in the complexity of my animus. I met someone who worked 6 years in investment at France, decided to start creating things on his own and ventured to Asia and built his own start-up. I met someone who never coded before, yet become a full-time system developer by learning in autodidact. I met someone who came from mobile app industry and told his stories from a developer perspective. I met someone, my colleague who recently released his start-up project and networked with way more people than me. I met someone who finally defined the term start-up to me, a realistic person that turned off Microsoft's offer because he enjoyed what he's doing now. I met someone who is presenting Malaysia in next regional programming challenge in Phuket next week. I met an actual googler who actually never purchased an app. I met a team of company workers who came from various backgrounds yet performed really efficiently. I met people who sit on the floor, typing frantically on their laptops and could pitch their idea the moment you opened up conversation. These aspiring people, their eyes are glittering with spirit, and dream, and ideas. And they are most welcome to share theirs since they won't lose it. The only valid formula for idea is addition apparently. Amazing foods and frequent tea breaks are made with the objective of providing a platform for networking, a chance to talk that could potentially turn ideas into existence. I was wrong. All this time I thought the tech community was not strong enough, at least in Malaysia. But no, I am rightfully wrong. It was there, you only need to know where to look. You could either basks in joy for finding the right environment for you, or hold it tight by keeping close contact to each other but heck, why choose when you can get both? Maybe because it's Google, maybe because it's the people, or maybe because it's you? You decide, I'm done for the night. I am a proud developer-yet-student dreaming to put on the original Google's name tag. #gdg #devfest