#wcktm2017 experience

Yet another year and yet another WordCamp here in Kathmandu. While I am yet to write the final few words of my #wcpune2017 experience, I thought I would go ahead and write this. Just a note, to those who think writing is easy and quick and they will be starting soon to write or restart writing; writing isn’t easy or quick and that is why you are not writing yet and that is also why I take ages to write one article. I feel you bro! I feel you. But I will try and see if I can get into writing one article per week, either here or at my other blogs.

So getting back to the topic for the article, WordCamp Kathmandu 2017 concluded yesterday (20th of May) and what an experience it was. The last month was hectic and the last week was just another level. My buddy and partner Dhananjaya gave birth to a beautiful, lovely little girl and got busy with it and me with the event and we couldn’t give much time to office work. But nonetheless the week was fun, happening and hectic (I wouldn’t miss that word). We had a change in venue this year, which meant we had to do a lot of testing but it being a venue also used for weddings and other family ceremonies, wasn’t available until a day before at 11 in the night. So there was almost no testing whatsoever until the event day morning. This however I will have to give to our lead organizer Yam Chhetri along with Sachet, Shiva and Surendra and their volunteers for getting things sorted before the event started. You guys were awesome.

The organizers and volunteers were at the venue by 6 in the morning. We worked hard to get everything sorted. Test the slides get things ready and get things started without a heckle. While there were a little issues with the projector, most of the things that were seen as an issue on the last WordCamp were taken care of and I take in pride in saying that coming to the 6th WordCamp in Nepal, the event has always started on time without delay. This is something we take very seriously. More seriously may be, because “Nepali Time” is generally taken as never being at the place at the given time. For us “Nepali Time” is doing things at the decided time. #ChangeTheNotion #ChangeTheNation 😀

More images to follow as I get them.

In the event, I handled the speaker selection department and became Speaker Wrangler along with Biplab Subedi. We made sure that the speaker well selected, trained and made ready to deliver. We had an overwhelming response from international speakers this time around with 5 international speakers and us having to decline a few others. We are so glad to see so many people trying to speak at WordCamp Kathmandu, which we take as appreciation to our effort on previous WordCamps held here. We look forward to seeing more of you participating at the event. The national speakers did a good job as well and I would like to thank each one of you for volunteering to speak at the event and help us make it a great event. There was last minute hassle as well, where one of our 6 international speaker pulled out of the event and we had to finalize another speaker. I would like to thank Sakin Shrestha for stepping ahead and taking up the spot at last minute.

Apart from this I would like to believe we did manage to get better at food, venue, session handling (except for the projector thingy at one session). However we would like to improve a lot at handling Internet at the venue. Internet has been something we have tried a lot to tackle and haven’t been successful at. ISPs here basically suck at providing quality service and I wouldn’t mind a little in saying that. But let’s get them out of the topic for now and look into how other things went.

So things I would take from this version on WordCamp Kathmandu is we had a good number of international speakers. Similar with attendees. We had a very good turn out of people at the event from the local scene as well and I met with people who flew in to Kathmandu just for the event from Nepalgunj, Pokhara, Butwal and other places. Thank you for your effort. Also good thing was the team effort and how everyone gave more than their 100%.

A few things, that I would like to leave back is the concept of workshop on the event. While workshop are something that I would still love to have, the internet just doesn’t let people take it’s advantage. Had internet been better, it would have been a different case. Another thing I would like to forget is how people complain of favor-ism, when they do not even apply for organizing, volunteering or speaking at the event. While no one came to me personally to complain about this our lead organizer did get a few complaints regarding this. This is something I or any other organizer won’t be able to solve. To solve this, we would need people to proactively come forward to be a part of it. Everything here is done through meetings and no favor-ism is prominent in any kind of selection. Take my word for that.

I have an attendees perspective of the event as well and may be I will write about it soon as well. But I think this would be for now. I will also try and come up with a podcast soon with some of the speakers at the WordCamp but can’t promise as of now. Before I finish, I would like to thank all the Organizers, Volunteers, Speakers, Attendees and everyone even remotely associated to the event for making this a great event.