These last two months I’ve been pretty busy and haven’t paid much attention to the blog. This time I’m not going to talk about anything technical; this is a very personal post. If you’re not interested in my life, stop reading. If you are, you’re a bit nosy ;P
This month I’m closing a wonderful chapter of my professional life. It has brought me a lot of joy, let me work with a great team, learn like I hadn’t in years, and have fun doing what I like most, developing software.
These last two years have been very important to me. Two years ago another very important chapter of my life came to an end. It lasted 10 years, and during that time I tried to get a software development company off the ground. Things didn’t end well and I had to do something I’m not used to: look for a job.
And that’s exactly when Carlos Blé crossed my path. As it happened, Carlos was in Madrid for work and we ran into each other at a couple of MSCoders events. He told me a cool project might come up in Las Palmas and asked me whether I’d be interested in helping them out with a few days of consulting as a .Net expert.
In the end the project happened and, instead of a few days, it turned into an offer for a one-year project, including the first 3 months on site in Las Palmas and frequent visits for the rest of the year.
So I went from having no job to having two offers: one from a bank “close” to home, and the other for a one-year project as a freelancer, spending quite a long time away from home and having to travel a lot.
The thing is, the Canary Islands project was really interesting, it was going to be quite a challenge for me and it looked like a unique opportunity. So I accepted Carlos’s offer and a month later I was sharing a flat with him and Fran in Las Palmas.
The year flew by and the project was renewed for another year, which has flown by too.
These have been two very intense years in which I’ve learned a lot and unlearned even more. I don’t think I’ve ever learned so much in so little time. And I have a lot of people to thank for that:
- Alfredo, Carlos and Fran (who doesn’t snore), for raising the bar so high. Thanks to you I feel like the hobbits returning to the Shire. I’ve grown, my stats have gone up and I’m several levels higher now. And on top of that I have three companions in adventure.
- The people at Aida, the company that has trusted us for the last two years. The progress we’ve all been able to make has been a great incentive to keep improving. I don’t want to leave anyone out, so I won’t name names 😉
- In order of appearance, Ronny, Miguel, Dani and Jose. Having you as apprentices has been quite a challenge. You’re so eager to learn that I feel younger when I spend time with you. Sharing a flat with you when I go to the Canaries is like a daily hackathon, but I’ve loved it.
- Luis Rovirosa. Even though we’ve only been able to spend a little time together, every time we have, you’ve made me grow a little.
- Antonio de la Torre. Even though our paths have barely crossed, it’s been great. My only regret is not getting to overlap for longer, because not many people can boast of making me change my mind so many times in so little time. We need to share the bar car on a train to some event again 😉
- My family, for being so patient. There have been months when I spent a lot of time away from home between work and community events, but they’ve always supported me.
- The community. Thanks to it I got a job two years ago, and thanks to it I’m changing jobs now.
It feels strange to leave a company where I’m happy. It may sound odd to put it this way, but every part of me is telling me to take the job opportunity that has come my way. I’m leaving Codesai proud to have been part of its beginnings and convinced that our paths will cross again one way or another.
Best of all, thanks to the community we’ll keep seeing each other and sharing a keyboard.
Update: My colleagues at Codesai have written me a farewell post. All I can do is say thank you again. You guys rock 😉