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sorry oh hi
so yeah I'm Katrina I'm now a front-end
developer based in Berlin here and when
I first heard about the topic here which
is actually a very awesome idea to talk
about gratitude and how communities come
tied to that I was thinking to myself
it's like is there one person or one
group I'm especially grateful for and
since my life was very meandering and it
kind of still is I couldn't pick one not
in good conscience could I just pick one
because it would do injustice to all the
other awesome people and communities
that have brought me to where I am today
and so my quick bio which is not so
quick but it's tied to all these
communities goes a little bit like this
and I forgot my name tag here and so
yeah I was born raised went to school
finished school get my first computer
only at age 20 since my mom couldn't
afford anyone before that studied German
literature linguistics and many many
other things and around 2004 --is--
started to dabble with HTML and CSS with
the help of the save HTML maybe some
people still remember I see some smiles
yes which is still online till today so
you can check it out um but yeah I never
really followed through I finished my
university but until various jobs but
never really had an idea what I wanted
to do with my professional life yeah
maybe something was internet but who
knows until one day in 2012 Michele just
mentioned it the rails girls workshop in
Berlin happened and that was the one
life-changing moment for me that I can
pin pin point it down that changed
everything afterwards but it also a
didn't fell from the sky I didn't hear
about it just like so I heard about it
by the Berlin Twitter community that
brought me in touch with the folks who
then also found at the
space and people who found it a CSS
conference J has conned yeah so the red
cuts workshop very incredible afterwards
we started off the Berlin the local
Berlin chapter which is now called
called curious Misha I mention it
because we're not girls after 20 we're
women or females not tight that were
harsh and also it's never been just
about rails its Ruby and the front end
stack as well then I went traveling came
back in between the Summer of Code a
stipend ship was founded and I wasn't
organized there and at some point fun
fact I realized I never learned Ruby
like I'm helping all these people in the
Ruby and the red skirts movement but I
never learned Ruby and at some point
again one day I realized I'm helping all
these women become developers what about
me and I stopped back to HTML and CSS
and my old love for CSS a walk again and
I started to learn it properly learn
front-end properly amongst others with
the help of CSS classes tied to the open
tech school that fluckey mentioned with
the conference nails a lot of other
things at first I wasn't attendee then I
became a coach I am NOT an organizer
again which I would like to use as a
small moment our next workshop is on
June 16th if here in Berlin if you want
to freshen up your CSS come to us if you
know people who want to learn CSS and
HTML please send them our way follow our
Twitter or find me afterwards if you
know CSS and want to help as a coach
also please find me afterwards
lalalala in the advertisement and I want
to come back to the rails Kurds movement
and what is behind that Ruby community
that had the biggest impact on me of all
because it's not a lightest it's not
exclusionary inclusionary from the
beginning the whole atmosphere has been
developers are keen to support
and they're happy to support there were
so many people stepping in starting
after that first red card workshop
within weeks there were four study
groups happening weekly on a weekly
basis with two to four coaches for each
group and also the whole existence of
Ruby the Ruby programming language is
based on making the code and to develop
a experience and more human experience
making the code human readable and this
bird went all the way down to the red
skirt community and it's something that
I want to bring now into the with the
set of CSS classes and together with all
these awesome people here also into the
CSS and J's community and yeah at some
point I realized I am a career changer I
am what people usually call self-taught
but yes I do have my share in it but
it's not just me I'm actually community
taught because community has made it
possible for me to be a front-end
developer now and last but not least I
want to mention one key factor in the
Berlin community scene and that is the
co-op space and in a blur of the Berlin
community providing space for hackathons
meetups workshops for free so we can
stay independent as well thank you very
much for that please support them
however and whenever you can just
amazing and that's it thank you very
much for listening
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