¡Buenos días! - My Devconnect Experience

“The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only one page.” — Saint Augustine

"¿Dónde está el baño?" - that was pretty much the only Spanish sentence I could make without stuttering. It roughly translates to "Where is the bathroom?", which was a regular question from me, as I was barely at home most of the time, during Devconnect week, and I needed to pee. However, before we get to being in Argentina, what did happen prior? This was going to be my second opportunity to attend Devconnect, and I was sceptical I would make it, as the last time didn't work due to visa issues.

As a Nigerian passport holder, visa issues are a constant for me. Missing Zuzalu is probably the one that has left a bad taste in my mouth. I pretty much didn't bother about Devcon in Thailand, first because of funds and secondly due to visa hassle. I was very excited for Devconnect in Argentina, which I had correctly predicted the location. I didn't want to delay, and as of 10th June, I sent an email to the Argentine embassy in Nigeria about visa requirements. I also asked Njoku, who had previously visited Argentina, and he confirmed he saw shege in the process, and advised to start early.

Then, on 21st June, luckily for me, thousands of Devconnect attendees, the Devconnect team announced a visa waiver program for attendees. In my 25 years of being on earth, I have never heard or seen this being done. What do you mean I needed to only fill a form with fewer than 8 entries and get a visa waiver, and not the standard submit 50+ pages of paperwork for a visa, only to get rejected? I was elated, and I quickly bought my ticket for the event and filled out the form. I could claim I was the first Nigerian to fill that form, but I have no evidence to back that up, so I will let it slide, no clout chasing today :) Some months later, in August, I got my ETA to Argentina in my email. This was really happening.

On October 7th, my friend Janjaa and I booked our flight, which was quite expensive, to be honest. That flight ticket could do a lot in my life, but I was already prepared to be at my first global Ethereum community event. Travelling solo is fun, but do you know what's more fun? Travelling with a friend. He travelled to Abuja earlier from Port Harcourt, and we linked up at Abuja, as I travelled on Tuesday, 4th November, to Abuja too, from Port Harcourt. Our Ethiopian Airlines flight to Buenos Aires (BA) from Lagos was slated for Sunday, 9th November 10pm.

We decided to just book an Abuja to Lagos flight for that Sunday, only for us to receive an email from Valuejet days before the flight, about shifting the morning flight to the evening. The timeline was too close to risk, so we had to reschedule to go to Lagos on Saturday, as opposed to Sunday. So yeah, next time, it's much better to arrive a day before your international flight, local airlines can be funny. It was finally D-day, and we got to Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos. During check-in, I met some other Nigerians going for Devconnect too, and we exchanged pleasantries. We finally got to check in and passed through hundreds of officials asking, "Anything for us?" NGMI society indicator. We boarded, and it was a long ass flight to BA, and after what seems like eternity, we landed in BA on 10th November at 10:55 pm. The route was Lagos to Addis Ababa to Sao Paulo to BA.

Also, prior to coming, I had already made reservations (and paid 50% with Peanut in advance) for an apartment in Recoleta through Booking.com. The host, Veronica, is awesome, and I definitely recommend staying at her place. It was a 4-bedroom apartment, and two folks cancelled out after reserving. However, I was able to get two others to fill the gap. Janjaa and I had initial reservations about staying with random people, but it turns out we got cool people, Bernard and Finisher, and they made part of my stay in BA memorable. The airport in BA, was pretty much the start of noting what was different. It didn't take long, and we were done with immigration and customs scans.

I picked up a trolley for FREE and didn't have to pay for it. We visited the Tienda León booth at the airport and paid for a taxi to our place, using crypto thanks to Peanut. Peanut pretty much made my stay in BA seamless, as I was able to spend my crypto by scanning QR payment codes. Going to the apartment, I noticed how beautiful, properly planned BA was. I also noticed the presence of a lot of traffic lights that were functional (side eyes Sim and Port Harcourt).

We got to the apartment, and the host helped us get in and gave us a tour of the apartment. She gave us directions where we could find a McDonald's, but when we went to search, we discovered we couldn't locate it, and Janjaa suggested we go back home. "2 black men on the streets of Buenos Aires at night ke, make we dey go back." I noticed the apartment had fibre internet, and I could see over 40+ SSIDs just from the apartment. We are really behind in broadband internet penetration.

The next morning, we went in search of an eSIM. I had previously seen a tweet about them having a 30-day, 25GB + free WhatsApp plan (WhatsApp is big in LATAM, apparently) for ~$14, so we walked to the closest one to us. We couldn't help but notice we were the only black people we were seeing, lol. We got to the store and tried to pay with QR, but they said that it worked only for sales of equipment in their store, and service payment required a card. I had no physical card that could work, so I quickly set up a Bybit Card and added it to my Google Wallet, and I was able to pay with contactless payment (first time using this feature). It made me pause for a bit to appreciate how technology can really make life convenient. We also found a gym nearby and signed up. Throughout our stay, we were the only black folks at the gym.

Before coming, I made a small Devconnect plan, so I don't miss out on events I found interesting. On the Friday of the week, I went to the Polkadot sub0 event. Largely because I wanted to meet Renee, one of the DeSci OGs, who's building Open Matter. We met briefly, and I later met folks from Africa, finally, familiar faces. I had a chat with Bekka, Koko, Pee, Victor, Pablo, John, etc before leaving that day. I did breeze in temporarily on the other days.

Saturday was Governance Day, and I was so excited for this event. This was the only side event throughout Devconnect that was geared towards folks like me, who work around DAOs and Governance. It felt good to be in a room where other people understood what you spoke well. I had to leave early to attend the Devconnect Volunteers meeting, yeah, I volunteered for 3 days. It felt like a fun thing to do, and it was actually fun. Sunday was the Uniswap Cup, and that was my best side event in Devconnect. It was quite a unique way to market Uniswap. I played for Team LayerZero, and we made it from the group stage to the quarter-finals. Not bad for a ragtag team of crypto bros.

The main week of Devconnect was a lot. It was as if many things were happening at the same time. The first few days were me coming for my volunteering shift, then after, moving from one evening side event to another until about 2am. I felt the pulse of the Ethereum community. As someone who is chronically online and tends to remember a lot of accounts and their faces, I could spot some popular folks around the venue. However, I didn't bother trying to introduce myself because I understand how it can be a hassle for someone who just wants to enjoy being somewhere, not being able to, because of their "fame."

I really liked the planning of Devconnect, especially the concepts of Districts and Community Hubs. Speaking of Community Hubs, some DeSci ecosystem folks and I helped put the DeSci Hub together. Big shoutout to Brenda of DeSci LATAM for leading the charge, and Joshua of DeSci World, Maria of DeSci Reviews, Rodrigo of AuraSci, Juan, and other folks who helped out virtually and ones who we didn't get to meet at the DeSci Hub due to timing. This was my first time meeting other DeSci players that weren't based in Africa, since being in the ecosystem in 2021, and it was heartwarming. I also went to the Governance Geeks Community Hub and dropped my hot take, too.

While walking around, I stumbled upon Eugene, who used to lead Governance at Scroll. We had a chat, and we ended up seeing each other two other times. That's the thing with events like this: you tend to stumble on some people multiple times at different venues. I didn't have a long list of people I wanted to meet. In fact, the folks I wanted to meet in person were actually people I have interacted with virtually. Either through Twitter (not calling you X) or DeSci/Governance/DAO ecosystem-related activity. Also, it was quite hard to meet up with people due to schedule conflicts. At one point, it was almost like I wouldn't meet Devansh, who works around AI x Public Goods at the Ethereum Foundation, only for me to stumble on him as he was leaving La Rural after the closing ceremony. I also met Theo, who was the Governance Lead when I was at VitaDAO.

I attended the ScrollDAO day, and I got to interact with a handful of delegates IRL, finally. I met folks who were part of the recently concluded Scroll Delegate Accelerator Program (Peter gave me a Project Mocha coffee gift) and other folks who work around Governance in DAOs. It was also my first time tasting the famous mate drink. It was pretty much agbo for Argentines. I did meet some new people at Devconnect, but it was all at party-related side events at night or intimate dinners. I finally had to use the Telegram folder feature for chats, and I sorted new contacts into a Devconnect folder. So this is what BD folks face?

My tongue didn't work well with the food available in Argentina. They had a lot of sweet pastries, and it's not what I would like to have regularly. The actual food was both bland taste-wise to me (trust me, Nigerians were wailing for food) and not spicy. Even the asado wasn't tasty to me, and the fernet drink was bitter to me. The only thing I really liked was the empanada, as it was pretty much a meat pie to me and the ice cream. I ended up cooking 80% of what I ate, and my flatmates got to partake in the dividends. I even hosted a few folks to have jollof rice over at my place. Thanks to Aliyu for bringing pepper from Nigeria for me. The African-focused events were the only time I got to taste something Nigerian or even hear afrobeats music.

Throughout my 20-day stay in BA, I didn't pay anything with cash. I only paid with stablecoins through Peanut, Onboard card and Bybit card. The crypto products worked very well because they could interact with the existing web2 products. For crypto apps to scale, we need to make them interoperable with already popular local solutions. My major culture shock was that I saw 10x more dogs than kids. It's as if everyone in Argentina owns a dog and they love to walk them. The dogs are also well-behaved and not aggressive, compared to the ones trained in Nigeria, lol. Traffic lights are obeyed, zebra crossings are used at all block intersections, and the drivers are not in a hurry and will wait for you to walk past, even if it is their turn to move. We did grocery shopping at the supermarket, about 3 minutes from the house.

I would say Argentines are the Europeans of Latin America. You even notice the influence in their architecture and food. The major challenge was the language barrier, although Google Translate came in handy a lot; however, there was no flow of communication when communicating with folks who don't speak natively in your tongue. I went clubbing, and as expected, it was electronic music. I am sorry, but afrobeats to the world haven't reached Argentina yet. My observation was that Argentine folks are not used to seeing a lot of black people, and most stared out of curiosity. A lot were open and excited to help us and even struck up conversations. I didn't use the bus, but I could see them move around a lot, and I never saw any that were full. They were prompt and more than enough for their population. An efficient public transport network is underrated.

The most random fun thing was me quoting Mano's tweet about performing Shakabulizzy at the Music Stage, and next thing folks came, and we performed afrobeats together, and the next thing, we got invited to perform as opening acts for the Devconnect Closing Ceremony. Another random thing was after giving a talk at the DeSci Hub (recording here). Someone (Aaron from Unbound Science) walks up to me and gives me his card and mentions he would like to donate some hardware to us at DeSci Africa. What came to my mind was a Raspberry Pi or Arduino board. The next day we met, and he handed me two MacBooks. I didn't expect that at all. I am still an Apple ecosystem hater though :)

A funny thing that happened to me was being hyped about the rAAVE party, spending a lot of money (enough money to do small Detty December in Port Harcourt, chai) to get an outfit on D-day, only to not be able to get into the party as it was at capacity by the time I arrived. The week after Devconnect was my flatmates and I doing touristy things before leaving on the 30th of November. I got to shoot a gun for the first time, and it was an interesting feeling. Overall, despite blowing my finances, I did have a swell time at Devconnect. I find it ironic that I felt safer in a foreign land than in my home country. I could walk around at any time without fear.

I liked that I was able to bring some gifts from Nigeria, which I gave to a good number of folks. It didn't get to everyone, so please, I owe you one next time. I met a lot of brilliant minds building and contributing to the Ethereum ecosystem. It was a really eye-opening meeting with folks who subconsciously motivate you that you can really just do things. The flight home was so long, too and at that point, I was dreading it despite missing home. The people and food at home. Imagine going that long without loi loi. In Addis Ababa, Nigerian passport holders were kept aside, because we were coming from a drug alert country. How much is St. Kitts' passport again?

Grateful to have the opportunity to meet and spend time with a lot of you at BA. It isn't going to be possible for me to fit everyone's name here. I hope we meet next year at Devcon in Mumbai. I will be writing to you all soon. I have some hot takes, and I believe it's best to just put them down in words. See you around.