Packed
I’ve seen a photo like this, but I don’t remember where.
I no longer have a place in Valencia.
"Start spreading the news, I am leaving today."
—
Not really, I’m leaving tomorrow, but officially today’s gonna be my last day on the Earth^W city of Valencia (and surroundings).
It’s been a good season. Valencia it’s not the best place I’ve lived ever, but it’s OK. I’m leaving a lot of friends here, what it’s sad… but awesome at the same time.
You may know I’m moving to Exeter, and I’m planning to retake my Fedora ambassador activities there.
The first step will be checking the usual suspects: Fedora UK and the UK Fedora ambassadors. It’s gonna be fun :)
The Second Barcamp Valencia it’s Over
Yesterday was held the second Barcamp Valencia, and it was a total success: 124 attendees (from 156 registered, and 23 non registered attendees that finally attended the event), 12 interesting talks + 1 (I hosted a talk about GPG, and I hope it was as interesting as the rest hehe).
That was a very nice experience, again (the past edition was great too), and I made a lot of new friends an learnt some new stuff (not much, because being in the organization team I couldn’t attend more that a couple of talks… not counting mine).
It’s surprising the high interest of the people to attend to such events, but the very low participation in the set up. In fact I was almost alone in all the setting before the great day (that day I had help from two guys, and without that help it would have been impossible!).
I don’t know if it’s related to the Spanish idiosyncrasy, but I think the barcamp idea of an event doesn’t work out here. In fact we didn’t run a pure barcamp event yesterday, but something a little bit more like a more classic congress.
Another conclusion it’s the impressive power of the social networks (mostly Twitter in our case) in order to promote events. May be you don’t know it, but 124 attendees it’s a very good mark of an event of this kind in Valencia.
In other news, some people speculated about the possibilities of the next barcamp once I’ve left the area (and the country!). Come on, I don’t feel I’m essential.
Moving to Exeter, Devon (UK)
It’s been two years since I moved to Valencia from Bilbao. That was a very important change for me, not only because Valencia is geographically closer to my hometown but because I was heading a new and challenging project.
Now it’s time to change again, because the join of two different factors:
- Alex is going to stay in UK until the end of 2011, and his next destination in the midst of Februrary will be Exeter.
- I’m getting old, really :), and I feel that this is the moment to go abroad for a season, or never.
So I’m moving. I’ll end my work here in January, and I’ll start telecommuting from Exeter for my actual company ASAP.
Overall I think this 2 years story in Valencia has been a very enriching experience profesionally, I’ve made friends, and I’ve met Alex (important!).
It would be impossible to summarize here 2 years, so let’s focus in the immediate problems: we’re looking for a house to live in Exeter!
I’m looking also for any kind of FOSS activity in the area (btw, I won’t be Fedora Ambassador in Spain for a long while), so dear lazy web, feel free to post any comment about it. Thank you!
Fedora 12 Release Party, Valencia (ES)
Everything went better than expected (seven attendees!).
Most of the people came from the Linux associations and LUGs of the city (there are 2 public universities in the area, plus some private), and I tried to advocate Fedora, but all of them are long time Linux users (even a Gentoo user in the house!). The Linux associations/LUGs in Valencia are quite dormant (one of the attendees used the word dead
), so I think the meeting was a big success!
We had a nice time talking about free software, programming languages, and (to some extent) the new features of Fedora (in the photo, because we were local logged users, we didn’t have to identify us to get a signed beer from a licensed repository heh, nice Fedora already fixed this).
The seventh attendee arrived a little late, but we had a big surprise because actually he was a Fedora user! I think we (the two only Fedora users in the party) deserve a photo:
So long, and thanks for all the fish.
Fedora 12 Release Party, Valencia (ES)
As Fedora ambassador I’m going to host a release party in Valencia.
I’m not sure about how many people will come to the event, because I don’t know if there’s a Fedora community in Valencia, but I’m sure it’ll be fun (no matter if we’re two or twenty).
In fact, this little event will be a proof of concept. As far as I know there are some Linux user groups and Linux user associations in Valencia, but they’re quite dormant. So the motto of this release party will be very simple: come to hang out for a beer (or a coke, or whatever you like to drink), and chat about Fedora, Linux and free software.
The meet will be next November 20th, from 21:00h, at The Black Sheep pub (it’s a nice and spacious place).
There’s a little poster for the event. If you’re in the area, it would be great if you come!
Update: the start time has been delayed one hour up to 21:00h!
What’s your Perfect Climate?
Alex is moving to Plymouth in a week and a half, and one of the things she’s going to face is a climate change: Plymouth (UK) is very different to Valencia (Spain).
About 14 degrees of temperature change, that’s so much! I hope she doesn’t get ill. She’s lived in Dublin for a year or so, so I think she will adapt fine to the weather.
I’m from Elche (Alicante, Spain), and the climate in Elche is very similar to the climate in Valencia: soft springs, autumns and winters, and hot summers, ever with high humidity levels (that makes you sweat and sweat in terrible summers, and a cold that chills your bones in winter). You’ll see more rain in Valencia than in Elche, though.
I know this is simplifying too much (because air conditioning can save you in summer), but this is not the kind of climate I like most. I prefer some cold, but softer summers, and definitely I like rainy days (not windy, please heh).
I was in Bilbao for 15 months, and you can hear about they climate that is awful, but I like it. Rainy, very soft summers, not so cold winters, and a very green land with a clean air pleasant to breath.
So I know what I like and what I don’t. What’s your perfect climate?
A BarCamp in Valencia?
I’m thinking seriously about it (at least I think about it in Spanish).
After being involved in the organization of FLOSS events at my hometown, I must admit I like it. All the work, the stress, the problems, and sometimes the satisfaction of a job well done.
I’m a Open Source advocate, you know, but in this case a more reasonable tagline would be: Web 2.0, Open Source and Social Media.
Valencia is the third most populated city in Spain (wikipedia says 1,583,331 habitants in the metropolitan area, data from 2008). It could be a nice event to spend a weekend in this beautiful city and know some local geeks. What do you think?
Update: we’re moving… BarCamp Valencia.
Almond Tree
They’re beautifull. When I was in Bilbao, the rainy weather let us enjoy of a green field. Valencia isn’t that rainy, so nature let us enjoy the Almond tree’s beauty. Good deal.
