AWS Summit Singapore Experience
On May 7, 2024, I had the privilege of delivering a lightning talk in the Developer Lounge at the AWS Summit Singapore 2024. The experience was truly unforgettable, leaving me in awe of the insights gained and the connections made within the industry. In this blog post, I will share my experiences from the event and the journey leading up to it.
Shooting my shot
This all started when our AWS Community Hero in the Philippines, Raphael Quisumbing, sent me the Call for Papers (CFP) for the AWS Summit Singapore Developer Lounge. When I viewed the CFP, which was an AWS pulse form, I immediately hesitated when I saw the requirements. The form gave me two choices: to apply for a lightning talk or to apply for a demo.
Initially, I considered applying for a demo, given that I have several side projects. However, as I reviewed my cloud portfolio, I realized none of my projects had a significant “wow factor.” The idea of applying for a lightning talk had never crossed my mind, mainly because the CFP specified that the talk should be impactful or useful for developers building applications with AWS. I assumed this meant presenting novel developer tools like the Serverless Framework or Lambda Powertools.
With about two weeks left before the submission deadline, I decided to set aside the CFP for now, and was back to my regular programming. During this time, my friend who was fairly new to AWS and serverless asked me a question:
“Iggy, is there a nodemon for serverless?”
Intrigued by the question and how relatable it was for me, I decided to give it a shot. With only a week left before the deadline, I submitted my proposal for a lightning talk on how to test serverless applications locally. After submitting, I never really believed that my talk would get selected mainly because I know how basic it is. It’s not about reinventing the wheel nor a novel developer tool. It’s purely just about Test Driven Development (TDD) 😂.
Days after my submission, I must admit I had completely forgotten about applying for the lightning talk. Then, out of the blue, I received an email…
I was in Manila for another AWS event during this time and I was so ecstatic when I saw this email! I even talked to sir Rafi to check if this is real. I mean, it should be right? That’s a legit email from AWS right there 😂.
The team from AWS was there to help me out every step of the way in creating my talk. Deadlines were tight and I had an online rehearsal with them a week before the summit (shoutout to you Derek! I hope you liked the chocolates 😁).
The rehearsal was quite tricky. Believe it or not, this was the first time I got to deliver a talk for only 20 minutes. I was used to delivering a talk for at least 30 minutes to an hour. And I must say, a 20-minute talk is a whole new ball game.
The trip to Singapore
I arrived 11PM on a Saturday, May 4. I immediately unpacked my things when I got to the hotel and slept. The day afterwards was the only day I could go around Singapore and enjoy being a tourist.
The day started when me and my travel buddy, sir Raphael Jambalos, who will also be doing a demo in the summit, went to Singapore’s shopping hub, Orchard Road. The highlight here is when we went to Kinokuniya. This was the biggest and most complete bookstore I have ever been to! From mangas, fictional books, to even technical books, you name it and I know for sure they have it here somewhere. Just a warning though, if you are into books, this place will take a lot of your money 😂.
We then went to the Lucky Plaza just for the Filipino feels. I really did laughed out loud when we arrived there. The vibe was so Filipino it really did not feel like I was in another country 😂. Then, we ate lunch at Hawker Centre in Chinatown where I tried out some Singaporean cuisine for the first time.
We then went back to the hotel to rest for awhile and finally went to Gardens by the Bay. Here we ate dinner at the Flower Dome and strolled inside the Cloud Forest. We then ended the night watching the Garden Rhapsody in the Supertree Observatory. We then grabbed some ice cream in Marina Bay Sands and went back to the hotel.
The day before the summit
The day before the summit, we claimed our event passes in the summit’s venue for us to have easy access by tomorrow. Here we saw the event preparations and visited the Developer Lounge where I would be delivering my lightning talk. I was so excited and at the same time nervous to see my name in the list of lightning talk speakers for tomorrow’s event.
After checking out the summit’s venue, we then went to the AWS office in Singapore to attend an AWS User Group Meetup. We arrived relatively late and when we got there, I can tell that this meetup is not your average meetup. I was quite shocked of how unorthodox it was. The sessions were not about the AWS cloud at all!
The first session I was able to attend was a workshop delivered by Mark Pergola. It was entitled, “The Architecture of a Talk”. This was a kind of workshop I never thought I needed! He basically went step by step and discussed how to draft an effective talk, may it be technical or not. The best part is that his workshop can be duplicated! You can learn more about it here. Big thank you and shoutout to you, Mark! I’ll definitely try this one out it my local user group!
The second session was a talk delivered by Aditi Sawhney. It was about building a personal brand. At first, I was a bit skeptical about this session. In my mind, I was like “I’m not an influencer. I’m a DevOps Engineer” 😂. This is because there really was a part of her presentation stating “How to become an influencer”. But then, there was this one quote of hers that really struck me. She said:
“There are a lot of Subject Matter Experts out there. But only few are ‘visible’.”
This then opened my eyes and made me realize that personal branding is indeed important in this industry. If my mission is to help other people discover more about the AWS cloud, then building my personal brand will surely help me reach more people and become even more “visible”. Thank you so much of that session Aditi!
D-Day
During the day of the summit, I was both nervous and excited. My talk was scheduled at 12:40pm, which was the first talk after lunch. I was going to other booths and attended Keynotes while waiting for my talk. I was having so much fun that I was almost late for my talk. Shafraz even gave me a shoutout in our WhatsApp group chat asking where I am. Sorry Shaf! 😅
Minutes before my talk, I was so nervous! I was not nervous of how I will deliver because I have done this a lot of times already but I was so nervous of the thought that what if I accidentally speak Filipino in front of an international audience (I read your blog, Ananda! It’s good to know I’m not the only one who had this kind of fear 😂).
At the same time, I’m also worried that it was my first time delivering a 20-minute talk. In my past speaking engagements, drafting my presentation is already my practice. I have this habit of inserting adlibs just because I remembered something during my talk. But in a 20-minute talk however, I am basically forced to follow the the strict outline prepared. I must be concise enough to convey what I want the audience to understand and at the same time, not explain things long enough to waste time, and my talk being a little bit too technical is really a challenge.
At the end of my talk, my adrenaline rush was over and I suddenly felt exhausted and hungry. I never eat before a speaking engagement for “safety” precautions (IYKYK 😉). Good thing the venue was full of food! After eating, I then proceeded to other booths and connected with a lot of people.
I am so thankful for AWS for presenting me this opportunity to speak at an international stage. Years ago, I was just this kid that trying to learn the AWS cloud not knowing that this technology would be the one to propel my career.
I love this famous GenZ quote in Filipino that pretty much sums up my career so far:
“Malayo pa pero malayo na.”
Which directly translates to:
“I still have a long way to go but I have already come a long way.”
This experience was truly another canon event for me. I left Singapore with a huge smile on my face and will for sure relay all my learnings from this experience to the local tech scene here in Davao City. I am now more inspired than ever to continue my mission of transforming Davao City into the next major tech hub in the Philippines, one line of code at a time. (And of course, backed with AWS cloud technologies 🤪).
I hope this inspires both those just starting their careers and those considering a shift into tech to shoot your shot! Impostor syndrome will always be there no matter how skilled you become. Don’t let it hold you back. Confront it head-on and seize every opportunity that comes your way. Remember, fortune favors the bold 😉.
