My Adventure with SayWhat
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It was the summer of 2014 and I had just gotten back from a semester-long whirlwind of an adventure around Europe. I was hungry for more excitement and joy out of life. My time in Europe introduced me to some of the most creative and talented people I’ve ever met. I was constantly being introduced to a number of photographers, artists, models, graphic designers, and musicians. Their work managed to evoke emotion out of me — through whatever medium of their choosing. I had never felt such passion ignite in me before. What I felt was passion for wanting to find myself. I was envious of both their talent and their drive. They succeeded in their tasks of being an artist; they were able to make a difference with their work. They were personally able to inspire me to want to find who I am.
I left Vienna with a serious case of the post-traveler’s blues syndrome. I was nostalgic of my home away from home — the croissants, the cafes, and the weekend getaways. More importantly, I missed being surrounded by people who were able to feed my creative soul. I wanted passion, I wanted experience, and I simply also wanted something different. I decided to upload my resume on StartX and AngelList in the hopes of finding a summer internship with a startup company on the west coast. I didn’t expect much to come out of it, so I was pleasantly surprised when someone reached out to me from a start-up company that was then based in Silicon Valley. I found out more about this mysterious company — SayWhat — its mission, its origin, and its story.
I’ve worked with SayWhat intermittently since that summer, and though it’s made some huge pivots since then, the concept has always remained the same. SayWhat is a tool for language learning, a concept that has always intrigued me. There is no shortage of textbooks that teach you formal speech, however, a common complaint among language learners is the application of such speech. While what they teach you in classrooms may seem sufficient in theory, many language users find out the harsh realities of limiting themselves to such a way of learning. Colloquial speech is just as important as its counterpart but it is unfortunately an area that does not receive as much attention. This is where SayWhat comes in. SayWhat is a video dictionary. With SayWhat, you are able to learn trending terms through the use of short videos. The videos are fun and the app is interactive, two very important qualities that are conducive to learning.
The app is constantly improving, thanks to the very passionate people working at SayWhat. Ding, founder and CEO of SayWhat, is constantly on the clock brainstorming methods for improving her product. I admire her resilience, for not a day goes by where she isn’t using every resource she has. For example, the people working behind the scenes just completely renovated the look and feel of the app. A new feature called “nomination” has recently been added. Download the app for yourself and you can see that this feature makes the experience a lot more interactive. You can nominate your friends to define trending terms or you can pass it on to someone else. By taking your friends out of their comfort zone you are also helping them, because you learn best when you try to explain a concept to someone.
What I like best about SayWhat is the sense of community that it has managed to foster. I believe Ding’s passion transcends to whomever she meets and she inspires them. She is a capable and inspiring leader, and her ability to foster togetherness among those she comes to meet is laudable. We are a family. We challenge each other, we support each other, and we constantly learn from each other. In the recent celebration of SayWhat’s new nomination feature, all the users participated in a weeklong video challenge. The challenge? To make at least one video everyday that corresponds with the word of the day. The experience has made the app more interesting. With Nomination, I can now interact with other users of SayWhat. I can nominate people who I want to see create a video or people who would be able to create a good video. This feature inspires you to want to create more videos once you see the long list of nominations that you’ve received from your friends. There is now so much content generated from using Nomination that it is never a dull moment.
I am sad to have left Vienna but I am happy that such immensely talented people can continue to surround me. When you are passionate about your work, your desire to make an impact is hard to hide. Working with SayWhat has inspired me to find my own passion so I can one day have the same level of impact as those who inspired me.
