# First time attending a tech conference 👨🏻‍💻! Hello everyone 👋! In this article, i will talk about my experience during the WordCamp Athens 2022 conference, organized by the WordPress community. # Some background This was actually the first time i ever attended a tech conference, something i always wanted to do since i study computer science. But many of these big-name conferences were never held in Greece, or at least i wasn’t aware of any. Not to mention that these major events had very expensive tickets. So going abroad was **a big no** for me. But then i started digging a little deeper, i joined some local community slack groups and there it was. The `events` channel. This is where it all started. At the time i was an undergraduate student, working for a research group at my university department (but that’s a story for another time). But i also had experience in building websites using the [WordPress](https://wordpress.com/) CMS. I’ve been doing this job since my early high school years, helping out my dad as a graphic designer who got into website design. So yea, i was very familiar with the WordPress platform and terms like **HTML**, **SEO**, **plugins**, **domain names** and **hosting**. # Finding the event So back to our story. Scrolling through the `events` channel of this slack group, i found a post about a [WordCamp](https://central.wordcamp.org/) conference. At first i didn’t know what it was about. But after reading the description i realized that it was a community-organized event, dedicated to the WordPress platform and web technologies in general. Also held in Athens, great news! I immediately rushed to see the ticket price and, in my surprise, it was very cheap compared to the ones organized abroad (✨including the student discount✨). That was it, my chance to attend one of these cool conferences. But i didn’t want to go alone. See now, the problem was that none of my friends were into programming / tech stuff, thus they would be terribly bored to go with me. But then i thought of my two research colleagues (the group that i mentioned earlier), and so i texted them. They were really excited about it, so i booked the tickets and we were ready to go! # The big day ### Entering the conference On the 9th of April, my friend and I are walking towards the event location. Unfortunately, one of the guys couldn’t make it due to being sick a few days before, and was still recovering. Nonetheless, we managed to get him a bag of goodies and swag, as well as his personal name tag. Stonks!

The conference took place at the [Megaron Athens Concert Hall](https://www.megaron.gr/en/), a beautiful building that i had never visited before. There was a big hall where all the sponsors had set their banners and filled their tables with even more swag! Notebooks, pens, stickers and t-shirts, even stress balls! We knew we were in for a treat.

***GoDaddy stand - they had a cool social media contest***

### Attending the speeches Of course there were two rooms for all the speeches and presentations that took place during the event. These were split in two tracks, **A** and **B**. Both tracks were executed in parallel, so we had to choose which speech to attend each time. Overall every presentation was very constructive and had a lot to offer, not necessarily about WordPress, but rather any subject related to website-building or managing data on the web. As a junior-level developer, i had no problem following any of the subjects as they were well-organized by every speaker and not heavily detailed with technical information.

***Room B- a smaller and rather flat room***

### Eat o’clock There also was a lunch break with provided food 😋, which we really appreciated and enjoyed in a nearby park under the sun. We were each given a bag with a sandwich of choice (meat or fish), balsamic vinegar salad, chocolate cake for dessert, and of course some soda drinks. As i mentioned there is a [really cool park](https://goo.gl/maps/bTUP3C5NkGBvcRX37) next to the Megaro building, perfect for a picnic or a quick walk. If you ever happen to be nearby, make sure to pay a visit! ![5730D0EF-D9F4-4C05-B615-42812343DCF2.jpeg](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1661468295455/qikYOi_rt.jpeg align="left") # Conclusion I had so much fun attending WordCamp this year and i am really looking forward to doing so next year as well. The WordPress community is very passionate and well organized, kudos to all of the volunteers that made it all possible! 👏 Finally, here’s a collage of me and my buddy [Panos](https://www.linkedin.com/in/karamolegkos/) having a blast and enjoying our first tech conference! (check out [karamolegkos.dev](https://karamolegkos.dev) for some epic *no-css* stuff!) Till next time! ✌️ ![67ED20D7-D73C-43B0-91E9-18B66B5B0910.jpeg](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1661465613362/1ZeG9blLf.jpeg align="left") *All photos were taken by the official [WordCamp Athens](https://athens.wordcamp.org/2022/) event website*