$whoami: Chiziaruhoma Ogbonda
It’s been a long ride. 18 years to be exactly
I’ve learned a lot I’ve met a lot of people made a lot of friends.
Hi I’m Chiziaruhoma Ogbonda…..
There’s a pause for you so you can read the name try to pronounce it, there’s a 90% chance you didn’t get it on the first read if you’re not my friend or an acquaintance.
And no I’m not Igbo, I’m from rivers state
I got into tech quite young I know….
Well, where do I start from…..
Little Beginnings
I was about 7 years old. My dad just bought this cool dell latitude pc. We were on holiday in Lagos at my aunt's house and all. Was great, I start using the PC a few days after they get it, I think I liked Microsoft paint first it was so fascinating because I loved to draw and create.
Then one day I’m using the laptop I get up to go get something I take a few steps and next thing I hear a crashing sound. I had pulled the laptop from the table via the charger cord with my legs and rammed it on the ground.
Wow, everything happened so fast my dad was speechless. I felt worse than him though but let’s not focus on that.
Long story cut short, Motherboard broke into two and couldn’t be fixed so that was the end of that laptop.
A few months later dad got another one lol this time it was harder to use cause it was kept from me but I knew where it was I would sneak to use it still lol and return it back.
But this time I began exploring the laptop both ran on windows XP so it was easy to use. Exploring system folders and various applications. I did this for a few years and I got better at using paint, this was my first encounter with basic designs.
Then I got into secondary school.
I’d take my mom's phone to browse about things I saw on Wikipedia and WikiHow was my go-to some days. Aha, I remember then I read up on viruses at about the same time as it was being taught in class. I wanted to make a virus lol. I wanted to learn how to make one. I take mom’s (Nokia Asha) phone and check: “How to make a batch script” — So I learned batch script (@echo off). The first programming language I learned.
It was crazy learned how to make calculations, write to files read from files. A favorite was the matrix effect using random numbers and a loop.
School then built a computer lab I was in jss3 or ss1 not sure. It became my new home.
I’d spend my two break periods, free periods and some times last two classes till after school. Then I’d go back to the house and oh I didn’t tell you dad got another pc too lol Windows 7 Dell Inspiron N5050, was faster better specs lol.
Wow, this is turning out to be a very long story and I haven’t gotten to half yet lol.
Fast forward to 2017 I graduated Secondary school. I had started android development. Built a couple of projects.
Then someone linked me up to Chimdindu Aneke. He literally called my mom and convinced her to let him take me on a private tour at Andela. I wow wowed Lol I was encouraged too. To see other devs also lol I was a lone wolf self-taught or rather “internet-taught”.
Then I got into UNN joined the tech community basically found my niche. I made a lot of friends, actually, they are more like family, This was where I started Flutter.
The Now
I’m a mobile developer and UI & UX designer. I wasn’t always one though I have delved in lots and lots of side passions/ stacks that faded away. Examples there was a time I did VueJS, Ionic Cordova, Backend Development with MongoDB, ExpressJS, and NodeJS. Delved in 3D Game creation with Unity. And lots I have probably forgotten about. But back to reality…
Before I started Flutter I was an android developer battling the hurdles of learning and building mobile apps alone and basically searched through the internet and found answers to most of my problems. Started with Java then Kotlin. Fell in Love with flutter and the rest is history and so they say. I had the opportunity to work at different tech firms either by contract or a full-time remote Role. Currently, I’m at Firstblood.io And it’s a great place to be 💜💜💜💜.
The Future
Part of my goals for the future include:
- Constant and progressive learning of technologies.
- Make my self a role model to young and future software developers.
- Pushing ideas and startups to production and seeing that they succeed
- I can’t wait to be a Flutter GDE. Maybe the first in my country lol
- Inspiring younger generations to be the best and be build the next wave of firebrand softwares and solutions
