By: Alicja Peszkowska, Fundacja TechSoup, Irmin van der Meijden, Kosovo 2.0

...of a large dome with comfortable benches around it, that obviously became more popular than the usual conference chairs in front of the stage. The constant stream of cigarette smoke swimming in from the direction of the bar. TechCamp Sarajevo, the smoggiest, most ‘laissez faire’ technology conference in Europe!

It is hard to expect something out of an “unconference.” An unconference, is an event where participants are all that matters. They either bond, come up with great ideas, plans, and projects or.. they won’t. We do not know yet what the end results of TechCamp Sarajevo will be. But all that matters now is that it was not only smoke filling in the coolest concert venue in Sarajevo. TechCamp succeeded, from the basement to the top floor. Mainly because the guests, the volunteers, and organizations consisted of young, really cool and interesting people.

The crowd was colorful: young people with cool-ass hair do’s and skinny jeans mixed with hippie-looking activists and serious officials (suits and laptops style). Freaks, geeks and nerds we could call them, although it felt like after the first initial moments all these groups intermingled beyond recognition. You know the feeling: it clicked. And we aren’t talking about (sub) cultures only. One day we participated in a workshop that, apart from Slovenian, featured all nationalities of former Yugoslavia.

As for the mood and level of participation, one can just say that everybody attended the working groups with as much enthusiasm as they showed during the late evenings’ and nights’ meetings. For it is always fun to meet people who understand you -- share your values, challenges, and the cigarette addiction. And so we talked, we partied, networked and -- while drinking rakija shots -- made promises to meet each other and work together in the future.

TechCamp seems hard to grasp, we get it. Are you finding it hard to understand how informal, chaotic, inspiring, and exhausting the last week’s get together was? We gathered a few comments from participants, volunteers and organizers. These are all answers to a questions about what their most surprising moment during the conference was:

Participants, volunteers:

-”I had so much fun! And I learned many things.”

-“The grass is really green, here. I liked Sarajevo, even in October.”

-“I thought “speed geeking” would be crap, but it wasn't. I thought there would not be enough time to actually learn something during those sessions, but I learned quite something.”

-“I broke my toothbrush, but somebody gave me a new one”

-“One of us brought a homemade baklava. That was really cool.”

 

Trainers / Organizers:

-”I usually don't rate things happening. I was out all day working on my project, actually”

-”Even though I am from Kosovo, I actually made it here!” (red. the Kosovars didn’t know if they would be able to attend the conference until shortly before it started, since Bosnia doesn’t recognize Kosovo, and it was very problematic for Kosovo participants to obtain a visa.)

-“I thought it was cool to see how many countries were finding common challenges in the problem statements.”

-“I am from Poland, and I was so surprised to know meet a lady from Croatia who actually knew my organization!”

-”Why do you ask me? I am just technical support! But anyway, I had most fun last night at the party. I drank five beers and danced a bit.”

TechCamp was supported by the Mott Foundation and the US Department of State, coordinated by Warsaw-based Fundacja TechSoup, while on-ground operations were conducted by DokuKino (Belgrade), Kosovo 2.0 (Prishtina) and Zasto Ne (Sarajevo). That, and the interregional participant selection, has for us been the most interesting feature of the conference. Well.. one should definitely not forget the hotel we all stayed in. Like kings we lived. We cannot wait until the next TechCamp happens!

Both the picture of extensions and security guards are by Alicja Peszkowska and published under a cc-by license.