CURIOSITY BIRTHED THE CAT

As a child, I was fascinated by technology despite not having access to any gadgets. My interest began in grade 6 at primary school. My teacher claimed he had a dictionary at home with "Ghana" in it. But in 2008, it wasn't in a paperback dictionary. I was curious about what kind of book he had. He invited the class to visit him, and I followed him home after school that day. He showed me a rectangular device resembling a miniature, flat version of a TV with a bright and colourful screen. He made click sounds with another device with a red light beneath it and a cable attached to the miniature TV. Alas! He showed me the Encarta Encyclopedia and typed in "Ghana." It knew our flag, anthem, photos of noteworthy locations like the black stars square, and cultural heritage. I was impressed. He asked if I wanted to look for other countries too. I made his room my second home and searched for countries, birds, and snakes in Encarta every day after school. I loved the images and sounds of these animals. My teacher volunteered to teach me about laptops and other kinds of computers. I used Encarta to supplement my learning. He taught me how to use the mouse and trackpad, right-click, left-click, and refresh the desktop. He also taught me how to create and edit text documents and type. He gave me an ICT education that my school still needs to provide. I quickly got comfortable using his laptop and spent most of my free time playing Road Rash. He urged me to apply my quick learning ability in all aspects of life.

I found the internet in internet cafes, which had more information than Encarta. I spent all my time there and discovered YouTube. I enjoyed watching "how-to" videos, especially on smartphones. I wanted to improve the features of my first phone. So, I searched for information on creating an operating system and discovered it would take years to master programming. I then tried to customise my phone's OS quickly by flashing a custom ROM, but I ended up bricking it. Let's say my mum wasn't pleased.

When I got my second phone the following year, I understood I had to be much more careful. I needed to flash ROMs that were compatible with my phone. I nailed it. I had rooted my Android phone and flashed a custom ROM. I could use apps that were previously inaccessible and browse the OS filesystem. I usually spent my time between internet cafes and friends' homes. If you had a computer at home, we were automatically best friends.

Now, I'm a freshman at the School of Nursing and Midwifery. How did I end up here, you ask? You can only find out if you keep reading. My former primary school teacher had done me a disservice(not my hero, who taught me everything). He knows himself. My grades after senior high could have been better. I got one A, six Bs, and a C. I studied general science. I couldn't go to medical school with these grades. I didn't care much because I informed my mum I wanted to study computer science at the university. The teacher went behind me and told my mum it was a terrible idea. He told her I would become "an excellent ICT teacher with a small pay at a senior high school at best." My mother wanted a secure and lucrative career for me, but I wasn't ready to rewrite my papers. I couldn't convince her either because "my teacher knows better than us." Since I couldn't go to medical school - mum couldn't have afforded it anyway, the next opportunity that came along for the haven of disappointed wanna-be medical students in my year group, I jumped on board. Nursing, by the way.

I was a diligent student, attending lectures, participating in clinical work, studying with a group, and achieving good grades. I planned to make money and enroll in a computer science degree, but something happened during my second year at university. Someone introduced the notion of starting one's business to me. He was a senior and a nursing student. He was a champion of startup ideas. He often touted it as the means to "lift Africa out of poverty." He formed a group and tasked me with building the website for an e-commerce business we decided to create as a bunch of mostly nursing student nerds. I'll refer to him henceforth as "Ideas Man." This task fell only to me because he had a falling out with a mutual friend from church - a senior he started the group with who taught himself to code and was a physician assistant student. I'll refer to him henceforth as "Master P."

I informed Ideas Man that I wasn't up to the task because I didn't know how to program. I mentioned that I planned to enroll in a computer science school after finishing my current course. I didn't even have a laptop at the time. I couldn't convince Ideas Man. He helped me realize that I could learn to program on my own. He taught me why we should start taking action now as young Africans, creating businesses, being authors of our destinies, and refraining from the "lack" excuses such as the one I was making. He said we needed to take unusual action to compete in the global market as Africans. I felt empowered and agreed like an unmaintainable legacy codebase, the narrative of Africa needed a rewrite. My excuses disappeared. Ideas Man had a way about him. He had an eye for the dormant potential in people. Perhaps it was because of his ambition, or maybe Ideas Man had the pure ability to "sell a cat to a mouse." Whatever the case was, he set me on fire. I was ready to learn how to program and take on this task.

Master P had a photocopied web development book. It was about HTML and CSS. He gave it to me and said I should begin from there. I read the book, made notes, wrote the code in my notebook, and ran it in the headless browser of my mind. Soon, though, it became unsustainable - this method of learning. I realised I couldn't progress if I kept running the code in my imagination. I informed Ideas Man about my inability to make progress. So, he donated his only laptop to me. He was genuinely committed to this mission. I felt motivated and pressured at the same time. I thought he was investing too much in something near impossible. The real task was to combine my nursing curriculum with learning to code and build an MVP for a startup.

HTML was reasonably straightforward, but CSS was tough. I couldn't figure out how to position elements accurately on a page. Then, I came across the concept of "responsive web development." I couldn't make a website for my laptop screen. How would I make an app that could fit nicely on every device worldwide? I explained to Master P that I was struggling with CSS. He sat me down with a piece of paper and a pen. He drew the concept of the CSS Box Model and explained it to me. He said I should picture every element on a page as a box. The explanation was a game-changer for me. I was now having fun with CSS. Soon, I discovered Bootstrap. Then, I began creating web pages that were beautiful by default with minimal effort.

DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME

I'm about to reveal some things to you now. Promise me you won't freak out, and promise you won't tell my mum. Stick out your pinky swear finger and do it now. If you continue reading, please note that I do not prescribe or recommend what I will share. I had to do these things because I chose to become a software engineer. I decided to follow my passion. And I was fully convinced about my choice.

Life was tough on campus. Sometimes, I went through a day without food. I hated calling my mum for money. You see, I didn't grow up with my dad. My mum left him when I was too young to remember we ever lived together as a family. He was a kind man, though. Before he died when I was 18 years old, he always provided money for my school fees and upkeep on time. He gave me extra when I performed well in school. He was a good man. I didn't get to know him as I would have wanted. So, my mum was my bedrock through my final year in senior high school after I lost my dad to the university. She struggled to provide. But she did it with love and passion. I wouldn't say I liked that she struggled. She doesn't know the secret I'm about to share with you. Only you and I know henceforth. Do you remember the promise you made to me?

I got some money around the middle of the semester to buy my first laptop. I installed Windows 8, only realising later that I was a loser. I dedicated myself to mastering my craft. To do so, I needed learning materials, specifically video tutorials. I learned faster with project-based tutorials. At first, I would go to campus early in the morning when the school's public Wi-Fi was high-speed. I would download video tutorials from YouTube and some torrent files. I looked for free materials because I couldn't afford online courses. Soon, other students who had learned the trick of coming early to campus to use the Wi-Fi started trooping in. It was now common knowledge, so whether I arrived early or not made no difference. We'd all connect to the public Wi-Fi during lecture breaks and after lectures. The connection speed would decrease as a result. After some research, I discovered an app for rooted Android phones. I had already rooted my phone, which was running a custom ROM. Since I couldn't afford an iPhone, I tried dual-booting my Android with iOS. I wanted to know what the fuss was all about. I bricked a couple more phones doing that. I couldn't quite get that to work. Anyway, I installed the app. It enabled me to reduce the speed of all other devices on the network. I gave them a few Mbps so that they would feel they were still in the game. I was cruising at altitude speeds, downloading torrent files and YouTube videos of tutorials on web development. My phone would become very hot, and the battery would run out within hours. Then I'm back in the sucker camp.

Since folks abused the public Wi-Fi (not me; I'm downloading lessons, remember?), it would usually run out of bandwidth soon after the semester began. I needed another source of internet. I started skipping some lectures at first. I would stay in my room and study the materials I downloaded the previous day. One day, Master P told me about a scary source of internet to make up for my struggles when we'd run out of public Wi-Fi. At this point, I was all in. Any risk was one I was willing to take. So he let me in on the secret.

Our lecturers' offices were built so that each office had two doors. The first door opened into a corridor. The next one opened into the main office. Master P discovered a broken lock on the first door of one of the lecturers' offices. He said there were LAN ports on the corridor wall. We got LAN cables. Lecturers would leave their offices seldom late. So we had to wait till midnight when we were sure everyone left. We also waited for the security man to finish his patrols around that area. Around 1 AM, we were clear to go. "Cover me, soldier. On my mark: three, two, one, go, go go." Who am I kidding? It was nothing like soldiers carrying out an operation. It was more frightening. We risked expulsion from school by using that space, and if they caught us, it would appear we broke the lock. We didn't break the lock. Master P found it that way. We tiptoed into the corridor and closed the door. The light bulb was dead—total darkness. Our laptop screens were our source of light. The corridor was all we needed because it had LAN ports. We'd connect our LAN cables to our laptops and then be transported to developer heaven. Insane speeds! I'd install all the programs I needed. Even download more tutorials. I had half of YouTube on my laptop at this point. I had backups on external hard disk drives. YouTube could have used me as a redundancy if their service had gone down, and they'd be alright. Since the office internet was high-speed, I'd finish all I needed to do around 4 AM. The security man will return around 5 AM, so we must sneak out beforehand. I couldn't attend lectures in the morning. I had to sleep for a few hours, wake up and continue studying. Sometimes, I went to the battlegrounds alone. Other times, I went with my able commander, Master P. One night, during one of my lone trips to the battleground, I cruised at top speeds as usual. Then I began hearing footsteps in my direction. It is the security man, I thought. How did he get back here at this time? I shut my laptop quickly and removed the LAN cable, killing any light that was present. I slowed my breathing. The footsteps grew louder. Ninety thousand thoughts fired through my brain per second: what to do if the security man caught me? Fight or flight. The footsteps went across the outer corridor. I heard a door open. Not my door. Thank God. Someone entered the next office. When I was sure the person had wholly entered the office, I packed my stuff, went out, and knocked at the door to find out who disrupted my party. Who am I kidding? I wasn't about to find out who it was. I packed my stuff and tiptoed out. I looked to my left and my right and ran for dear life. Whew! that was close. I'm not doing that again. At least not alone. I have enough material now, anyway. I only needed the internet for research and installation.

I attended lectures only once in my third year—none in my final year. I got a job at a bakery nearby. I woke up at 5 AM and went to the bakery for bread. I sold bread on campus and in some parts of town. I got a small commission on each loaf I sold. I also taught primary school kids science and math in the evening. I used proceeds from these ventures to fund my midnight internet bundles and to take some pressure off my mum. Midnight bundles allowed you to browse for free from midnight to 3 AM for GHS 3 and then from 3 AM to 5 AM for GHS 2. I subscribed to this package on some days, meaning I would write code overnight. I was making progress with building the e-commerce website for our small startup.

Eventually, I completed the website and presented it to my team. They appreciated how far I'd come and were impressed. My team had some criticisms, but they mostly entailed praise and applause. We agreed we needed a more experienced developer to help with some of the issues raised. Most of these issues were beyond my skill set. We brought on board a developer who was my senior at school. I'll refer to him henceforth as "Senior Man." He'd just graduated. A majority of my team had also just graduated and left for Accra. The date we proposed for the launch of our startup drew near. We needed all hands on deck. I left school and joined Ideas Man in Accra. I missed interim assessments and lectures, to say the least. I was on a mission, so it didn't matter. We had nowhere to stay, so we worked out of our church building. We slept there, too. Soon, it became unsustainable. We needed a place to meet as a team and work together. We looked for an affordable co-working space at Labone. The entire team was united there. Senior Man and I rebuilt the website from scratch with HTML, CSS, jQuery, and PHP with MySQL as the database, while Ideas Man made deals with local and international suppliers whose products we wanted to list and sell on our platform. Others worked hard on branding, marketing, design, social media, etc. Everything we did, we learned on the job. We worked on side projects besides our main project to make ends meet. We slept on office tables and floors. We rarely bathed, working day and night to meet the deadline. We launched the business in April 2018 at Airport View Hotel. We hired their conference room. Astounding! Something that started as a joke, well, it ended as a joke because we couldn't get any suppliers. They just saw a bunch of enthusiastic nerds. But the experience is priceless. We worked hard, and I acquired programming skills.

I returned to school after a while. Since I quit lectures altogether, my strategy was to write code all semester. Then, just a week before exams, I'd get all the learning materials for the courses we had taken at the nursing school. I'd study that for about a week. I'd fail 2 to 4 papers each semester from my third to final year. We took between 7 to 12 courses per semester. I'd take a re-seat of those papers, rewrite them, get a pass mark, and move on. I was close to not graduating. I didn't graduate with my year group. I delayed my graduation by a month because I failed a couple of papers during my final exams. Soon after returning from my failed expedition in Accra, the head of the Department of Nursing and Midwifery invited me to her office. She had learned of my truancy. I could bet I was going to get expelled that day. I went to her office. She was seeing someone, so her assistant asked me to wait. My heart began pounding in my head. She invited me in after a while and offered me a seat. Something to drink? - you wish. She asked why I would leave school in the middle of the semester, missing all school activities. I responded that I was building a startup. She needed clarification. We discussed the startup idea. She asked why I enrolled in the school of nursing in the first place if I knew I wanted to build a startup. I replied with my story. She then asked why I didn't defer my course. I replied there was no time and that we, as Africans, were lagging. I saw pity in her eyes. One you'd have if you had a good-looking, mentally ill young man in front of you. She asked if I was going through stuff, you know, and that she could provide the help I needed. She said I had mental issues that needed addressing and that no regular student would leave school, risking everything to do the things I did. She recommended the school's shrink. I didn't have that kind of time to waste, I thought. She emphasized that there would be consequences. I responded I was ready to face them. I'd made my choice. I set myself on a path, and there was no going back.

I graduated from the university in January 2019.

My mum and the family came. They were full of joy. When we got home, I gave her my certificate and told her I wouldn't work as a nurse. She needed clarification. I assured her I was now a software engineer hence I could get a job building apps instead. She agreed I would look for a job for a couple of months, and if I weren't successful, I would work as a nurse, period. Meanwhile, I collaborated with Senior Man on several projects to make upkeep money. Down the line, Ideas Man mentioned an institution in Accra called MEST that trained software engineers. He encouraged me to apply. At this point, it was my only escape. I sent an application to MEST and prepared for the assessments and interviews as if my life depended on it. I progressed through the stages, and MEST invited me to the final interview at Accra. I went there. There were folks more qualified than I was. I felt I didn't belong. Then, I brought to mind my entire journey up until that point. I felt empowered. The interview process was challenging. But I nailed it. I was among the 60 applicants that got a spot out of the over 4000 applicants that year. I left home to start my MEST journey in August 2019. Life at MEST deserves its book. I honed my programming skills amongst others there. I learned what it truly means to build a startup. I learned to be a software engineer, not just a developer. I was a refined entrepreneur. At the end of the one-year program, 15 teams pitched for seed funding. My team was one of the seven teams selected and given a $100k seed capital to start a business.

The story of my MEST startup also deserves a book. I took notes of lessons I learned while working on it. Hopefully, it summarises it for you.

We failed to find product-market fit in time before we ran out of runway. I then went on to work at Tendo, one of the other startups. Then BTS. I'm still on my journey. I am still learning and improving my craft daily. No limits. God is good.