Why volunteer?

I started my journey with the community in 2020. Somehow the pandemic year really helped me to reach out to people. I always admired the people who were deeply involved in community or volunteering work. I never could fathom how they could make time and space for all the amazing work they do.

There is one significant incident which actually brought me in touch with the kind community. I attended my first R Ladies virtual event, at 4 am in the morning (IST), where Dorris Scott taught us how to make website and BAM in 2 hours by 6 am in the morning here in India I had a personal website which was way above my expectations. I was so satisfied with the outcome and the power of community learning and hand holding. I thought if I could build a website at 4 am in the morning, imagine what I could have done at 9 am (kidding, probably I would have added more content). So I checked for R Ladies local chapters here in Bangalore, India. I found that the chapter never started.

I have a very good friend from college Deepthi, a very amazing colleague Saumya and a friend Anupama, who was also equally excited to start a Bangalore Chapter when we had met at a conference.

We quickly gathered the information required to start a chapter, and from then on conduct regular meet ups every month, hoping that people like me and I myself are benefited highly by these short power meet ups. You can check out the amazing speakers and topics our chapter has hosted.

Once I got a taste of volunteering and organising, I could not stop. I think the way I have benefited from the community, I feel volunteering is my very very small bit to give back.

I also got an opportunity to be a part of a global conference because of Bangalore chapter.

Once I started volunteering for organising etc, I got some confidence in contributing to open source software as well. I have taken baby steps like fixing typos, and also somehow took the courage to do some major coding stuff.

This year, since I am involved in R communities, I have started to give some time for Python communities as well. If I have evolved so much with R communities and the kind humans, I am sure I will be welcomed there too.

So, why volunteering? For me, it would always be because I grow, I learn, I meet people around the world, I sleep peacefully. Sometimes it is difficult to find time, but I always remember all the super humans who contribute, they do it, so, I atleast can try.

This piece is a tribute to all who have helped me knowingly or unknowingly. Each one of you all have supported me.