Speaker: Kel Santiago

I just moved to Japan last May 20 and I cannot read nor write Japanese, and when I moved to my apartment, I was faced with many challenges such as operating my washing machine and toilet. There are so many buttons and not to mention, they are all in Japanese characters! I was afraid to touch the buttons, since no one can help me out if something bad happens. My neighbors will not understand me at all, since the only Japanese word I know is „”BANZAI!!!”” which cannot help me in any situation.

Now I work for DigitalCube (Japan) as a writer and marketer. Since my job is completely WordPress-related, at the beginning, even before I started trying it, I was nervous because I am scared of HTML, CSS & PHP. I was thinking I will be faced with all these codes I have no idea of, since I am not a programmer. With my experience with confusing buttons (in Japan), I would like to relate this to my WordPress experience. I realized that my washing machine and toilet are actually very easy. And this is the same thing that I discovered with WordPress. Just like my washing machine, I love how user-friendly it is. I love it so much that I washed the clothes that don’t even need washing! This is the same case with WordPress. There are no confusing buttons and it is very easy to use. It is true that I do not have to be a programmer to use it.

I have only been in Japan for nearly a month (one month this June 20), and I have been using WordPress in my daily work. I publish many articles and by watching many talks from previous WordCamps, I was inspired by a couple of speeches that I wanted to make a WordPress theme. Of course I have not done this, but what I have put into action now is learning the basic HTML and CSS. This is just a rough draft of my idea, but overall I would like to share my super beginner experience with WordPress and the big inspiration I got from it.