It was on 1st July 2024 when I received the greatest News of my life that I was awarded a full travel sponsorship to attend the State of the Map Global conference 2024 in Nairobi Kenya. I screamed like a baby in Town and people started looking at me 😂. They thought I have lost it. I couldn’t keep calm because it was one of my to do list this year to visit a foreign country and my first time attending the State of the Map Global conference. I shared the news to my sister Ndinawe and guess what? we screamed even more 😂. I was so excited that Day, I couldn’t believe it. I was excited about meeting my geospatial family across the globe in person. I was excited for the whole week. I did some research about Kenyan food and culture. I was so thrilled to taste ugali and beef pilau. Arrival in Kenya. Me and my sister Letwin were early bird’s. We arrived at the Airport in the evening and started waiting for the mogul behind Every door application. I got the local sim-card at the Airport and we proceeded to the hostel. I fall in love with Kenyan infrastructure,, the people, environment and the weather.

The following day, I met the African geospatial Giants Geoffrey, Benedicta , Walter, Victor and Mr Josm Kingsley. I was so excited because it was my first time meeting them in-person. We made noise, look some pictures and guess what? Geoffrey decided to surprise us by bringing Arnalie. Everyone was elated to meet Miss smiley. Come on you just have to love Arnalie personality. Welcoming party at ESA After breakfast, we gathered for the welcoming party at ESA . It was a wonderful experience, I met incredible people around the globe, we had a mapathon and celebrated Geoffrey’s birthday in a unique style. Day 1 ,2 and 3. The state of the Map finally commenced and everyone was in awe. Walter and Laura officially gave an opening speech and that’s where thing’s got excited. I attended a number of sessions such as community capacity building - a case study case study OSM Kenya by Walter. The session was insightful and I enjoyed every bit of it. Women in Osm Tech -What worked best for me by Anastazia , Exporting high quality Atlas Maps in bulk by leveraging OpenStreetMap Data in QGIS by Jonanes from Tanzania, .Mapping Kenya: 15 Years of Map Kibera, Hagen, Joshua Ogure and beyond and lighting talks from Incredible people and I can proudly say that the volume of information shared on each session from day 1 to the last day was very insightful and informative. I also had the opportunity of hosting a session on day 2 with Samson. It was my first time hosting a session but Samson made thing’s easy for both of us ☺. Social Event. Ooh my god, the social event on Day 2 was electric, the local organizers decided to make the conference more interesting by bringing Nganga bus filled with loud music, all I can say about the bus is they’re on another Level 😂. We reached our destination, played some games, did karaoke with my geospatial family. It was one of my favorite moments, Everyone loosened up . On the final day, attended a number of sessions and I also had a lighting where I spoke about local knowledge Mappers, I gave a brief of what we do and what we are working on. I would like to thank all organizers, sponsors and everyone that made the conference memorable. A big thank you to Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Open Summit Grant for granting me a full travel sponsorship. Thank you Geoffrey, Letwin, Walter, Tom Tom, Priscilla, Victor, Benedicta, Arnalie and everyone for making the conference memorable as kenyan would say ASANTE SAANA..