Newsletter Programador Pringao

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I was 26, recently finished the bootcamp.

I know, I know, a bootcamp has nothing special.

But in my case, I had no other option. I couldn’t afford going to university, and due to my lack of self-esteem, it wasn’t a bad idea to have someone on my back encouraging me and asking for the homework.

Otherwise, I would’ve been self-taught-no-looking-for-job till death. But that’s another story.

With such a low profile: no experience in the field, bootcamp graduate, self-taught, amateur personal projects… Plus the overcrowded IT industry…

I had no other choice than to accept any offer just to get my foot in the field and gain experience. At any cost.

And that was exactly what happened. After reaching out to 1000 IT recruiters from Portugal, I finally got my first offer:

1,150€ and hybrid schedule.

3h of bus in total to go and come back. Great, isn’t it? Actually, that was okay - I read so many books and had time to deeply think about my life.

Less than what I was earning at my previous company, a zero-specialization job.

But, I was in.

Finally, fuck yeah.

Besides the salary, the team was great: friendly, cozy, experienced, non-ego programmers (which is weird), they were so nice.

There I learned a lot, and not only programming but also Portuguese. So it was tough to reach the end of each month without asking my parents for money, but totally worth it, there I became a real programmer.

Sometimes you cannot think only about the money.

Money is important, of course.

But if you have no big commitments, money can wait, and believe me, it will be worth it.

You just have to start, no matter how.

If you’re impatient, you’ll just end up at McDonald’s (all respect to McDonald’s employees).