I started baking in 2018, after repeatedly binge-watching The Great British Bake Off on Netflix. I'd always wanted to bake — when I was still living in the Philippines as a child, I'd salivate over images of baked goods in American cookbooks. But ovens were a rarity in Filipino households, a luxury for the well-to-do. Here in America, there's an oven in every house. And after my Netflix binge, I felt empowered to try my hand at different bakes.

And of course, for my very first bake, I started with: croissants.

Croissants are infamously difficult and finicky. My husband kept advising me, "why not try something simple first?" But I was adamant! Failure was, of course, a possibility — and failure is what happened. My first bake was ugly, raw, and very bad!

But I really wanted to make croissants, so after that first attempt (well, first three attempts, all in a row), I scaled back. I started again, this time with basic bread: flour, water, salt, yeast. Knead; rest; bake. My loaves came out beautifully, and after six months of practicing and trying new recipes and scaling up, I was finally able to do it — I created my very own flakey, buttery croissants!

I took so much joy in baking, I started organizing bake offs with family, friends, and people I work with. Anything for an excuse to bake! I wanted to share with everyone how fun and rewarding it could be to create something marvelous and elaborate out of such basic, "nothing" ingredients, and in the process give joy to people and build relationships.

My approach to baking mirrors how I've always looked at coding. Tech work should be a means to not just create something out of nothing, but to empower people, and to build relationships. This mentality is an approach which, I think, could apply to any industry, but is especially sorely needed in tech today. It has been a practice of mine for a long time, and it is at the center of everything I build, plan, and organize — whether it be a community of tech workers, a bake off, or a tech project.