Gigging, Moving and Schmoozing
July has proved to be a manic one! With events, gigs and moving house, I can certainly say I am rather exhausted. Unfortunately I didn’t make it to a couple of the events due to moving commitments, however the events I did manage to get to were great!
Congratulations to Mike Butcher and the guys at Tech Crunch for a fun and memorable awards evening. Tech Crunch Europa winners included Huddle, Spotify and Nimbuzz amongst others. Spotify being the biggest winners of the night scooping 3 awards. The free champagne, wine and beer flowed for the majority of the evening, I for one certainly felt the effects in the morning. Events such as these are a great way to meet like minded people, budding entrepreneurs and generally get inspired. I met a fair few people I follow on Twitter and was very pleased to find they were just as entertaining in real life 
Another event I have attended lately was The Big Ambition event in Victoria. The Big Ambition is a branch of e-skills and is geared towards attracting teenagers into the wonderful world of tech. The website features relevant tech news, profiles of inspirational people in the tech world and advice on IT education and careers.
This event was inspiration for me. The young people who I spoke to and their presentations wowed me. Their enthusiasm and drive to succeed gave me a real buzz and made me really want to help youngsters like them to achieve their goals. With Girls ‘n’ Gadgets, I feel I could do this and as a result, I have jotted down some ideas and spoken to a few people in the youth working fields as well as the tech field. More details to come… so watch this space.
The event was presented by the ITN news reader Alasdair Stewart who made the day fun, factual and gave the audience many a reason to pause for thought. The keynote was delivered by Lord Carter and companies involved included British Airways and IBM. Hermione Way from News Pepper covered the event and spoke on women in tech and the last Big Ambition event last year. It was a real eye opener for me as I haven’t been as in touch with the educational side as I want to be. It was most interesting to hear the young peoples views on the IT industry and the curriculum the have to follow. As I say, I will be following up on this subject very soon
Other fun events included the Blur concert in Hyde Park which was amazing. Since being a little indie chick back in the late 90’s, Blur have always been a band I have wanted to see and like the break up of Kula Shaker, the absence of Blur upset me quite back in the day. Damon was… Damon – He hasn’t changed at all it would seem. The big screen could have done with more shots of the lovely Alex though. I bought myself a Milk Carton T-Shirt (from the video of Coffee and TV) and drunk a fair amount of Pear Cider which was refreshing on such a hot day It’s certainly been a while since I have sat in my Bikini in London!!!
Finally, I attended Michal Acton Smith, Alex Tew and Tom Boardman’s legendary Berwickstock. What an evening that was! I donned my huge false lashes, naked Kate Moss T-Shirt, denim mini and large knit fishnets and partied the night away! Considering this was 2 days before my big move (and I hadn’t packed anything) I probably should have taken it easy and got home at a reasonable hour… that didn’t happen though LOL.
So that brings me to my move. I have now relocated from sunny Clapham to the nice and central London Bridge with my boy… I am loving it! We are nearly 2 weeks in and the place has a 42″ TV and most of the furniture (except for the table and chairs.) I have astounded myself at how many pairs of shoes/ bags & junk I own and am still slowly getting through it all. I think I counted about 60 pairs of shoes and they are not even fully unpacked!!!
Anyway… Off to watch some movies. Anyone who is involved in youth work, I would be very keen to hear from you. Also any companies that would like to get involved with some youth project, please also get in touch – leila at swanification dot com.
Ciao xx