An Intense Experience | Bootcamp Diary by Alejandra Gea

My name is Alejandra Gea. I am originally from Madrid, Spain, but when I was only four years old my family and I moved to Basel, Switzerland, due to my dad’s job. I went to school there until I started my degree in business and management with French at the University of Manchester. Due to the current pandemic, all my programs are online, so I decided to stay in Madrid and finish my degree remotely. Of course, this is not ideal, but it has given me the opportunity to take part in this Bootcamp. 

Last summer, I had the opportunity to work at McKinsey, where I was introduced to the world of big data and data analytics. When I found this Bootcamp I thought the perfect time to do it would be as I finish my degree. 

Even though they constantly repeat that it will be VERY intense, I didn’t really pay much attention to those comments. That is, until the first week, when I realized what I had got myself into. It’s been six weeks since we started, and I still can’t believe how fast it has gone by. I will be totally honest and say that I cried in one of Juanjo’s classes, because I was so lost. It was very hard balancing my university classes with the Bootcamp sessions. However, now that we are in week six, I feel a lot better. Not only am I able to follow my classes, but I also find myself spending more time coding and enjoying it.

I want to thank the rest of the Bootcampers. Being totally honest, I feel that I wouldn’t have got this far without them. In my business degree it is hard to find help from others, as it is a very competitive program. But in the Bootcamp everyone is happy to help, which is very comforting. If any of you are reading this, thank you so much for all your help and all the great laughs!

We are now in our second intensive week, and I feel it’s nothing like the first. Even though it’s still intense, there’s time to go through the work and retain information, whereas that was almost impossible during the first. As we continue our journey in this Bootcamp I get more and more excited to learn new tools and theories and continue growing in this field.