State of the Map Conference in Kenya
Last month, I traveled to Kenya to attend a conference called State of the Map 2024 (“SotM” for short), which is an annual meetup of OpenStreetMap contributors from all over the world. It was held at the University of Nairobi Towers in Nairobi, from the 6th to the 8th of September.
I have been contributing to OpenStreetMap for the last three years, and this conference seemed like a great opportunity to network with others in the community. As soon as I came across the travel grant announcement, I jumped in and filled the form immediately. I was elated when I was selected for the grant and couldn’t wait to attend. The grant had an upper limit of €1200 and covered food, accommodation, travel and miscellaneous expenses such as visa fee.
Pre-travel tasks included obtaining Kenya’s eTA and getting a yellow fever vaccine. Before the conference, Mikko from the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team introduced me to Rabina and Pragya from Nepal, Ibtehal from Bangladesh, and Sajeevini from Sri Lanka. We all booked the Nairobi Transit Hotel, which was within walking distance of the conference venue. Pragya, Rabina, and I traveled together from Delhi to Nairobi, while Ibtehal was my roommate in the hotel.
