This story begins in 2005, when I was finishing ninth grade and I had to decide something about my future and who I should be in it.
Since I am not from a very rich family, it was decided to get a working specialty, then get a job and earn a higher education on my own. There was no confidence that I would enter a “tower” on a budget for the desired specialty, and this greatly increased the period of my parents’ support, which was not a very good option for them. I must say about my love for information technology, I have had all this since childhood and everything was always good in computer science. Pascal was at school, but at home I practiced Delphi using the book “The Delphi Bible”. Everything worked out, and I dreamed of how I would become a programmer or, as a last resort, a video operator, but fate decreed otherwise. I decided to get a working specialty at the only college in our city. At the admissions committee, of course, I wanted to enroll in “information systems and networks,” to which I received a decisive refusal, saying that with such a certificate there was no chance. And my certificate was not the worst. Then I tried for “electric power engineering”, but was again rejected. A person from the commission recommended that I enroll in mechanical engineering. I didn’t want to go to other specialties at all because I was far from it all. In the end, I left the application for “electrician”, reasoning that if I didn’t get in, I’d go to 10th grade. Now I understand that the point was not in the certificate, but in the fact that everyone goes to one specialty, and the task of the commission is to recruit groups of less popular professions. I passed the exams well and, in principle, would have entered anywhere, but this no longer matters. While studying in college, I became interested in the specialty of energy engineering and completely abandoned programming. While still in pre-graduation practice, I got a job as an electrician. After college, together with my classmates, we went to a “tower” in our specialty under a shortened program for college graduates. We entered the evening department by correspondence. I worked in shifts, school was every Saturday and Sunday. At work, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was doing something wrong, I didn’t like everything. What kept me going was the salary, the shift schedule and the fact that when I finished my studies at the “university” a dizzying career growth would begin. Between shifts, he worked part-time repairing computers. For the money it wasn't even bad. After finishing my studies, naturally no one made me a boss, or at least an engineer. Well, not right away, I thought, I need to prove myself, show desire, etc. Over the course of several years, I tried different tactics and strategies, and even one where you just need to let go of the problem and it will solve itself. Naturally nothing helped. You might think I'm the problem. Perhaps, but I am more inclined to think that the problem is that in large state corporations, which Rosseti is, you can achieve something if only you are a relative of some boss, or better yet a director. Then I had no time for a career; I was immersed in “matters of the heart.” And how quickly did he get married by the age of 27? By this time, my second job was also related to electricity and together it included about 60 thousand a month. You might think it’s not bad, but if you imagine that you will have to work like this until retirement and nothing will change or change, it becomes sad, and working two jobs was terribly exhausting and there was practically no free time. After all, you can earn so much from one job, sitting in a warm office, and not climbing poles in any weather. Many people told me that I was doing the wrong thing, especially colleagues whom I sometimes helped solve their problems related to the computer, and encouraged me to learn to be a programmer on my own. It was hard to believe. I understood that computer repair and programming are a little far from each other. You know, like in that meme? I thought, then what do they teach people for 6 years at the institute? And I will never remember or learn even a part of it all.
Everything changed when my friend announced that he was moving to Belarus. He was invited there to a startup with a salary of $3,000. True, he is not self-taught, he studied at the institute and did an internship at Intel, then stayed there to work. But he assured me that there are a lot of people in this field who taught themselves without any higher education at all. That they look at your real skills here, and not at university degrees. After six months of work in Belarus, this startup was bought by Google and took all its employees to California and my friend. I was more motivated than ever. I devoured tons of articles about what language I should study. The choice fell on Java because you can write applications on Android in it, which really attracted me and plus it is the most popular, for several years now, which means a lot of information and support. Next the question arose, how to actually learn this Java. I read articles, watched videos on YouTube. I found the GeekBrains portal, it seemed suspicious to me, everything was too beautiful. I started looking for reviews. The reviews turned out to be very contradictory, I was completely confused, and even wanted to spit, but in one video they advised me to start with the book “Head First, learn Java”, they say that the innovative approach is not like this boring “Philosophy of Java”. Having ordered the book, I read it in a month in the evenings, completing assignments from it along the way. The advice turned out to be correct, although the story there is about Java 1.6, but such basic things are given there that the version is not important, OOP is very chewed up, which is called at the kolobok level. But after some time, I noticed that nothing stuck in my head, and it was time to re-read the book again. It became clear that without practice there is no way. And I started looking for courses again... and came across JavaRush. The resource also didn’t seem serious to me, but my opinion changed after completing the first 10 levels, which were still free at that time. And without a doubt I subscribed. Things were going slowly; at the same time, I was also working two jobs and completed only 20 levels in six months. When I got bored or something didn’t work out, I read books and watched tutorials on YouTube, re-read “learning Java”, rethought a lot, everything fell into place, as a reference I bought the book “Java 8 Complete Guide” since I’m not very good at English language to read the documentation. Since the new year, I decided to quit my second job and devote the time between shifts entirely to studying on JavaRush, and I did so, things became more fun, and I passed from levels 20 to 30 in January-February. I would like to especially thank the developers for the great tasks, especially with the graphical interface. I wish everyone would become like this) A problem is solved more fun when progress is visible at every stage. There were moments of despair when you thought that you had started all this in vain, and that it was unlikely that anything would work out. At this moment, the main thing is to discard such thoughts, perhaps take a break, switch to something else, watch some kind of motivational video. For example, I have always been very motivated by success stories, especially those who changed their specialty. And when I conquered another difficult task without peeking in the comments, there is no limit to inspiration. So, by the end of level 30, I began to look for a job on the relevant resources, because in the stories, basically everyone writes that they got a job without finishing the course, but I didn’t really believe in it, I was just testing the market, so to speak, looking at what the requirements were and all that. . And I saw that Yandex was looking for Java interns, without thinking twice I quickly put together a resume and sent it to JavaRush for verification, since this opportunity was already unlocked for me. The response literally trashed my resume; it failed on almost all points. They gave a lot of practical advice, by the way, I have not seen this in more than one article about resumes. They gave me a lot of links on how to prepare for an interview and advice on how to behave there and even, in part, what to say, I really liked it (By the way, I used them in the future, and they really work). Taking into account all the comments, I sent my resume to Yandex. And then the agonizing wait began. But I didn't waste my time. I studied algorithms and data structures very intensively, as it was in the requirements. This can also be improved on JavaRush by watching the CS50 course. A week later I was completely desperate, I thought that they certainly wouldn’t call. But two weeks later the answer came: “We are very happy about your desire to work at Yandex, but unfortunately the vacancy for which you are responding has already been closed.” I was a little upset, but I didn’t get upset. And I continued to occasionally browse sites with work. Although there were no “junior” vacancies, my successful friend advised me to send my resume even to places where “middle students” were required, but I decided for myself that I would do this when I completed the course and completed an internship. But one fine day a vacancy appeared for June, I quickly sent my resume and the very next day received an invitation for an interview. To say that I was worried would be an understatement. The evening before the interview, I read everything I could, it seemed to me that I was like in the joke about Pinocchio, all I had to do was stumble and everything would get mixed up. It seemed to me that I passed the interview averagely, but a few days later they called me and said that they really liked me and were ready to hire me. Of course, I lost money, but I'm sure this is just the beginning. After some thought, I agreed. And now, at 28 years old, I am already a junior programmer, and just yesterday I was an electrician who knew nothing about modern programming. I want to say that when you are already working as a programmer, your learning goes much faster, and you are already progressing by leaps and bounds. In the end, I want to wish everyone not to give up, no matter what happens. If you have decided something, then no failures should embarrass you or, much less, lead you astray, but only spur you on to new achievements. Remember, the weak look for reasons, the strong look for opportunities. Stay strong friends, there are so many opportunities out there. Special thanks to the developers of JavaRush for your very powerful tool in learning Java, I also wish you not to stop and develop in all directions. If there is such a resource for mobile development, I prophesy mountains of gold for you)
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