I have watched tweets and blogs about Tweetups and then GeekFests and I ignored them. I ignored them because I thought they were cheesy. By the third one (or what is dubbed 3.14 and incorrectly called geek to the power 3.14) I decided that it was time to check what it was all about. Admittedly, part of the turn off was the location. Al Quoz. I'm not particularly fond of driving in areas I'm not familiar as I am notoriously known for my lack of internal GPS :) But.. still. Al QUOZ?!

So, at around 5:15PM I decided to have a look at The Shelter's website to get directions. Clear enough, even for hopeless folks like myself. I still missed it as it is tucked in between warehouses. It is Al Quoz, remember? However, when you enter The Shelter, it is a whole other atmosphere. I was pleasantly surprised. It is indeed a gem.

I sat down and dealt with the awkward questions of "Hi, are you from twitter?" Umm, no, I'm not FROM Twitter, but I do have an account much like everyone else in here. It took me awhile to loosen up and I had the pleasure of meeting some very interesting people. At the risk of forgetting names, I will try and not mention any :)

The talks were rather interesting. I had the privilege of sitting and listening to Rabea Ataya (CEO and founder of Bayt.com) speak about entrepreneurship and business plans. He explained how, despite having written business plans they have never been followed or even looked at by those who provided financing. From personal experience, I can second that the business plan barely resembles the reality once you get into it. However, I strongly disagree with his conclusion: business plans are of no use. Being able to clearly articulate what it is that you want to accomplish and how you think that would happen not only puts things in perspective, but helps you throw out the many unworkable ideas you might have. It takes a lot of passion to be able to sit through writing a business plan. For most people (myself included), they are a chore.

Rabea's talk was otherwise inspiring. He spoke about leadership and how he viewed it with your male-centric (as he pointed out) war-based analogies. I enjoyed it.

Mohammed F. Al-Awadhi followed with his hilariously titled "Islamic Pampers Design". Of everyone I ever talked to, they unanimously found his presentation to be entertaining. While it had little to do with diapers with Islamic designs (I won't spoil it for you since you might want to watch the videos once posted), Mohammed worked the crowd. Oh, he worked the crowd! I particularly liked the idea of mosques beaming lights into the sky to identify their locations during the times of prayer, as a solution to a city full of skyscrapers like Dubai. What I like the most about this is that he is not trying to "preserve" anything, but rather, evolve it within a modern context. I am not a fan of preservations in general. They smell of backwardness and an unwillingness to move forward and adapt to a changing environment. His proposed solution (as, "just an idea") tells me of the kind of architect he is. The kind that I would like to see more of.

I missed the other 2 talks as I found myself getting into conversations with people outside and learning about what they do.. and yes, there were the occasional my Android is better than yours geek conversations! Needless to say, I think I would be attending all future GeekFests, barring the unforeseen!