Last week I attended WordPress Kitchen in Kiev, Ukraine – a little informal conference about all things WordPress. One whole day with around 70 attendees, 9 sessions and a great deal of fun.
I learned about WordPress Kitchen a few weeks before the event and immediately reached out to the organizing team to see what they were up to. The event was mostly organized by Pingbull, a web development agency scattered between Oslo, Stockholm and Kiev. They were all super friendly and nice.
The event was held in an anti-cafe called Besedniza. Nine sessions total, one in English, one in Ukrainian and the rest in Russian. The speakers were mostly developers, quite a few of them from Pingbull. They covered some interesting topics, most of which were directly related to WordPress, including a session about why one should not pick WordPress.
The after-party was at a bar nearby, with some food, lots of drinks, jokes, laughter and a boxing match between Klitschko and Povetkin — Klitschko obviously won.
This was my first time in Kiev and my first time in Ukraine. I stayed there for three days in quite a nice hotel called Alfavito. Walking around the streets felt a lot like Russia, especially Magnitogorsk – the city I lived in right before I moved to Moscow.
Huge thanks to everyone involved in making WordPress Kitchen happen. I hope to come back to Ukraine very soon for another WordPress event or two, hopefully leading up to the first WordCamp Ukraine in 2014.