Hello, mundo
My name is David Romero and I’m from Granada, a city in southern Spain. I’d like to say that I was born on a very sunny day, but to be honest I have no idea.
All hail Game Gear
I was 4 years old when my brother brought Game Gear home. This wouldn’t be a remarkable event if not because it defined what would be my passion and main hobby during the rest of my life: gaming.
Made in Japan
Rurouni Kenshin was aired in Spain every Saturday around 7am. My brother and I were getting up very early just to watch the new episode coming out. This was just the very beginning of my passion for manga/anime and Japan. Berserk, Naruto, Gundam, Full Metal Alchemist, Death Note, etc. came afterwards.
Is this technology?
Our first computer came home in 2002, but my parents didn’t sign up for an internet connection until 2004. Suddenly, this big “useless” machine opened a new world of possibilities. I randomly joined a portal named Pobladores.com (disappeared now) with a very strong community about Final Fantasy. There, I created what was my very first “blog/website” and I made my first online friends. The platform itself was very basic, but some of the friends I made there are still my real-life friends nowadays.
Tales Translations
In the summer of 2007, I joined an amateur translation group called Tales Translations. I knew about them because they were translating some of the Tales of videogames series from English to Spanish and they needed people for their most recent project: translating Tales of Destiny1Sony Playstation (PSX) version..
I first joined as a regular translator and I was later promoted to lead of the translators’ team designated to that project. This was my very first contact with remote “work”, as all the members of this group were based in different cities of Spain.
The Spanish translation of Tales of Destiny was released in 2010. I also was part of a sub-group named GNAC, which was translating some unlicensed mangas and also the movie 5 Centimeters Per Second of Makoto Shinkai.
Real life enters the game
I had the greatest dreams when I was a kid: becoming a chef, architect, trash collector2Yes. True story. or psychologist were some examples. In the end, I decided to study design after I finished high school.
One month, one salary
My very first “real” job happened in December 2008 – I worked in a toy store as Stock Clerk during the christmas campaign.
This very first (and only) salary I got was used to buy my first digital reflex camera3Canon EOS 450D..
Telecoms World
I finished my graphic design studies and I did an internship in a marketing agency, hoping that I would get hired after that. Of course, that never happened so I tried to find a job as a designer in Granada. When you’re young and you don’t have the experience, the only way you have to get hired as a designer is basically having good contacts, I’m not sure if I had the skill but I definitely didn’t have contacts, so finding a job as a designer turned to be a nightmare, to the point that I abandoned the idea completely.
Spain (or the world, better said) was going through an economic crisis. Finding a job was getting more and more complicated, however, thanks to a friend of mine, I was given the chance to apply for the role of Support Engineer in a local telecommunications company. In a matter of two weeks, I went from zero to being an employee of this company4Jetnet Wimax SA., where I stayed for almost 7 years.
Crossing borders
From this moment on, I started traveling internationally. Every time I could gather some money I was visiting a different place in Europe. I realized that even though countries in Europe are so close to each other, people and culture are very different than in Spain. I got completely hooked on seeing more and more places (not that I could do that very often though).
The University Adventure
After some traveling around Normandy, something clicked on my mind and I decided that I wanted to study French Philology. I was still working in Jetnet and quitting wasn’t an option so I decided to work and study at the university at the same time.
This decision marked the beginning of the four hardest years of my life. I was leaving home every day at 7am and I was returning at 1am – weekends were just there for me to catch up with sleeping. I could write plenty of things about the University environment, but very few of them would be nice. At least, I can say that I can read French perfectly and even understand when someone is talking5Please don’t ask about my speaking..
Let’s go remote
By the summer of 2016, Jetnet already gave me everything it could ever provide. I knew I couldn’t learn anything else in there and I also knew I would never grow if I’d stay. So I decided that it was time to leave that place and look for something better… but where?
I started looking for remote jobs due to something very silly: my ex-boss told me that remote jobs “don’t exist” and I just wanted to prove him wrong. Purely as a coincidence, one of my friends of the times of Tales Translations was working at Automattic as a designer, so I asked him what were the possibilities for me to apply.
In January 2017 I officially joined the support team of Automattic and, with that, my full remote journey began.
Jet Lagging
I traveled a lot during this year. I visited Barcelona, Berlin, Gdańsk, I did a trip around the East Coast of the United States, visited New York, and lived in Japan for 3 months. Remote work was the only possible way to make all that happen.
Pandemic!!
This doesn’t need any explanation, does it? The world stopped, but I feel lucky and grateful that it didn’t have a significant impact in my professional career due to remote work.
Changes
This year marked an important milestone for me: I became the Lead of a new Customer Success team in Automattic. My team was based in EMEA and APAC, composed of people from very different backgrounds and tenure. We achieved a lot together, and this experience taught me countless new lessons, both personally and professionally.
Fraud Fighting
After nearly three years leading a Customer Success team, I was ready for a new challenge. Fighting fraud was something that always piqued my interest, and I often read books and blogs about it purely for my own entertainment. The opportunity to join the Risk Operations team in Automattic showed up unexpectedly, and I embraced it with all my soul.