Falling Walls Conference - Berlin 2014

Which are the next walls to fall?

November 9th 2014, marked 25 years of the falling of the Berlin Wall. The actual day in 1989 was a epic day in the history of the world. It was not just about taking down the physical wall, but it was shattering the barriers which existed between human beings at large. 

Falling Walls Labs Berlin 2014

To commemorate this event, Berlin hosts the famous Falling Walls Labs and Conference every year since its inception and brings the world's leading researchers whose work impacts the area of science, technology and society to share the same to the world. This year, I got accepted and participated in the Falling walls labs as one of the 100 participants from around 40 countries. I received the A.T. Kearney scholarship, which took care of most of the expenses and I am thankful to them for that.

Presenting my talk at Falling Walls Labs 2014

I presented my talk on the topic "Breaking the wall of Building Effective Communities" , sharing my experience volunteering with Mozilla at India and Germany. The format was simple 3 minutes per speaker with a maximum of two slides each. It was really a difference experience to jot down the most essential points in the two slides and explaining them to the audience in just three minutes. The jury too consisted of distinguished scientists and leaders in various fields in science, engineering and technology. It was thus a great experience to talk to so many talented individuals, listening to their work in areas from Automotive engineering to Chemistry to Biology and sharing Mozilla's mission with them all. As the event was live streamed with massive response on twitter (#fallingwalls), it was personally a great event for me as it helped me grow as an individual. The platform allowed me to promote Mozilla's mission to a global audience of intellectuals and sharing my experience of building and working for various communities was spread far across various countries.

All participants of the Falling Walls Labs 2014

Here are my slides:

And last but not the least, I had some time to explore Berlin and celebrated the 25 years of the historic event with the locals. Here are some pictures:

Some Random Landscape of Berlin

River Spree

Berlin Academy of the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung (Falling Walls Labs Venue)

Neue Nationalgalerie (Falling Walls Conference Reception)

Radial System V (Venue for the Falling Walls Conference)

Ducks at River Spree

River Spree, Berlin

Me enjoying at the Conference Venue

Balloons formed a mock-up wall at the same place, where Berlin wall once exited.
Later in the evening, the balloons were freed in the night sky.

The tags associated with the each Balloons commemorating 25 years of the event.