The first time I ever wrote a line of code was in 6th or 7th standard, in a subject that was just another school period to me. We were introduced to MSWLogo, a simple programming environment where we could command a tiny turtle to draw geometric shapes. It was fun—I enjoyed it—but not enough to go home and practice. After all, playing outside with my friends was far more exciting than staring at a computer screen.
As I moved into 7th and 8th standard, we started learning about computer architecture, hardware, software, and some basic programming concepts like MS SQL and C++. But honestly? I dreaded those lab sessions. The air-conditioned computer labs made me feel way too cozy, and instead of practicing the small coding exercises, my friends and I often ended up playing whatever pre-installed games we could find.
The First Real Challenge
In 9th standard, we had a particularly tough exam where we were asked to write nested loops to print pattern-based designs with *. I hated it so much that instead of figuring out the loops, I just wrote multiple print statements for each line. Somehow, I passed the exam thanks to the heavy theory portion, but I got a big, fat zero on the coding part.
Those who failed had to attend extra morning classes before school to improve their coding skills. I remember feeling like I had cheated the system—I had taken a shortcut, and it didn’t sit right with me. I went to my teacher and asked to be included in the extra classes, even though I had technically passed. That was the first time I made a conscious effort to learn coding properly, but I still didn’t love it.
The Turning Point
Throughout 10th, 11th, and 12th, I was introduced to Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) so many times that I practically memorized all the definitions. But none of it clicked. The moment things changed for me was in my first year of engineering when I saw my friends building websites and working on cool projects. I was intrigued but didn’t know where to start.
One day, I had a personal problem to solve—tracking my expenses. My father often scolded me for not keeping a record of my spending, so I thought, Why not build an app that could parse my bank messages and categorize my expenses? I had no idea how to do it, so I did what any beginner does—I Googled it.
That was when I saw my benchmate effortlessly searching for solutions on Stack Overflow. He was an insanely good coder back then, and I realized that coding wasn’t about memorizing everything—it was about problem-solving and knowing how to find the right resources.
I never actually built that expense tracker, but that moment changed everything. I started learning mobile development in 2019, during my second year of engineering, and that’s when coding became something more than just a school subject—it became a tool to create real things.
Looking Back
My journey with coding wasn’t love at first sight. It took years of exposure, trial, and failure before I truly saw its potential. From writing print statements to avoid loops in 9th grade to building actual applications in college, it’s been a long road—but one that I wouldn’t trade for anything.
And if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s this: Coding isn’t about knowing everything—it’s about knowing how to find and apply solutions.