Meet Sulaimon Babatunde: #ALX_SE comedian-in-chief and undisputed meme lord
When the ALX software engineering program throws challenges at Sulaimon, he responds with memes and code! Read about his unique journey blending humor and innovation in his quest of becoming an SE.
My name is Sulaimon Babatunde and I graduated from Kwara State University in 2021 and further completed my National Youth Service in 2023. I am involved in real estate property management and also currently a student of the ALX software engineering program as part of cohort 12. Many people know me online as the meme guy, #meme-ology, because I fuse humor into learning at ALX through my twitter account, @babs_illy. I know most of my peers have interacted with my content online but very few know the person behind the account hence the cat is finally out of the bag! Before I joined ALX, I had been creating content such as memes, funny jokes, short skits and so much more because I realized I have a natural talent to make people laugh. When I joined ALX, I noticed that there was nothing like that hence I felt that it would be great to help people take a minute to laugh at the struggles and challenges they face on the program. I wanted to contribute to the movement and do something that could help ginger people to keep going despite the program being tough. I knew I could use my talent and create memes where fellow learners can get a moment of relief by letting out any frustrations through laughter.
I have a YouTube channel where people can check out the other types of content that I usually create. One thing many assume is that software engineers are super uptight people who do not have time for fun or anything else apart from the black screens. I am on my journey to becoming a Software Engineer but I am keen on equally building my comedy career through content creation. I think it comes naturally to me like a talent I have since a lot of people that I come in contact with often compliment my sense of humor. I remember even in High School, I would be called up to stage to crack jokes so the notion that software engineers are extremely serious nerds is not accurate. When I started posting the memes, I did not anticipate the tremendous response from the #ALX_SE community and when I see people come to my profile, laugh and re-share the content, I usually feel very happy that I am able to cheer them up and lift their spirits. I become greatly motivated to keep producing content for the community, even though balancing it with other responsibilities is not easy.
I work as a real estate property agent hence I spend a lot of time on sites fulfilling various obligations. At the same time, I am undertaking the ALX SE program but I am a total newbie to coding since I have zero prior knowledge on programming. As a result, I have to work extra hard; any free time I get, I dedicate to reading resources and completing tasks. However, my brother who is a backend engineer has really been instrumental in this journey because he has been my source of inspiration and encouragement. He constantly reminds me that the future lies in programming, and I firmly believe it. The job I do at the moment is not easy spending a whole day on a site hence I keep pushing because I know the flexibility to work from anywhere that I will get if I stay diligent and graduate successfully. I appreciate the awesome community at ALX that has made the journey pretty easy for me so that I can even keep creating content to post online.
My brother is the one that introduced me to ALX and currently, we are 5 members of the family actively learning in the ALX program so I have sufficient support around me 🙂. We actually have a WhatsApp group where we hold discussions and virtual meetings to support each other because we would love all the family members to graduate and finish with flying colors. I also read a story of Alice Mamsana on Faces of ALX SE and how she was a newbie and she has gone to achieve many things. That story gave me a lot of motivation too and I knew that if she can do it, then I can also do it. Such stories helped keep my grit intact such that I do not allow anything no matter how difficult a task or project is to bring me down. When things show me pepper, I go and create a meme and share and we laugh about it with the other learners on twitter. The response has been great to the content and many people reach out to let me know that they often visit my profile to have a good laugh and cool off. Julien has been one of my greatest fans and I really appreciate him for always reacting and re-sharing.
I am excited about what the future holds especially now that we are entering specialization for cohort 12. I have not made up my mind yet whether I am going backend or frontend but I am still doing research. I will choose the one that I perceive to have greater demand in the job market and pursue it more aggressively although I am keen on being fluent in both modes. Simple Shell project really challenged me and I eventually had to defer to cohort 13 so that I could take a step back, research some more and come back to conquer it. I decided that I will go through the program without falling to the temptation to copy code, so even now, if you visit my GitHub, I have written all the codes for all projects and tasks from scratch. You also need proper time management because for example myself, I juggle a full time job, the ALX program and also having time to actively create and post content.
The key to succeeding in this program is to always stay positive no matter how tough it gets. I chose humor to give me the ginger to keep going and I also went ahead and shared this gift with the community. However, even if humor is not your thing, just find something that will help you stay positive in the program. Keep the hope alive, the grades going and never lose your grit. Always remember that the ability to laugh at yourself is a very important survival skill when navigating various challenges that life throws at you. Make sure to stay connected with me on Twitter for your daily dose of laughter and positivity. In closing, I am team VI 🙂.
To stay connected with Sulaimon, reach out to him on Twitter, LinkedIn, Github and on his YouTube channel. Also set a reminder for this upcoming Twitter space on 5th September to hear his amazing story of fusing humor and coding to excel in the ALX SE program.