How to win a hackaton (spoiler: Power of Friendship)

The author participated in their first hackathon, the NASA Space Apps Challenge, and described it as a brutal injection of energy. The hackathon was a global event where people from all over the world participated, and the author joined from Cochabamba, Bolivia. NASA provided various challenges and resources for teams to choose from, and the author's team opted for the "Imagine Our Earth Connected" challenge, which explored how different aspects of the planet are interconnected. The team consisted of five members with different skills, and they worked together to develop an application that visualized wildfires in South America. They used NASA's resources, including the Globe.gl library, to create a Node.js app that fetched news about wildfires based on the location selected on a globe. The team encountered some challenges, including limited and difficult-to-process data, but they were able to overcome them with the help of mentors and their own teamwork. After presenting their project, the team was announced as one of the winners, which was a surreal and euphoric experience. The author credits their success to aiming high but staying grounded, prototyping, having a committed team, taking breaks, and selling their idea. The experience gave the author a confidence boost and was a huge energy boost, and they would definitely participate in another hackathon. Overall, the author recommends participating in a hackathon as a great way to challenge oneself, meet like-minded people, and have fun.