So, I’m in Argentina (for the fourth year in a row), attending Smalltalks 2010 and doing some consulting. During lunch I walked a couple blocks from the client’s office to get some lunch. The restaurant is nice, inexpensive, and has WiFi. Glancing around, I saw something that looked both familiar and unexpected: someone working in Squeak. Familiar, because I’ve just spent a an intense several day with other Smalltalkers discussing cool projects. But unexpected, because I don’t think I’ve ever gone to just a random cafe WiFi and found someone working on his Squeak project.

I introduced myself (yes, he spoke English), and found that he has been doing Smalltalk for 15 years and has an application in production. Adding to the surprise, he was not aware of the conference last week nor that a few blocks away a major corporation uses Smalltalk. Perhaps the Smalltalk prevalence is a bit larger than I thought, at least in Argentina!