#YVRTwestival

Last night I attended Twestival 2011 Vancouver at the Vancouver Lookout at the top of Harbour Centre. I’ve lived in Vancouver for years, and I’ve never been up there. It was a perfect evening to go up as well. The sun was shining and we could watch the sun set from the top. So gorgeous!

The view from the top

Twestival (aka Twitter Festival) is a gathering of social media users in communities around the world to fundraise for a charity. This year, Twestival went local with each meet up fundraising for a local charity. The Vancouver Twestival fundraised for Beauty Night Social which “builds self esteem and changes lives of women and youth living in poverty through 3 streams of programming: wellness, life skills development and makeovers.”

Twestival was my third Twitter based event that I attended and it was definitely the best one yet. I met some pretty awesome people in person finally, after some random conversations, and made some new connections. Its always awkward when meeting someone for the first time that you’ve been following for awhile.

I was pretty excited to meet @jchui and @maggieverse who I’ve been chatting with a lot lately. We hit up the photobooth provided by Three Sixty Photography. Definitely the most fun aspect of the night:

We ended up raising over $8000 for Beauty Night Social between the silent auction, raffle and tickets. Pretty good for one evening.

Meeting Twitter superstar @mozy19 (Photo courtesy @jeremylim)

Afterwards, I headed to the after party for food and more mingling at Subeez Cafe, which was participating in Dining Out for Life, where restaurants in Whistler and the Lower Mainland donate 25% of their bill to HIV/AIDS research.

I left that night feeling super energized. It was definitely a great night.