I was sorrowed to hear that Jaakko Pesonen has passed away after battling cancer.
I first met Jaakko a few years back, during a Percona Live conference, and as community goes, our paths crossed again a few times. He spoke at and attended conferences where we’d have casual chats.
We were both expats in the Netherlands for a period. As I moved in from Israel, he was already working at Spil Games, having relocated from Finland, his home country. We shared expat experiences and longings to our homes. One day he pinged me that he was planning a trip to Israel – and the next few days were all about planning the best culinary experience of his travel (he approved of the results).
He was happy for the opportunity to work for Percona, as this allowed him to move back home to Finland.
Jaakko had the biggest, widest, most consuming smile, and this smile will sure be the most vivid memory of him that I’ll keep.
I do not have personal pictures of Jaakko. This picture was taken by Julian Cash at Percona Live. A rare non-smiling appearance.
One thought on “Remembering Jaakko Pesonen”