#WhoAreWe！

A Happy Accident One Weekend Afternoon

CompoundWater had found Meta Space, a very cool Web3/NFT café near Wudaokou in Beijing (it had only opened in mid-July), and loved the vibe — so one weekend, a friend from outside crypto, H.H Huajiang, came along to check it out (2022/07/23).

She was a little bored that day, and seeing the walls covered in mfers, she casually drew mfers-style fan art of CompoundWater and the café’s tattooed, motorcycle-riding barista 🤣. The reason: she wanted an mfer of her own, and CompoundWater said “one costs 1.5E” (about US$2k at the time) — so she just started drawing them herself xD. It turned out to be surprisingly fun. The barista encouraged her to keep going, saying it might really be something, and the owner liked it even more, offering to print them and hang them in the café — and just like that, she found herself inspired and encouraged.

Later she shared the drawings on her IG Stories, and to our surprise, people asked to be drawn too. So the two of us decided: purely for fun, no charge — free donations instead, as long as everyone’s happy. It was also a way to keep Huajiang company as she explored a Web3 side project after work — she had only just installed MetaMask.

That began her Web3 drawing side hustle: on her very first day in crypto, she also set up an IG account. Her little goal is a fun one: to someday draw 1,000 heartfelt custom mfers this way and trade them for a real mfer xD (purely for fun — I’m curious how far it’ll go myself, though it may be slow, since H.H still has a day job).

Defining WhoAreWe

I think the question of “who we are” is worth pausing to reflect on at every stage of life. Our clothes, accessories, ideas, thoughts, choices, careers, friends, surroundings, actions, and values all reveal how we define ourselves and what we pursue. Woven together over time, these countless small choices become who we are and how we look today.

So we got curious: how would each of you — kindred spirits living in the same time and place — describe who you are right now, inside or out? For example:

• What features or accessories you’d like — hats, glasses, or favorite things, hobbies, and quotes from your life
• Who you feel you are — your personality, life philosophy, and the values you pursue
• The more honest and true to you, the better — plus anything else that comes to mind

We’ll try to draw you from your words.

Treating Every Drawing with Care

After the NFT tide went out, many NFTs became just JPEGs. I think that’s a necessary stage — part of NFTs moving toward a healthier state. The companies, projects, and creators who really want to build are starting to think about what’s essential, and are willing to create patiently through the bear market — to Build Something.

Most people may see NFTs as a zero-sum game, but something deeper is happening underneath: changes in asset classes and how we collect, and the release of humanity’s immense creativity. Even if it isn’t recognized yet, it will slowly be felt. We’re also excited to have some paradigm-shifting insights and ideas of our own.

For us, this has been an unexpected and fun little interlude. We never meant to make it complicated or commercial — it’s purely for fun, and we just want to see what it naturally grows into and enjoy the ride. Rather than the 10,000 images a computer spits out at once, we want to treat every drawing with care, connecting with people through art and getting to know the real look and world of each friend behind every piece.

That “Not Even 3 p.m. and I Want to Go Home” Feeling

JN’s description captured a mood everyone in crypto knows during a bear market — work is too boring, it’s not even 3 p.m. and you already want to leave, so you might as well go WorkFi at McDonald’s. This was the first real self-description the project received.

Mr Huang JN x MFERs

Big thanks to him, too, for a Free Donate of 0.00666 ETH right from the start, which made Huajiang very happy — it was the first ETH she had ever owned. Even more eye-opening, she’d never imagined she could draw like this and earn money from it; the jolt and joy of that new realization were hard to put into words.

The first Free Donate — 0.00666 ETH

Actually Printed and Hung in the Café

2022/07/31: a week after a casual afternoon of doodling, the Meta Space owner really did print the drawings and hang them in the café. Custom drawings of 12 friends followed, each answering “who we are” in their own way — and the waitlist keeps growing.

An accidental win — the drawings printed and hung in the café

The first wave of friends celebrating together at Meta Space

Just for Fun ~ So It’s Free

If you like it, feel free to Free Donate (no pressure 🙏🏻).

We may put them on-chain later — if we do, we’ll send them to everyone. For now, let’s just have fun. Sincere thanks to everyone for being part of this 🥰. If you have a MetaMask wallet, remember to send us your address so we can collect them~