I’ll never forget my first @StellarOrg Meridian conference in Rio last year. I went as a +1, with little context about Stellar, assuming it would be like many of the other blockchain conferences I had been to but I was wrong. The opening video showcased how Stellar, alongside its ecosystem partners, helped healthcare workers in Syria access their wages more reliably. This was a HUGE deal. Healthcare workers had to travel often under dangerous conditions, to collect their salaries in cash. They’d wait for hours, sometimes days. Some had to make the same journey multiple times, spending more of their own money just to collect their earnings. Moreover, the consequences of delayed wages extended far beyond the workers themselves as families and communities also relied on that same income. So when Stellar, their partners, and local cash out networks, enabled timely salary payments via USDC into workers’ digital wallets, the mental, physical, and emotional impact was beyond measure. That’s when I knew Stellar’s approach was different. The tech is just so REAL. It’s not about hype or narrative around here. It’s about real world impact. Stellar is committed to their mission and they don’t need to prove it; the stories from humans around the world whose lives have changed for the better already do that for them.