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After a year of confinement, these 2022 fallas promise to be unforgettable.
From the Chair of Conversational Business we are fortunate to be able to contribute our grain of sand hand in hand with our colleagues from WOZTELL.
FallasBot 2022 aims to be the virtual assistant par excellence for the thousands of foreigners living in Valencia. A 24/7 companion for the Fallas that is reborn from a rescued project.
We tell you all about it in this article, read on!
The beginnings of the story
Dr. Kanseitova is 33 years old.
She came to Valencia invited by the Institute of Chemical Technology as part of the PhD she was doing, with the aim to stay 3 months in Valencia and return to Kazakhstan with a nice memory: 8 years later she is still in Valencia.
Dariya Kanseitova works at WOZTELL, the Valencian startup that managed to become one of the few official WhatsApp distributors for organizations in the world.
From her position as project manager, she participates in the growth of the company by building bridges between Asia and Valencia, making the most of her knowledge and her 4 languages.
In addition, she is our executive director of the Chair of Conversational Business at the University of Valencia.
Although her most important role is to be the mother of Alma, a 3 year old Valencian girl who begins to “demand” her first fallera costume.
The expats and the fallas
Our director is part of a group of people from all over the world who have decided to settle in Valencia.
Despite their enthusiasm and desire to integrate into Valencian society, the Fallas is a cultural festival that is still inaccessible to them.
Due to the many years of tradition, the expats live with frustration these 5 days of festivities and streets cut off. A party full of noise and stories that displace these citizens who only seek to be part of the celebration.
Rescuing FallasBot
FallasBot was born in 2020 from this need and thanks to the collaboration of entities such as the Valencian WOZTELL and the Hong Kong company, Sanuker.
An ambitious virtual assistant that showed the events of the almost 400 fallas throughout the week of festivities. All through a WhatsApp number, in 8 languages and free of charge.
FallasBot aspired to be the information guide for any type of citizen.
But, the 2020 fallas were one of the multitudinous events that ended up being cancelled due to the confinement.
As we reached the year 2022, our director, Dariya Kanseitova, discovered and decided to rescue the project for these upcoming fallas.
From the Chair of Conversational Business and with the support of a team of 6 expats, this project will be relaunched.
FallasBot 2022
The most fallero chatbot will have functionalities such as:
- Free assistance in 8 languages
List of events of each collaborating falla
Guided tours led by the fallera mayor or the president of the falla
Now questions like how much does a falla cost, or how much does a fallera costume cost, why are the fallas burned, how to participate in the offering, what does each ninot mean, all the answers to these and many other questions are at the reach of a WhatsApp message.
The bot also allows the fallas to update their event calendar and schedule activities in real time.
Another of the objectives of this project in the future is to consolidate the activity of guided tours. This is an attraction for visitors, new falleros and all kinds of resources due to the important link that is created at the moment of visiting a falla.
During the next few weeks, the FallasBot team will contact each of the fallas to invite them to participate in the project. If they are interested, they can provide the data to the team or upload them directly through the FallasBot itself in the menu “register event”.
Conclusion
These fallas 2022 are being announced as the great return of the star festival of the Valencians.
After two years where they have not been able to shine with all its splendor, from the team of the Chair of Conversational Business, and thanks to the leadership of Dariya Kanseitova, we will accompany every expat and every citizen who decides to partake of the fallas tradition.
We are proud to undertake the FallasBot 2022 project, and we hope that it will continue to grow and accompany citizens for many more fallas.