Tey El-Rjula

Tey discovered why he was born shortly after ordering a pizza in 2015. It is a day that defined his existence and inspired him to take a mission on giving children the right to exist. He shares the label (invisible) with 290 million children and feels blessed to carry that title. Tey was an expat in the Netherlands with a 9-5 job until one day his life journey flipped upside down. He asked why this happened a million times, and the answer came in a pizza box. In his talk, Tey will share with the audience untold moments in his journey that lead him to discover his purpose, connecting the dots of the past and present to draw a future where Invisibles become invincible.

Fleeing Kuwait as a 5-year-old boy at the start of the Gulf War, Toufic “Tey” El-Rjula's birth certificate was destroyed. He had no identity, he became "Invisible." Years later, after experiencing the financial crash in Dubai in 2008, he moved to The Hague in The Netherlands, where he became a Blockchain Senior Analyst for wikistrat.com, as well as a Bitcoin miner. But, in 2014, Tey was forced to move into a refugee camp in The Netherlands, after his work permit was terminated. Living in the camp for two years, he came in touch with Syrian refugees who were unable to verify the authenticity of their documents or had lost important ones such as land titles or academic certificates while fleeing their homelands.