In 1998 my friend asked me to set up an IRC server for him. He needed it for his job and knew I had done it before so asked for a favor. An afternoon’s work. His boss was impressed, and offered me a job. My first IT job.
Hung around on that server to keep an eye on things until the customer could take over, then made friends so just made it my home server. Ended up meeting my wife on there a few months later. A year after that, I immigrated to the US. Used the experience gained from that job to get a career here. Still here 23 years later.