Creating an account

https://signup.oraclecloud.com/
use a private chrome or edge tab (signup is messy, Firefox is supported but buggy)
use any email (will just be used for login)
they don't accept prepaid cards
if in europe pick the germany/netherlands, if in US pick east coast (better connectivity to europe and rest of the world) - or if you're in asia / africa / australia pick that (not sure what's better then... :))
When the free account is setup, we need to switch to pay as you go but then just keep using the free resources.