Dragon Post, Take 3

Three Dragon Posts down, 8 to go. Newspaper is getting a little easier. This week I wrote 5 stories. This sounds excessive, I know, but we used all of them. And all except one had at least one source I actually spoke to, so obviously I'm doing something right.

I have not handed in my literature review yet. One of the lecturers who was supposed to grade our dissertation proposals got really sick before he finished his share, so they pushed the deadline on the lit review back so that we can see our grades on our proposals before we finish the assignment. This is ok, I guess, but I'd rather be done with it and move on with my life. I'm still on the lookout for a case study of an NGO, perhaps even a feminist NGO. So if you run across one, please send it my way. Cheers. (They say cheers here sometimes when they mean thank you--not sure if there's a meaning difference.)

I have been working in the photo darkroom a bit. I spent almost 5 hours there on Sunday, and it was so relaxing. Didn't have to speak to anyone, didn't have to think about news, just had to think about how long each chemical needs to be exposed to a roll of film or how many seconds under the light will give me the best contrast for a print. So soothing.

Tomorrow I am going to Stratford-upon-Avon, the birthplace of Shakespeare. Sarah Lynn tells me the town's name is silly, but I didn't name it, ok? It was like that long before I was naming things. We have a free place to sleep, cuz we are traveling with our old flatmate from when we first arrived in Cardiff. Jolly good, as the English supposedly say. I have not yet heard one say it. But then most of my friends here aren't English, so there you go.

Ok, obviously I don't have a lot going on, other than school, which is probably not terribly interesting for anyone not in my program. So let's close with a photo of the Dragon Post staff. These are the people with whom I make a newspaper each week.



From left to right here we have Shamayita (India), Tiffany (Minnesota), Sunny (China), Abbas (Iraq), me, Winston (Ghana), Kayt (New Zealand), Karen--she's the one laughing--(Canada and Switzerland), Anisha (India), and Kelsey (China). Behind us, on the top row of the pages on the wall, is Dragon Post dated February 14.

10 weeks to go

Yesterday we created our first of 11 weekly newspapers for my International News Production module. (A module is what Americans might call a class.) Our paper is the top row in the photo. The bottom row is the pages of the other team--I'm not sure what happened with them, but they had some trouble getting their pages printed or something. We were officially supposed to have all of our pages posted on the wall by 5pm, but ours weren't up until probably 20 past, and at one point our lecturer (professor) gave a stern warning to the other team that they needed to start printing SOMETHING.

The day went ok. It was as exhausting and stressful as I had expected. My job was news editor, which means that I had to: ensure that everyone had something to write; ensure we had enough news to fill the paper; ensure we had enough of specific types of news to fill each page; keep track of who was writing each piece and when each piece would be done; review each article (or assign someone to do it) before passing it on to the chief sub, who would assign it to a sub who was laying out that page in InDesign. I also helped review some pages, wrote an article on the US election, and wrote up a short sports roundup when we had a hole on the sports page. Fortunately, next week I am editor, which means I oversee everyone and write a leader (like an editorial, but represents views of the whole team) for the paper. After that, I don't have to be in charge anymore. Someone else takes over.

It was a long day, and we have 10 more days like that. This semester is, so far, overwhelming and exhausting. I have a group presentation for another class next week, but at least it's not graded. A week from today I turn in my literature review, the first section of my dissertation. Working on that pretty much sums up my plans for this weekend.

One thing we're learning this semester is some journalistic skills, such as building a base of sources. It is not easy. The first thing to do is to have actual conversations with people everywhere I go. I'm pretty ok at saying hello and talking about the niceties, but I'm a little intimidated by asking more than that, especially when I'm so tired from all the schoolwork. But I'm trying.

A key part of journalism is talking to sources. Taking a bunch of facts from the AP and putting them in a story is not news. This may seem obvious. This week I wrote a short recap of the Super Tuesday primaries in the United States. For our newspaper, though, we need to give things like that a Welsh angle. So I went out in Cardiff to ask people what issues they thought Americans should be paying attention to. It was a hit-or-miss mission. The first two people I talked to were very helpful. Then I took a break and ate lunch, and afterward, I asked three different people and none of them were able to talk. To be fair, one woman was on her way to get her bellybutton pierced, so it's only logical that she didn't want to talk about a presidential election in another country.

Cheers to Friday and no newspaper stuff until Monday, unless I happen to bike past a terrible accident, which for a journalist is sort of good news.

Ta.