First thoughts of my journo career

Shall take a hiatus from my Europe trip log since there's simply just too much to upload and blab about, and dedicate one entry to "life as an online journo" so far.

It's been about two months now and the experience so far has been rather eventful and challenging nonetheless.

In two months, I've learnt how to be the "duty person" (person who's in charge of breaking news and managing the homepage) from what I reckon is intensive training.

I've been on regular, night and morning shifts - morning shifts starting at 530am was quite an experience for such a late night person like me. All I can say is that it's quite a terrible shift.

I've been to a few events - I won't say I've gotten the hang of it because I haven't. And there's an event tomorrow which I'll have to play by ear because no information was given to me at all. This is really what I call "on-the-job training". Requires you to work your EQ more than anything else!

I've translated, re-written and written a number of stories. Initially, I found it quite baffling. I didn't know what was it that they wanted - fanciful, descriptive, straight-reporting, or...? Took me a few re-writes, write-ups and translations to get the hang of it but sometimes I still find myself quite challenged by the story in front of me.

Therefore, I now time myself. Yes. A strange way to gauge my progress but it allows me to understand the way I work better. Recently, I realise I don't take as long as I used to when it came to translating a Chinese story. I spend less time pondering on how to re-write and I've found it easier to write a story especially when the interview or event is fresh in your mind.

Of course, small errors and grammatical mistakes tend to occur when one is "speed-writing".

I have a few bylines now - ones which I always send to my dad to read so that he knows what's going on in Asia and how I'm doing at work. Plus he's such a current affairs person, so he loves to read anything that has got to do with news.

I watched the entire Mumbai and Bangkok incidents unfold concurrently and it was during that fateful week for so many people in India and Thailand, that I realised how grateful I am to be an amateur journo who's work is fully and purely online based. For if I were to be at the front line covering such stories, I would probably die from a wretched heart and a jaded soul.

Perhaps what affected me was that I interviewed a friend of my ex-boss who happened to land on the day the attacks began in Mumbai, and to actually know someone stuck there in such a tumultuous situation, really made me sit up and pay attention to the wires, ensuring the situation didn't worsen. And it did.

I've produced a few videos - a very time consuming task due to shortage of manpower on both ends and probably underlying politics.

I'm beginning to grow fond of my team mates - those smart, friendly, learned and helpful journos. They seem to be a bunch of nice and hardworking people, although initially I felt that the environment was quite cold and sterile. I soon learnt that they take quite a lot of time warming up to newcomers.

There's just so much to say about my new career path and I guess one sentence sums it up: I'm loving it despite the random odd hours, despite the lack of "Journalism 101" skills, and despite not possessing the basic training and foundation most of my Literature and Arts teammates have. I must admit I did feel a bit out of place when everyone assumed I was a local grad. Nevertheless, I think I can learn a lot from them, work related or not.

Everyday is a different work day for me and I'm glad to finally heave a sigh of relief and say, "I think I've found what I enjoy doing."