progress and more progress

This last week was a pretty good one in more ways than one. The weather was nice for the most part (until today when I woke up and noticed the crappiest of Oregon weather was awaiting my presence outside) and Jimmy and I made progress on our final project for NMC 301.

We got three interviews done this week, and like always, there are many ideas still flying around. I realize with only 2 weeks left, it may seem a little late in the game for new ideas. But in a project like this, people, believe me, it's never too late for new ideas. We interviewed Tiara Weiner who traveled abroad in Chile, Heather Thomson who is getting ready to go to Sweden in the fall and Destinee Dixon who studied Spanish in Spain a few months ago. These three girls were very honest, provided a lot of incite and were fun to interview.

Tiara, being my best friend, gave us answers I was expecting as I've heard all about her trip a thousand times.
Heather (in the picture from her facebook at left), however, seemed to shed new light because she is going to a country that none of our other interviewees have been. She seemed... vulnerable. I liked it. I liked that she is still brand new to the world of traveling, and that she has no idea what to expect. She made it very clear that the decision she made to go on this 3 month-long journey was very sporadic and not like her at all.. but she doesn't have very high expectations, which usually means it will turn out great for her!

Destinee was another story (pictured below left from her facebook page). First of all, this girl is one of the most pleasant and fun people I've ever come across. She was so open and helpful and willing to talk about her experiences. Jimmy and I knew before her interview that she had BAD experiences in Spain in the fall, but we didn't know the extent of it. She told us everything, but her sense of humor was incredible throughout the whole thing.
She spoke about being an African-American girl in Spain, and how the area she was in was known for it's unfriendly, racist, bigoted way of life. She did not feel welcome there. She told various stories about her racist and rude encounters, but still kept this beautiful bright smile on her face and even laughed about it all. It was something else. I really appreciated the fact that she trusted me with her stories, and she had never even met me before!

As far as the rest of the project goes, Jimmy and I have a couple more interviews to go this coming week. After that it's putting it all together in an aesthetically pleasing fashion, which I know will happen one way or another. I'm more excited than stressed about it, because more elements that can contribute to a BETTER story keep presenting themselves to us...

It's amazing what can happen when we have a camera and an open mind.

I'm trying to stay cool.

I'm about to hit one of the most cliche moments of my life, but... I believe when life hands you lemons, make lemonade!

That is what I am trying to do.

Reader Response for February 9th

Last Tuesday's class was a good one. My interest was held from beginning to end (partly because "end" was not at 10pm, but that's beside the point.)

If I remember correctly, Pam started the class talking about the new blogging and online journalism guidelines. I read the article she posted before class started and I had a bunch of questions/comments about it, meaning I was pretty skeptical.

So apparently the RTDNA (Radio Television Digital News Association- what a mouthful!) came up with an online supplement to the Code of Ethics, which is "the ethical standard that newsrooms have followed for decades" and now online journalists and bloggers who present "news" are expected to do the same thing.

Honestly, I think it's good. I think it's good that someone or a group of someones is finally deciding to limit what can be said by professionals in the news on the world wide web. It's good. My skepticism rooted, however, from the idea that nobody, this group or any other for that matter, can really carry these rules out and expect all online journalists to follow them for a few reasons.

First of all... who of the millions and millions of bloggers and web writers is considered a "professional journalist"? Who can make that distinction?

"What distinction?" you ask.

Well, the distinction between a recreational blogger (someone who blogs for fun, as an emotional release, to keep friends updated, etc.) and a "professional". These people at RTDNA obviously don't expect recreational writers to follow these guidelines- or "laws" if you will. So who decides what writers need to abide by these laws and which writers can go about business as usual (i.e. using curse words and distasteful pictures because in many cases those people are simply exercising their rights to freedom of speech.) Like a student in class mentioned, what are the consequences or punishments for a professional not following these rules? Obviously there are those that write for an online publication that would fire writers in a heartbeat if something of "bad taste" was posted, but there are also those who post news that don't answer to anyone like that. I'm just confused as to how these regulations will be carried out and followed.

The other important question in relation to the guidelines is age-old: "what is news?" But hey, if we could answer that we wouldn't encounter many of the journalism problems that exist today. It's a discussion that could last for days.

There's my two cents. I'm unsure what difference these guidelines will make in the world of blogging and online journalism, but I do believe they are a step in the right direction.

Some progress

Jimmy came over on Saturday morning to get some filming done. Finally.

We first took the time to set up some good lighting in the biggest room of my co-op house and then interviewed Selah Meyer, who happens to be my room mate, about her travelling experience and her connection to Haiti. I think the interview was very powerful and it will definitely be one of the grippers in our documentary.

After Selah, Jimmy and I sat down in front of the camera and just started chatting. It was fun! We talked a lot... because we are good talkers. We chatted about our own experiences abroad, though they differ greatly, and how they affected us. I think that the filmed chats between him and I will be the comic relief in our documentary. I'm pretty stoked about how much potential our video has.

Our first victim

Tiara Weiner

February 2, 2010

We met up with our first study abroad interviewee. Tiara Weiner, 20, is a sophomore at OSU with a major in Business and a minor in Spanish.

Joce: Where did you go, when and for how long?

Tiara: I went to Chillan, Chile for three months starting September 9th all the way through December 4th. While in South America, my group took trips to Peru and Argentina as well as traveled all over the country of Chile. I studied Spanish while I was there and went through the Oregon State study abroad program.

Joce: Where had you been outside of the United States before your trip to Chile?

Tiara: I had taken various trips for church missions that lasted only a few days to Tijuana, Mexico. I had also traveled to Greece for a two-week vacation and I had been to Victoria B.C.

Joce: So nothing for a long period of time?

Tiara: Nope, before Chile I had only been out of the country for two weeks at once.

Joce: When people ask you how you were effected by the trip, what do you tell them?

Tiara: The first thing that comes to mind is that my trip started a hunger for traveling more- as much as I can. It's like there's now a thirst for traveling that I will never quench. Experiencing a new culture was so refreshing and coming back to the states afterward seemed so dull. I just wanted to learn about other cultures and their ways of life. When I returned home, American culture seemed somewhat unoriginal to me because Chileans have so many traditions and they're so proud of who they are.

Joce: In what ways would you say you've grown on a personal and global level as a result of your travels?

Tiara: I matured culturally and learned to accept a culture for what it is instead of having pre-conceived notions of how things should be and how a life should be lived. On the global level, being there made me wish I didn't have the "American" shadow following me around to every country I visited. The world seems to have this idea of what Americans are, and I didn't like that part at all!

Groundhog Day

Yesterday was supposed to be a day of some interviewing and editing with Jimmy's camera. However, something of huge importance came up yesterday that prevented us from performing our tasks, so we moved those tasks to today and... lone and behold Jimmy comes down a with a bad case of food poisoning.

Needless to say I have no edited interviews to present tonight, but I do have our game plan.

Within our documentary as a whole, we are planning on using three different elements of media: interviews, statistics/facts and aesthetically pleasing factors such as pictures and quotes.

Interviews.

Interviews will be conducted in order to gain information about students and their travels, whether it's through personal experiences or an OSU study abroad program. Between Jimmy and I, we have the names of 14 students and three teachers who we plan to interview. These people have either studied or traveled abroad at some points in their lives, are currently abroad (we will contact them through email and skype) or are planning to travel in the near future. The point of these interviews is to obtain a fresh perspective on how being overseas can affect an individual in such a major way. We will be asking some very generic questions (i.e. where did you go, why there, etc.) along with some very personal questions (i.e. what kind of things did you realize about your life and home when you were away?) Through these questions and many more, we hope to eventually show that travelling allows people to feel apart of a global community, instead of solely a citizen of a city or states.

Statistics.

No claim is ever worth listening to unless it has facts to back it up. To bring some reality and facts to our documentary and to prove our claim further, we'll be doing our research. We'd like to include stats that show where people are going, reasons they are going there, why people aren't going at all, funding, etc. For example, according to Open Doors 2006, "the number of students studying abroad increased 8% in the year 2006... with a special increasing interest in destinations in Asia and South America."

Aesthetics

With this element of the documentary, we are adding "texture" and "depth" to an otherwise film-only project. We plan to get our hands on pictures taken during student travels and throw them into the show every once in a while because we feel that a picture can often show what words cannot. Pictures like this, for example, show fun and unity in ways that an interview simply can't: