Welcome to "The Other Blonde Reporter" version 2.0 - my public blog as I get set to do something a long time coming.
On June 6th, I'm going to Africa. I can't tell you how good it feels to finally be able to say that definitively. For those of you that maybe don't know me... I'll back up a little bit.
My name is Heather, I'm 26 and for the last 5 years I've worked as a news reporter for a few different tv stations. Right now I work for Global News in Calgary - a station that I'm a big, big fan of - - and not just because I work there ;). Every day I go to work and realize how little I know. I'm given an assignment or talk to an incredible person and my eyes open a little bit wider. Then, I scramble to do what I can to make your eyes open a little bit wider too.
Okay - so thats maybe overly romanticizing the gig - but its the goal.
So now its time for me to have my eyes opened in a part of the world that I've often heard described as hopeless.
When we talk about Africa on the news, we talk about violence and malnutrition. We talk about corrupt governments and brutal genocides. We talk about refugees and HIV/AIDS, crippling debt, insane inflation, lost boys and child soldiers.
In so many words it sounds like a backwards hell.
It makes me wonder, how can we relate to that? How can we as journalsts tell you as viewers what is happening in a way that doesn't seem like world away wall paper of the dark and depressing. How can we see that world as anything but hopeless?
I don't know.
But this is what I'm going to do. I'm going to Africa on June 6th for 2 months ... maybe (and quite possibly) longer. I'm going to work with the group Hands at Work. I'm going to bring a video camera and a microphone and I'm going to try and give a voice to people I meet so that I can find a way to relate our world with that world. I'm going to post pictures, videos up on my youtube channel (newsgirl7) and blog compulsively, as I always do.
What this will do... again, I don't know.
But it shall be interesting.
Thanks for joining me.
