Nadia Gilani

The most dangerous drug isn't meow meow. It isn't even alcohol...

2011-10-25T13:28:00.000Z

Who’d have thought it could be sitting stacked in piles at your local newsagent?

I’ve just read a piece (see link below) by columnist Charlie Brooker of Newswipe fame – written last year so yes old news that I missed, but its inspired me to say something.

In it he talks about his experience of drugs and alcohol, which as it turns out is not dissimilar to my own.
He says he’s a lightweight, talks about how smoking dope in his 20s got in the way of him getting things done. Absolutely, yes. I totally relate when he says ‘Marijuana detaches you from the world, like a big pause button’ and the rest.

The most interesting part however, is when he goes on to talk about what in his view is the worst drug you can possibly buy and ‘perhaps the biggest threat to the nation's mental wellbeing, yet it's freely available on every street – for pennies’.

Yes he means newspapers. And unlike all other mood altering substances – of this thing he is ‘afraid.’ The ‘meeja’ I think is blamed all too quickly for every ill we face in society. Yes it has its part but that is another story for a different time.

He makes interesting observations over the impact that news has on ‘users’ who ‘exhibit an initial rush of emotion (often euphoria or rage) followed by what they believe is a state of enhanced awareness’.
Heavy users he says, ‘exhibit impaired decision-making abilities becoming paranoid, agitated and quick to anger’. I enjoy how he makes it sound like the user has had one too many ciders.

I’m a Brooker fan (is anyone not?) and urge you to take a look at the article, but first – a key thing he fails to make (and maybe it's because he's on a different thread, but it was enough to result in me making it personal ) was that he leaves out the impact of newspapers – not on society in general but the effect it can have on the actual journalists on the frontline writing the stuff that goes into the ‘lethal’ newspaper.

Ok no-one care about journalists – we produce frothy bile or depressing front page after the next that you wished you didn’t want to read, but what else is there to do when there is someone shoving a wad of inky pages in your face when all you want to do is jump on the Tube?

Being a news reporter – on the ground I mean and not in an office, which I am happily doing now (I needed a break) - gets you into places you might not have access to and it can be great fun. It can at other times be an increasingly tiring experience.
I found myself walking into slices of people’s lives quite regularly when they were in the middle of a great trauma – I think this is something that is more common when working on a local paper.
Most people are usually impressed when they find out you are a journalist (one of the reasons I'd keep it private as long as possible), they think it's glamourous and exciting. It can be - exciting I mean. Covering the last election - the most fascinating to have taken place in my lifetime for example, was one of my highlights.
It's probably not glam unless you work somewhere like Conde Naste and get Diptique candles sent to you in the post without having requested them.

If you’re covering a lot of crime including fatal shootings and stabbings where all too frequently the victims are teenagers like I did for a long time, it really is like being on the frontline, ok I’m making it sound like we’re soldiers and we’re not.

But this line of work can after a while, catch up with you and fuck your head up a bit before you know it. It’s not surprising that a stiff drink is what one turns to – or if you can afford one you’d be sensible and pick a life coach or personal trainer instead.
It took me four years to realise that (the fact it can eff you up not the picking the alternatives stated).
Yes sometimes I found victims’ families felt it helped them to talk things out and for us to run a tribute piece but it’s not the same as trying to save a person’s life or catch the killer.

There is only so much one can do before you are onto the next story.
I had no problem with that for a long time but in the end found it overwhelmingly frustrating and cripplingly sad. This isn’t necessarily the case for everyone and it was a hard thing for me to admit that I might be buckling years in. I thought I was a hard nut to crack.
I’d protected myself by blocking out events I became exposed to that could risk me feeling pain. It worked. And can work for a long time. I kept this strategy going until earlier this year. But unlike the police and paramedics who are there to help, as a reporter you are not. You’re there to find out what happened and leave.

I knew something was wrong when Tommy Cox, Billy Cox’s dad died (see Dad’s Dying Wish to see Justice for Billy Cox post). Then within the space of a few weeks, a five-year-old got caught in a crossfire and was shot in the chest in a newsagent.

She survived ended up paralysed from the waist down, a 15-year-old got knifed to death in my local park one night and then when I was cycling into work one morning a friend sent me a text saying she’d heard gunshots on an estate that backed onto her garden the night before. On these stories and the rest before them, I just got on with my job and did what was necessary. But I think I did get to the point I literally didn’t think I could face the idea of talking to another grieving mother again. But I didn't have a choice. I cared enough to do it, but part of me didn't want to have to anymore, and when there isn't another job to go to you have to keep on - do as I say what is necessary.

Now I don’t have to. After a long time trying and getting nowhere I found something else to get on with.
I do think about those stories now - there've been so many. I hope that I did good by them, particularly the most recent ones when I felt pretty spent and wasn't at my best. I hope my reporting of the awful hollow facts they’ve had to live with one day at a time long after the story I tapped out left the news shelves sufficed.

I don’t know if Brooker has it right that newspapers are the worst drug, I just don’t know. Everything has its flip side. The things that we deem necessary can be equal to the things that cause us the greatest pain sometimes.

News is necessary. And if we can’t get a grip on ourselves to take stock of ‘society's unrelenting bullshit’ as the columnist calls it and I take it what he means is filling news papers – well, I don’t know what else to say. I think some compassion for the people putting the paper together - whatever you think of its contents however wouldn't go amiss.

Here's a link to Charlie Brooker's piece http://tinyurl.com/5u5n4jp (You'll have to paste it into your browser.
Yeah I stole his headline

Call yourself a journalist?

2011-10-13T18:29:00.004Z

OK, so the first thing you'll be wondering is why I'm never here and not writing anymore. There are lots of reasons and it doesn't really matter.

I long to of course. For a while I didn't have anything to say - that's probably just partly true because I suspect I had far too much to say and there is always so much to report on when you are chasing a story in terms of getting down what other people want to say - the reason I got myself involved in this business in the first place that there's not really any head space left to think about what you might say yourself.

But then along the way I went and got myself an opinion, or I already had one - something you're not supposed to have too much of as a reporter - or at least you keep it to yourself. If you're a columnist you can never have too much of an opinion, though I doubt that kind of work has a job description with it.

Truth is for the most part I have done - kept the opinions a secret, or at least off the written word. Although there are a couple of occasions - only a COUPLE I hasten to add, not a handful of occasions when under pressure I made my feelings known and got into a wee scrape.

Those caps above were not me shouting btw, it's probably my newfound fun of playing around with fonts, copy, text and pictures that I'm discovering we get away with in my current job, which I've only been on a couple of weeks so far so new learnings daily is what I'm on at the moment.

In terms of personal opinions though, with the barrage of info and opinionated stuff that comes out and adds itself to the over laden verbage pile and look at me, me, me that goes on all over the interweb - blame Twitter - I figured no one's going to want to hear what I've got to say anyway. What could be fresh?

Here we all are shouting from the bottom of our lungs for attention. We love it. I do too, why lie? But there is a balance to be struck.

The main reason I've not been on here isn't because I grew me some modesty. It's because I've been too perpetually knackered with my paid jobs over the years and been doing too many other things when I'm not working as usual to get on here.

You'll notice the years that I was most prolific were before I cracked the news industry. When I was a workie and then a trainee. Soon as I got the qualifications in my pocket I was running off doing the real thing. The blog wasn't for other people so it wasn't like I had to do it. Though I did miss it because it was me writing for me, something I started doing as a kid. Getting words and ideas out on the page because they were within me and would not be still.

A couple of people along the way said they liked reading it, which was all very pleasing and encouraging, but the main reason it was started was selfish and for my own entertainment. And it was a risk - making anything public always is. When you put your words out there in a written form there is always a big bit of that going on.

It's delicious though isn't it - the risk taking I mean.

And I'd like to come back. Not to make a point. I'm not amazing. I'm not columnist material. I do what I do. I put other people's words together and make them make sense for other people to read it - people like you. That's what I get paid to do.

It's a skill, yes, when you've got to pack it into 300 words or so and allow for pictures etc but it's not an art. It's not really writing. It's sort of putting words together - making them fit, telling a good story well, and a naff story even better than that. It's shoving and shaving words and putting it all together like fridge poetry. But unlike the refrigerator game they are all composed of fact.

At the moment feels like I'm talking to a brick wall. But I have ideas yes, bag fulls of them, and I intend to return here hopefully. Unsure when that will be currently but I still exist is the main point that should be made I suppose.

So that's it for the moment. Meantime I'm on Facebook for personal connection purposes, Linked In and sporadically and sometimes daily on Twitter (see I'm at it too of course) @nadiagilani

Over and out...

FACEBOOK

2011-05-11T19:16:00.005Z

I SPOKE with a Facebook bod for a story today.

Threw a few randoms in at the end - off the point, just a bit of chit, and she asked me if it was "off the record" before answering the questions.

"Of course I replied", and put my pen down.

But we all know there's no such real thing don't we? And if you don't - you should.

Especially when dealing with a politician and they know it too.

You can see it through their wry smile...their steely eyes unable to hide the thrill of seeing it in print. The thing is, I won't do it. Not unless it's life-threateningly in the public interest.

Them's the rules.

There are editor's that would though.

It's all part of the risky business of news that everyone hates and loves.

It's dirty, but people are compelled to read it, irresistibly grubby-ing their fingers in the process.

Welcome to the game.

Dad's Dying Wish to Get Justice for Billy Cox

2011-03-07T23:22:00.009Z

I MET Tommy Cox this time last week. Dad of schoolboy Billy Cox who was shot on Valentines Day 2007, Tommy has fought for four years to get his son’s killer behind bars but to no avail.  
Fifteen-year-old Billy Cox was shot in his Bedroom on the Fenwick Estate in Clapham. No-one has yet been charged with the killing, but Detective Sergeant, Russell Duke, the officer in charge of the investigation from Trident – Scotland Yard’s shootings team told me: “The suspect is known in the community – everyone knows who it is. 
“There are a handful of people who have got direct evidence and we need them to be willing to give a statement and appear in court. 
“There’s no other suspect.” 
I even know the suspect’s name. Tommy told me and DS Duke confirmed it to be correct. 
The investigation is at an apparent stalemate until those individuals who the suspect knows, according to DS Duke, have “a change of heart and mind.”
Backtrack a week, and I was invited round to the family home - now away from the estate, as Tommy wanted to make a final plea to those in the know, holding the crucial evidence that would help police charge and convict the killer to come forward.  
Tommy was terminally ill – diagnosed five weeks ago with melanoma, the most deadly form of skin cancer, and doctors told him he had six months to live.  
Sitting in the family living room adorned with pictures of his beloved Billy, Tommy told me of his anger, and determination to get justice for his son before he died.  We ran a double page spread in last Friday March 4 edition of the South London Press.
His sister Maureen sent me a text to say: “I can’t thank you enough.” I felt we were onto something.  
Fast forward to this morning and I had London Tonight on the phone who having read the story in Friday’s SLP wanted to feature the appeal on TV. I phoned Maureen, to let her know.  She told me Tommy had been rushed to St Thomas’ Hospital in London Bridge with a chest infection. 
I liked Tommy, we chatted well. There was profound pathos in his interaction, punctured with his drifts off into stoic humour in the time we shared together alongside Maureen and her husband, Reg in that room last week. 
Maureen and I agreed to check in later re: Tommy’s progress. Nine hours on – tonight - she called to tell me: “he’s gone.” 
I learnt years ago that getting emotionally involved with stories I was working on wasn’t a good idea. But this was different. I was gutted. I felt sad and angry. 
This was specifically different to any of the dozens of crime stories I’ve covered before. The fact that police are pretty certain they know whose done it, but can't act is beyond frustrating. 
The police know who is responsible but are powerless and reliant on reluctant members of the community who hold the key to justice, and haven't even been enticed by a £20,000 reward for information that could lead to a conviction. It doesn’t seem fair. I felt impassioned and moved to do whatever it took to convince the people concerned they should do the responsible thing – think less of themselves and of the family still grieving. It was worth the try.  But what would work? If the police can’t persuade them, who could? 
We discussed it at the office and decided I should immediately contact specific celebrities who might make an impression. Their agents said they’d come back to me. Meantime, Tommy has died – taken “the easy way out” he had told me, where his wife and daughter, Maureen and Reg would have to live on. 
One of the most profound moments during the evening I spent with Tommy was when he shared how his grief had remained unchanged four years on since Billy was shot.  
He said: “It finishes you.  
“It’s a horrible thing to happen, and you think about what he would’ve been doing now – maybe I could have been a grandad.  
“But then all of a sudden – bang – it comes to a halt and he’s not there anymore.  
“You can’t put it into words. He would have been 19 now.  
“I should have been booking his first holiday to Ibiza and giving him some pocket money for it.  "You’re not supposed to bury your kid.  
“You’re not meant to go to an undertaker’s. They’re meant to be doing it for you.”

The Food of Love

2011-02-13T08:47:00.005Z

I wrote this for issue three of the beautifully designed food and culture magazine, Eat Me, published last Autumn. I had such a laugh writing it, I wanted to share it, especially as it's timely with this year's V-Day encroaching. I take the view that pretty much everything has been written about before. The challenge then, is how to pretend it hasn't and make it fun.

FOOD is good, food is sex, food is pain. But it goes beyond popping your bird’s cherry, fondling melons at the supermarket or running your fingers down a ribbed cucumber. 
Great food is like great sex, the more you have, the more you want. They’re both primal habits, essential to survival and yet, can also be superfluous.  
The act of eating or fucking – making love, whatever - can be simultaneously full of passion, and a greedy place where hedonism rules in a Mae West "too much of a good thing can be wonderful" drift. 
They fire up all the senses at the same time, and you’re not going to want to stop either one of them half way until you’re done.
Take the excitement of cooking a meal with your lover, feeding each other as you go – who cares if you finish searing the sea bass?
We start out as oral beings from birth - biting, sucking, licking anything within reach, it figures that we’re left with a natural urge to nibble our lover’s neck, shoulder or ear the way we might on a bit of Montgomery’s cheddar in later life.
I always thought I liked sex like I like my food – fast, on demand and hot. Time and experience revealed the pleasures to be had from savoring things slowly on occasion – sexually and on the plate.
Think of biting into a mango - so ripe you can taste a foreign summer’s heat in it. As your canines sink into it’s thick flesh, nose buried deep, there’s juice leaking down your arm, and your tongue’s hanging out to catch the drips.
Or maybe a sharp olive, - its oval stone marble-hard to suck on after you’ve devoured it’s oily fruit. 
Sweet cherries, - plump, and bloody or a fat aubergine, firm, bouncy and warm. If you linger over the sensation long enough, it’s like cupping a…you know where this is headed.  
The sight of sushi – all those colours, rice cradling its filling, and bound by seaweed. Nyotaimori, is the practice of eating the mouthful-sized parcels off a naked body first enjoyed by the Yakuza – members of the Japanese mafia as the ultimate decadence after a criminal day, combining the two greatest pleasures in life.  
Then there’s the case for aphrodisiacs. 
Men and women have sought foods to increase their sexual appetites since time immemorial.  The term derives from Aphrodite – the Greek goddess of love.
In China it was believed that warm snakes blood – the more venomous the better, pepped up men’s stamina.  The Aztecs put their money on avocados containing magical powers of arousal and the Romans put their faith in garlic.  But as mythological as the Grecian deity, there’s little proof foods actually possess qualities to kick our carnal instincts into overdrive at all.
Nutritionist, Ian Marber, also known as The Food Doctor, says: “People say oysters are an aphrodisiac because they contain zinc, which is important for semen production. That’s true, but nothing works instantly. 
"But if you believe they do – strawberries for example, or asparagus for obvious reasons, then they become an aphrodisiac. 
“If you’re brought up in a culture where algae is an aphrodisiac then you would know, if you came home and your partner had prepared a meal with it what was coming next.”
Sounds as though opting for a healthy diet i.e. feeling great in your own skin, is the real key to satisfaction in the sack.
Though the sexual impact of seafood is not without some truth with the right company. One of the most sexually charged meals I’ve ever eaten was not with a lover, but one of my closest friends. We chanced to dine together at Café Espana in Soho’s Old Compton Street: Mussles in garlicky white wine is heady eroticism on a plate. We ate every juicy one, giggling throughout.  It was the closest we’ve got to having sex without even touching each other.
And that’s the thing – the mind being the most erogenous zone, it doesn’t always matter what your eating. It’s who you’re with, where you are, what you’re thinking.
New York City based Anthony Bourdain describes in his seminal book, Kitchen Confidential the moment he knew he wanted to be a chef. He saw the head chef of the kitchen where he was working as a washer upper giving a new bride bent obligingly over a 55gallon drum an impromptu send off while her groom and guests were being fed during the reception in another room. 
It’s evident environment is an irresistible part of giving food its sexy edge.
Crispy vinegared chips on a pebbled beach, mixed with deep breathfuls of salty sea air and a neck to nuzzle your head in is more than enough to provoke your urge to lean over and lick your partner’s salty lips isn’t it?.
Or stove-popped post-coital popcorn in bed after a sneaky middle-of-the night quickie.  
Which is better – eating before during or after? It’s all a matter of personal taste. Fiddle around with things, try them on for size, see what fits. The bedroom is your pantry and the kitchen your play-pen. Over to you.

When Will I Be Famous?

2011-02-12T15:19:00.003Z

I’VE been thinking about what it would take to become famous. Even just a little bit. In the current climes of celebrity obsession I reckon it might not take too much effort.
It’d probably do to take a giant crap outside an important building, or get arrested following a skinny dip in Trafalgar Square’s fountain’s, but then, neither of those is a particularly pleasant way of gaining notoriety.
I guess it looks like it might take having to actually go and do something important – make a difference of sorts and all that.
Or get elected, and get famous for being the lazy councillor who never listens or gets anything done.
But before that life of sloth, the getting elected in the first place part, would take arse-aching months of convincing people to vote for you. So another not so effortless route to infamy.
Trouble is I don’t actually want to get famous, I’m just curious about how you get it. The big worry is that once you’ve got it there’s probably no easy route back to anonymity.
But lets see. The first step I reckon is to start writing on here after being AWOL for more than a year for the most part.
Yes I know bloody bloggers – “ugly fucking people”, according to The Thick of It’s Malcolm Tucker.
I love his unashamed description: “Pale, bloated and flabby, they look like they’ve survived on a diet of KFC and biscuits in a cellar for the last 20 years. They haven’t of course. Nearly all of them are based in their fucking bedrooms. In their mum’s house. They like to think of themselves as ‘journalists’, in the same way those waddling cockstumps who wear a tabard saying Community Support Officer like to think of themselves as ‘the police.’
“A minister who crosses a blogger will wake up the following morning to find themselves at the centre of a shrill, un-spellchecked blizzard of misplaced apostrophes and very fucking poor grammar indeed.”
But hey, back to my fame experiment. Well, you’ve got to try everything once and see were it takes you, haven’t you?

Damilola Taylor's death ten years on

2010-11-27T09:28:00.004Z

TEN years ago the fatal stabbing of 10-year-old Damilola Taylor ripped through a South London community and shocked the nation in 2000.
A decade on and just months after a spate of shootings in the area I spent the earlier part of this week talking to residents, campaigners and Southwark’s top cop about how the neighbourhood has changed.
We did a double-page feature in yesterday’s South London Press.
Damilola Taylor was stabbed in the leg with a broken bottle and left to bleed to death in a stairwell on what was the North Peckham Estate on November 27, 2000.
His parents Gloria and Richard Taylor set up the Damilola Taylor Trust the following year to campaign against knife crime.
Since his wife’s death in 2008, Richard has continued to work in schools and we talk to him and highlight his work in the newspaper regularly.
It’s a poignant time, with the second Spirit of London Awards launched by the Trust last year to celebrate the achievements of young people across the capital held at Greenwich's indigO2 tonight on Damilola’s anniversary.
And on November 29, a short documentary called Damilola’s Friends shows how the killing affected his closest pals on BBC One. It's a moving piece.
I’ve been working in newspapers for four years and during that time written a lot on crime from various viewpoints - police, ex-offenders, victims and their families. It happens. We cover it. You get so used to it, you’re desensitised to it.

But when I visited what used to be the estate on Monday, it did send a heavy mix of emotions and deep compassion for those people still living fearfully on a daily basis in their homes through me. It was a cold and comfortless night and there was nothing I could do not even say “hey, it’s going to be OK.”
Since the schoolboy’s death a multimillion-pound regeneration of the area saw the North Peckham Estate razed to the ground. What I saw on my visit was street upon street of houses and low-rise blocks. It looked safer, like any number of residential streets.

A couple of people told me to "fuck off" from behind their netted curtains when I knocked on their doors. Fair do. They've had enough of being the subject of copy. I understand that need to want to be left alone. But I also have a job to do.

Lucy Cope who set up Mothers Against Guns after her son Damian was shot dead in Holborn in 2002 who lives in one of the new homes said pulling down the “concrete jungle” estate was the best thing the Labour Government did.

She said there were stairwells “everywhere” and you couldn’t get a “postman or milkman” to go near it because it was so scary.

She claimed to have seen crime go down "99 per cent" since the estate was demolished. It made sense to me, I never understood the unnatural idea of droves of people living on top of one another in gravelly grey prison-like blocks with tiny windows in a space devoid of trees. I'd say all housing estates should be torn down.

But some of the locals I spoke with were unconvinced Peckham was any safer now their homes were spread out in well-lit streets and many of them have installed CCTV over their front doors.
One 20-year-old spoke of bike thefts and of being beaten up nearby in what he described as an unprovoked attack.

Southwark’s Borough Commander, Chief Superintendent, Wayne Chance said the biggest change in the area was an improved relationship between the community and police, which has to be a good thing.

The most powerful moment for me while doing the feature was sitting on the edge of Ms Cope’s sofa in her living room watching her face, her gaze drift off with every puff of her fast burning-out cigarette as she described Richard’s visit to the scene of his son’s death.

She said: “I remember when Damilola died. I remember Richard arriving at the scene, recoiling against the stairwell and that cry of despair.
“I know that cry. I had the same cry when Damian died. A parent should not have to bury their child.
“Your body isn’t built for it.”

Brixton Prison Radio

2009-05-28T21:38:00.007Z

I POPPED into Brixton today to meet the Governor, Paul McDowell and his deputy governor, Amy Rees.

I've always wanted to get into a prison, and having passed it on the bus to work over the last six months, I finally made it.

The prison was splashed all over the papers earlier this month and I did a feature for SLP after the in-house radio station - Electric Radio Brixton won four Sony Radio Awards against the likes of the BBC, which was pretty impressive.

The station is run by inmates who have to do six-weeks of media training run by the Prison Radio Association before they can get into the studio.

Brixton is a bit different as it's a remand prison and turnover is high as inmates are awaiting trial and move on after being sentenced.

I was struck by how open and honest Paul and Amy were, and happy to talk about whatever I raised, which was surprising and refreshing in a situation of such tight security.

It took a while to get in - there are locks on every door and no two doors can be open at the same time, and it's a pretty compact place with around 800 prisoners and 400 odd staff.

I didn't get a tour of the place this time but as we talked about stories I could cover in future, Paul, who himself sets aside one hour a month for governor's questions came up with the idea of me going in and being interviewed about working as a journalist.

I was speechless and jumped at the chance to write a feature about the experience.

I suspect it might take a while getting used to being asked the questions, but hey it'll be interesting.

And the pay off is that next time I've been promised a tour.

Joanna Lumley goes Down

2009-05-27T21:26:00.003Z

THINGS were looking Ab Fab in Stockwell not too long ago when actress Joanna Lumley was spotted looking elegant in an understated long black coat and laden with a giant bouquet of posies (not gurkhas). On her way to visit someone it would seem. But it is hard to say whether she made it at all, judging by the number of times she was stopped along Clapham Road for her autograph.

OK So Where Have I Been?

2009-05-25T06:49:00.009Z

EVERYWHERE but here it feels.

In the middle of a murder scene, talking to kids about their views on the ever controversial police tactic of stop and search, chatting up people in the street for a vox pop, racing to a yoga class, leaning as far over a police cordon as is possible without crossing it in order to squint for a quote off a tribute note.

Walking around on patch sniffing around for a lead, holding a candle at a vigil commemorating the Brixton bomb, grabbing a coffee, chasing MPs, not chasing MPs, meeting Boris more oft than anyone else for some inexplicable reason and happily causing a fuss with him over the East London Line on Platform 2 at Clapham Junction train station.

Writing about jobless estate agents who set up a pest control business and spending time summing my daily life in a nib on exhibitionist networking space, Facebook of course.

Riveting you say. Well, yes. And there's more to come. Watch this space. Now, how do I upload pictures using my shiny new mac?

South London Press

2008-12-07T22:28:00.004Z

I was at a leaving drinks on Wednesday with my colleagues and although it was a lively and enjoyable affair, the surreal thing about it was that it was for me.
I start at the South London Press on Monday December 8. Theres a faint sadness to be leaving Enfield underneath all of the anticipation for what’s to come, but for the same reason that I’ve watched outstanding former colleagues move on, it’s time for a change.
I’ve been in Enfield for 20 months and was reaching my natural leaping time. I’ll always remember it because it’s a good patch on which I learnt so much about being a good journalist.
It’s where I started out, the place I did the first of many death knocks, the area I came across teenagers wearing stab proof vests and where I grafted the bare essentials of what it takes to perform in the trade.
There’s a lot that goes down in South London, and the Press is going to be an exciting challenge. For a start, it comes out twice a week and covers Lewisham, Southwark, Wandsworth and Lambeth, which is the area I’m assigned to.
I don’t suspect there's such a thing as a quiet day down there, which is why it sounded like an opportunity not to be missed and I grabbed it.

Comment not so free

2008-10-03T07:08:00.002Z

CENSORSHIP is such a spineless and pointless idea.
The futile thing about trying to ban something is that the persons being gagged are likely to find another way to express themselves and get their "offensive" material out some other way anyway so the censors may as well not bother in the first place.
Aside from raging against a universal human right, censorship reeks of supremacy and panders to creation of a nanny-state, where everyone walks around with blinkers on without an opinion, unable to deal with a bit of confrontation or whiff of a thought provoking idea.
Journalism is about pushing boundaries, and yet, in some parts of the world the idea of this terrifies those in power so much, you are more likely to be killed if you are a journalist than an endangered animal. It's worth mentioning that the internet is censored in North Korea, so
perhaps we should count ourselves lucky for our freedoms in this country.
But free access to Google doesn't ignore the fact that censorship that results in dumbing down a public that's perceived as incapable of making their own decisions does exist this side of the Atlantic.
Banning something that "might" provoke outrage is clearly used by those in power as a way to avoid dealing with issues that are being raised. It's being in denial, and it's patronising, to think yourself qualified to decide what information the public can and can't have access too. Did I mention it's arrogant?
It's unlikely that we'll ever have a world where free expression never leads to offence on occasion. But that's no reason to snuff it out and render it altogether invisible.
Turn the television off if you don't like what your seeing, hurl your book aside if you don't like what you're reading. Problems are not solved by banning words. Everyone knows that supressing something so as not to rock the boat doesn't work, and the boat rocks anyway so you may as well set it free and deal with it.

Keep Quiet

2008-10-03T07:00:00.003Z

LAST week I innocently wrote a bit along the lines of the below for my blog entry on our website, http://www.enfield-today.co.uk/.
By the afternoon the following day, the offending material was scrapped as,"unacceptable", by the publisher and ripped from the web page.
I'll admit I was pushing the boat out a bit, I guess I subconsciously wanted to see how far it would sail before it was noticed.
I'm greatful that none of my colleagues on the editorial side of things thought my comments were aggressive and supported my small moment of anarchy.
So, this week I felt it apt to scribble something on censorship. See above.

Silly Season

2008-09-25T20:48:00.006Z

THE newsroom is cloaked with a faint heaviness and everyone is feeling weary.

Having survived the not-too-silly-season that was August and after gearing up for an Autumn of hard news, an event we were unprepared for has frozen us in our pace.

We were told at the end of last week that the 137-year-young Enfield Gazette is going to be axed, leaving most of us reeling with shock and disbelief. That, and the fact that one of us is going to lose our job within a month.

There was no warning sign prior to our publisher's announcement but having sat through the ten or fifteen minutes it took her to deliver the news a swathe of nausea swept through the office and all of us had to get outside for some air.

The tragedy of this circumstance is that not only is the decision resulting in the death of a newspaper but one of us is going to be stuck without a means to live.

We are of course fighting the decision, and today went public with it, trying to get as many contacts, politicians and community groups as possible to write to the owner, Sir Ray Tindle in a bid to save it, and save us.

But at the moment I'm feeling pretty numb about the whole thing. And angry that it's all happening too fast.

The Sun - We Love It

2008-09-12T19:47:00.003Z

AS with most newspaper offices, we have the nationals delivered daily.This means we’ve all read - or at least have looked at almost everything that’s going on around about the time some of our readers are reaching for their cornflakes.
We’re allocated a different paper each month, which I imagine is intended to keep our brains ticking over nicely since we’re not stuck with the same reading matter for two long. Last month I was mulling over the cerebral prose of the Telegraph, which can be a toughie. Not least because of its shape and size. There’s a part of me that enjoys it’s defiant shape - it’s the only paper that’s not buckled under the pressure to re-size.

But it’s a challenge to manage when your desk is already littered with paper. There have been times it’s just been easier to plonk myself on the floor and read it there. Most of us don’t tend to stick to the sole title assigned to us anyway, with loyalties lying elsewhere. If you return to your desk and find your paper’s gone, chances are you’ll know who’s nabbed it. There's a reporter on our sister paper the Barnet Press who has a thing for The Guardian’s G2 - as do I.
A fellow Enfieldian who sits next to me is known for snatching The Sun come lunchtime.

It seems a sandwich doesn’t taste the same without the tabloid punch of a red-top. Now that The Sun’s mine for a month I’m becoming convinced.

And of course, being a London rag as we are, everyone wants the Standard.

Usually all at the same time.

Big Brothel

2008-09-06T08:52:00.005Z

A REPORT on London’s brothels that I’ve been waiting for was published this week.
The Poppy Project's Big Brothel survey of the off-street sex industry in London punches alarming insight into not only the sheer volume of what's going on in my patch, but also the culture of workings within it.
All of the covert research was gained by investigating sex-services advertised in the back-end of local newspapers. And the Enfield Gazette was one of the papers listed.
Almost everyone is our newsroom doesn’t want those ads in our paper. And yet, advertising bosses don’t look like they’re anywhere near axing them.
The highest number of brothels was found in Westminster with 71. There were 54 in Enfield. Only 8 were found in Southwark, which has admirably banned classified ads offering commercial sex.
To give a flavour of the bleak reality of what's on the menu in the capital's brothels, you can get full sex for £15.
The average age of a woman available for purchase is 21. Most pricey is anal sex in Enfield, which averages between £80 to £200. Kissing, something we thought was off limits is £20. Kissing, oral or anal without a condom can be got for an extra tenner.
The sad fact is that much of the rest of the report's detail won't make the story.
My job is to report the news, keep the facts simple and fill a tiny space on a page, leaving it up to readers interested in the between-the-lines stuff to dig out a copy of the 60-odd-page report for themselves.
The Poppy Project, which exists to help trafficked into the UK for prostitution, doesn’t believe that prostitution should be tolerated, i.e. regulated, a view that is becoming an increasingly popular solution to a growing exploitative industry.
Male prostitutes and both male and female customers aside for a moment, the simple fact is that there is no other way in which, gender inequality is supported more starkly than in the case of prostitution. Here, men and women are constructed fundamentally as, buyer and bought, highly sexed and sexual object, hunter and prey, master and slave.
There are arguments told that prostitution is a choice. Common myths spout that “men need sex”, “prostitutes enjoy sex”, and a most abhorrent view that “prostitution prevents rape.”
Napoleon claimed in 1827 that prostitutes were a necessity because without them, men would attack respectable women on the streets.
And despite this idea that men are seen as innocent victims of their biological sexual desires being sheer bollocks, it is a view still held.
Women are shrouded with shame, seen as dirty and worthless – and we may as well be honest here –meat.
Yes, it doesn’t sound so good put like that does it? But the truth isn’t always.
It’s not clear what will happen in light of the research, which while challenges the situation, doesn’t look likely to spell the end of it.

Coming of Age

2008-08-28T20:04:00.003Z

YOUTHFULL good looks will only get you so far in life, believe me I know. Well, perhaps less of the "good", but I expect I do face discrimination for my looksmore often than I rightfully should.I get ID'd all of the time – for alcohol.

A non-exhaustive survey has found that it's most usually in supermarkets. I've got a handful of different ways that I try to avoid it. Most of the time I mind my own business and pray. Sometimes I feign tiredness, looking like an exhausted office-worker in want of a quiet night in. Other times I'll offer a scrap of conversation, and ask the shop assistant how they are doing. It doesn't always work.

My latest worst-case-senario was in a mini-Tesco near Liverpool Street Station on a Sunday afternoon, I was at the pointless invention that is the self-service till, which broke down half-way through bleating "approval needed". A woman came to assist but then asked if I had any ID when she saw the giant bottle of Grey Goose vodka in my grip. "Oh no please don't ID me today" I pleaded, "It's for a present". I got out my press card and various other miscellany to prove my case. None of it passed. I left seething and devoid of a gift for my friend.I couldn't understand it then and I still cannot fathom it now.

Some shop assistants clearly don't have any sense of culture. My basket contained a loaf of the store's "finest" bread, The Observer, an over-priced organic rocket and watercress salad and one of the top-of-the-range vodkas you can buy. Hardly a cocktail for causing anti-social behaviour in a dodgy park corner.

Most people close to me know that I absolutely loathe supermarkets, but the red wine selection (my most frequent beverage of choice) is oft available in ample supply with a fair selection to choose from. And of course the superstores are open late, so it looks like I'm resigned.Enter: ID cards. Shrouded in controversy of course. But I realise I may have to apply for one of some description if my life is to continue with a certain semblance of dignity.

Hello Again

2008-07-23T21:56:00.003Z

OK, so the first thing you’re probably wondering is why I’m here after an absence for so long.
Would be future editors might not be impressed by a reporter who sets up a blog then rarely shows up. I can only say that it’s because there are times when you’re brain’s fried to a crisp and you feel you’ve written so much that there are no more words left in you that the thought of going home to yet more time facing a laptop can leave you paralysed in fear.
I’ll add that if you trawl back to previous postings at the time I set this thing up before my news training. Then, during and after it I was on here daily, several times a day on occasion, I couldn’t keep away.
Funnily enough, the reason for my return has probably been prompted because our editor has informed us he wants a weekly blog entry from each of us after out new website goes live. When? Soon.
With no word limit or censorship over subject matter he’s given us free rein to say what we want. The deal is that we just ensure we do it.
Everyone’s being a bit resistant so far. Not due to apathy or lethargy but I expect because we’re more rehearsed at writing about other people’s opinions rather than our own.
Still, needs must. I’ve no clue as to what my first entry should be about. I’m torn between doing a bit of a behind-the-scenes of what goes down in our newsroom or a read-between-the-lines stuff that doesn’t make it into the paper of some of my stories. Having spoken to other reporters and undergone work experience up and down the country in different newsrooms none of them is the same.
All of them have been unconventional and entertaining.
Equally, some of places and conversations that stories often take us are worthy of a write up in themselves.
So I guess watch this space.

Work Wear

2008-04-08T06:46:00.003Z

THE dilemma when it comes to dressing for work is how to keep your fashion credentials and still dress appropriately.
If you’re a goth in your spare time, you’ll clearly have to leave yourdarker side at home. So what do you wear instead? It all depends on your office’s etiquette. The dress-code expected of a PA at a law firm will clearly differ from that required of an employee at a call centre that could frankly do the job in bedraggled bedwear. Women around a boardroom table might choose to dress in clothes akin to their male colleagues in a bid to assert who’s really wearing the trousers.But such a severe look isn’t necessary. Style Council holds fast to the truth that it is possible to revel in the joys of looking feminine and still be taken seriously.
So some useful pointers to note: if your workspace isn’t all about tailored suits and allows room for play, invest in a selection of separates - trousers, skirts tops and sweaters, means you can just reach for one of each and compose outfits daily without panic.
You can’t go wrong with crisp blouses or shirts. White is a good staple. But if that leaves you feeling flat, then play with stripes, different sleeve lengths, bold colours and prints.
On the point of skin and whether to bear or not, less is more. A suggestion of decolletage, or knee is preferable to a plunging neckline or balcony-bra’ed cleavage.
And if all else fails, on days you’re devoid of inspiraton, there’s always the fashion police’s choice du jour of black.
But remember to accessorise. Jewellery, a belt, scarf or jazzy handbag adds character and will stop you from looking like mime-artist Marcel Marceau.
And whatever you wear, a great manicure will render you impeccable.

Agyness Deyn

2008-04-07T06:45:00.005Z

OUR resident fashionista took leave for New York so I had the job of filling in her Style Council column this week. The task was to scribe some advice on what to wear to work and rant over model Agyness Deyn.

The rant follows below:

SUPERMODEL Agyness Deyn has become fashion’s hottest twiglet on the catwalk and SC is getting pretty bored of the whole thing. She’s been fetishised on the fashion pages of every international style bible as an irrestible rags to riches maverick woman that’s swopped working in a Lancashire chip shop serving up chip butties and saveloys for the restof life in lieu of a career stomping catwalks of the world.

Granted, the fact that her determinedly tomboyish-looks have generated so much hype in an industry obsessed with an homogenous code on what it means to be feminine and sexy is to be commended.

But you can’t open a magazine without being greeted with that gangly frame, unkempt ragamuffin platinum crop and eighties day-glo clobber she cobbles together in a seemingly thrown-together fashion that’s become her signature style.

She’s the face of this, the body of that and meant to embody the spirit of pretty much everything else.

SC senses a situation of over-kill coming on.

The good news is that fashion is fickle so let’s hope that this is a trend isn’t one that lasts.

Postscript: Having said all of that, I've purposely chosen one of the hottest shots of her foraged off the web for the purposes of this blog. Hey, if you're going to add to the over-kill, you may as well enjoy it. So do.

Newsprint

2008-04-03T07:56:00.005Z

I google-image searched the word newsprint.
And what have we here?
Is this an advert? Advertising what?
The fact that it’s sexy to read the papers?
Is it ironic?
A scantily clad woman just happens to be catching up on what’s going on in the world, while wearing stuff that makes you want to rip it off her and read too (while she gets back down on her hands and knees in servitude and tends to your pleasures).
Or is it another fine example of a woman’s body being fetishied as a commodity for the voyeuristic consumer?
I don’t like it.

And defy anyone that says their looking at her face.

Court Notes Confiscated - CORRECTIONS

2008-02-16T10:59:00.006Z

REPORTS of my journalistic rights being trodden on below have been published in this week's Press Gazette after Johnathan Lovett, our arts don at the paper and NUJ rep suggested I tell them.

Holdthefrontpage.co.uk soon got word and were able to give the story more space, including a quote from my editor, Gary.
To say that Gary is livid would be an understatement. He hates any kind of authority overstepping the mark and rightly so.
But I did put up a fight.
I'm not a mouse and never let officials off lightly in interviews.
But it can be intimidating in a court room and my disappointing mistake was complying in the end on this occasion.
Now I'm angrier than I was before in my resolve to fight for press freedom and won't be letting anything like this get in my way again.

For the record the only true account of what really happened lies herein my blog. I did not hand the usher my notebook - but tore out a single sheet. The court has not appologised to either me or Gary directly. And I was not talking to other reporters as the court is quoted as claiming elsewhere. I was the only reporter in courtroom Four of Wood Green Crown Court that day.
The people talking were from the Department for Work and Pensions - one of whom was told to leave for trying to record the proceedings in a benefit fraud case - something all adept reporters know is in contempt of court and thus highly illegal.

I always find it amusing when I'm faced with health bosses, council chiefs or police, who are always armed with an entourage and so careful about eveything they say when sat across the table.
But it baffles me is why courts faff around so much in the presence of reporters.
If we publish something that's not meant to be made public, we're the ones that are going to get in trouble - not them, so it's utterly incomprehensible.

There are jobs that are respected and admired - and then there's journalism.
I've always enjoyed that sense of risk and mischief that our trade exudes.
Being a journalist is a thankless task that's never really bothered me. We are not ones who are ever going to have rose petals strewn in out paths and we don't expect to.
It's just ironic that no-one would have a clue what was going on in the world were it not for what we do.

Law out of Order

2008-02-13T22:03:00.004Z

LAST week at court my notes got taken from me.
I was at Wood Green Crown court to report on a case that had a section 39 of the Children and Young Person’s Act reporting restriction on it.
When you see things like “who cannot be named for legal reasons” or “a 17-year-old has been charged” instead of an actual name, in a story you can be sure that there is an S.39 hovering nearby.
Simply put, it’s there to protect the identity of a young person mentioned in a case.
But it’s not infallible. Last year, I successfully challenged an S.39 after asking the court to lift the ban based on a matter of public interest as it was a high-profile case - covered in the nationals and the defendant had killed someone.

Back to date, I was three quarters down my first page of notes and a bespectacled usher who looked like a dodgy librarian appeared.
She said that I wasn’t allowed to take any notes due to the reporting restriction and could I tear the page out please.
And what precisely do you want me to do with it? I wanted to ask.
She even had the audacity to ask me if I knew what an S. 39 was.
I understand that courts don’t tend to like journalists but she was wrong so I told her that.
I was well within my rights to report on the case - as long as I didn’t breach the S.39 order.
She confiscated the page, plonked herself on a bench nearby and copied out my shorthand while I looked on agog.
I was stupefied, feeling both furious and paralysed with panic, uncertain of what to do.
She passed a note to the clerk. I quickly scrawled one of my own.
As I approached the clerk, he handed me a note back that read: “take notes but no publicity”.
He was wrong too. Publicity is exactly what I was there for.
No time to argue I raced back to my seat and got back to doing my job.
But not before unfolding the piece of paper that the clerk had written his note to me on the back of.
It said: “I’ve taken the notes said if you agreed she can have them back. She is a reporter and reckons she knows what a sec 39 is so I still took them and said she can ask you for them back.”
Upon release, I phoned the news desk and got it off my chest.
We ranted about the bane of our lives having to face court staff that know less about legal workings than we do.
It’s like having to tell one of Jesus’ Wise Men that the son of God’s mother was a virgin.
Next time I’m taking my copy of Mcnae’s Essential Law for Journalists to wave in the air if that same usher or otherwise tries to stop me from doing what reporters were put on this earth to do.

Moving On Up

2008-01-23T07:40:00.001Z

WE move out of our office on Friday. Ok, so it’s only to the fourth floor – we’re currently on the first.
Its been dark in there these days so we’re all looking forward to the promise of loftier sights above.
But it’s all a bit surreal at our place at the moment - somehow sparse and dishevelled at the same time.
Bits of desk have already been stolen from us and carted off to Basildon for reasons unexplained.
And thankfully, most of our recycling has been dumped, after we all got on our hands and knees a couple of weeks ago and filled sacks with yellowing council documents and the like.
The de-junk part is starting to feel a bit cathartic.
But our desks are in disarray.
I can’t see our editor, Gary anymore from where he sits a row behind me, for all the papers and stacks of crates srouding me into my corner.
And my desk, has managed to take on an even heavier cloak of chaos than is cope-able with.
But Gary’s hanging onto his nerves and chugging out his four titles for deadline with admirable fervour, and we’re following suit.
We’ve been banished from the office on Friday morning so that he can direct the removal men with us “crazy cats” as he calls us out of the way.

Daylight Street Stab Death in Edmonton

2008-01-22T22:25:00.000Z

A SECOND teenager was stabbed to death in Edmonton yesterday – in broad daylight this time.
And kebab-loving, I’m-scared-of-the-dark, home secretary Jacqi Smith wants schools to install metal detectors in schools to stop youths carrying knives (see the nationals for more).
I’ve no idea what the answer is to put an end to all of this youth-on-youth crime.
Enfield police told me in an interview that knife crime is going down, and the figures show this to be true.
But they also admitted that Edmonton is a hot-spot problem area.
It’s time to stop sticking to stats and look at the underlying issues.
No one’s asking why a growing trend for teenage violence is sweeping across London at such a rapid rate.
Since most knife attacks happen outside of school, it makes more sense for the focus to be on the streets. And for energies to be spent on investigating what’s making youths want to carry a knife in the first place.
Rather than simply prosecuting them when they do.

Knifed in the New Year

2008-01-02T22:13:00.001Z

LONDON’S first stabbing of the year took place on our patch – in Edmonton, Enfield.
I say first because regrettably if last years number of 27 teenagers killed in violent attacks is anything to go by, there will be more.
In 2007, eight victims were shot, one was beaten to death and most of the rest were stabbed.
Last week, I reported on a stabbing (not fatal) that happened on a bus on an afternoon just three days before Christmas.
Today, I dashed down to the crime scene on the way to the office to get the news on the latest incident, spoke to residents, got the quotes and filed for tomorrows Gazette.
Henry Bolombi, was on a night bus, returning home with a bunch of nine friends from a new year party. He was 18.
The group was chased by a gang of youths after stepping off the bus before the murder at about 6:30am.
This is London in the 21st century.
It’s shocking and not so shocking at the same time.
As much as London is a paranoid city wedged within a neurotic country harbouring a society under constant surveillance courtesy of CCTV cameras, we’re are in turn a society sick with an infectious virus – the desire to kill by violence.
The reason behind what drives such attacks – many of them carried out by criminals that are getting younger and younger is incomprehensible.
As journalists we must get on with the job of reporting the facts.
I won’t doubt that it’s not exciting running around in the middle of live events that turn into breaking hard news.
But it’s not true that doing it day in day out toughens our skins beyond feeling.
On my own way home tonight, I started thinking about our editor Gary O’Keeffe who’s cousin, Stuart was murdered two years ago.
It’s horrid, heartbreaking.
Here’s a link to him talking about it on his blog on Stuart’s anniversary last month:
http://blog.enfieldadvertiser.co.uk/archives/2007/12/a_life_lost_ove.html

Festive Cheer

2007-12-28T07:27:00.001Z

CHRISTMAS wouldn’t be the same at a newspaper without tighter-than-tight deadlines. The week before the main event we were writing for three papers instead of the usual two before the week was out. All the while planning for the fourth.
I’m sure it’s the same everywhere, but you notice as a reader that dailies come out as they always do, only they look leaner and so are faster to get through.
But the news journalists can’t really write in advance so their deadlines are still daily – albeit earlier on in the day.
For those of us on weeklies we have to ensure that we get our dates in the right order so that we’re clear about when things are happening. This isn’t always easy when you’re writing for several papers at the same time that come out on different days, about stuff before it happened, when the readers will see the paper after it has. Confused? There were moments we were too.
But it was all quite funny really.
The layout-plans for the final paper that we are to produce during this writing-with-no-sense-of real-time situation, will come out today at midday for us to fill.
And I'm just starting to get the hang of this time-warp just when it's all over.
But hey -good practice for the same again next year I guess.
Happy Winterville and a merry new year!

Benazir Bhutto Assassinated

2007-12-27T21:41:00.000Z

BENAZIR Bhutto was killed today. Assassinated.

A bomb exploded next to the vehicle she was in during a rally in Rawalpindi in a gun and suicide bomb attack.
There’ve been several attempts on the Pakistan opposition leader's life before, which is why she's been living in exhile and only returned to her home-country in October.

She's renowned for wearing a bullet-proof vest in public.
Well, somebody got her in the end.
For her supporters it will be a sad loss - some of whom might seek revenge.
For those that hate her, it will be an utter triumph.

I’d say it must be pretty sad to know that there are a hefty number in the latter camp, which leads to you having to wear a protective armour in the first place.
But there you go.
It was breaking hard stuff that flashed onto our computer screens in the newsroom today and stopped me still - only for a brief moment though.
Then I rushed to put the television on.
We all looked on in silence and intrigue.

Before postponing our interest for a couple of hours in order to do our own stories.

Pakistan was a country already in political crisis.

Now things are likely to flare up even more.
Ongoing reports will continue anon no doubt.

It'll be on all the fronts tomorrow.

And I am poised to see what unfolds.

Tis the season to feel heavy

2007-12-27T21:11:00.000Z

POST Crimbo and there are many people who may be feeling worse for wear having succumbed a notch too far during the season of indulging in too much of everything, leaving them sitting around feeling like sackfuls of cement, unable to move.
Not so for the four of us covering the office over the holiday period.
Things have been quiet back at the ranch.
A woman from the advertising department said: “It’s like a morgue”, and groaned.
I quite like it.
There’s a ghostly feel in the air, with a mischievous tinge to it – as though we shouldn’t be there. Then the phone rings and it’s obvious why we are.
It’s like feeling a fluttering breeze after the frenzied storm we swept through last week.
A time to wind down, reflect on a messy desk and find those scoops to fire off come the new year.

Quotes of the year - 2007

2007-12-17T23:16:00.000Z

A FEW, as foraged from today's Guardian:

The fear of missing out means today's media, more than ever before, hunts in a pack. In these modes it is like a feral beast, just tearing people and reputations to bits.

(Former Prime Minister) Tony Blair

Newspapers have a good future. A laptop runs out of battery and you can't tuck it under your arm.

Google co-founder Larry Page

I have never acted on a press release or gone out to dinner with a PR. I think PR is a ridiculous job. They are the headlice of civilisation.

Journalist and food writer AA Gill

You have all let me down. You are a disgrace.

The Sun editor, Rebekah Wade emails her staff after the Daily Mirror got a Pete Doherty scoop

The only people who wear ties daily are male politicians and reporters and dodgy estate agents.

BBC journalist Jeremy Paxman

I've had worse press than a paedophile or a murderer, and I've done nothing but charity for 20 years.

Heather Mills McCartney on GMTV

Piers Morgan

2007-10-17T21:14:00.000Z

I WROTE to Piers Morgan.
And wonderful news - his PA wrote back.
After I’d read both of his autobiographical books, The Insider and Don’t You Know Who I Am? - I had too.
As a trainee reporter you have to admire the man – for his tenacity, drive and skill at what he does – not forgetting an all important ability to entertain and keep people interested.
In my letter, I suggested an idea.
The fact that what I would really find interesting to read now would be a book about his experiences of starting out in journalism on a local paper i.e.doing what I am doing now.
I want to read about his first death knock, his fears and excitement on the job, and all the challenges he faced and how he progressed from there.
Ms Chapman said that Piers Morgan thanked me for the comments about his books, which were "very much appreciated". And "Good luck with your reporting at Enfield Advertiser and Gazette".
I’m hopeful he will consider the idea in future. Watch this space.
Here is a man that edited the News of the World aged 28.
And was eventually sacked from his high-profile job spear-heading the Daily Mirror over publication of some photographs of British soldiers torturing Iraqi’s, which were later found to be fakes.
I’ve met a lot of people who feel animosity towards him over that scandal and his connection with a froth-spinning red-top.
But I believe his take on the fact that he didn’t know they were fake until it was too late.
And so what if they were fake – they didn’t ignore the fact that torture’s gone on in Iraq.
While we are here. Since a journalist’s job is to tell the truth and the pictures didn’t, it was probably right that he was sacked. Many of the greats have been – another most notable for me was former director general of the BBC Greg Dyke.
Not many people like journalists.
But then a lot of people don’t like hearing the truth.
And that’s what we make a living in telling.

Ring around 13 Spikes

2007-10-16T20:17:00.001Z

IF I got married I reckon I'd want to wear a ring like this.
Well actually I probably wouldn't. Aside from the fact that I would never be able to afford it - my political views wouldn't allow it.
It would be unethical to spend so much money on an accessory all for your single self.
It could be argued that it would last for a life-time in a way that a coat wouldn't.
But you could probably feed the starving world with the money this ring would beg in a single transaction.
Everytime I see high-end fashion pieces and the obscene amounts of cash demanded for it I feel a bout of nausea run through me.
As lovely as all the perfect-cut clothes, shoes, bags and the rest look - are they really necessary? Of course not.
Therefore it's a fact I find hard to condone in others and could never in my sane mind bring myself to do - if I had all the money in the world. Cliched but true.
I prefer simplicity and the ad-hoc spoils to be found after a rummage through charity shop rails. That kind of recycling to me makes more sense.
Because we live - and I'm speaking of the Western world here, in a place that is already so full of stuff its suffocating.
But then again in that same world that thrives on the next and newest best thing it is sometimes hard not to get carried away with the fanciful drivel thrown at you - see the self-confessing first line of this blurb.

On its own, it is a beauty.
It's called 13 Spike Ring - 18 carat gold and black rhodium with rubies.
The creation of British designer, Hannah Martin who makes men's jewellery or what I call "bloke's bling".
She says it's: "Jewellery for the decadent and dissolute. Derived from the masculinity of a rock and roll lifestyle.
"Welcome to a world of the fierce and glamorous where hedonism rules with opulance and men will find treasure beyond their wildest dreams."
That's a nice bit of copy but I fear unconvincing.
But if I suspend my disbelief and pretend I'm someone else I can almost believe her - for a moment and as long as it doesn't have a price tag.
For finding that out and knowing that there are people willing to pay for it would probably have me shouting to whomever is near enough "bring me a basin I want to be sick."

My Old Bailey

2007-09-25T05:51:00.000Z

I RETURNED from carrying out my civil duty as a juror a couple of weeks ago and wrote a feature for the paper. It was a funny story because I had to tell a story about something I couldn't really talk about. As my editor wrote in the teaser: "Reporter Nadia Gilani has to hold her tongue for once..."
It was nipped and tucked for the presses but here's the raw edit.

JURY SERVICE: I had been summoned to court.And truth to be told I did not want to go.This mood changed however when I discovered that I was to attend the mostfamous criminal court in the world.The Old Bailey, a century old this year, hears cases from all over England.I arrived on my first day in an adrenal overdrive of excitement.This swiftly evaporated after I realised that being a juror involves agreat deal of waiting.Most of the time it is like sitting in a departure lounge at an airportwithout knowing when your flight is.When I asked if I could go and sit in one of the public galleries until Iwas needed – they said no.I ended up serving on only a three-day trial out of the two weeks I wasthere.I cannot of course reveal any details of the case, or details discussed in the jury room, but the experience itself is like no other.The jury selection process exists on the probability of chance.You are picked at random in the first instance by the electoral register.When at court, you wait every day for your name to be called.If it is, you are taken to a court where a new trial is due to begin withup to 18 others.The court clerk then re-shuffles the names and reads out 12 who will serve as the jury.I started plotting a way to flee after the second time this happened to meand I got turned away.But security measures are tight.And you are not allowed to leave the building until the jury bailiffs“release” you so I thought it best to retract the plan lest I might neverreturn to Enfield.Aside from the tedium, there is ample action on which to spectate.From ushers gliding past in their billowing black robes that make them looklike crows to TV crews and barristers speed-smoking outside before theirmorning session to try and convince a jury of their case.One morning I found about 15 armed policemen by the door.The Old Bailey is an exciting, busy place steeped in history.
and the motto: Defend the Childen of the Poor and Punish the Wrongdoer. Inside the courts are dark, windowless and all made of wood.
Still in their traditional form since they were built, they are architecturally intricate and beautiful. Watching the psychological drama that unfolds in a court room is something I find facinating. But as a journalist you are there as the public’s eyes and ears and to challenge reporting restrictions if need be. I succeeded doing this once on behalf of the Gazette when a 17-year-old joy-rider appeared on charges of death by dangerous driving and there was a ban on naming him. So, observing the process of transparent law in action as a member of the proceedings and being unable to talk to the outside world about it was deeply surreal. It confirmed for me that a free press is a vital part of the judicial system. Would I do it again? Given that whenever I come across an intriguing piece of action, my innate urge to tell people about it is hard to switch off - probably not. But if you ever get called and it’s the Bailey that beckons I would say go and try it for size yourself.

Red Top Daily

2007-09-24T20:32:00.000Z

CRIPES! I’ve been absent from these shires for a lengthy time.
I realise that blogging doesn’t really work unless it’s consistent.
So here I endeavour to return.
And what’s new?
Well, our swish news editor departed last Wednesday to head to the hills of the Daily Star.
To write "pun-tastic prose" about “busty blondes”, I teased.
Withered and worn as we all were after deadline - we all trudged to our local in celebration (for him) and gentle commiseration (on account of our loss).
I’ve never had that much fun in a Wetherspoon’s.
Our editor, who wasn't able to make it, whacked a hefty tab on the bar to kick-off proceedings.
All manner of bevvy’s were poured, pub lasagne and mash were consumed and a helium balloon bobbed alongside.
He’s a special spark is Tom – encouraging, motivating and most inspiring.
He was a tough task master, but always fair and made us laugh.
God, this is sounding like an obituary so I’ll stop.
It was his first day today.
I know he’s headed for the top.
Maybe I’ll follow him and we’ll work together again someday.
That’d be a nice dream.

Milk Bottles

2007-07-18T12:28:00.001Z

NEWS is fresher than a pint of milk.
But goes off twice as fast.
All news hacks know that if you miss a story when its “new” – you’ve lost it.
You thump yourself if it was your fault for not seeing it, allow yourself to be scolded by your editor.
But then quickly get over it lest you miss anything happening right now.
That said, there is a place for topical stories – not news but in many ways a response to it, reflection on it or other strong idea that might strike a debate among readers.
The reason for the preamble is that there’s so much I deal with and observe at work that I’d ideally want to get on here.
All the stuff of our busy news-room – the stories, stresses and strains that are emitted amidst our tight team – all that evaporate behind the headlines.
But it’s so busy being a news-person all day, and often into the night that there’s simply not enough time to be newsy on here as well.
When I started the blog in February last year, it served as a reportage space for my findings within the offices of papers I was doing work experience.
I had to get it out of my system as swiftly as possible.
While I cannot maintain that level of tempo now there are things I’ll put on here on occasion that might evoke a whiff of aging dairy.
But I guess what I’m arguing is that outside of the newsroom, off the radio, TV or other output source, what constitutes news is subjective and should still be reported if it's noteworthy enough.
i.e. it’s still new – sort of - if you haven’t heard it yet.
So read on.

ENFIELD goes Live

2007-07-17T14:22:00.000Z

WELL what better way to return to the blog than to share word of our new website.
Yes indeed, the Enfield Advertiser is now live. Do visit http://www.enfieldadvertiser.co.uk/.
You can also read our editor Gary “I’m too busy to pee” O’Keefe’s blog to find out what he thinks of us. We all check it obsessively for that purpose too.
No surprises that have proven too shocking - yet.
The day after the site launched I walked into the office on a Thursday morning after the regular lie-in we are granted the day after our papers for the week are out.
I found our newest reporter on his way out after a phone-in about a forensics’ white tent that had been erected somewhere.
It turned out to be a shooting. Another one.
Five minutes after he’d gone, my editor suddenly remembers the internet.
“This is breaking news – come on Nadia – bash us out a few lines for the website.”
I’m still seated there in my post-deadline haze, leafing through our own papers – a weekly ritual that reminds us all that our hard work is more than worth it.
But as if instinctively I’m on the phone to our reporter – no time for shorthand, I’m typing straight onto the screen, demanding quotes down the receiver from eye-witnesses and filing the story within 10 minutes.
Said editor who was suddenly full of life, rushed off to his office to edit and upload.
It was all very exciting – like being on a national daily for a moment.
There is no better tonic to wash away post-deadline flunk-out or replenish depleted energy reserves than word of a good new story.

School Dinners

2007-05-24T19:45:00.000Z

I’m an ardent believer in ethical journalism.
I’m not going to run off and write an expose – not unless it’s to reveal criminality of some kind.
We’re not into scape-goating locals on local papers.
But just two month’s into the job and I’ve already received complaints on a couple of stories.
Today’s moan came from the headteacher of a primary school.
The story on page five of the Advertiser began:
LUNCHTIMES will never be the same again for an Enfield school that has been fitted with a swanky new kitchen.
Xxxx school is putting good health and taste back on the menu now that they can prepare home-cooked meals on site.
Previously pupils had to make do with “mushy” vegetables brought in from xxxx school nearby. A school spokeswoman said: The food wasn’t particularly good before as vegetables were rotten by the time they had been transported to us.”
And so on.
I failed to see the problem.
And so did my editor.
But alas – I had made a grave error with “mushy” and “rotten” in the copy, which “showed the school in a bad light”.
Hands up – but I only wrote what I was told.
Even the school chef of the school that did the cooking before the other school got its new stove phoned in offended.
And the council suggested I go and eat lunch there to write a piece to prove the food is not "mushy" or "rotten."
WOAH - that'll teach me.
I invited the schools to write a letter to my news editor and he chatted to the aggrieved parties and asked them to stop giving his reporters a hard time.
We’re just doing our job.
In my view, they were pretty lucky to have been the subject of a page five lead in the first place. We were half expecting a raging call-in from he subject of the splash this week – which was a REAL expose.
And would have warranted the required explaination.
But we didn’t hear a tinkle and had a school in a tizz instead.
Maybe tomorrow the "racists" will catch on.
See above post to go up shortly.

Access all Areas

2007-05-23T05:45:00.000Z

My NUJ press card has landed.

And my photo looks as dodgy as deems nessesary.

It seems obligitory that you look a bit mischievous and grubby - like a wanted person if we're going by most press cards of people I know.

Still, it pleases me that I'm armed with that all important accessory for any journalist wanting to get through many a heavy door often shut in the face of the public.

I've had an oversized temporary blue one to date, which always needed an explanation.

Most memorably last month when I attended Woolwich Crown Court for the 7/7 suspected London bombers' trial.

An usher eyed me suspicously from the floor as I sat above her behind a glass screen in the public gallery.

I eyed her back.

Until she came upstairs and asked me who I was.

I pulled out my card with gusto and announced the publication for which I was there with pride.

"One of the men lived on our patch ", I said - (So there).

She handed the card back with a disdainful look.

There's no getting away from the fact that a lot of people think the press to be scum.

Despite the fact that we do an honourable public service.

But she did let me stay.

So i got the story.

And that at the end of all events - is all that matters.

I couldn't think of a headline today

2007-05-21T21:26:00.000Z

A helluva load goes down on our newsdesk.
I write for two papers.
My editors work on four.
And our stories go through about six pairs of eyes before they hit the printers each week.
Rigorous evidently.
And the schedule is relentless.

Even with the fresh air breaks you get out on jobs.

Days of shorthand scrawl, bleed into evenings of writing, into meetings with your colleagues, more interviews over the phone and even more waiting to hear back from others for that all important quote that will make your story publishable.
The latter seem to have an irritating habit of phoning back just when you’ve got a sandwich spread across your keyboard, which sends crumbs flying in the face of your computer screen as you scrabble for a pencil to note their spicy quote.

Some days I feel I've written to the point I've exceeded my word quota for the day and can't sustain a verbal conversation.

Fellow reporters might recognise this affliction.

I'm sure our team does.

To end, I’ve said it before, and here I go again – it’s not a job you could do unless you love it.
It’s not for the money.
But because there’s no other buzz like the kind you get when your editor nods a little “well done”, in your direction.

My First Splash

2007-03-23T07:48:00.000Z

Yesterday I wrote the Gazette's splash.
It's my first so an epiphany.
I’ve written more emotive and I like to think, riveting prose.
But a splash’s a splash and whatever’s most newsworthy of the editor’s choice.
It’s all over the nationals this week so topical.
And at Enfield its unwritten, but an understood given, that we are on the pulse on what is and should be too.
The piece saw me locating and then running after a team of refuse collection people for quotes on deadline day and ringing up a photographer who was on another job to get down there a.s.a.p. to snap them in action. Energetic.
The story is too long for web but this what the headline said:
Amid fears of stinking rubbish lining our streets,
we are pleased to tell you plans for forthnightly rubbish collections are BINNED!

Mr E N Field

2007-03-21T20:57:00.000Z

E N Field is a fictional character. I’m not sure exactly what he looks like. But he is along the lines of: white, middle class pensioner, and more satirical and cynical than might be immediately comfortable – specifically if he is talking about you.
There are three of us reporters on the two papers I write for: Enfield Advertiser and The Gazette. They both have different audiences so we get quite a wide bit of scope in terms of what goes where.
Some of the content overlaps but broadly speaking, the “Ads” is more the mainstream, tabloid, community paper. The "Gaz," is more formal, a tad serious perhaps. Very slick on design, with stylistic features reminiscent of the Daily Mail, or London’s Evening Standard. It’s for the more “mature,” reader. This is speaking in very general terms.
E N Field keeps a diary that is serialised in two extracts every week on the bottom of page 2 of The Gazette. It’s a reaction to the news. A comment on what’s been seen to be going on (off the record) at meetings, appearances and interactions between local public figures – specifically councillors and MP’s.
It is not bylined and we're not allowed to divulge who writes it. But it's a really popular and important section of the paper.
Our editor says that when he's away it's the only thing he worries about being done as it should.

The Fresher’s fare

2007-03-21T20:32:00.000Z

The new job’s been a whirlwind. Almost three weeks into proceedings and I’m part of the furniture. What else could a newbie want than to blend in?
A newspaper is not a world in which one eases into things gently. It’s the nature of the business that you get in and get on – the phone, to that meeting, event, press conference, council meeting, launch, court hearing…unexpected circumstance, and so on.
Anyone that’s never worked on a newspaper will never really understand what it is like. I refer here to other journalists too.
We’re talking magazine journalists with longer deadlines, freelancers, feature writers on national dailys even – they might only write one piece per day.
The life of a news reporter is exceedingly different.
That pressure, the hectic-mania that fill you as you race to file for deadline, the buzz to be had when you get it all done can only be experienced by being on the newsdesk.
And when it’s done, there’s that sweet, sweet feeling of relief. This is when your editor tells you the final edition had gone to print.
You might get a 20 minute breather. This is when you and your colleagues have a power laze-around. I’m partial to hysterical giggles.
And then it starts all over again.
The only reason I spell all this out is because non-journalists won’t necessarily understand the mad desire to want to do this job. It’s relentless. It’s demanding. It’s not one that lets you get away with a botched job.
But there’s nothing else we’d rather get out of bed to do.

Marching into March

2007-03-03T10:43:00.000Z

School’s out and my full-time reporting career kicks off next Monday March 5.
First though, we’re off to cover a protest today that will feature in our papers as an ongoing campaign against cut backs on Enfield's Chase Farm hospital. This is the BIGGEST story of the moment for us. Ten thousand people are expected.
We're all excited. I'm a bit nervous too, if only because I want to do a good job.

Battle of the Block

2007-02-13T17:45:00.000Z

I’m not a massive believer in writer’s block. I know that when I get stuck it’s my own silly fault. I’ve blocked myself.

Then again, I have been struggling with some copy recently that I’ve been putting off because I didn’t know what to say. As I see it, if I don’t know what I’m talking about my readers sure as hell won’t.

I discussed the main thrust of the story with everyone I came in contact with over the past month at length and it made sense. But when I went to write it I couldn’t do it. Is this a form of block?

Something seems to be going on in between the workings of the mind and writing what’s going on in there, down.

Block or not, it’s got something to do with being precious about every word – something I ignore well enough when I’m writing news when no word must be wasted. When writing features I sometimes forget. It makes me recall something novelist Hanif Kureishi said in a two minute exchange we shared at the Cheltenham Literature Festival several years ago.

He said: “When you take your cap off your pen, it makes you stop and you see your mother. You consider, ‘what will mother think?”

I’m not conscious of doing that exactly. But I am concerned about what it is that gets in my way and freezes me now and again.My current ineffective way of dealing with it is to avoid writing for as long as possible. Left unattended in this way it risks growing into depression or mania, which in turn leads to writing something incredibly mediocre. And mediocrity is not to be celebrated.

Fellow writers - we must find a cure. Or is there one I’m not aware of?
Answers on a postcard please.

Boxed in a Byline

2007-02-13T00:02:00.000Z

Journalists see things that even the discerning reader will miss. I’ll explain.

A friend who works on a national daily came over with that day’s paper last week. She’s on the news desk – not as a journalist but as the office’s glue - aka admin assistant.

She doesn’t get many opportunities to write. Granted it’s not on her job spec, but she’s been NCTJ qualified longer than me and does push ideas regularly. I push her to do this too. Maybe she’s not pushy enough.

Then again its harder to get your stuff in on a national. I wouldn’t cope – writing on a daily basis, not sleeping all night for praying that it will make it only to buy the broadsheet the next day to see your 150 words spiked.

Back to point – she had two bylines in the paper of the day. One of them was in a box, the obscure contents of which I could tell required a bright spark’s initiative to glean.

She said: “I feel silly having a byline in a box. Nobody’s going to notice it, or they’ll just wonder what it’s there for. It’s stupid”

I disagreed. It’s important. I always notice names in boxes. When you’re at the bottom of the food chain you’re not just interested in the words in the press but who wrote them.

I also note joint bylines. Those situations when you see a story written by xxxx AND xxxx. The ‘and’ is the equivalent of the person in the box. That person is the assistant to the lead writer. They did a lot of background work and their name appears at the discretion of the journalist that wrote the story.

It always pleases me when I see this - the underlings getting a chance. That boxed byline was me this time last year. And I almost cried the first time my work made it into print but my name had fallen off.

It's not stupid.

Political Scribbles

2007-02-05T11:57:00.000Z

An artist, illustrator and comic-obsessed friend of mine, Chris Rainbow does a monthly cartoon for Blueprint magazine for architects and designers.

See image above and: http://www.wdis.co.uk/blueprint/

He says: "My work is at various times drawing, painting, collage, digital imaging, hand drawn text, comic strips, reportage, political cartooning, observational drawing, murals, graffiti and peculiar scribbling."

His political if poignant satire are my favourite bits.

Nice Work When You Get It

2007-01-30T10:12:00.000Z

*STOP PRESS*STOP PRESS*STOP PRESS*STOP PRESS*

I got a job.
THE job
I was hoping for.
10:30am and I’m at the sinks in the ladies’ at college.
The editor of the Enfield Gazette rings through.
“I hope this news pleases you," he said, "I’d like to offer you a job. “
Hell yes, thank you , thank you.

“I’m really pleased Nadia, well done,” he added, “The two other girls were gutted (those that interviewed me alongside him on the panel), "because they wanted you as well.”
I'm flattered.
But of course given the choice of where to work, my loyalty is to Enfield.
I had the interview last Friday Jan 26 so the speed of the decision is just what I needed to push through final exams next week.

Start date is sometime end of next month. I said I’d be willing to forgo the placement I lined up at G2’s The Guardian in the event of no immediate job prospects.
But he’s happy to wait for me and says I should do it.

Looking forward to starting out, joining the deam team and yay yay salary!
Wouldn’t ask for more.

The News Map

2007-01-05T08:03:00.000Z

This news potal must be viewed.
It was sent to me by a non-journalist contact and I am not sure how she sniffed it.
Even if you think you're not interested in what's going on, the design of the site will ensure you linger longer than you thought you might.

http://www.marumushi.com/apps/newsmap/newsmap.cfm

Quite superb.

Nervous Breakdown on the Small Screen

2007-01-04T21:56:00.000Z

Celebrity Big Brother Five launched last night.
Over eight million viewers tuned in as the eleven celebrity contestants walked their way to CCTV hell led by Dirk Benedict, best known as Face of top TV fodder – The A Team (I never missed an episode as a kid – can you tell?)
Other participants include: Jermaine Jackson (of The Jackon Five – now known as Muhammad Abdul Aziz since a conversion to Islam), Bollywood starlet my-nose-is-now-plastic Shilpa Shetty, Sunday Mirror journalist Carole Malone and others.
The London Paper runs a daily reader’s poll I check with interest. Today’s was: ‘Are the housemates Z-list freaks craving attention or contestants taking part in a valid social experiment?’
When BB started out it may have passed as the latter – it was indeed curious and intriguing.
However the shows since been flung out of hand. See archived June blogging re: BB and the Mental Health Foundation’s thoughts on the show in an interview with me after a contestant announced he wanted to kill himself on air.
But who cares? As long as we want to watch – Channel 4 will hand it out.
Last night, host Davina McCall (the best bit about the show) vowed “Big brother will be just as twisted and just as devious as ever.”
Let the raucous begin.

Note: I didn’t watch BB - I stole the facts from the morning papers. But comment is free as the saying goes - and herein is all mine own.

Biggest Sick Day Ever

2007-01-03T22:37:00.003Z

No time for recouping from post new-year flunk out, we’re back to school.

Yes, believe. Day 2 of Jan 2007, and we were in front of our Macs like we never left them.
The only difference was that everyone was really quiet and still is feeling flaky, judging by the lack of bums on seats in our first class.

This sparseness was echoed on London’s streets most acutely yesterday.
7am at the bus stop and the road outside my abode was barren. I was driven to Liverpool street station by the bus driver all by myself. The station in turn seemed almost vacant. Where were all the commuters?

Homeward bound and the Evening Standard offered explanation. Reports revealed that London had been hit by record levels of sickies pulled en masse as thousands stayed away from work.

Recovering from mulled-wine-belly and post festive debt probably. The paper says the capital’s not expected to return to its traditional chaos until next week. So I guess the rest of us can get a head start by enjoying a little more space while it’s available.

It does all feel a bit odd though. Like London’s lost a few pounds.

Enfield Dreams

2006-12-17T15:17:00.001Z

I woke up with a jolt and realised I had been dreaming of people I’ve written stories about for the paper. This struck odd and hasn’t happened all year since my newsy life began.

While here though, it’s worth mentioning that during my current term in training, Friday’s are my favourite day because I’m at workon the paper. It's a reminder of what the rest of the course is for.

I did a week’s placement at the same paper back in May and came away with a pile of bylines.
This time around, going in just the one day a week over a longer period of time gives you a real sense of the paper and the most important people that make it what it is – the people written about of course – but perhaps more importantly the readers.

Like all reporters I like going out on jobs best. If I'm with a photographer then even better. I don’t mind what for but meeting people and finding out what they’re up to is what inspires me most.

Back in September on my first day I wrote a story about a mother of a THREE-YEAR-OLD who has set up a charity after her son has been living with a pace-maker since he was born. Other favourites include: A volunteer who has raised over £800,000 for arthritis research in twenty-five years, A LOVED UP couple’s diamond wedding anniversary, A MAN with learning difficulties who thought he was “stupid” because he didn't know the alphabet who has just been short-listed for a student of the year award and an EIGHT-YEAR-OLD schoolboy who won first place in a tae kwon do championship with hopes to become the youngest to hold a black-belt in the country.

Most recently I visited a member of the Green Party at his home for a feature I was writing on 'How to reduce your carbon footprint and live lighter,' and last week a case study on a survivor of domestic violence. The interview was conducted in Urdu with me translating into English as I went along - which really put my multi-tasking skills to the test. The latter was a story my editor wasn't sure about in the first instance but open to persuasion as he is, he let me have a go and ran it. That's another reason that makes this team so good. I must sound like I want a job there. (Off the record: I do).

All news is news worth writing. But what we call human interest stories in the business are my niche and what I strive to do.

London Lite Cleans up Messy Business

2006-12-17T10:13:00.000Z

I read London Lite the other day (Free sheet from the Evening Standard, handed out on weekdays in Central London).

It was my first read. I admit I’m a bit late in catching up. But when you’re surrounded by news and read all the nationals everyday, there’s often no room for another newspaper to get a look in.

Actually, there's always room for paper in my life. Truth is I've been reading the London Paper (launched by Rupert Murdoch aka proprietor of the Times/Sun) instead, because that’s what was handed to me often enough to become habit forming.

Picture the scene: Friday night on the tube homeward bound, someone has left a copy of said free sheet on a nearby seat. You reach, rifle, read, rifle some more then fold and go to put it in your bag. And this is where you notice the strap-line above the headline. “Printed with ink that won’t come off on your hands” it says.

I’m sure non-journalists, who form the bulk readership of London Lite probably appreciate the thought. To me it didn’t make sense.

The smell, ink, grain of paper, the fact that you can tear it in a dead straight horizontal line, is what I love about newsprint. The familiarity of news writing style and the quality of snatched pictures that can’t afford as much time as long-drawn photo-shoots.

I understand that when we live in the Big Smoke its all so filthy, keeping people’s hands clean might prove a good move.

But as a die-hard traditionalist at heart, I do feel printing with non-budge ink seems to sterilise a bit that illicit stain of grubbiness on your fingers that's left behind after a gloriously greedy read.

Quick Thinkers

2006-12-17T09:44:00.000Z

Journalists have incredibly fast minds. They’ll ask you a question, be taking notes all the while thinking about the next piece of information they want from you. This is an asset and a specific necessity in the world of newspapers when you often have to source your story, write and file it for publication the same day.

Often when I go to interview someone, I know what their answers to my questions are going to be but I ask them to get it in their words. Their words will form the life of my story.

In the past I’d sometimes hear what was probably minor irritation in the voice of my subject at the obviousness of my question. But I’ve moved on from that and I don't hear it anymore. No question is stupid. I am not asking it for me – I’m asking it for the story, which I would not be able to write without the obvious vital information.

We were taught very early on in our training to develop skills not unlike a detective. Learn to read things upside down, and to read people’s faces and body language. How does our interviewee look? Tired? Well? Run down? Pregnant? (!) Are they shy, being honest or suspect? It's not always easy to get this over the phone but we get what we can.

Either way, all of it has to be got really quickly. This fast pace, fresh immediacy and realness, is part of why we love doing it.

“Relationships are imperfections”

2006-12-16T11:50:00.000Z

A friend quoted another’s adage over the phone last night. Yes I agreed, they are, but what would we do without them?

It came clear as the conversation progressed that the root of the fore-stated comment was after recent shouting matches with her on-off-partner.

Thinking in the bigger scheme of current events, I've noticed how much of their conversation people devote to talking about their relationships - and not usually with the person they're in the relationship with.

I’m not speaking here about the entire spectrum of social interaction of course. I do not mean employers, friends, siblings, parents or others – with whom, granted we may have less than perfect relationships. I'm refering to times when people’s hot topic of choice is their significant other, who may ideally be a friend, but is in the fortunate position of sleeping with them too.

From a scant non-national, non-exhaustive study of the species, it appears that beyond the honeymoon period when being with someone new is exciting and electric, when we speak of our relationships it is less to celebrate the others’ good points than to ponder what they could do better.

At a party last night, a friend shared concerns that the woman he is “seeing” is not “the one.” He said: “I know I’m never going to fall in love with her because I want more.” It turns out that the “more” he seeks is manifest amply within his circle friends. His relationship is the soothing balm to go home to at the end of it all to wake up to on Sunday morning. Sounds good to me. Opposites attract and all that. He conceded my point and reconsidered his views.

A nearby source who has been married for thirty-eight years said the relationship's success owed everything to compromise. Add to this a story I wrote for my paper a couple of months ago on a couple who were celebrating their 60th diamond anniversary. The seventy-eight year old husband’s secret was along a similar compromising line. He said: “I love my wife, so I’ve never strayed. It’s that simple. ”

Perhaps it is ego-obsessed arrogance that makes the rest of us struggle with negotiation. Or maybe we suspect somewhere not too far, the grass is that bit greener.

I can't help thinking if we thought about the sad prospect of being lonely we’d settle down and enjoy what we have. Or get on with ironing out those creases we're not happy about rather than just talking about them all the time. If it's broke, fix it. And if it ain't, think how pretty it is.

Image: group de quatre nus (Four Nudes) - Tamara de Lempicka

Some of the Music I like

2006-12-11T21:07:00.000Z

One of the photographers at the Enfield Advertiser had to take a picture of me to illustrate a feature of mine. It's the longest ten minutes we've ever spent together.

He's German and we bonded over the Berlin electro-music scene. He asked me what I've been listening to recently and truth is I had no idea. I'm lucky enough to have my own private supplier of music and mixes courtesy of dj - Thee hausfly you see. Check: www.houseflymusik.blogspot.com for more.

"Spike Spondike aka Thee hausefly was born and raised in Ohio USA, and has been mixing mix-tapes since the 1980’s and DJ-ing on the scene since 2000.
An international superstar, she was resident DJ at Crush, Portland Oregon, and has since played everywhere from San Francisco to Helsinki to Sophia to London. Versatile sets range from electro-punk to minimal tech to dirty house beats and slow-it-down groovy lounge vibes."

She's currently without a home so if anyone has word of third parties interested in having her play/be resident, all the better. Do get in touch with me on this blog. Or leave her a comment on hers.

Shorthand Kit

2006-12-11T20:45:00.000Z

See here: all the necessary acoutrements for Teeline practice. I'm currently at a speed of 80-90, sometimes, back down to 70. Enter panic = the highs and lows of shorthand.

Still, Teeline has to be one of my most favourite subjects. The intense concentration it requires leaves no room to think about anything else. It's almost meditative. Move over chanting and lets go Teeline!

The other day someone in my class asked our teacher to dictate at 120 words per minute. I knew I wouldn't be able to do it but started to sharpen my pencil anyway. The boy next to me told me I was a masochist. Maybe. But there's no other way for it but to be obsessive.

I've been practicing manically everywhere, on the bus, in lectures, at friends houses, even on the walk to college, listening to a Yorkshire woman dictate passages to me on my ipod nano and writing outlines on the floor of my mind.

The exam's in January and I have to get up to 100 wpm to pass. No prizes for guessing what I'll be doing frantically over the festive break.

Start Writing - now

2006-12-11T20:23:00.000Z

It’s the eve before exam number 1 and I’m feeling pretty numb. That’s news writing, followed by Public Affairs on Weds, then law on day three.

The past three weeks have been spent at my mother’s, holed up in one room , knee deep in past exam papers and enveloped by floor to ceiling notes on lining paper (used to line your walls before wallpaper) in a bid to focus.

When you’re brain’s feeling freeze-dried and you take a break with friends, and find yourself partly listening, but mostly rattling through judicial proceedings and reporting restrictions on points of law, elections and local government finance, you realise you are headed towards going very slowly, and quite blandly mad.

So unready as I feel, the prospect of any more revision makes me feel queasy and there seems nothing for it but to do them and be done.

It’s our Christmas party on our last day. Mine’ll be a G&T I think – pint of.

First though, it’s show-time.

Post-party mortem

2006-11-14T00:30:00.000Z

It was my birthday yesterday but I had my party the day before – a ceramics-painting do. I filed friends the invitation below.

More people showed up than expected and we ended up pulling more tables together, taking over in our fun. The laid-back venue that also lets you bring your own food and drink didn’t seem to mind much.

A couple of friends – designers, got a bit frustrated, perhaps a tad outside of their perfectionist comfort zones when their paint started to bleed and blur. I didn’t mind as much.

I’d intended to do a Jackson Pollock but got commissioned by someone close to me to do a barcode instead. This required a more linear approach to that which I am inclined as it involved masking tape and bouts of deep concentration but hey I went with it. It did smudge a bit.

A range of other things were painted. One friend did a cat, paws outstretched with its arse in the air, another chose a Buddha. Others models were: an ashtray, salt shaker, and green-tea style cups.

I’d recommend this sort of thing for a party, date with friend, prospective partner or other as good therapy on a mellow Sunday afternoon.

Pre-birthday Party

2006-11-14T00:29:00.000Z

Monday 30 October 2006 The Scorpio Gazette
Islington journalist
gets friends
to paint
tea-pots
SOON to turn 26, Nadia is holding a ceramic-painting birthday party on Sunday November 12 at Art4us cafe, 172 West End Lane, London NW6 1SD from 3pm-6pm. Visit www.art4fun.com for more.
An excited Nadia said: “It’s a mad bonkers idea, but I hope everyone comes and joins in the mad bonkers fun.”
Cost: £5.95 studio fee, plus item chosen to paint.
Transport: West Hampstead tube/Silverlink/Thameslink.
(By tube, turn right out of station. By Thameslink/Silverlink, turn left out of station).
Note to readers: Please RSVP immediately – xxxxxxxx@xxxxxx.com or xxxxx xxx xxx to secure your seat.

National Standinaqueue Day

2006-11-09T21:35:00.000Z

Two friend’s and talented designers are on a mission for their final year project towards an MA in Creative Practices in Narrative Environments at Central St. Martin’s.

The brief they’ve set themselves is: “To change and enhance the inevitable queuing experience by engaging the public using playful interventions to challenge the 'rules' that inform how we interact in a queue.”

And behold – today is National Standinaqueue Day. And I took part. My story will follow in a separate blog post.

Background to the momentous occasion: For those of you who don't already know, Thursday November 9 is an exciting opportunity to join in a massblog at Standinaqueue. We want as many people as possible from aroundthe world to record the time they have spent standing in a queue on this day.
It can be a queue for the bus, a pension or even a bag of crisps. Hereat Standinaqueue no queue is too big or too small to talk about.Send your queue story from November 9th, plus pics if possible to standinaqueue@gmail.com by November 13th, and all queues will be posted up for all to see.

Watch this space for more!

Spank-in Harlow

2006-11-09T20:58:00.000Z

Picked this up in the canteen on tea-break. Remember that Harlow is dominated by sixth formers. We never had fliers with that kind of rhyming allowed on literature floating about when I was at school...

Essex Sabbatical

2006-11-09T20:51:00.000Z

Well, it’s been a while since I scribed on these premises and someone confronted me on my absence and beckond me back, so here we are.

Well what’s the story? Plentiful obviously but in that cliched situation of so much to say and no time to comment, I see no point in reflection but to continue on from here.

It's all old news now. Gone and done. But since good journalism is the art of precis - here I go:

We’re currently on countdown to pre-Christmas exams in between evening council meetings, scrutiny committees and other field trips. Next weeks it’s off to magistrates for a flavour of court reporting.

No space for anything but to live and breathe news writing, Public Affairs, Law and shorthand. This constant juggle is a mind boggle and I’m sure I’m not the only one in class who’s brain feels like it’s been in a kiln since the beginning.

And yet, there is something profoundly satisfying, perhaps gently subversive feeling of living on the edge, constantly catching up in a perpetual whirlwind of outputting new information relayed to us as soon as we have absorbed it. Life’s too short to be bored – and there’s no chance of that over here.

As a group, we took slightly longer than the other class on the same course to bond. But it’s happened and laugh our way through the quirky bonkers mix up that is us. It works.

I’d love to write about the conversations that have taken place at college. The sub-text that lies low in law amid lectures on contempt, the satire in public affairs, the word-play that’s spoken not written in news and the sexual innuendo we throw about in Teeline.

But I can’t. I don’t want to libel anyone (exhibit A: of newly planted quite fascinating essential law for journalists study).

Not that I have a defamatory comment to say about anyone in my body. But it’ll all just have to be our sacred secret life and times hidden in the college grounds at Harlow.

Brick

2006-10-16T22:01:00.000Z

I got bylined in yesterday’s Sunday Times’ Culture magazine and I've been "misquoted."

The brief was for a 200-word review of the out on DVD now, film Brick. In print, the copy's been NIB’d (news in briefed), down to 80. That’s a hefty chop, but my ego isn’t as easily bruised as previously after 9 months of news practice.

In some ways I reckon it’s the right length for that kind of thing. They should have asked for 80 in the first place. I can do it now.

Back in my 80-word book review days for the back pages of Dazed & Confused, I struggled to squash fiction’s flavour down to size and I hated it. But I’ve since realised NIB writing is one of the best skills I’ve picked up through my work experience.

O how we change.

With regards editing - I wrote “less film-noir than it says it is, the film delivers no more than another round of existentialism and drugs in high-school.”

That bit was cut.

Re: misquote - I said “The extras are the best bit." (extras equals the making of, interviews with crew, auditions, etc.)

What they said I said instead was: “The extras explain but don’t add much.”

Still they kept the gist and the rest of me is intact – ish. See below.

Brick Film Two stars Extras Two stars
This over-stylised experiment takes itself too seriously and fails to deliver the sum of its potential parts. A low-budget high-school film (edited on the director’s home computer), Brick is to be commended for its moody look and evocative score, described by its composer, Nathan Johnson, as a “junkyard, drunken orchestra”. The flaws are a plot that lacks pace and structure, and implausible characters. The extras explain, but don’t add much. NG

Studio Voice Man

2006-10-10T22:38:00.000Z

I’ve been translated into Japanese in Studio Voice Man (men’s fashion & lifestyle glossy magazine).
Autumn/Winter 2006 edition just published.

Last July I wrote a 1000-word feature and interview with the editor of 10 Men magazine for SVM’s issue on the history of British Men’s fashion magazines.I wasn’t qualified on the subject at all but it turned into an absorbing area for research.

It’s the first time my byline comes next to non-English text which means I can’t scrutinise the final edit to see what might have been hacked off. The font is tiny though so I like to think it is in print as was writ for the most part – question marks and other bits of punctuation appear to be in place.

It also means friends escape having to plough through and read it which is a shame as I was really happy with the final choice of words. I'm thinking of stapling a copy of the English original to the magazine and handing it round to get round this one.

On the design front, it looks good (white text on black does it for me every time) and is illustrated well. Most interesting however, is discovering that Japanese books/magazines are read from right to left.

How fun!

Fishwives

2006-09-25T06:12:00.000Z

I meet all sorts at work on my Saturday job.
I mind a stall at Broadway Market, Hackney selling cakes, pies and pates on behalf of the Two Fishwives, www.twofishwives.com.

It's a buzzy place. My favourite bit is the other stall traders. We’re a motley mix and cajole each other cheerily through a long day.Then there’s the customers. You get your regulars, first-timers, tourists, all manner of age-groups and from different walks. Some of them like to stop for a chat, others ask intriguing questions. Here's a flavour of a few things I’ve come across over the month I’ve been doing it:

“My son’s a chef and can make these at home.”

“I make Thai fishcakes too so I’m not buying - just looking."

“Real fish-fingers? do you have any fake ones?” (I shake my head - no and say, we leave that to Birds eye).

“Are you one of the fishwives?”

“vegetarian” a woman says when I smile at her as she walks past.

"I know it says to cook them in the oven but I fried them instead and they collapsed - they were still delicous though."

“Where do you get your tea-towels?”

Better than morning television – believe.

Buffet Ash-bowl

2006-09-24T21:24:00.000Z

Supper and catch up with my trusted friend John, editor of http://www.fringereport.com/. Spot his ash-tray, home-made for the occasion. Probably bearer of instant-bake lasagne or the like, in a former life.

John used to work as an architect. Couldn't let this brilliance of mind escape a photo.

Kate goes Black for Red

2006-09-22T21:59:00.000Z

See the Independent this week - The Africa Issue, Thursday Sept 21 with a picture of quintessential model of our times, Kate Moss, on the cover - painted black and photographed by glam style photographer Nick Knight.

Is it art or irony? I am inclined to lean towards the gist of former Africa editor of the Financial Times, Michael Holden's comment in today's Evening Standard. He said: "If Kate can get away with this patronising, offensive image, posing as an icon of our concern for Africa, then why not bring back the golliwog that once adorned every bottle of Robertsons marmalade?"

The paper was printed, at the tail end of London Fashion Week, guest-designed by Georgio Armani in The Independent's partnership with the Product Red initiative (set up if I have read things correctly, by U2 front-man - Bono).

The reportage within, on issues afflicting countries in Africa are all to be commended, thoroughly researched as they were. But aside from the pressing issues, news is out of the Product Red Initiative, i.e. Armarni, American Express, Converse, Gap and Motorola are all joining the red campaign by launching, products in special red ranges with percentages from sales going to Africa to help fight HIV and Aids.

Capital capital – evidence, we are merciful consumers and can’t get away from it try as we might. Much as I appreciate good intentions of the above actions, they seem to just widen the chink between the richer and poorer worlds.

It seems to follow on a bit from the trend MAC cosmetics did with their Viva Glam lipstick several years ago. Unfortunately the shade doesn't suit me as well as it does Missy Elliot so I've never bought it.

Lets face facts, we're all capitalists to use the ugly word, just by virtue of living in a capitalist world - despite our socialist hearts and intentions. What can we do to help? Oh yes, lets buy a pair of trainers and skinny jeans made by a street-kid in Ecuador to go with.

If money were the answer, the continent would not be in the dire state we've put it in. As long as products are available, people will shop, they will shop, they will shop. So, in this stance, our shopping or witholding from buying specific goods, deems itself ineffectual. Back to drop the debt and start again.

Meantime, a return to the Indy and piccy of Kate - was it necessary?

I'm not convinced.

Almost Famous

2006-09-22T21:52:00.000Z

Three people have addressed me with a sentence that ended with ‘The Observer’ this week. A sentence that started with a miscellany of intros along the lines of ‘I saw you in – .’ And they don’t mean they saw a byline.

Confused? You’re meant to be. Away from writing news, to be convoluted is my art didn’t you know?

Back to point however, the three in question were: a colleague at college (this is how we have been taught to refer to each other), a tutor, and then today, one of the lovely photographers at the Enfield Advertiser where I am on placement every Friday.

I’ve had people refer to things I’ve written before. Back when I was a serial reviewer for various websites of - you name it, I’ll give an opinion on it - people I didn’t know until they found out my name by introduction via mutual acquaintance. They would comment, agree, disagree. We discussed.

But this is a bit different.

Is it a warning sign as to what it might feel like to be famous? Quelle oddity.

And let anonymity reign.

Lesbians Have More Orgasms

2006-09-21T19:26:00.000Z

We all skim the nationals at college every day. Found this in The Sun today:

'WOMEN are more likely to orgasm during lesbian sex than straight sex, a survey reveals.
Just under 69 per cent of women climaxed during their last heterosexual encounter compared to 76 per cent who romped with another female.
Researchers who quizzed 19,000 people across Australia blamed selfish fellas who concentrated solely on intercourse because it was most “effective” for them. They added that many women with lower sex drives were also left unsatisfied when pressured into having sex — while only 5.2 per cent of men did not orgasm.
Three-quarters of women polled by three Aussie universities said their last sexual activity included some kind of “manual stimulation”. A quarter said their romp included oral sex. The survey was published in the Journal of Sex Research.'

One hour Photo

2006-09-17T21:51:00.001Z

There’s a picture in the Observer Magazine today of a group of four, of which I am one. Very strange ketamine-looking eyes on my part methinks. Vanity kicked in this morning when I saw it and I thought it would be so much better if we could supply our own photos of ourselves, especially when we are uncomfortable about being seen in a national magazine anyway.

The feature is a brief profile of Let Them Eat Cake magazine for the Rising Star section. I started writing for LTEC earlier this year, after my friend designed the first issue and introduced me to the editor, Njide Ugboma. In July, I was asked if I’d be up for the role of Contributing Features Editor. So here I am. It’s a very odd feeling to be on the other side of things, i.e. when it is seeing your name in print as much as possible that drives you - not your face. But we laughed through it, and I was happy I got to wear my black tie (just seen).

In the picture, Njide is the said R.S. and the rest of us make ‘the team,’ sans other freelance contributors to the magazine mind, of which there are many. We’re poised, holding exquisite hand-made micro-fairy cakes looking more serious than I recall us being.

BTW - issue 3 is hot off the press now. And in my view, the best issue in terms of design and content so far.

Undercover in the Staff Room

2006-09-17T21:24:00.000Z

Last Thursday afternoon, and we’re to write our stories got the previous day in Brighton. There aren’t enough Mac’s to go round so I am left computer-less and swiftly whisked off by our course programme leader to the staffroom to use a spare machine in there, (we're very well taken care of round here).

Another one of my tutors, eating lunch, is charming enough to endure my invasion of a private space. I get to work and engross my mind as best as one can when your superiors are having some down time and you are peripherally gate crashing the scene.

It was all a bit voyeuristic, despite my back turned on the action. A telephone conversation was made, which I did my best to ignore since it was obviously confidential when the door was shut before it was made. Not easy to switch your ears to zero so I have to say, I value this trust, especially as they do not know that I am not a gossip and just trust that I am not.

At one point, a tutor who is not actually assigned to me, so we have not formally met, enters, looks at me and says: “It’s the blogger.”

I do not understand, so entrenched in my narrative and affliction of thesaurus block. I think I smile and say: “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”
“You have a blog do you not?” He says cheerily, not minding my dumbfold.
The proverbial penny bounces back: “Yes I do.” And then I follow with: “How do you know?”
“We’re journalists” he replies with gusto.

Well, of course.

No one here has stopped doing what they’re teaching us to do. Their love for it is infectious. And this, dear reader is why this college is brilliant and I realise why I am here.

Sunrise: 6:47am

2006-09-17T20:38:00.000Z

I have to leave the flat at around 7.15 everyday to get to Harlow in time to use the loo etc. before the day’s 9-6ish timetable ensues. Could be worse. The train journey is actually a welcome change from tube "cattle class" rush, and an excellent 40 minute space for shorthand practice.

I must start taking my vitamins if my stamina is to match my appetite to thrive and excel in this business however.

On Wednesday last week, I was up at 4am for our 7am coach departure to Brighton for this year’s Trades Union Congress event. The Town Park was a sight for incredibly sore eyes on this specific morning.

Meet the Local Cows

2006-09-17T20:29:00.000Z

Walk to school through Harlow Town park on my first day. London feels quite far away indeed.

Welcome to Harlow

2006-09-17T20:23:00.000Z

My training at Harlow college began last Monday. The tutors were not joking when they said that they are going to work us hard. To say that the course is full on would be an understatement – the timetable is like a military regime.

No time wasting, the year’s newspaper course, squashed into a 19-week fast-track is listed in our hand book, bullet by bullet point. First exams come in December, and everything’s over by Feb 5 (assuming no re-sits!)

We were interviewing each other within the first hour of arriving – to write up the next day, in between enrolment forms and getting lost and finding our way around a new building swarming with teenagers – did I mention there is a sixth form strand to this place? Interesting to be in such company, if self-conscious inducing on day 1. I’m a little used to it now, and find it curiously refreshing, if amusing.

This course is tough work already, but being a news reporter is tough work and we’re all on this course because we’re not afraid of that. But it feels like it’s going to be good fun too, so none of the drill above should be misconstrued for complaint.

The tutors are superb and second to none so far. They take pride in what they do, really care about us and want us all to do well – by any means necessary. Not something I am well aware one should be complacent about.

Absolut Ice

2006-09-08T20:01:00.000Z

Three of us went to the Absolut Icebar in Mayfair last night as part of a friend’s birthday surprise. I'd like to pretend it was my impressive idea but it wasn't - I didn't even know it existed before this time.

It was thrilling, exhilarating and minus 5 below zero. Everything’s made of crystal clear ice, save for the floor and ceiling – that means walls, the bar, glasses and all. The entire space is reconstructed every six months from ice transported from the Torne river, Sweden.

In our designer thermal capes and mittens provided for the occasion, we looked set to embark on an expedition.

Unusual and tasty drinks and happy fun all round. You get thrown out after 45 minutes, but that didn’t stop us taking our ice glasses out with us, to slurp slush puppie style, in the lounge bar next door.

Of course, you pay for your mega-star priviledges, but I’d go again, and endorse it as an alternative escape from the mania of Piccadilly on any given evening. Go chill.

Pot Lucky

2006-09-08T12:14:00.000Z

I got the bursary.

Incredible news and hard to believe, since the 45 min interview yesterday morning before a panel of 4 people was a slight shock to the system. Add to this penetrating and tough questions making me feel I didn't perform as well as I could have.

Who would have thought? I really didn't, so what fab relief. Proof it pays (see pun!) to keep the faith and stay plodding.

What Editors look for at interview

2006-09-07T08:45:00.000Z

Aside from drive and determination to succeed, my private research says:

Personality
Personality
Personality
Clean fingernails
Good shoes

Teeline Begins

2006-09-02T07:20:00.000Z

Earlier this year, someone told me that I’d find learning shorthand easy because it looks a bit like Urdu or Farsi without the dots. These are both languages that I can read and write but of course shorthand is not like either of them at all. It’s another cryptic language in itself.

Despite popular advice on this blog from practicing reporters to get started on shorthand, my text book had turned into a monster on the shelf that I was quite terrified of facing.

Last night, gravely aware that there is only one week until my first day as a student again I took it to bed. Thirty mins on the alphabet and I fell asleep drawing outlines on the floor of my mind.

On waking I reach for my pen as I would to the kettle, and start scribbling the twenty-six letters over and again until I’ve nailed them. I’m addicted and am delighted to say, it's fast becoming my new obsession.

BTW, did we know that T is one of the most commonly used letters in the English language and blends with other letters to give word endings, which is how this system of shorthand got its name?

It pleases me to find things like this out.

Fight Club

2006-09-01T17:05:00.000Z

I joined a friend for my first time at a Kung Fu (gong fu) preparation class last night, at one of only a few Shaolin Temples in the world. I had no idea what to expect, but getting physical seemed the best way to rid myself of what appears to be pre-school nerves that have afflicted me recently.

In the changing room I was told, ‘this is going to fuck you up.’ It was magic and did.

There was no formal introduction, no ‘is this the first time for anyone?’ type questions, just join in with running, press ups and sparring the evening air.

I'm feeling muscles ache today I forgot I had, and am filled with both fear and excitement at prospect of another gruelling hit. I crave more of that same relentlessly physical, tiring and meditative experience.

I must have a sadist streak. But with such euphoric inducing activity as this, where you can kick, punch, and jump out your stress, who needs pills or therapy?

NB. Attached pic is of Shifu (master) who led the class

A bit of old but still pretty good news

2006-09-01T15:42:00.000Z

Last week, I received word that I’ve been short-listed for an interview for the George Viner Memorial Fund to which I applied to pay my Harlow course fees. I almost didn’t apply because I’d got a bit dubious as to whether the money advertised to support journalism students actually existed when I applied for 3 bursaries previously and failed on all accounts.

So this time, I had fun with it, turned things inside out and took a risk. Rather than beg for the bursary, I thought I’d show them what I’d do with it if they invested in me. I wrote all my answers as news stories, with intros and quotes from senior people I’ve met on my placements, and even got away with one of them as a NIB.

I haven’t got the money yet but reckon my audacity is what clinched it. It says in the letter that I must please note that I’ll be asked questions relating to my knowledge of the GVMF trust, the National Union of Journalists and Trade Unions in general.

All well and good. But I suspect they’ll also want to know why I want to be a journalist again which makes me want to scream since I’ve been asked that over and over on every form I’ve filled in. Still, patience and deep breaths.

Dusty pinstripes have been dry cleaned and creased brogues are polished and poised.

Postscript re: Exterminus and other things

2006-08-17T11:14:00.000Z

It has been alerted to me that I perhaps forgot the plot herein this blog recently. I value this feedback and understand that I took a risk that could easily be misunderstood.

I am referring to my last post – below, where in fact, deploying a sense of insanity was precisely my point. I considered deleting it, if I was in danger of causing offence. But instead, to assuage any further discomfort, I will point out a detail re: said post ‘Exterminate Them All,’ below.

To clarify, the bit in brackets at the beginning is like a warning sign. It is a guideline to introduce that what follows is a fiction, a satire and piss-take if you will, written in the persona of a person gone mad.

In an earlier post some months back, I mention the blessed gift of artistic licence. I state that I often employ this in my written word outside of newsprint, in the way that writers do, because we can. And I maintain that in writing a bit of reflective, distilled prose such as the below, all or some or none of it might be true.

It is a game.

And while we are here, I may as well reiterate that this blog is often just a crazy bonkers bit of ideas and word play. It is a space where (without the luxurious assistance of an editor), I will make writing mistakes, create sentences with clumsy structure and see words in their raw form. But, if we can’t enjoy throwing around copious hyperbole now and again where would we be?

I trust my risk taking will not be deeply career threatening. Perhaps If I was a columnist on a national daily, I’d get away with it. Then again, maybe not. But getting away with things is not why I say what I do. It is my aim to challenge public opinion as I develop as a journalist, to play devil’s advocate because apathy is lethal.

Journalists cannot change the world. But they can act as catalysts, make people think and perhaps provoke them to invoke change. For me, it is this reason that makes it the most important and rewarding job around, and why I am determined to work hard in order to be the best I can be at doing it.

Exterminate them All

2006-08-15T15:03:00.000Z

(The perilous workings of a mad person not quite on the loose)

I have an idea, a solution to the terrorist problem, and I am convinced it will work.

I’ve run out of patience with anti-terrorist laws that have proved to do nothing so far, but make us a nation terrorised of terrorists.

So my remedy is as follows: since all would-be terrorists are perceived to be Muslim, it follows that the only safe thing to do is to eliminate all Muslims. Kill them all. That is the answer.

While we’re at it, we may as well, get rid of non-committal types too, just in case they have an epiphany at some point in future and turn fundamental. I am talking here of people like myself.

I am not necessarily devout or currently practicing, but don’t rule out the possibility that my Muslim upbringing might come to the fore and turn me into an actual terrorist. So I’ll happily suicide bomb myself, for the sake of everyone’s peace of mind. Can’t get fairer than that.

It might sound extreme but extreme times, cause for extreme measures. Islam is the fastest growing religion too, so the sooner things get going, the better, we’ve a lot of the world to cover.

No one will be safe until all Muslims are wiped out. The part of East London where the 24 arrests of young men, were made late last week is the same place I grew up. It wouldn’t be a bad place to start.

I’m really excited by my idea. Maybe I should get in touch with Mr. Bush for talks about how to get the action started.

Cashpoint

2006-07-31T20:21:00.000Z

Writing is such a solitary exercise – and I like it like that. There are moments however when it drives you bonkers in the end. I’ve been known to play little games with myself when I’m hostaged to work from home. I’ll buy pints of milk one at a time and such like, simply to force me to leave the house and not get agoraphobic.

So, on today’s get outta the flat excursion, and a drop by the shops on return, I stop off at the hole in the wall that thrusts you deeper into your overdraft specifically if you are a journalist starting out and not getting paid yet.

The rucksaked bloke in front, keeps looking over his shoulder at me. It always strikes me as funny when I get that, because it happens a lot and I still haven’t worked out the best way to respond other than to make a massive point of looking at something deeply engrossing in my purse. Today, I stare at my shoes and notice the rubber sole is coming off more than I remembered. The man walks off.

When I come to insert my card in the usual fashion, the computer appears to be in the middle of a transaction, I press ‘OK’ without thinking and it deposits a red Abby National card, bearing the name Mr. A Soma. I remove it and stand agog for a few. A look up and down the busy high street at home-time rush hour and the bloke is no where to be seen. Since a queue has formed behind me, I decide to hand it into the Abby tomorrow and continue with my own transaction and leave too.

But then, and I have no idea from where, I recall the words of an Iranian friend of mine of the Zoroastrian faith. Although not deeply orthodox, she does endeavour to abide by the ‘good deeds, good thoughts, good words,’ philosophy that is integral to the faith. And I think I must do the deed, and look harder for Mr. Soma. Especially since he looked at me with that dubious look.
So I’m legging it along the street thinking it’s all in vain but at least I’m trying and then I see him at an Island in the middle of the road. ‘Excuse me, is this yours?’ I say knowing it is. ‘yes, thank you so much,’ he says of course, looking more stunned at my handing it to him than at his own carelessness.

I leave him to ponder what he's just done himself. And I feel better for having got a result. Truth be told, It’s the kind of thing I might do myself, which is maybe why I did what I did, and why we often try to do good things like that when we can. In the hope that people might help us back when we make the same mistake ourselves.

Press Perks

2006-07-29T15:09:00.000Z

Am on a procrastination lapse from three features I am flitting in between writing all at the same time. It's how I work best. Must be the recent news experience that's done it when you have no choice but to multi-task and keep all plates spinning.

Thoughts are turning to tonight's events. I'm off in toe with a few friends to see tango, folky, with a bit of electro throbbing in - The Gotan Project.

The pleasure's in lieu of a feature I'm to write for the Kilburn Times, where Peter has been kind enough to offer me space on his arts pages as and when I find something I want to write about that's going on in his patch of Londoninium.

This is one of the best bits about journalism - free entry. Especially when tickets are sold out to the public. You can gloat with glee at your privilege. It makes up for the down side, of being refused access just for being a journalist (even when you are 'off duty'). This has happened to me already, even when I've insisted I'm still in training. And I do mean it when I'm not going to spill any beans.

But it seems journalist's are doomed to be 'grasses' ad finitum.

It's true, if a scoop frisbeed it's way in my face tonight, I wouldn't turn it down. I'll admit, our noses are never far from sniffing out a potential story, so perhaps people are right to be annoyingly cautious.

The skill I am mastering currently, is how and when to keep it secret without raising accusations of liability. It goes with our territory to do anything for the sake of getting the story. And if masquerading as someone you're not works, well, we'll do it. As far as is possible anyway.

Which brings me to a note to self: Must double-underline in bold, how far we can take this when we study media law for journalists bit at college in September. Or I won't be going far as a journalist as I intend to, at all.

Seal of Approval

2006-07-27T10:42:00.000Z

I’m going to Harlow, yay. Today this is my favourite phrase.

My ‘I think I can, I know I can,’ attitude has paid off. I had to blog this.

I rang the college. It’s my third try (I know – seems like harassment, but limbo isn't a nice place to sit and I prefer to think of this behaviour as conscientious).

I got 68% so onto the interview next month.

Great feelings of relief are currently awash over me. “Well done” – the admissions person said. The course tutor is said to be a tough cookie, and most people usually get graded in the early 50’s. Not that I'm a snob regards this - I'd be happy to be one of the most people, if it was enough to get me in. But enough of the hypothetical speak. All's well that ends well.

And now onto raising the course fees.

HoldtheFrontPage

2006-07-20T13:37:00.000Z

The editor of this excellent resource for journalists that I use daily, read the blog unbeknown to me and asked to re-publish the posts below re: my week at The Sun.

My favourite tabloid agreed and so here it is: http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/funny/060714sun.shtml

I also submitted a ‘top tips’ piece for those wanting to get work experience with advice on what to do when you’re there. http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/training/060720tips.shtml

I've done enough of it to talk about it and am pleased it's going to use. I’ve made so many mistakes and picked up even more insight through making them, that it’s worthwhile if my feedback can help others that might feel as lost as I did when my first CV went out and the rejection letters started flooding in.

I still don’t know how HTFP found me. But it’s all good.

NO Comment?

2006-07-20T09:16:00.000Z

It surprises me sometimes when I receive nil comments on certain posts that I blog. I know that they have been read because of newer comments that frequently appear on earlier posts. Most recently the 'C-Word' below. Is it due to apathy? disinterest? Is it because it's easier not to have an opinion and ignore it until the person that put the initial argument forward, shuts up and goes away? (i.e. me)

Only one valued person I know shared his thoughts - in a personal email. He agreed with me (although that's not always what I seek to provoke - any response will do - a desire to spark off discussion being my aim).

While I am here though, I have to say I was heartened at the feedback in May on my 'Women in Ties,' I took part in a photoshoot for The Observer Magazine last week where we all wore black and white.

I urged the photographer to get the tie in and she said she would. Let's look out. Proof I'm still practicing my preach.

Wear Nice Knickers Please

2006-07-13T23:11:00.000Z

That’s the message included in Safe! - a new magazine published yesterday from Suffolk Police.

In an article depicting a woman sprawled on the floor with her suspenders showing, fashion editor WK Dee says: ‘For those of you intent on getting ratted this weekend, THINK…if you fall over or pass out, remember your skirt or dress may ride up. For all our sakes, please make sure you’re wearing nice pants and that you’ve recently had a bikini wax.”

Forgive my being naive but I understood that when things go wrong, the police existed to look out for us – not up our skirts.

Of course it’s not the safest thing to go out on an alcoholic bender but it happens. It's a part of our social coditioning and pople will on occasion get trashed. Forcing a pint of tap water down a friend’s throat and walking her to the night bus stop is an old scene familiar to me.

No it’s not convenient. It’s boring. But whenever I’ve been faced with it – dealing with it patiently, by seeing the person safe, is the only thing that comes to mind.

I don’t see how commenting on an inebriated person's perceived depilatory needs is thought to assist. And Mr. WK Dee ought to be given a smack.

Nil Desperandum

2006-07-13T20:33:00.000Z

Hey ho, so the test wasn’t so bad. Just me on my own with my pen in my hand and news stories to fabricate tabloid style for the purposes of high marks - yay.

Two hours of biro over-killed the wrist though. Facts were provided for pretty hefty going hard news. And there was nothing for it but to go with it. So I had ‘a cyclist left for near dead,’ in a ‘hit and run by two joy-riders in a red Ford Escort, while he competed in a 4 mile race.

In the second story: ‘Fourteen elderly people were evacuated from their residential home.’ It went on to explain how ‘an ‘elderly lady collapsed and was rushed to hospital,’ when fire fighters were called to the scene to ‘pump water from a flood in Westbourne at midnight, after gale and heavy rain caused a river to flood the town centre.’

Phew, cliché upon cliché – my brain’s thesaurus was clearly running on empty today. But I’m trusting they credit structure over lack of creative vocab when under pressure.

I haven’t taken an exam in 3 years and rarely write more than 700 words with a pen these days before turning to my keyboard. And I miss it, so scribbling on deadline never felt so good. Illegible may be – and this is where short hand comes in. Am intrigued, when we do short hand, will our entire paper be written in cryptic dashes and swirls?

On my way home I didn’t go back the way I came and got lost for an hour, walking through the park, round 3 different roundabouts and across various dual carriage ways. All of this in aid of a coffee. But perhaps my error was a significant bit of subconscious judgement.

The de-tour led me to the town centre to Gregg’s the bakery. The woman in there gave me a loyalty card and told me if I buy 6 cups of tea I get the 7th one free. I never go to Greggs in London. So I smiled a hopeful smile that i’d be coming back to this branch in September.

I’m safe-keeping the card as a symbolic reminder – to keep the faith and trust Harlow will pick me to be on their course please please..! And then I’ll buy my morning coffee from Greggs, Harlow each and every day. That’s the bargain.

ps. Nil desperandum was messaged to me in an email today, courtesy of a former 'colleage' at one of my recent placements. It was just the impetus I needed as I left the house for the station this morning.

The 'If You've got what it takes' detector TEST

2006-07-11T14:45:00.000Z

Following a week’s sabbatical from news and a weekend sleeping in a field, I’m back on TV, on radio and online.

This panic-induced news overload has come about in light of my entrance exam this week, for the Journalism school at Harlow college in September.

After all my work placements, this is the necessary gap in my lack of formal training that needs to be filled. We look at current affairs, politics, media law and shorthand in 19 weeks. Intense but impatience means I'm ready for this squeeze over the one-year stretch instead.

The test covers the following:
English test – CHECK
News-writing exercise – CHECK
Current affairs and general knowledge – THIS IS THE BIT I’M FRANTIC ABOUT…

I know it’s down to the student how far you get on in life, but we’re talking the ‘Oxford’ of Journalism training at Harlow – the prospectus states that Piers Morgan, Steve Lamacq and Richard Madeley are all former students. I don’t know about successful women journalists that have emerged. But you can guess I’ll be asking to know when I get the train out of London on Thursday.

First things first though, I simply MUST, I must, I must pass the test.

Gay's the Word

2006-07-11T09:25:00.000Z

‘You’re so gay…that’s so gay…I’m being so gay.’

Who’s heard this before?

I’ve just got back from a weekend of camping for a friend’s birthday. Amongst our adventures, I’ve returned with insect bites, bruises from fairground rides, and discovery of new turns of phrase in the English language.

So what’s this one all about? It’s clearly not gay = homosexual. Poof may be – let’s see…

It turns out it’s a North London thing. I've lived here three years and escaped it for the entire duration to date, and so not convinced by that.

Now before anyone thinks I’m pre-menstrual or feeling extra touchy this week I’m not. I heard these uttered on several occasions and was left unmoved every time. I wasn’t going to make a fuss. I tend to make my choices on when it is appropriate to be pedantic on a case by case basis. And here I wasn’t bothered.

But the birthday girl finally had to dispute it…‘It’s as bad at the N-word that’s offensive towards black people…why do you say it?...would you say it if you had a gay friend in the room?’ Her boyfriend swiftly agreed. I quietly did too. But again didn’t feel a strong urge to argue. I was on holiday and probably wouldn’t see this person again.

But every time it was spoken thenceforth we had alarm bells ringing round and the person who had said it, was forced to defend herself again.

We were told it doesn’t mean ‘gay as in homo/queer,’ as suspected. Its post-modern meaning is ‘lame,’ or ‘stupid.’

Pretty crass I’d say so won’t be using it myself.

The C-word

2006-07-10T21:50:00.000Z

I’ve had it with the C-word and women that use it.

Just last weekend two women, with whom I feel especially close, used it more than once over a period of three days. Not as an explicit insult, but as a casual bit of name calling towards male friends. I couldn’t help but wince.

I didn’t say anything because the timing was wrong. I did used to ask people not to use it in my presence in the past. But, since it’s used so much more frequently than it used to be, I had a word with myself at the start of the year to loosen up and finally accept it. I tried to become immune, free expression is no offence and all that – I decided there were probably more important things to get upset and do something about.

But my patience has been overruled and I’ve had enough. I’m going back to my old ways. I don’t like hearing the C-word being used as a term of abuse. And lets face it, that’s the usual context within which it is. I’m also against other words some women are choosing to ‘reclaim’: bitch, ho, slut and the rest. I don’t understand the idea that women believe it a feminist action to reclaim these words for themselves as ironic. It doesn’t work.

No woman would dream of talking about having thrush in her cunt would she? It would be unthinkable. It’s too ugly a word, too disgusting and taboo a word that refers to her own sex. So why do women contribute to the misogyny that goes with it when they use it in jest? Think about why you're using it and stop it will you?

I’ll admit it’s no fun being called one. And I have been in the past – not surprisingly in the current climate – it was yelled at me by an angry woman - and it hurt.

Cunt is not a word I am afraid of saying. But I’m not being ironic when I use it. It stands for itself and I do not use it for effect or to be political. It’s a sacred term for a sacred part of a woman’s body and warrants respect and respectful company. It’s not unmentionable for me, but hard and beautiful: cunt cunt cunt – there. I enjoy how it sounds and feels to speak it , tongue against teeth, in my mouth. This may sound unconventional and unusual of me but there you go. No harm done.

It’s only because the women that used it last week were my friends that I kept my high esteem of them – that, and the fact that they were not addressing me. Any other woman would have lost my attention immediately. And I’m saying this without apology. It’s a situation that angers me too much.

I don’t care how uptight and PC anyone thinks I am. I know I am not. I don’t want to hear it. And I plan on spreading the word in my circle of company as and when if ever they use it again. Someone’s got to raise alarm and it’s going to be me again.

If they’re wise women and men, (and I know they are), they’ll have a think about it and will understand what it means to be casual about something that we as women really can’t afford to be.

Postscript:
I met author and journalist Kira Cochrane when I interviewed her for Dazed & Confused last November. I’ve since kept an eye out for her articles and have quickly become an ardent admirer of her ideas and voice. Cochrane wrote a superb article on the cruel usage of the C-word in the New Statesman last May: http://www.newstatesman.com/nssubsfilter.php3?newTemplate=NSArticle_NS&newDisplayURN=200605290017
She was appointed Women’s editor of the Guardian earlier this year.

Colours Test

2006-07-10T13:00:00.000Z

I'm consistently on the look out for writer's block type aids. This is pretty good fun - for a couple of minutes and then you're bored. But it often does the job when that's just the length of distraction you need to get back to the scrawling board.

Red Lights

2006-07-03T12:25:00.000Z

A friend went to Amsterdam recently and thought I might have followed her.

I Love You, but I'm not in love with you

2006-07-03T11:07:00.000Z

A copy of this book landed at mine today - a seven step help book on saving your relationship.

The press release states that one in four people who approached relationship counselling charity Relate in the past 2 years reported what’s come to be the book’s title. That said, these people were still having sex with their partners, depite increasingly loving them in the way they would a friend or sibling. The opposite of this would be what a friend of mine calls 'bed death' - when the reason a relationship turns into friendship is because there's no longer any action at bedtime.

A flick through reveals itself to be an accessible and speedy read and it’s said that to take the advice, couples will emerge with a better understanding of themselves, each other, and a stronger bond. Promising stuff and I'm interested - is this strange of me?

Marital therapist and author, Andrew G. Marshall says, ‘the most common question people ask when they hear about my work is “is it really possible to fall back in love?” My answer is always an emphatic yes.’

I don’t have a use for it so don’t know how qualified I am to review it. And it feel’s an uncomfortable thing to save for the dismal day I might need it.

I feel I should pass it on. Then it strikes me how awful it sounds for me even to think like this. Indispensable as it seems, it’s not the kind of present you’d probably want to open in front of a group of friends.

So at the risk of advertising, it’ll be in shops from July 13. I reckon a bit more of a read for general knowledge and mine’s going in long term hibernation in the hope I never have to see it again.

Unless it sheds light on understanding what being 'in love' is - now that would be useful since none of us can ever seem to put a finger on what it is when we are.

Enfield Town

2006-06-30T20:12:00.000Z

I hadn’t been before the Gazette offered me a week there.

Enfield is a funny Town. Far enough not to be London anymore, there’s a really strong feeling it’s not London. When you get off the train it’s evident London is long gone. I like that feeling. The office is hectic just as I like and unusually not in the middle of nowhere (see Yorkshire Post, Kilburn Times, the Indy and pretty much The Sun – not that it matters much at the latter since they bring everything you might need to you by installing it in the building).

But back to Enfield. On the high street, people are friendly and take time to throw you a smile. It’s enough to jolt you off guard a minute. Why are we so rude in London? Is it because there are too many of us constantly falling over each other: on the tube, on the detested routemeister, in shops, queuing for the Evening Standard…No wonder then that we ignore each other and interact with strangers as little as possible.

Homeward bound and the big smoke smacks me in the face at Liverpool street. Everyone that’s shovling through arms and bags trying to get on the train I’ve just got off, has that frazzled-too-much-of-London look. That’s usually me too.

But actually getting the hell out of here for the day makes me look forward to coming back, if only to disappear anonymously into the claustraphobic crowd. I’m unaffected by it for a change.

Love it or loathe it, you can't ignore it

2006-06-30T19:47:00.000Z

I left The Sun knowing friends would be intrigued to hear about it. Most of them had views on what it would be like. None of them got near thinking correct. As a journalist whose job it is to report facts and dispel myths, I say: "I was there – you weren't so I’ll tell you what I saw."

I have converted from dubious to curious and am unashamed at having acquired the most salacious of tastes for it’s prose. But let me tell you why.

In previous times, I thought all that punchy prose would be jarring to a fragile brain during the morning rush hour. Now I realise its easy-to-read style perks the snoozing cells into gear. Despite popular dismissal as it being lazy, celebrity-stuffed froth the fact is that The Sun is a ‘news’ paper in the traditional sense. It gives you the whowhatwhenwherewhy and how, hard and fast so you finish it quickly. This is essential. When news exists, it is fresher than a pint of milk, but goes off twice as fast. No point in writing stories so long the public is reading about what’s gone on - on their way home is there? They might as well wait til tomorrow's paper.

RE: me, the workload was slim but with enough going on, just watching and listening revealed itself to be the best form of learning. The talk that fluttered livelily in pockets around the office was most entertaining and educational in itself. I wrote a few bits - two made it in print without bylines but the second was hardly edited, so confidence spurring.

Most significantly I saw the best balance of the sexes amongst the staff, of all five placements I’ve worked on since January. Yes – believe. I didn’t smell a whiff of sexism and the team are the most charming people you could meet, which make up for my lack of activity. Their smiles surprise me given gruelling schedules on probably one of the toughest papers in the industry. Pressure never leaves the air but everyone seems to keep their cool. And forget what you've read about journalists being drunks, this red top has a hard working ethic throughout.

But it’s fun too. The quietest afternoon I had came on weds June 14. TV screens that usually feature news programmes and Prime Minister’s questions flashed in unison as England played Trinidad & Tobago.

Footie fever had hit the workplace and red and white flags were handed round.

Think Tabloid

2006-06-13T21:32:00.000Z

If 'd' were 'g' you'd have a laugh too wouldn't you?

Red Top Tour

2006-06-12T23:15:00.000Z

The Sun resides in Wapping. Tucked away is the only accurate way to describe it nestled bang in the middle of residential estates, beyond the tobacco dock, with the river a stones throw away.
Safety measures are tight with cameras everywhere, but your pass will get you anywhere. Through the revolving doors, and you enter not just a newspaper office but an entire complex. First, a park with benches and shady trees, then the entrance of the building sees escalators bedecked by fountains. An electronic sign greets you at the top with ‘News International wishes staff and visitors a safe and happy day.’

A lift to the top floor, along corridors wallpapered with miscellaneous front page scoops and then “Stand tall you are entering Sun country,” as quoted by a former editor of the paper from the 1970’s adorns the door to the air-conditioned editorial team.

It is an unwritten rule that tabloid journalists dress better than those on broadsheets. If scant observation of what's here is anything to go by, this is true. No other office could be tidier either.
Everyone is working on something, busy busy, and getting it all done. The red suffused interior is apparently what keeps them thriving. Carpet, chairs, balloons and filing cabinets – all blood coloured scarlet. Glass cabinets flank the sides of vacant wall space containing Sun memorabilia – Headline splashed T-shirts, mugs et al.

There is a restaurant (not canteen) and consumables are purchased with your security card passport which you can top up with cash by machines. Short on cash? There are cash points. Barnet a mess? A hair salon is nearby. Need something picked up from the ground floor? Messenger boys sit poised at the ready. Will all staff conformts catered for, there's clearly no need to rush off at home. What's not to like?

Tongue in cheek and satire reign here. If life could smirk at you in the face of stress this is what it might look like. And just in case you manage to make the mistake of taking things all a bit too seriously, a giant cow, papier mache’d with yet more red-top splashes stands adjacent to the news desk with it’s tail held high.

The Sun

2006-06-11T19:53:00.000Z

Persistence got me a week’s work experience at the UK’s biggest selling daily. A fortnight ago when they confirmed dates, I put down the phone and dashed around the flat on an adrenal overdrive of excitement and terror. The latter for fear I would louse it up once there.

I’ve not been a particularly avid Sun reader in the past. I didn’t grow up with it in the house. This has obviously transformed of late, where I’ve been studying it in the manner I do with all publications before I enter their offices.

I've been lucky to have got a 'yes.' In light of this, it's worth mentioning the cross-section of attitudes that I have experienced from news reporters on papers throughout the country. I’ve found local and tabloid staff to be the most willing and supportive towards me as an apprentice. This is a gross generalisation of course and I am not suggesting it's a true thing everywhere you go, but it is telling given the fact that the world of tabloids is probably the toughest in which to thrive. It’s certainly the most challenging style in which to write. Anyone who thinks it’s easy hasn’t tried.

Another thing, is that almost all non-readers of the paper with whom I spoke about my placement told me they hate it and find its worthiness as a paper questionable. Ignorant opinions never cease to amaze me.

The paper has not suddenly turned into my reading of choice above all else, but having familiarised myself with its style, I've acquired an appetite for it's emotive punchy prose. The truth is, that beyond the 'froth' (which has its place too) exists much hard news which makes for an authoritative newspaper.

There is no discussion on my attitude towards Page 3 here today because I don't have one. Work experience and training is what I am after, and the news is what interests me. Any argument towards the topless page would be futile and arbitrary in my view. And anyone that seeks to question my credibility as a feminist is welcome to challenge me.

I still am.