Friday 28 June 2013

Guests comes to class, hilarity ensues...

I love the phrase "hilarity ensues". I think I picked it up back when I was reading blogs like Tucker Max, which, although hilarious and entertaining, is not for the easily offended. Or for people who get offended at all really.

But seriously, "hilarity ensues" is pretty much my life story. I open my mouth, hilarity ensues. I have a "bright" idea, hilarity ensues. Which is great really, because it means I always have something to laugh about.

Today we had a guest speaker come to our journalism class to talk about diversity. A lovely Muslim lady who was really helpful and interesting and genuine and I really can't say enough positive things about her.

Anyway, at some point I asked about Muslim views on gay marriage, to which she replied that sodomy was forbidden.

I had a rough idea of what sodomy was, but, unthinkingly, asked for clarification. Had you been there, you would have witnessed my whole class mentally facepalming.

To her credit, she answered honestly and calmly and moved on.

Our second guest speaker, the lovely Taryn, was also fantastically brilliant, and was very informative, inspirational and helpful.

The experiences she shared made a real impact on me as to how important it is to establish a relationship with your sources and to treat them with respect and most of all, to cherish the honour of telling their story.

She told us that this year, while we're still learning, we should do as many stories as we can about things that interest us. Which got me thinking about what I am interested in that I could do stories on.

The first answer that came to mind was "nothing". And then I looked back over my past few stories, which were about things like birds and cafes, and I realised that I'm actually interested in everything.

Previously, I hadn't been interested in pursuing journalism as a long term career. But after hearing Taryn talk about the privilege of telling people's stories and being reminded that, really, journalism is about people (apart from the odd bird) and people are what I'm interested in, I'm seriously considering it.

Don't tell anyone, but maybe I DO like journalism after all...

So, in short, today I became interested the Muslim faith, learned what sodomy is, and discovered a new passion for journalism.

My class also learnt that I should not be allowed to ask questions. EVER. Which may be a bit of a problem if I want to be a journalist.

Bye for now,
Love,
Jess, future journalist.


2 comments:

  1. Fantastic. Your writing style makes me happy in pants. That's happy, wearing pants. Like something being cool with knobs on.
    Rock on, girly.
    xox

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    Replies
    1. Did I ever tell you how much I freaking love you?

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