Here’s a few post-convention Dodo Bird Discoveries du jour:
Anachronism can work. The Choosing the Best Platform for Your Story workshop told us to check out the low-tech work of the Seattle Sketcher, a blog with beautiful hand-drawn paintings of Puget Sound life by Seattle Times staff artist Gabriel Campanario (http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/seattlesketcher). So I thought I’d try my hand at some sketches of AAJA Convention life.
This was an amazing moment at the Gala Scholarship & Awards Banquet when Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer Nick Ut (above top) received an AAJA Lifetime Achievement Award. During his acceptance speech, he spread his arms and showed how he saw a girl running down a road trying to tear flaming clothes from her body after a napalm attack in Vietnam. He said that he took the iconic picture, then put down his camera and tried to help Phan Thi Kim Phuc, then 9 years old.
Thank you so much to the Ford Foundation and AAJA for an incredible learning opportunity.
Above left and right, I’ve included before and after sketches of my experience at the convention. As an older print journalist, a.k.a. Digital Dinosaur, I found this convention was an invaluable, insightful and inspiring doorway to new discoveries. Thank you so much!
So folks are filtering back to homes, jobs and schools, and I have a couple more hours to spend at the RenCen before hopping a flight back to Sacramento. If you’re a little younger, like me, and leaving one of your first conventions, you might need to take a few minutes to wrap your head around…
Over the course of several days at the AAJA convention in Detroit, I attended six different workshops, reunited with old colleagues, developed new relationships, received some career advice and even found time to spend a few hours in Canada for the first time in my life.
The work that activist Helen Zia, attorney Roland Hwang, and director Christine Choy put into fighting for justice for Asian Americans inspires me.
What I learned is that director Christine Choy says you should tell the story from the start to the end. The story she thought would be five minutes long turned out to take five years to follow. A commitment needs to be taken on to tell the entire story with lots of perspectives. It is still important to share about good and important stories even in these modern days of Twitter and getting the information out as fast as you can. Getting the story out affects many people.
The times and technology in journalism may be changing but the determination and persistence that Christine Choy, Helen Zia, and Roland Hwang put into following the story should not go in vain. We need to continue to represent for their sake, for our sake, and for the future.
I was glued to the window during the flight to Detroit from Seattle. Looking down at the view, I admired the massive land below me, and the equally impressive rivers that ran through it. From the sky, cities look tiny, compared to our every day view of them from the ground.
My first trip to Detroit and I am smitten! The weather is a beautiful 81 degrees and my flight arrives 30 mins early. I disembark the airplane and as I enter baggage claim (and to my pleasant surprise!) there was a sign for AAJA convention attendees. I immediately felt the warm welcome and…
Hi folks. Theodore Kim here. The 2011 AAJA Convention in Detroit launched with a blast tonight at the Arab American National Museum in Dearborn. Our hardworking friends at AAJA Voices were there. Follow their convention coverage here.
First time at the AAJA Convention and don’t know where to start? Join us at the AAJA New Attendees mixer to mingle with other new attendees. It’s from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Wednesday, Aug. 10. Here’s a link to RSVP. For more information email memberTheodore Kim at thdkim1@yahoo.com.