My Trip to the U.S.A./ Treasure of Baghdad's Diary
December 2, 2005
Today is my first day in America. J woke me up at 8 a.m.. I took a shower and had my first American breakfast with her. The first thing we did was we went to Harvard University Campus. “Oh my God!” I exclaimed to J. the design of the buildings looked like the ones in my Jesuit high school in Baghdad. I was veryexcited and happy to see the students, professors and visitors walking here and there. Although it was freezing but I felt so warm the moment I entered the campus.
“I am sure you want some souvenirs of Harvard, right?” asked J. “Definitely!” I replied. So we went to the Harvard book store first and I bought "The Bookseller of Kabul”. J and I had a wonderful time searching for the kinds of books we like. I love books a lot. I might learned that from my father who has a huge book collection in Baghdad. He brought most of these books when he was in England. I wished he was with me this time to see me like him. I am proud of him and I really hope that one day, I would be like him; well-educated and very smart.
I came to Boston to attend a 3-day conference on narrative writing. The conference was called Nieman Conference. The Nieman Program on Narrative Journalism currently has five major activities: organizing the1,000-journalist Nieman Conference on NarrativeJournalism, organizing a springtime seminar fornarrative editors, building a set of Web pages (notyet online) linking to current narrative articles,assembling various publications and consulting withnews organizations on developing narrative skills.
J and I took the subway to attend the conference that was held in The Boston Convention and Exhibition Center.
We left the subway to go to the Convention center. Thecityscape was amazing. I was overwhelmed by the sightof the skyscrapers. They were amazing. I used to see them only in movies but this time, they are real!
The conference was amazing. Tom Wolfe, the author of more than a dozen books, among them such contemporary classics as "The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test," "TheRight Stuff," "The Bonfire of the Vanities" and "A Manin Full.", started the conference.
Today is my first day in America. J woke me up at 8 a.m.. I took a shower and had my first American breakfast with her. The first thing we did was we went to Harvard University Campus. “Oh my God!” I exclaimed to J. the design of the buildings looked like the ones in my Jesuit high school in Baghdad. I was veryexcited and happy to see the students, professors and visitors walking here and there. Although it was freezing but I felt so warm the moment I entered the campus.
“I am sure you want some souvenirs of Harvard, right?” asked J. “Definitely!” I replied. So we went to the Harvard book store first and I bought "The Bookseller of Kabul”. J and I had a wonderful time searching for the kinds of books we like. I love books a lot. I might learned that from my father who has a huge book collection in Baghdad. He brought most of these books when he was in England. I wished he was with me this time to see me like him. I am proud of him and I really hope that one day, I would be like him; well-educated and very smart.
I came to Boston to attend a 3-day conference on narrative writing. The conference was called Nieman Conference. The Nieman Program on Narrative Journalism currently has five major activities: organizing the1,000-journalist Nieman Conference on NarrativeJournalism, organizing a springtime seminar fornarrative editors, building a set of Web pages (notyet online) linking to current narrative articles,assembling various publications and consulting withnews organizations on developing narrative skills.
J and I took the subway to attend the conference that was held in The Boston Convention and Exhibition Center.
We left the subway to go to the Convention center. Thecityscape was amazing. I was overwhelmed by the sightof the skyscrapers. They were amazing. I used to see them only in movies but this time, they are real!
The conference was amazing. Tom Wolfe, the author of more than a dozen books, among them such contemporary classics as "The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test," "TheRight Stuff," "The Bonfire of the Vanities" and "A Manin Full.", started the conference.
After that we had to choose the kind of subjects we are interested in as journalists. I am so overwhelmed by the description of events, so the first session I attended was by Jacqui Banaszynski who holds the Knight Chair in Editing at the Missouri School of Journalism and is on the visiting faculty of the Poynter Institute. She was amazing. I really liked the way she speaks and explains. In her profile I found out that She has worked as a reporter and editor for more than 30years, most recently as associate managing editor ofThe Seattle Times, where she was in charge of special projects and staff development. She spent 18 years as a beat and enterprise reporter, and then worked as aprojects editor at newspapers in the Midwest and Pacific Northwest. While at the St. Paul PioneerPress, her series "AIDS in the Heartland" -- anintimate look at the life and death of a gay farmcouple -- won the 1988 Pulitzer Prize in featurewriting and a national Distinguished Service Awardfrom the Society of Professional Journalists. She was a finalist for the 1986 Pulitzer in international reporting for coverage of the Ethiopian famine and wonthe national Associated Press Sports Editors deadline-writing contest with a story from the 1988 Summer Olympics. The pieces she has edited have alsowon many awards, including the 1997 ASNE Best Feature Writing Award, the 2003 Ernie Pyle Award for HumanInterest Writing and the Loeb Award for economicjournalism.
I wished I could spend much time with her to talk about reporting and journalism. When she finished the session, everybody stood up and clapped.
I liked this conference a lot as it makes me be among the best journalists and editors who attended to learn and to share ideas. There were journalists from allover the United States and some of them came from other countries, including me. The journalists I met were so happy to know that I came from Iraq. “Oh myGod! Really?” wondered a female journalist. “how is Baghdad?” she asked. “Burning!” I answered. She was shocked as if she is not a journalist and never heard Iraq's news.
We had a one-hour break, so J and Idecided to leave the Convention Center and spend sometime in Boston. We walked but didn’t know where to go. Finally we reached the Seacoast Hotel. It was a huge and fancy hotel.
At the lobby, we sat and ordered beer. “How do you like it, Sir?”, the waiter asked. I didn’t know what to reply until J asked him, “What do you have on draft?” I did not have any idea what did this sentence mean until she taught me its meaning and how to use it. On the way back home, I spent 5 minutes repeating the word in order not to forget it and to know how to use it next time.
I wished I could spend much time with her to talk about reporting and journalism. When she finished the session, everybody stood up and clapped.
I liked this conference a lot as it makes me be among the best journalists and editors who attended to learn and to share ideas. There were journalists from allover the United States and some of them came from other countries, including me. The journalists I met were so happy to know that I came from Iraq. “Oh myGod! Really?” wondered a female journalist. “how is Baghdad?” she asked. “Burning!” I answered. She was shocked as if she is not a journalist and never heard Iraq's news.
We had a one-hour break, so J and Idecided to leave the Convention Center and spend sometime in Boston. We walked but didn’t know where to go. Finally we reached the Seacoast Hotel. It was a huge and fancy hotel.
At the lobby, we sat and ordered beer. “How do you like it, Sir?”, the waiter asked. I didn’t know what to reply until J asked him, “What do you have on draft?” I did not have any idea what did this sentence mean until she taught me its meaning and how to use it. On the way back home, I spent 5 minutes repeating the word in order not to forget it and to know how to use it next time.
