Festivals and Jobs

Uh hello.
I might as well reacquaint myself with this site, seeing how it's been nearly two months. What's happened since then? A lot. And a little. I can run down the career highlights later, but needless to say, I'm still freelancing.

I've been looking up a lot of websites lately for jobs, and I figured I might as well post them onto here just to make sure I have all of them in one nice convenient list:

Job websites

Craigslist

JournalismJobs

MediaBistro

Academic Programs

University of California, Berkeley Grad School of Journalism

New York University Dept. of Journalism

Journalism resources

From the Detroit Free Press
American Society of Newspaper Editors

Poynter Institute

Asian American Journalism Association

Journalism grants and fellowhsips

Asian American Journalists Association

American Society of Newspaper Editors

Michigan State University links

A list to come about some of the festivals I want to visit,
including Coachella, SFIAAFF, NoisePop, SF Sketchfest, Pitchfork festival, SXSW,
Treasure Island, Winter Music Conference...too many to name!

My first co-produced show!

Well, the focus sheet for Monday, January 14, 2008, 9AM, "Proposition 93- Term Limits" says I'm a co-producer, when really what I did was background research and pre-interviewing. But I learned a lot about local politics, and I got some folks up on the political pyramid to call in and talk. I'm expecting a spirited discussion, and can't wait to hear what Steve Westly and Kevin Spillane have to say. To have a tangible, notable contribution to something that's going to be on-air...it's kind of like having a by-line in the Guardian, small but no less important than any other contribution. I am proud to have my notes and research in the capable hands of producer Dan Zoll and guest host Rachael Myrow of The California Report. For the first time, I feel like my background work and my hours will prompt public discourse, induce conversation, which is really why I wanted to get into journalism in the first place.

Hopefully, both pundits call in on-time...

First Day at KQED...

I should preface this by noting there's a hilarious article in The Onion concerning internships...but no web version yet, I'll be sure to post it later.

I woke up at 5:30 this morning to finish some clips for the Guardian, and that was fun. I didn't get out the door until about 7, almost falling behind schedule on the first day. What a great impression that would have turned out to be.

Luckily, after maneuvering through the Mission District and some direction from an elderly garage worker, I found the KQED studios. Julia, my fellow Thursday-Friday intern, quickly familiarized me with documents and tasks. I basically followed her around like a lost sheep for the first hour.

My first uneasy moment came when Clara Jeffery, an editor from Mother Jones magazine came in to talk about gender politics and Hillary's run for the presidency. I told her that I had visited the Mother Jones office before...then let loose that I had interviewed for an internship there. Uh...awkward! Smooth, Kevin. Reeaal smooth. Mother Jones rejects end up at KQED apparently.

I was going to give a spiel about how I would be interested in applying for MJ but figured Ms. Jeffery, a stern-faced thirty-something, had more important things on her mind. I figured I had blown it with my "rejected intern" small talk.

The next meeting with guests at the 10AM hour went a little more smoothly. Jared and Susan Diamond came in, the former a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer, the latter an author and former contributor to the New Yorker and the Los Angeles Times. I managed to actually engage in small talk this time around, touching on their appearance at the Herbst Theatre the night before. They seemed like genuinely nice people, towards the elderly side, experienced and wizened to the world. They remembered my name on the way out, which was nice to hear, a graceful endnote to remember them by. I even traded contact info with Ms. Diamond so she could drop some notes of wisdom for me and my green writing skills.

From 11AM onward, producer Dan Zoll had me work on getting guests for next Monday's 9AM show, featuring proponents and opponents for Proposition 93. I did not think one proposition could sustain my attention, but I took off on the project and was still going pretty strong by 5PM, especially considering I had been up nearly 12 hours.

Background research went rather well. I'd post some links, but I'm afraid I'd start arguing both sides, getting into messy details, yadayadayada. But I'll say this: "Keep your friends close and your enemies closer" really REALLY applies to politics. Folks on each side knew their counterparts like the back of their hands. The media contacts for the Yes and No sides had ideas on the hierarchy for the opposite campaign. It was interesting to note.

The recent presidential primaries, my first day at KQED, and numerous viewings of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report clips have got me more excited about politics than at any other point in my life. I feel like politics are more riveting than sports right now in terms of drama, highlights, scorekeeping, competition...You can't take your eyes off it! Too bad these wide-open national elections only happen after an incumbent leaves, which for the presidential races, is pretty much once every eight years...

Waking up tomorrow at 6:30 again. Hopefully I can secure some guests for next week's show...

Khaled Hossieni at the Herbst

First, the pick:
Khaled Hosseini speaks at the Herbst Theatre on Thursday 12/14.

If you'll indulge me, I really feel like this is one of my better written picks. I spent a lot of time on this one (re: a few days ago) and I think the finished piece reflected the work I put into it. Granted, it was 280-words...not exactly a expose or anything. But I'll take it, especially since the Team Sleep pick was not published, for whatever reason. Oh well.

On to the actual conversation. I could not wait for KQED to rebroadcast these lectures, so I figured I would bootleg my own, mono sound and all.

Caille Millner is an editorial writer for the San Francisco Chronicle, and while her writing has garnered her accolades, I felt she forced the interview. Her introduction seemed rather dry; there was no mention of Hosseini being named Humanitarian of the Year last year by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

Moreover, with her first question, she broke one of the most important rules in interviewing: always make your subject feel comfortable. It was one of the central points in research methods and journalism courses I took, and besides that, it is common courtesy. Instead, Millner took this route:

Millner: "Now, the film version of The Kite Runner opens tomorrow. And there's been great controversy over the film..."

Hosseini: (inaudible)
I think he says something to the effect of "Oh, that's how we're going to start."

(Audience laughter)

Millner: "That's how we're going to start. Particularly...(inaudible)...concerning this one scene that relates to the rape of Hassan...(inauduble...might have been "one of the characters in the film")...What do you think about this?"

Yeah, the recording's kind of bad, but the point is that Millner immediately leaps to the question of the rape scene in Hosseini's The Kite Runner and the controversy over its film portrayal. I understand Millner's approach, which is that she's trying to ask a germane question. This is an important question here, and one where Hosseini could provide a lot of insight, but it also holds deep emotional and social ramifications here. Professors always taught me with interviews that you must establish a rapport with a respondent, that you have to establish some sort of trust. Once trust (or some sort of quasi-relationship) is established, then the hard-hitting questions can come out. To throw the the very big concept of rape out there not only complicates the interview from the beginning, it tarnishes any chance of establishing rapport. Even Hosseini acknowledged the awkwardness of the opening with his light-hearted interjection that got the audience chuckling.

I cannot quite make out all of Hosseini's response, but he answered the question thoroughly and emphasized that the "kids were never hurt" in the scene, that the portrayal was just a portrayal, that the actors involved are safe. The question still set an uneasy tone for the conversation that never really subsided.

If I had to do the interview, I would have asked about his childhood in Kabul, how he got into writing (an audience member asked him this later), and what immigrating to the US was like. Get him talking, then ask more thematic related inquires about his work, his books, his characters, etc.

I got to ask my question:

"First off I would like to thank you for coming in. As a young writer I was hoping to gleam some more advice. You mentioned earlier about writing based upon your experiences. You can't write in a vaccuum. You have to be grounded in your own reality. I was hoping if you could give some further advice, perhaps on how you get through writer's block, how you develop your characters...how does writing come to you?"

(?) = inaudible or indecipherable

Hosseini: "For me it's always been a process of trial and error, of testing things, of the fact that when I sit down to write a first draft, that's it's going to be a miserable failure. And you have to accept that it's a necessary failure, because it will lead somewhere. And that I have to put down all these other tasks until (?)...and not be discouraged by the fact that 1700-pages of (writing?) something turns out to be a dead end. You have to accept that that is a necessary part of what it takes to build a manuscript.

You know, I meet a lot of aspiring writers now on the road. And a lot of them, well, not a lot, but many of them...it turns out that they are not really writing...(?) It kinds of goes without saying (?) but in order to be a writer, you really have to write. You have to write all the time. It's just one of...you really have to do it, especially if you're writing a novel. Once you hit that 50-page mark, it really becomes cumbersome because the romance of having started (this project?) is over. And now you're kind of in the blue collar section. You have to show up there, you have to punch in the clock, you have to sit down, and you have to do it. And just not get discouraged."

Real encouraging, haha. Basically, sit down and do it.

At the end of the discussion, I met Brenden Salmon, who is associate producer of City Arts & Lectures. He was actually the person handing out the mics for the audience participation segment, and he was a charming fellow who catered to pesky audience members like myself. It must be tough running around the theatre and coordinating question-taking with another fellow mic-person, but Brenden did a good job.

Now to research picks for the next couple of weeks...

For a limited time only!

I'm on the San Francisco Jazz Festival website! My preview on Chava Alberstein has been quoted. I feel awesome. I'm looking forward to the show tonight.

On another note, I erased half of my notes from the Treasure Island Music Festival. No more bootlegged recordings of Thievery Corporation, Gotan Project, DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist. No more interviews with Thievery or Au Revoir Simone. ARRRRRGGGGH. Must learn how to use recorders correctly. Truly frustrating seeing as I had two of my first interviews with musical acts ever. Then, Gotan only threw down the greatest breakdown I have ever heard live on Triptico. But I'm determined to look past it and see this as an opportunity to record more great stuff. And to learn how to use digital recorders.

More apps finished last night after skipping out on the Prefuse 73 show...which sounded like it would be an awesome show, based on the cuts I've heard...I need to start thinking long-term here, especially since I've renewed my look towards a journalistic job...

Why Why Why

Some Guardian clips:

Israeli singer Chava Alberstein performs at the Herbst.

I get 1/5 of the RZA pick.

I just sent it my weekly picks for the Guardian for the week of December 12-18. One is a regular 100-worder for Sunday the 16th for a band named Team Sleep. The other is a 250-word whopper (well, I submitted 280! D'oh!) on writer and advocate Khaled Hosseini. He wrote The Kite Runner and most recently A Thousand Splendid Suns. I got assigned the piece at about 4:30 yesterday. I read the e-mail sometime around 5:45. I bought the book at 6, read for about 40 minutes, ate dinner, read for an hour and a half, went home, dawdled for a couple of hours, then spent 11:30-3:30 finishing the novel. The book was really good. How good? Well, you'll have to read the pick for yourself, next Wednesday. The point is, for the last 14 hours, except for sleep between 7-10AM, I have either been:

1) reading A Thousand Sleeping Suns
2) listening to Team Sleep on YouTube or Myspace
3) writing about Team Sleep
4) writing about Khaled Hosseini.

I really love how writing comes (or doesn't come) together in some weird late night session, but I really hate how it makes me feel afterwards.

Back into the swing of things...

It's been a long time coming, and rather than type out a lot of the updates going on, I've written them down. I like the texture of writing, the tangibility of pen in hand, ink on paper. There is so much going on with blogs and design and animation which is stunning and amazing in its own right. But transcribing text electronically still doesn't beat writing by hand.

What's been going on?
San Francisco Bay Guardian picks last week:

Frank McCourt at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco.

Eric Schlosser at the Herbst Theatre, benefiting 526 Valencia.

Frank McCourt proved a sharp and witty mind, slightly sarcastic, outspoken, upfront. Teaching kids in inner-city New York would probably drag down even the cheeriest of souls, but McCourt managed to hang in there for 20 years. He was personable throughout the interview and the book signing, undoubtedly a practiced hand at these sorts of events. His advice to young writers? "Scribble." McCourt apparently used his own scrawled notes over a number of journals for the source material of many of his works, most notably Angela's Ashes. The tangibility and maneuverability of ink prevails over the clunkiness of electronics!

Eric Schlosser impressed me not only through his work and credentials, but more so through his demeanor. Erudite and opinionated, yet soft-spoken and self-effacing, Schlosser represented a lot of what I hope to be, both career- and person-wise. Former UC Berkeley Dean of Journalism Orville Schell mediated, an excellent choice for the conversation. Schell has his own journalistically-loaded CV, and you could tell the two had a great deal of respect for each other. One of the highlights of the program took place when Schlosser turned the tables on Schell and began asking him questions, turning the program into an organic discussion, a meeting of minds. I could go on and on and on, but I would simply sprawl into next week with my material. I will say this - I got the last audience question for the night: "What advice do you have for young readers? And if both of you could address the question... (I also whimpered "thanks" as the micperson started backing away from me)"

Both Schlosser and Schell converged in their advice: Be passionate about what you do. It was great to see them address me directly, despite me being locked in the corner seat of the balcony way high up. Something clicked in the way both distinguished men addressed me; whether these are self-made delusions of grandeur remain to be seen. I am interested to hear the dialogue when it comes out.

Anyway, 3 AM as I typed this, but I needed to start typing on this lovely blog again. The fuel for keeping me going?

This group from Japan called Soil & "Pimp" Sessions has a
jam session on DJ and music aficionado Gilles Peterson's website. I really cannot stop listening to this stuff. "Aggressive alternative jazz" is what the band's MySpace says; I suppose that's as good a summary as any.

An excerpt from Jon Stewart on "Bill Moyers Journal"


I discovered this as an audio podcast on iTunes...and am glad I found it on video. This is the part where Stewart and Moyers discuss Stewart's interview of Senator John McCain (R-Ariz), really insightful in regards to the conservative ideological agenda. Look for Moyers' slip up at 6:09...particularly telling. I'd recommend the full audio podcast (or viewing it on YouTube) for a stirring conversation on politics and proof on how lucid and intelligent the "Daily Show" anchor really is.

And of course, a little humor in
Conan and Chuck Norris

"...that make me stupid...and you a whore." Classic! Thanks to Sofie for the heads up...