A Silent Rage

When I first met my dear Jewish friend, Riva Finkelstein, I felt uncomfortable talking to her on the Israeli/Palestinian struggle. I mean, how would I as an Arab and Muslim, tell a Jew that I’m crammed with great deal of sympathy for the Palestinians. I’m sure she had some things she wanted to tell me, but never really knew how to. I can imagine she had millions of questions wandering around her head about Palestinians or Muslims, but are too controversial to be set free.

But somehow, this urge to find out about the other side pushed us to finally talk about it. Frequently and sometimes endlessly, we talked about things like, who started it all, who’s killing more, the best solutions for both sides, and many other things, things that I never considered before. And for the first time I’m genuinely exposed to the ‘other’.

Such beautiful conversations made me realize that we need to talk. We, Arabs and Jews, need to have some kind of communication. But I’m sure many students in Canada just don’t have the means to do so. Or maybe they don’t want to. I wanted to know if Arabs and Jews on campuses talk. If they ignore each other, or maybe if they even fight, or are they just not interested in the whole thing at all.

The other day, I received a facebook event invitation to attend “Break the Silence: End the Siege”, a rally against Israeli Apartheid, calling for an end to the Israeli siege on Gaza.

On Monday, February 9th, 2008, under the freezing rain, hundreds of people gathered in front of the Israeli Consulate, at 180 Bloor Street West, Toronto. There I met Hammam Farah, a Palestinian from Gaza, who came to Canada five years ago, and since then hasn’t been able to visit home and see his family. I asked him if he would be interested in being interviewed for a feature story on communication between Arabs and Jews, he totally welcomed it. Actually, everyone I asked for an interview that day welcomed it, maybe because my name is Arabic, or maybe they needed media exposure, especially that the event didn’t receive media’s attention.

Few days later, Riva invited me to attend a “Rally for Sderot”, calling for an end of Hamas rocket attacks on Sderot, in southern Israel. The rally took place at the Sheraton Hotel in Downtown Toronto, and there I met many people who also welcomed my request for an interview, including the guest speaker, Prof. Alan Dershowitz, a notable writer on civil liberties in the United States. Although I considered it a great honor to have Prof. Dershowitz in my feature, I ended up not interviewing him. I just wanted to talk to students. I wanted to know if they are trying to communicate with Palestinians and Arabs, and if not, why? So I started calling people in Hillel of Greater Toronto (a Jewish student group), and I finally met with Jonathan Vandersluis, a former president of Hillel at Ryerson.

After several interviews with other students and few professors, I came up with the following opinion. It could be wrong, and if you think so, please feel free to leave a comment. But some Arab and Jewish students are quite sensitive towards discussions on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Although each group longs to engage in some sort of debate with the other, they don’t seem to exert great efforts in doing so. You know why? Because they think it wouldn’t work out. Previous experiments taught them that communicating with the ‘other’ only escalates the tension. Past discussions ended with failure than success.

However, communication between Arab and Jewish students can be successful, and the proof is OneVoice Movement, a student group uniting Jewish and Arab students in Ottawa. The reason for their success according to Joel Tietolman, a co-president, is going into such discussions knowing that everyone may not necessarily agree with each other in all the aspects, but truly listening to one another is what makes it work.

Take alook at a feature story on communication between Arab and Jewish students in Toronto.

Cultural Cravings

Customers satisfied with their visit to Greek House

One customer spent $90 on cheese! Another was a woman who was visiting from Halifax and wanted to buy meat to take back home with her. I didn’t understand exactly what she was saying in Greek, but she argued with her daughter who kept telling her that the meat would go bad. This passionate dialogue went on for awhile. The store owner even got involved. But this drama didn’t seem unusual for this store, Greek House, which experiences daily laughs and drama about…food.

When I set out to write a feature about food and the immigrant experience I wasn’t sure where to begin. How could such a big topic, that could potentially include people from all over the world, be covered in a five minute slideshow? Toronto is a city full of ethnic neighborhoods and food choices. Whose story was I going to tell?

So I drew up a storyboard with contacts I thought would make interesting interviews. But when my interviewees were not getting back to me to confirm interview dates, I decided to leave my story recipe at home, and take my curiosity about people and food to the streets.

I went to Toronto’s Greektown, around Danforth and Pape Ave. I am new to Toronto myself, and I really wanted check the area out. This was the perfect opportunity to satisfy my own cultural cravings. When I got there, I walked into Greek House, a speciality food store that sells food imports from Greece, including cheese. It looked like it would be a good start. To my luck, it ended up being more.

Almost every single person that walked in spoke Greek. They spoke to the store’s owner like they were old friends. Another co-owner waved to all the pedestrians in the streets. Everyone who walked in bought food. Most of them were Greek immigrants themselves, who had raised their children here in Canada. Sometimes people came in alone, sometimes in pairs. But there was constant action. I didn’t know a food store could have so much live drama – and it was this live energy, passion and charisma that I wanted to capture for my story.

One customer traveled all the way from Buffalo, New York. It was a routine trip for her and her husband to buy pies that reminded her of her mother’s cooking back home when she was growing up in Greece. As she described the pie’s ingredients to me, I heard more than just its flavors; I heard her passion, history, and cultural pride.

“Opa!” I now had more that just a great start for my feature story. I had the most important ingredient of all: motivation. What I had seen that day in Greek House, were the reasons why someone might take a cooking class, decide to eat only organic meat, or plant seeds in a community garden to harvest vegetables from their home country.

What I captured that day was the energy behind our basic connections with food, as varied as the individual experiences might be.

PLAY STORY

A ‘creative license’? Where do you buy that?

This image is not of the housing discussed in this article. Feel cheated?

Finally, I thought. I’m in business.

An elderly woman slumped in a wheelchair muttered as she rolled up to a large glass entryway through a path of gray slush and snow. The apartment complex I wanted to gain access to. I had been waiting outside this rambling structure for only five minutes, but it was cold, around minus thirty, and I could hear a crackling sound of my nose hairs freezing as I breathed. I wanted in.

I smiled at her and nervously attempted to make small talk about how Toronto is inhospitable to life in the winter. She grunted, thrusting her worn electronic keycard towards the keypad beside the door and after a muted beep, it mechanically jutted open. I stepped in.

I was at once greeted by a large sign above the elevator that read: No Trespassing: trespassers will be prosecuted. No Loitering. I felt my camera turn to lead on the strap around my neck. What was I doing?

I thought of the many interviews, emails and telephone conversations with various sources that all told me the same thing: that this was the location of the housing used by an immigration agency for its clients. According to sources the apartments were overcrowded, “they pack three single people into one room”, dirty, “the situation of that place is so disgusting that it should be shut down”, and that the immigrants who stayed there had just arrived in Canada, “didn’t know the system” and were scared to complain. One source who previously lived in the housing explained to me that although he was “really pissed off” he “never complained to anyone about anything. Nobody wants to rock the boat.”

Now that I was here I looked for signs of decay. No cockroaches. No peeling paint. Perhaps there had since been renovations? After all, it had been years since my sources had lived in these residences.

I walked up to the elevator and waited as it descended. I checked out every floor. I took photos of the hallways. I peered out the windows into the bleak parking areas and entryways. But I didn’t find what I was looking for. I couldn’t be sure if what I was looking for still existed.

I didn’t find the old common room that I was told contained computers and other resources for job-seeking immigrants to use. I had no access to anyone currently staying in the apartments. I wasn’t too sure how well I would be received knocking on doors.

I felt I stretched my ‘creative license’ when I paired the photos with audio descriptions of the apartments. I wrote a disclaimer in my article alerting my reader to the possibility that the photos may not be of the same building discussed in the audio and text.

The experience got me thinking: How far can a journalist travel on ‘creative license’ and where will it eventually take you?

Reporting on observations

It's always interesting trying to do a good reporting job on something you've observed in passing over a long period of time.

For several years, I've observed the science and technology intellectuals I know from the U.S. become increasingly disillusioned with the Bush administration. More and more, I heard them say, "If Bush gets re-elected" or "If the next president is Republican, I'll immigrate to Canada."

Right now, sitting in my living room, I have several guests who fall into this category. Mike was just offered a $100,000 job in the U.S. with a house and a car. It was in Virginia, and in fact he's had several offers. He says, "I keep on turning them down, because of the politics in America."

Amanda and her partner Sue immigrated to Canada recently because of the political situation in the U.S. The friendly laws and policies towards same-sex couples in Canada were part of that, but other legal trends in the U.S. also played a role. All three are highly paid computer professionals.

I personally have U.S. citizenship, and miss Boston sorely, but my concerns about trends in U.S. politics and policy give me a great deal of pause. For the time being, I'm staying here in Canada; who knows what will happen when I graduate.

Only Holly, a Washington, D.C. editor who is visiting her boyfriend in Toronto, says that the U.S. politics are not having any effect on her willingness to move here, "And I'm pretty liberal too," she says.

But these are me and my friends. It's not exactly a random sampling of highly educated professionals. To write a journalistic piece about this, I had to go out and find out if my observations had any validity in them. My observations and convictions that this is a story worth telling were certainly not enough.

In case those who have read and watched my story Brain Gain: Canada's Science Boom are wondering, I didn't shop around for scientists who were upset with the current U.S. administration. I did meet Mary Mangan at the Union for Concerned Scientists reception at the American Association for the Advancement of Science's annual meeting. But Belinda Chang and Aaron Wheeler are just the two scientists who responded to my request for interviews first. And both expressed grave concerns about U.S. science policy.

On the Canadian funding side of things, even I was surprised by what I found. I'd had the impression for a few years that things were getting better for Canadian research. But the amount of money that is being invested in research was far more than even I had imagined.

I'm sure there are people who will watch my slideshows and be appalled by the amount of funds being invested in science.

I don't get that, but I imagine that they don't get why I think investment in science and technology is so important. I guess it takes all kinds.

Keep on Laughing

Penis jokes, your father hitting on your girlfriend and ending up in a police lineup. Not my typical topics of conversation for a Saturday night, but on March 15th not only was it typical of the conversation, it was the norm.

I was at The Most Races Show On Earth! The night featured eight different comedians from eight different ethnic backgrounds. Stereotypical jokes were being thrown around like nobody’s business. Comedian John Ki’s Korean background opened the door for a penis joke, Daniel Tirado’s Peruvian father led him to comically explain how his suave dad would inadvertently hit on every girl Daniel brought home and of Jamaican background, Quinn Martin managed to tell a story of how he ended up in a police line-up with a bunch of other black people who look just like him…one person may have even been his brother! Coupled with the other five comedians and host Drew Thomas, the night proved to be an onslaught of ridiculous jokes revolving around ethnicity and race.

The event bills itself as "a culture-building endeavour designed to bring the funniest multicultural comedians together to celebrate diversity and to help fight racism through laughter. By bringing cultures together, this show aims to promote cultural understanding and awareness within our communities."




I was covering the show for my project Learning Through Laughter. My topic centered on the idea of ethnic comedy. So what better than an entire event focusing on ethnicity as the impetus for comedy? The second I heard about the show I knew this would be perfect for my project. The only obstacle in my way would be access.

I needed to be allowed to attend the event, take photos of the comedians while onstage, interview them, record audio from the show and be allowed backstage to get more photos and hang out with the performers. To be honest, I did not think it was going to happen. I figured there was no way that they would grant me all access the night of the event. Especially considering that the comedians had to perform twice that night, the last thing they would welcome was a journalism student poking around with a camera in their face before they hit the stage. Boy was I wrong.

I was given everything I needed. I started by calling organizer Ryan Jones. I left him a message and he actually called me back right away. Note to everyone else in the world, calling back journalists is really nice, it actually allows us to do our work. A novel thought, I know, but you should try it some time. From there on Jones provided me with all the access I mentioned above. I thought the comedians might still have been a little weary, but I was wrong.
They were welcoming, allowed me to take all the pictures I wanted, wherever I wanted, whenever I wanted. They granted me interviews and didn’t mind me hanging out backstage with them.

I’m not naïve, I realize that the comedians have something to gain from free press. But, I promised nothing to any individual person. Not one comedian was told they would end up being a final part of my project. Yet, all the comedians were welcoming, kind and actually took the time to chat with me. This allowed me to collect all the materials needed to put together my feature. Without the access I would have had nothing.

I am currently working on an article for my magazine class and am running into numerous people who cannot comment, don’t want to comment or can’t be bothered to comment. It makes it difficult to put together a compelling story when the main players don’t want to give you access. I am not saying that I want anything handed to me, but if someone absolutely refuses to talk to you or give you access it eliminates them from being a part of your piece.

Throughout my time as a student journalist I have been lucky. With hard work, overall, I have been able to get the sources I need and the access necessary for my work. But, I have heard many classmates complain about the lack of cooperation they receive while working on a story because they are students.

So thank you to everyone involved with The Most Races Show On Earth! for providing me the access I needed to put together a quality feature…and for a few laughs while doing it.

(S)talking City Hall

When I tell people that one of my favourite beats as a journalist is city hall, I usually get the same response: "Why?"

Most of my classmates can't understand how I could possibly enjoy schlepping to 100 Queen St. West for a council meeting or nagging councillors for an interview on a regular basis.

But I love it. I really do.

That's how I ended up profiling immigrant city councillors for my feature called The (long) road to city hall.

I wanted to explore how people can make the transition from being a completely new resident to a representative of the people.

And in order to do so, I had to make more than a few trips to one of my favourite places in Toronto (pictured).

My love of municipal politics began in February 2006 when I got a job at a community newspaper in Kingston, Ontario. One of my beats (it was a small paper, so I had a few of them) was Loyalist Township council.

Loyalist Township is a predominantly rural municipality outside of Kingston. The first time I had to cover one of their council meetings, I was terrified; I knew little about reporting at the time, and even less about local politics.

How could I tell readers what council was up to if I couldn't understand it myself?

My former editor drove me to that first meeting, and I remember the pep talk he gave me along the way. He told me to follow along with the agenda, write down as much as I could, and do the interviews during the breaks to save time.

Oh, and he told me to get at least two or three stories out of it. Yeah right.

But after a while, it got easier, and before I knew it I found myself looking forward to my trips to the council chambers. I began to see that covering local politics is the heart of beat reporting -- that what most people truly care about are the issues in their communities.

Before I left my job, I tried my hand at a Kingston city council meeting, which was a significantly larger (and longer) gathering than I was used to; I loved it all the more.

Some journalists think covering city hall is boring, but not me. Whether it's a scandal involving a politician, an uproar over the latest tax hike, or a profile of some of the city's most interesting councillors, there's never a shortage of stories when it comes to local politics.

Never been inside Toronto's chambers? Here's a sneak peek:

Working on my feature project allowed me a behind-the-scenes glimpse into life as a municipal politician and gave me a better understanding of the people responsible for making major decisions in Toronto.

Covering city hall isn't easy, but it's something I want to do for a long time to come; I just hope the councillors will still be happy to see me walking into their offices twenty years from now.

Wait times

Criticizing the Canadian public health care system has become something of a national pastime. Wait times, doctor shortages, misdiagnoses and crumbling facilities have all been popular targets for the media.

But for many new Canadians, the biggest problem is even accessing the system Canadians take for granted. Not just finding a doctor, but finding one who will serve you without a health card, or in your language.

For the past two months, I've been travelling to clinics across Toronto. My goal was to learn about how immigrant women access the health services, and what sort of resources were available to help them.

I’ve been to see policy makers, researchers, and some of the frontline workers who are trying to build a more inclusive health care system.

When I started this project, I’d hoped to talk to women who were seeking health services. I wanted to tell their story, and hear about their experiences.

This was easier said than done--health care is a pretty private issue, and most women I met refused to speak on the record about their experiences.

So I adjusted my story, and decided to look at the issue from a different angle. I tracked down the service providers who are working with these women, and asked me tell me their stories.

It took me weeks to get through the door--and countless phone calls explaining who I was, and what I was trying to do. When I tried to explain that this would be recorded on tape, and that I needed to take a surprising amount of pictures, I waited even longer.

After weeks of waiting, I managed to set up my interviews. I could never anticipated how open they would be, and how much I would learn. Three different women opened up their clinic doors, and showed me what they do. But more importantly, they explained to me why they do it.

All three of them were immigrant women themselves, and all three had encountered the barriers that their clients were now facing. They talked about their experiences as service providers, but they also talked about their experiences as immigrant women, trying to adjust to a new country and a new home.

Notisha Massaquoi, the executive director of Women's Health in Women's Hands helped me to understand what drives her organization when she explained how it works: "Everyone that works here comes from one of our target populations," she said as we toured through the office.

"For our staff, 'culturally sensitive' health care isn't something that has to be taugh. It's what we do, and it starts at the bottom and filters all the way through the organization. It's not something we have to think about, it's automatic."

Each interview showed me another dimension of a healthcare system that I’d come to equate with emergency rooms and walk-in clinics. These women were showing me a different model, one where outreach and education were as important as clinical care.

Every interview generated far more audio than I could ever use, and not nearly enough photos. Paring down their complicated stories into one compact audio track was a challenge. There was so much information, and so many details.

It took at least a day--sometimes two--to turn a thirty minute interview into a two minute clip. It took weeks to assemble the final project, and I still feel like I could have done so much more.

While I know that I only introduced a very small part of a very intricate story, I'm hopeful that this online project will present a new perspective on our health care system.