SUNDAY: Exciting Day, Interviewed by Dragon and Cow

Yesterday was so exciting for me. First I met my web master, the excellent Michael who has changed the very site you’re looking at for the better and given me so many good ideas, and then two students of journalism named 龍 and 牛牛 who wanted to interview me for a journalism project. They had listened to what I think are rules number 1 and 2 in journalism: 1: Turn up on Time (they were 20 minutes early) and 2: Do Your Homework (they had researched stuff about me and asked interesting questions about Cantonese, Sichuan cooking and what not.)

Well done, young people of today!

The last “experienced” journalist who “interviewed” me for a nearby magazine turned up half an hour late, didn’t even know that I teach Cantonese, and got really angry when I remarked I didn’t think women were a special interest minority group who should have special treatment. She then proceeded to tell me all about herself for the next half an hour. When I suggested we did the rest of the interview while doing some shopping in the market seeing I had other things to do and the hour was up, she got all sniffy and called me a “dick” in a subsequent email to her editor – which that seasoned professional then forwarded to me.

Call me old-fashioned, but I think a journalist’s job is to ask questions and write down the answers, then write the story. Also, people, if you want to abuse someone in an email, don’t send the email to them! Just saying.

龍 (Long – dragon)
牛 (Au – cow)
記者 (Gei jeh – journalist)
雜誌 (jaap ji – magazine)