When I hear teachers or soldiers or ministers talk about what they do as a calling, I get it. Though the public may not believe it, journalists carry a similar sense of duty and purpose, a similar feeling of being … Read more
My mom, like most Indigenous women of her time, didn’t really value Western education. It was my dad, an Italian son of immigrants, who pushed me to go to university. He knew a diploma was a key to the middle … Read more
I never dreamed of being a journalist. I came to this profession without studying it in college, guided by my love for the written word. I had studied history at the university, and always imagined that choice would lead me … Read more
As a reporter, I have written numerous stories about people. I hope I got as many stories right as I could, but I’m sure I missed many, too. The one I most regret not capturing is a personal one. That … Read more
It’s odd that we forget people in our reporting. We’re people. Everyone around us is a person, however annoying their habits might be. People want to know about people; gossip and curiosity are some of our default settings. Yet we … Read more
I didn’t always know I wanted to be a reporter. I came at it sideways, in college, after deciding to major in creative writing. There’s no career path for writing majors, so I did what a lot of aspiring writers … Read more
My grandmother was well known for telling extraordinary tales. One in particular has stuck with me since the summer I was dispatched alone to her in Delhi. At the time I was living in Kuwait where my father had found … Read more
Two years ago, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette gave me the reporting opportunity of a lifetime—go to the Dominican Republic and Cuba to write about the dynamics of the baseball culture on each island. In … Read more
When I started out in network news, I was all about the big, lead story. There’s a sense in most newsrooms that those are the ones that are the most important, the most meaningful. I’m not a political junkie, … Read more
As a legal reporter in China for the past six years, I have spent a lot of time in courthouses. Judges almost always bar reporters from sitting in courtrooms and policemen frequently shoo us away from the … Read more