First Week on the Job
The nightmare I'd dreaded for an entire week became my reality my first day at work: I arrived earlier than my boss, and nobody else knew who I was.
At this point, let's laugh at the irony of an American student who studies Communications suddenly becoming an intern at an Italian radio and TV station without the ability to communicate perfectly in Italian. I had no ideas what my duties would be, but I was happy to be in a field that I love, even if I am in a foreign land, speaking a foreign language.
This city is a small one, but its crew of broadcast journalists and disc jockeys is even smaller. Everybody is stretched really thin here. So I don't hold anything against my boss for forgetting about my first day.
Luckily, the disc jockey on shift that morning was very welcoming. She didn't have any other guests on for the morning so she brought me on as one. Day one, and I am live on the air speaking Italian. It was a whirlwind already, and then she asked me what I thought about Trump.
I do not remember what I said and I hope it does not come back to haunt me.
We thought I would be a better English teacher on the radio than a political commentator. That is what I do every morning now: teach English to whoever happens to listen to the radio between 9 AM and 10 AM. Right after I teach one lesson, I plan the next lesson and email it to the DJ to get her approval. Sometimes I include audio of me reading the words so that she can get the pronunciation right and does not embarrass herself on the radio; we do not have a lot of time to rehearse. Her shift starts at 7 AM and her breaks are however long a single song can be.
Everyone leaves their door open for me. I have observed nearly every aspect of local journalism: filming, using microphones, interviewing, anchoring, and editing. Here, they use the same editing system as my university so I feel as though I am learning what I could in class through this awesome foreign experience. Particularly, I observed one journalist include edit small clips of every mayoral candidate-there are nine-into a two minute service. She included their responses to the same question to be fair and balanced.
Outside of observing, I furiously study Italian. The station is small as is and there are already two high school interns who speak flawless Italian obviously so they get all the work. One of them told me school ends this Friday though, so after this week I will likely have more to do. I study the language by reading their newspapers online and in print. I look up words I do not know, but take special note of words that could be useful in future articles. For example, this week I learned the Italian words for "police chief," "crime," "sports fan," "nab," "beaten," "hurt," "government headquarters," and "second election." I also learned words that helped me with day to day tasks, like "edit," "captions," and "teleprompter." In the meantime I am trying to convince my boss that I understand Italian so he will stop speaking broken English to me.
At this point, let's laugh at the irony of an American student who studies Communications suddenly becoming an intern at an Italian radio and TV station without the ability to communicate perfectly in Italian. I had no ideas what my duties would be, but I was happy to be in a field that I love, even if I am in a foreign land, speaking a foreign language.
This city is a small one, but its crew of broadcast journalists and disc jockeys is even smaller. Everybody is stretched really thin here. So I don't hold anything against my boss for forgetting about my first day.
Luckily, the disc jockey on shift that morning was very welcoming. She didn't have any other guests on for the morning so she brought me on as one. Day one, and I am live on the air speaking Italian. It was a whirlwind already, and then she asked me what I thought about Trump.
I do not remember what I said and I hope it does not come back to haunt me.
We thought I would be a better English teacher on the radio than a political commentator. That is what I do every morning now: teach English to whoever happens to listen to the radio between 9 AM and 10 AM. Right after I teach one lesson, I plan the next lesson and email it to the DJ to get her approval. Sometimes I include audio of me reading the words so that she can get the pronunciation right and does not embarrass herself on the radio; we do not have a lot of time to rehearse. Her shift starts at 7 AM and her breaks are however long a single song can be.
Everyone leaves their door open for me. I have observed nearly every aspect of local journalism: filming, using microphones, interviewing, anchoring, and editing. Here, they use the same editing system as my university so I feel as though I am learning what I could in class through this awesome foreign experience. Particularly, I observed one journalist include edit small clips of every mayoral candidate-there are nine-into a two minute service. She included their responses to the same question to be fair and balanced.
Outside of observing, I furiously study Italian. The station is small as is and there are already two high school interns who speak flawless Italian obviously so they get all the work. One of them told me school ends this Friday though, so after this week I will likely have more to do. I study the language by reading their newspapers online and in print. I look up words I do not know, but take special note of words that could be useful in future articles. For example, this week I learned the Italian words for "police chief," "crime," "sports fan," "nab," "beaten," "hurt," "government headquarters," and "second election." I also learned words that helped me with day to day tasks, like "edit," "captions," and "teleprompter." In the meantime I am trying to convince my boss that I understand Italian so he will stop speaking broken English to me.
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