Journalism Reflection

One thing that I really enjoyed about the journalism unit is learning how news packages are made because I hear them very often on the news. It was interesting to discover that there are only three major news corporations. It was a very enjoyable experience learning about the do’s and don’ts for interviews. I think that all of the things we learned with Sean Thomas will really help us in the future and we will definitely be able to apply these techniques later on in our life.

The topic that I chose to study is the Hong Kong protests because it is a topic that I was interested in learning more about after visiting Hong Kong during fall break this year. After visiting the protest sites, I wanted to understand more about why the students were protesting, and to learn their main goal. After discovering the story behind the protests, I had a deeper understanding and could connect to the protesters more.

I decided to interview my aunt, Bonnie Lee, because she is a resident of Hong Kong and has lived there for a long time. I thought that it would be a interesting experience to see how different people feel about the protests from different perspectives. Since she is living in Hong Kong, she has been to the protest sites and knows quite a bit about the story behind them. I also decided to interview Ella Chen, my chinese teacher, because since she is from China and not Hong Kong, I thought that her perspective would differ from my aunt’s. This would make the interviews more interesting and engaging.

I started both of my interviews by saying “Thank you for taking the time to meet with me today.” During my interview with my aunt, Bonnie Lee, who is a resident living in Hong Kong, she mentioned that in this specific movement (Umbrella Revolution) includes more younger people rather than middle aged to elderly people. As a result of this, I asked a follow up question which was: “You mentioned before that the younger people are more involved in the protests, why do you think this?” (7:20)

Although my two interviews showed support for Hong Kong, they also stated some negative aspects of the protests. Both interviewees said that the protests were a bit inconvenient, especially for the older people living in Hong Kong. “I have some friends who live in Hong Kong. They feel that the protests make it quite inconvenient to go shopping or to go out to places, and some people from the mainland want to travel to Hong Kong but they find that it’s not very easy.” (Chen, 2:41) “The protests are actually concentrated in 3 main areas: Admiralty, Causeway Bay along with Mongkok, but I don’t live or work in these areas, so my daily life is not really affected, but my friends who life in the affected areas find it hard to g to work since bus routes have been cut off or changed and it is more difficult to use public transportation.” (Lee, 9:04)

My most surprising moment as I was interviewing was when my interviewee, was when she explained how shocked she was when she heard the news. “I think the most alarming or most alerting scene I had is on the TV when the police had the smoking gas and used it against the protesters. I found it very shocking.” (Lee, 10:13) It was very interesting to learn how she first felt when she received the news of the protests.

“I think economically, Hong Kong is having a lot of multinational companies being situated there, so the investors may be having worries about the future of Hong Kong. Whether we will be able to be politically stabilised and may be withdrawing their investments in Hong Kong to a safer place. Many people’s jobs may be affected as well because the sales might decrease. I think that economically there will be the biggest damage.” (Lee, 12:09)

I think that this unit was a very enjoyable experience and helpful for us to use in the future.