Diary - 6

As I returned from Florida two weeks ago, I started to work on my commentary piece for the Foreign Service Journal about Hungarian-American bilateral relations and how Hungarians view the U.S. presidential elections. It was a challange for the sheer size of the work: I have never written anything that is even close to the required2,000 words. In my home newroom, an article of half of this size is already exceptionnaly long.

So the work required a lot of background research and I could put into practice what I learnt about structuring stories (which is my biggest weakness, as I realized at Poynter). The first reaction of the editor was encouraging, but the editing work will not start until the magazine's editorial board meets in two weeks. So I will still work with them on the story.

A disappointing, but not surprising experience came from the Hungarian Foreign Ministry. I first contacted the Hungarian Embassy in Washington to get to know the official viewpoint on a couple of bilateral issues, but I was only given a list of articles that were published in the past year in the Hungarian media. Then I contacted the Foreign Ministry in Budapest, which returned my e-mail with questions about my previous work and the magazine I would write for. I answered their questions and never heard from them ever since.

Their indifference reinforces my two beliefs: first, Hungarian bureaucrats have not realized yet they live off taxpayers' money which makes them responsible for answering journalists' question; and secondly, they are not interested in promoting Hungarian interests in international issues. I have noticed as a reporter on the EU that in most cases it is impossible to get to know the Hungarian standpoint before an EU-decision is made, and my guess is it is simply because they don't have a view - they just follow others.

Most of last week, after I finished this piece, I did not feel very well so I was not really pro-active at the Inquirer. I agreed, however, with my mentor and the online editors on how I will spend my time with the multimedia people; the system is quite confusing as philly.com is completely seperate from the Inquirer, and even within the newsroom, on the one hand there is a reporter who shoots videos for the online desk, and there is another producer who works for the photo department. I hope to spend time with both of them, and maybe even at philly.com where sponsored, TV-style videos are shot.

I also had an edifying session with my mentor who showed me how to try to find contact for such a "top gun" businessman as George Soros. As he is Hungarian-born, I tried to do an interview with him but was turned down by the press officer of his foundation (I was naive not thinking that above a certain level of wealth, having the same national origin does not secure an interview). My mentor did extensive research in my presence in the Inquirer archive, on Nexis and on the Internet, and finally came up with the idea that I should contact one of the leaders of Soros' publisher, who used to be a journalist. I am not very optimistic (neither is she), but I learnt a lot from her method.

I started my online stint today, arriving in the office at 7.25am (!) (and still 25 minutes late). I had a conversation with online editor Julie Busby (she arrives at 6am every day) who explained me how she works with reporters and photographers early in the morning to do quick coverage for events that happened during the night. She also posts advance stories. The most interesting thing was the Internet site where she can view all kinds of statistics and information about the traffic on the Inquirer site; the datas are provided by a company and there are people with the publisher who analyze them each day.

And now comes the fun part! My wonderful mentor did no smaller thing than getting me backstage at a concert of one of my absolute favorite bands, Iron Maiden! Yeah, I was having dinner trying to look calm as Nicko McBrain (drummer) and Janick Gers (guitarist) were walking around in the same room. But I was told in advance not to talk to anyone :)

And the concert was one of the best shows I have ever seen, definately the most spectacular with all the stage-sets and fireworks. These guys at the age of 50 are still so energetic and enthusiastic (much more than the audiance, who could have done better).

I can also thank my mentor for a tasty Greek dinner at her house Sunday, June 22. This was the day when I visited the Philadelphia Museum of Arts, and was amazed by some of Monet's best works. Thursday, June 26 my mentor, her sister and I was invited by food writer Craig LaBan to a restaurant he critiqued called Memphis Taproom. It was interesting as he told his comments in his hidden voice recorder, but we think he was busted anyway :)

And one more culinary experience for this weekend: Saturday I joined my colleague Barry Zukerman and his friend Adam on one of their regular roadside restaurants adventure: we went to Bucks County (North of Philly) to a burger place, then to an ice cream place (which is adjacent to a dairy farm and I also bought fine goat cheese) and finally to a donut place.

I also enrolled in the free library of Philadelphia. I found a book written by John Steinbeck's son, Thomas Steinbeck. It contains stories about the Monterey Peninsula in California, an area I will definitely visit in September. It is the place of several of John Steinbeck's books (who lived in Salinas) and also of one of my favorite Kerouac novel. I might even try to do an interview with Thomas Steinbeck.

I met a Hungarian-born retired architect, who left the country in 1956 and contacted me after my story on John Lukacs was published. Dezso Bacsujlaky invited me for dinner in a restaurant in Cherry Hill, on a Friday evening (probably June 20th).

As I see in my calendar, tomorrow, July 1 is Canada day! So don't miss this one.

Iron Maiden, Somewhere Back in Time World Tour 2008, June 17, Camden, NJ, Susquehanna Bank Center

1.Aces High
2.2 Minutes to Midnight
3.Revelations
4.The Trooper
5.Wasted Years
6.The Number of the Beast
7.Can I Play With Madness
8.Rime of the Ancient Mariner
9.Powerslave
10.Heaven Can Wait
11.Run to the Hills
12.Fear of the Dark
13.Iron Maiden
Encore:
14.Moonchild
15.The Clairvoyant
16.Hallowed Be Thy Name