A reason to hire me

The media can be more powerful than politicians. With this power, comes responsibility and one of the most unpredictable careers ever. For me personally, becoming a journalist has been a life long goal.

After graduating with my honours degree this year, I intend to move to the Middle East to learn Arabic and gain experience within conflict zones such as Palestine and Lebanon. Palestine is an issue that is both ongoing and challenging at the same time. I thrive on challenges and work best under pressure and I believe that reporting on such a controversial issue will help me use skills I learned in university to the best of my abilities.

I chose the Middle East because I am very interested in its culture. The views and attitudes of Middle Eastern people have always intrigued me. I would like to experience as many cultures as I can and pursuing the path of journalism will not only be enjoyable, but also a learning experience.

As my parents are originally from Pakistan, I have travelled there many times and I am also fluent in both Urdu and Punjabi. Whilst visiting cities such as Lahore and Islamabad, I did voluntary work in orphanages which helped me understand the ongoing problems of poverty and corruption in the country.

Similarly, I visited Zambia two years ago with my university lecturer and fellow student to broaden my journalistic experience. Again, we worked and lived in an orphanage with former street children, held meetings with the Zambian Council, and worked in a radio station. From this experience, I learned about the political situation in Zambia, and gained the real facts about social issues surrounding HIV and AIDS. With the basic standards of living that we here in Britain would never see, I pushed myself to forget about superficial things and concentrate on necessities. This made me realise that materialistic things do not matter as long as you can survive on a simple way of living.

This year, I went to Cuba to see the country that has been described by many as different from any place on earth. I was very intrigued by the political history of Castro, communism, and of course the Cuban Culture.

By speaking to many different Cubans about the political situation of the country, I improved my interview skills and became more confident to meet people. And by travelling to this region I gained more knowledge.

I believe that you can only truly understand somewhere and gain real knowledge, if you visit that place and see with your own eyes so you can give an accurate account of what is happening when writing a news story.

Education has also been the main learning experience for me and going to university has taught me many things about the industry and has given me a chance to practise my writing skills as well as learning interviewing techniques and designing a magazine.

Throughout university life, I learned how to write a news story properly and became prepared for all the different types of media.

With technology advancing, a modern journalist must be capable of multitasking. This is essential in the news room and at the news desk. For example, being able to write for a newspaper as well as updating a blog.

During my 3rd year I did work experience for the Herald and the BBC. Work experience is more than making coffee and handing out biscuits. I got a real insight into how a highly reputable broadsheet newspaper works along with what is entailed in making a radio programme for BBC Radio Scotland.

Experience in the field is just as vital as university. I was able to make contacts which will help me when I graduate.

In my final year at university I have leaned how to do my own blog. Blogs are now one of the main sources for news and the majority of them are not written by professional journalists. One of the most famous blogs came from the Baghdad Blogger who gave first hand account of what was happening in the Iraq war. This is another challenge that the industry faces.

There are many prominent journalists in the field that have inspired me. Lindsay Hilsum, Robert Fisk and John Pilger are a few that come to mind.

In his book Freedom Next Time, Pilger describes his experiences in some of the worlds worst hit conflict zones. Cambodia, Palestine, Afghanistan and Iraq have been covered extensively in what would not always hit the mainstream news.

Pilger said: “For those inspired by the great international movement that helped to bring down apartheid in South Africa, the parallels with Israel, however imprecise, offer a way forward.”

His extensive reporting on Palestine and the documentary Palestine is Still the Issue showed a unreported angle of events that the main stream media failed to do.

The lack of accuracy reported in Palestine is something I intend to tackle. I believe that organisations such as the BBC should be equal to both Israel and Palestine especially in the current conflict in Gaza.

Overall, studying journalism and constantly watching the news has helped me increase my knowledge and news writing skills. I have learned how to interact with the interviewee, how a news programme works and most important, the way into the industry.