By Raffat Binte Rashid
Feature Writer and Editor, The Daily Star
Dhaka, Bangladesh

I took up a personal challenge after my first week of introduction was over at the Houston Chronicle. I wanted to get my work printed—printed as in not rewritten or heavily edited, but just as filed with some minor fine tuning. Indeed it is a puny thing to struggle for, especially when you were judged by all these famous journalists in Washington and awarded this fellowship. But this became my prime motive as a working journalist from a developing nation at an American newspaper.

When I began my career as a feature writer in the early '90s, almost all my features took some editing. I remember one that was printed but my editor was furious about it because it was not up to the paper's standard. The experience was unnerving. I was hurt, but since I was a novice, I stuck to it. After all an apprentice or a cub reporter has to do what has to be done. One must see it to the end and succeed.

I've come a long way from that day in my editor's office, from being lectured about writing for a newspaper and the desire to write, to where he handed me the Alfred Friendly Press Fellowships application form, forwarded to him by the Asia Foundation nominating me for the fellowship, to where he talked about his confidence in me, to where he asked me to pursue higher goals in journalism.

I was thrilled. I knew that day that I was good and my editor had faith in me. However, accepting this fellowship needed a lot more than his faith in me. I needed to rediscover myself first as an individual and then as a journalist. Because when you are doing the same sort of writing for years at a stretch, you don't know how good or bad you are. You tend to think of yourself as the high and mighty where you have the ability to criticize the policy makers or change human lives or whatever. But coming to America and working at an American newspaper took me to that exact spot I was in eight years ago. The fine line between a fellow, an apprentice or an intern is so hazy that at one point the order becomes something like an intern, an apprentice and then a Fellow—maybe.

You are at the lowest end of the hierarchy, but here you have an advantage: you've been there before and you know how to weave your way out of these predicaments. The first three months as a general assignment reporter at an American newsroom from a feature writer at a Third World newspaper, was very intimidating and frustrating. Almost all your thoughts that were put to words in your report stood a zero chance with an editor. "English is not your language, your thoughts are haphazard," after eight years in the business, this comment is like a stab in the back.

Every sentence was dissected, chopped to something that was not mine. The by-line in the next day's paper stared me in the face like a horrid bruise, but nothing could be done to help the situation. I didn't know enough about their style or language. I worked hard and did a lot of footwork and heavy thinking like I did back in the early '90s. But every day it felt like I was going nowhere. I could never be sure whether I was learning anything. And then one day, to my utter surprise, I saw a story of mine in the pages of the Houston Chronicle almost entirely unedited. My instant reaction was 'I made it!' AFPF paid off and my work has reached the standard of an American newspaper. After all, I sacrificed a lot when I took up this assignment overseas, it had to pay off.

From this experience, I gather a few things about journalism. Firstly, no matter how experienced a journalist you are, you can always improve your basic skills. Secondly, new exposures actually reveal the weaknesses that you would never be able to see if you keep on working in the same environment all the time. Thirdly, journalists can work anywhere in the world if they want to—provided they try to understand the particular society where they are working.

The basic purpose of journalism is to create social convergence. In today's world, it's not just social convergence—but global convergence as some values like democracy, social justice, humanity and freedom have become universal. So the better skills a journalist has, the better she/he can contribute to creating global convergence—and ultimately contribute to the evolution of civilization. My involvement in AFPF, like that of all other AFPF fellows, has strengthened my skills and commitment to journalism. And I believe this could not have been achieved just by reading relevant books.