SO it was one humid Monday morning in February 2003 when I set out on my first
day of work as a ‘reporter’ for Sunstar, one of the three major newspapers of Davao
City.
My three other companions who were hired with me were already
deployed to their beats to tag with the regular reporters. One went to the
Business section, one to the Sports and the other one was sent to cover the
political beat. I was given a trial at the police beat.
With no experience to back me up, to say that my first day
is a nightmare is an understatement. The regular police reporter told me to
meet her at the regional police office at 9 a.m., and I had no idea where on
earth it was. I just boarded a Jeepney and kept watching for the gate with a signboard.
I was so busy looking and when I finally saw it, the jeepney was passing over
another car on the road. I had to walk back over 200 meters in the sweltering
heat and another 250 meters more to reach the police office.
The regular reporter had already left. She had no way of
contacting me as I didn’t have a cellphone and she didn’t even remember my name
or my face in the first place. I introduced myself to the police on duty and he
handed me a thick police blotter.
I have never seen a police blotter in my entire life, and I could
not make a head or tail of the jumbled pages of reports from all police
stations in the region.I stared at the folder and started leafing through, hoping
something will make some sense so I can get a story. I stared at one page for
eternity, trying to make sense of the capitalized initials like OOA (how could I
know it meant ‘on or around,’ to describe the time the incident happened, MOL for
more or less, and NFA—I often hear those initials when the price of rice goes
up and the National Food Authority sells low quality rice at lower prices. How
was I to know it meant ‘No Further Action!’
Luckily, the police reports that came in at the regional
police office were mostly typed, although obviously the fifth or sixth copy and
barely readable. Little did I know that the worst was yet to come. I was about to
encounter police blotters with entries that look like doctor’s prescriptions,
and in English constructed in such a way that looks like it’s still under
construction. I gathered small bits from the report I was looking at and learned
it was a stabbing incident and the suspect was detained at the San Pedro Police
Station.
I scribbled notes, which meant I literally copied that whole
police blotter into my brand new notebook (digital cameras were not even in my
bucket list yet) and headed to the San
Pedro police station, hoping the regular reporter is already there. She was, and she was interviewing somebody from the
detention cell, protected by the bars. The smell was overpowering and I stayed as
far away as I could, scared of the mass of jumbled bodies inside the detention
cells.
I stuck to feature writing in college and did not even try straight
news writing and I definitely did not have an idea how to transform a police
blotter item to a readable story. All computers were occupied and the regular reporters were
busy beating their deadlines. It was as if we newcomers didn’t exist and when one
some of them went out on cigarette breaks, we were told to use their computers.
Another shock awaited me. They were using WordStar and I have
never seen it before. The newsroom admin was kind enough to set it for me and have
it ready so I can start typing. It took me bloody forever before I even typed one sentence,
distracted with the cursor which kept on blinking horizontally below the letters.
Double terrible first day pains. I sat there for a couple of hours, having no idea how police
stories are made until in desperation, I copied the police blotter to the computer
then left in a hurry, crushed with the realization that I always thought I had
a good command of the English language and discovered that I knew nothing at
all.
I reported to Sir Tony the publisher the following day and
told him “I quit” because I can’t do the job. He asked me to stick it out for
two weeks and the rest is history.
COMING UP…
Read how I got my first banner story, and how it turned my
world upside down so that I had to ask for a ‘reporter protection program.’
