A New Beginning

Hello there, or as my boss would say in his English-type accent "Hello Tha". This is really my first time blogging (I'm sure that is what all first timers have said...but I will say it again) and to tell you the truth, I am both excited and curious to see what comes from this experience. I consider myself a journalist (I work in TV) eventhough I never studied journalism in college. Its funny because when I was in middle and high school, I was always in to the journalism thing but for some reason, it never even crossed my mind to study journalism in college. I always wanted to be a doctor.....so much for that! So here I am now, somewhat of a newbie at doing what I am doing. I have been in Oklahoma City working as a producer and reporter for the local Telemundo affiliate since the beginning of May, '07. I had never worked as a producer before and had very, very little experience reporting before I came here. I started in TV and the whole journalism gig while I was studying my Master's degree in Albuquerque, New Mexico. A few years before that, I fell in love with Latin America, it's language and it's culture (I don't remember if I'm supposed to put an apostrophe in between the t and s when I want "it" to be possesive or no, but I put it there anyway), so decided to change from becoming a doctor to studying Latin American Studies and Spanish. I finished a Bachelor's degree in both of those subjects and proceeded to do Latin American studies on a Master's level. I had spent the summer of 2002 in Brazil studying Portuguese (after all, if you are going to be a Latinamericanist, you absolutely have to know the language of the largest country in Latin America....at least that is what I thought) and was looking for something to do during the summer of 2003, other than take classes. I thought to myself, "What can I do here in Albuquerque that has to do with my studies?" Then, one night I was watching the news in Spanish on Univision and I said, "I wonder if they have internships?" I called the next day and sure enough, they did, but, someone had already been decided on for the summer internship. They told me to try back in the fall. I set up another internship for that summer in Juarez, Mexico and had one of the best times of my life. When I got back I did call them up again and, sure enough, they had a space for me. I started out learning all of the newsroom terminology....what a "vo" is what a "sot" is and so forth, and so on. I also learned how to run a teleprompter...not the greatest job in the world. After they realized that I wasn't a total dope, they started to teach me how to edit video for the newscast. I excelled rapidly, and by the time my internship was done, I was extended an invitation to be a part time editor. I was king of the hill then! Haha! Whatever! They didn't even give me a raise. I was making a cool $5.15 an hour....rollin' in the dough. However, I have learned that in this business, you really have to love what you do, because the compensation really does not correspond to the amount of work you may put in many times. Anyway, back to the point....what was the point? Oh yeah, sorry, I learned how to edit, write stories and do some minimal on-camera reporting while at Univision. I think though, what I really learned there was that I love working in that newsroom atmosphere. Stress is awesome...it makes me tick, and a daily deadline really turned me on. I ended up leaving Univision, much to my lament, because I couldn't live off of peanuts and I accepted a job as a full time editor for the NBC affiliate in Albuquerque. Eventhough maybe I didn't have some of the opportunities to learn different jobs within the NBC newsroom as I did at Univision, I did have the opportunity to learn how a larger newsroom worked. You see, at Univision, everyone was spread thin....the anchor was the producer and a reporter and the reporters were cameramen and editors. Everyone also had their specific job when the newscast was live on air. But at NBC, everything was different, the editors just edit video and that is it, the reporters go out, talk to people and write stories. They have cameramen ( and good ones too) that shoot the video. The producers produce and everyone does just one job. I learned so much at NBC and made many good friends. I had been working there for nearly a year and a half when I met Leo Anchondo, who stole me away from New Mexico and gave me a job in Washington DC with the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and their campaign called Justice for Immigrants. He must have seen something in me and took a chance...something I will always be grateful for. I spent close to a year and a half with the campaign as a Public Education/Outreach Coordinator until I came here to the great state of Oklahoma. You see, while I was working at NBC in Albuquerque and for the Bishops in DC, the anchor of Univision whom I had worked with in Albuquerque had built up his skill and found a job as the News Director for a fledgling Telemundo newscast in Oklahoma City. He called me up one day while I was living in DC and said, "Dave, I need a producer here in Oklahoma City, and I think you would be great at this job....do you want to come back to broadcast journalism?" And I said..."Hell yeah!" And that was that...I arrived in May of 2007. So I have been here since then, my main job has been producing the 5pm and 10pm newscasts at Telemundo and up until recently I would do some on-camera reporting once or twice a week. However, about a month ago I started reporting daily during both newscasts as well as producing. I have decided to use this blog space to expand on some of the stories that I have done as well as providing commentary on some important local issues as well as current events. I was inspired to begin this "blog quest" by my good friend and fellow journalist, Jeremy Jojola, who is currently an investigative reporter for the NBC affiliate in Albuquerque, NM. He blogs about the stories he does and made me want to do the same. So thanks JJ.....I know there must be thousands of blogs here in OKC, but mine is unique because I am bringing news that we report on "the Spanish channel" to an English audience. So if there is anyone out there...thanks for listening...and starting Monday, February 18th (my 28th birthday actually) this show will be on the road with my first blog about whatever it is I cover that day....Cheers!