Saturday, May 08, 2004
STANDING WITH SOLIDARITY
The Damage Report - Year 2 - Summer Week #4
Background Music: "Everytime" by B. Spears
NOTE: This is a weekly blog entry that summarizes a series of events of a finished week in and around La Salle.
THE long-awaited results of the new Editorial Board of the Heraldo Filipino was released last Wednesday. I was thrilled, I was happy, I was a bit scared and excited all at the same time. I wasn't disappointed I didn't become Features' Editor because I already expected I had better chances of becoming Copy Desk Editor.
I'm so happy that Eric is Features' Editor. He's the person who influenced me to take the competitive exam when I was still a freshman. We joined HF together with our other classmate Maycee. Maycee, now News Editor, is one of the most critical and focused people I've ever met. The three of us would become the first Broadjourn majors to enter the official student publication of DLSU-D, and now, the first Broadjourn majors to be editors as well.
Flashbacks
A lot has happened since then. Around ten broadsheet issues and 5 La Salleño magazine issues later, we have been through challenges both of the internal and external. I remember all the times an article was running late, an article was rejected, but more specifically when an article was published. Our eyes were glued onto reading word-for-word what we wrote in some funky attempt to feel satisfied and real good about it. Yes, it does feel damn good to have your article published!
My first published article was actually quite short. It was entitled "The Silence vs. Sweet Prejudice" and was published in the La Salleño X-2 themed "Isang Bayan, Isang Bansa". My editor back then was Kuya Marthy (Marthy Angue).
Eric was the first from the three of us to get an article published. I remember my classmates in JOU1-1 in freshmen year congratulating Eric for having "Style or Substance" published. It was a well-crafted article depicting the scene of students in La Salle on terms of their style and their knowledge.
Maycee started a chain of news articles as part of the news staff. She would later be writing just about all the banners of the broadsheet up to the present.
Copy-slash-Desk Editor
Finally being given a position of great responsibility has started to make me an even more serious person. I've been in different places already but I've never been given a real position. Knowing now that I'm truly part of "a machine" will get me brushing up on editing styles and techniques. I need to set a solid example. I remember JD Apolo, the guy who was the former Copy Desk Editor of HF. He had this solid presence. He really looked like the butcher of articles! Haha. I mean, I looked up to him as this guy who could edit a three-page article in less than three minutes.
Admittingly, things got blurry from there. He disappeared from his "desk" from time to time. The rest, I don't want to enumerate. All I can say is that there are shadows in the office where staffers like me back then did not venture into..
..until now.
I want to redeem the image of the Copy Editor, which lost its touch when JD Apolo left. I don't want to be looked at as the dumping ground of articles and numerous other paperwork that needs editing. I know my job is to clean up articles. I have to scrub news articles for clarity. I have to intensify but not sensationalize banners and different headlines.
I want to pursue the former CDE's concept of an HF Stylebook. It's a guide for editors but more importantly their staff on proper writing skills. It's a project I wish to accomplish of course with the help of other members of the EB. My goal is to have an HF Stylebook available as a hand-out before the Apprentice Staff Orientation in July.
Image revamp
I'm an incoming third year student and I'm not stupid to not see how some people probably perceive me at HF. I want to prove that I'm dead serious. I want to prove I'm a force to be reckoned with when pushed to the limits. I'm not a dummy sitting in a dummies' position! I stand together with my three other classmates in HF in complete solidarity ready to face whatever challenges that come as writers and editors... solid in pursuant for an even greater publication.
I will do everything I can in order to restore the good image of a Copy Editor. An efficient, hard-working copy editor and not just someone that bites the dust from articles.
But of course, at this moment, priority goes towards re-building HF since just about all the past editors have graduated. All the pressure falls in the hands of the other EB such as Paul (EIC) for getting things back on track after weeks of delay. Tom (ME) has paperwork to work on and the bidding. Tom will be working with Jaynie (OCM) in re-shaping the office and building a more efficient one. Our proposal is to restore the "Editorial Board Room" enjoyed by past EBs. This past year it was sort of messy despite the new and improved look, that's in my honest opinion.
At the brink of our block's little golden age:
Teatro Lasalliana
Arjay Navarro - EVP-Finance
Jennyfer Arboleda - EVP-Membership
William Kristoffer Eusores - EVP-Academics
Athena Maquinay - EVP-Internal
Filipiniana Dance Company
Ayesha de Celis - EVP-Property and EVP-Finance
Pointes 'N Flexes Dance Company
Jeremy Manicad - EVP-Property
DLSU-D Chorale
Leah Rose Sison - EVP-Membership
Heraldo Filipino
Maycee Mercado - HF News Editor
Eric Nicole Salta - HF Features' Editor
Me! - HF Copy Editor
Quick Summary:
- Went jogging with Leah on Monday night around the campus.
- Went to the gym late Tuesday night with Tope. One of the instructors there shows me a picture of him when he was 19-years old. He said he was just as skinny as me back then and encourages me to keep working out.
- The new HF Editorial Board was announced on Wednesday.
- SOSC107 was held in the Cabuco Viewing Room on Thursday and Friday.
- Communique, our publication project in BRJM204L, was in steady progress throughout the week.
Defend myself?
First of all, I don't want to aggravate anything. I don't even want to argue with people who make senseless comments. This is my blog, this is my journal, this is my photo journal, call it whatever you want to call it and it's still mine.
I'm not writing to impress anyone, I'm writing to express myself and share my life with my friends and anybody who wants to know me better.
The comments recently posted simply have no relevance to whatever is going on lately. I know I'm not the best in writing but I know even more that I'm not that bad either! What's goin' on in your fucking heads anyways?
This is my place and I can do anything I want to. It's my journal and I can write anything that I want to write about.
Most importantly if you don't like it, DON'T READ IT and just LEAVE!
Okay... go ahead now and let's see if you'd like to make a comment. That just shows even more how you ARE reading these entries and judging them to your own liking.
Sige nga... bitch more about your little fucking insecurities. How you fucking think you know so much by going over to people's journals and go bitching about who writes better. If you want me to improve, make a constructive criticism rather than bitch about what you want to read in a photojournal that has nothing to do with you in the first place.
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