By Jimmy Tang (Alhambra, CA)
Our mission yesterday was simple: interview businesses about the new Qdoba on Nassau Street in order to find out how they’re reacting to the decrease in family-owned stores, and get some man-on-the-street reactions (journalistic lingo for interviewing pedestrians) as well. Of course, being the relaxed Californian that I am, I convinced myself this would be an easy assignment.
I was completely wrong.
We began our trek on Nassau Street and went up Witherspoon Street and Palmer Square, stopping by local hot spots like Small World Coffee and The Bent Spoon. Now, I am your average awkward teenager, constantly being let down by the girls at my school. Nothing changed yesterday. In fact, I think I broke my “rejection record.” The only difference was that instead of being rejected by girls, I was being rejected by people whom I had never met.
Our first interview at Landau went well, but it was all downhill from there. Some major roadblocks that caused this wave of disappointment included corporate management (a.k.a the big bosses) not allowing local franchises to answer our question and the old “our manager is busy/unavailable/coming on Tuesday.” As a result, our optimism was slowly disintegrating until it was completely turned into dust by the time we made it to Mexican Village.
In the end, I got my reality check. I learned that journalists deserve much more credit than what they are given, including credit for the amount of traveling they have to do to get their story—even a simple one.
Good job, Jimmy! As always, it's a pleasure to read your work :)
ReplyDelete-Victoria G.