Live from camp: An interesting interview experience

A week and two days through ThreeSixty Journalism, it’s been a tense but mostly fun experience. My group members are Franny (my partner) and Charlie (my mentor). We are a broadcasting group, and our project is on teens with Type 2 diabetes and obesity. We shot our very first video on June 15, 2010 at Park Nicollet. With no experience at all, we went to go interview our very first source. I was very nervous because I had never done a recorded interview before.

I soon figured out that I was overdressed for the interview. I had on shoes with heels that were about six inches tall, which was a very bad idea because the interview didn’t go as planned. On our way to Park Nicollet in Saint Louis Park, Charlie realized that he forgot the map. It was too late to turn around, so we spent minutes going around the hospital and the parking lot looking for the diabetes center. We were later informed that we were in the wrong location.

We immediately marched out the hospital to go look for the right location. About three minutes later we found Park Nicollet Clinic, which was the right location. We were relieved. That soon came to an end when Charlie realized that our camera bag had no tapes in them. He left us in the hospital to stall and buy as much time that we could so he could leave and find a Target to buy tapes. Our tour guide that was going to lead us to our interviewee arrived soon after Charlie left. We bought as much time as we could, making small talk with the patient and tour guide.

Charlie soon arrived and we began our interview. Our patients were very helpful and we learned much from them. We thanked everyone that day for helping us and were glad to be going back to campus, until we got stuck in traffic. That experience taught me so much. It taught me that things don’t always go your way, but you can always turn it around by being positive and never giving up.

— Belinda Ampofo, ThreeSixty 2010