By Shaima AlAmmari
ABU DHABI — Three graduates of Zayed University have taken their first steps out in the real world as professional journalists. All three are working at The National, an English-language newspaper in the capital city. The three, Ayesha Almazroui, Ayesha Alkhoori and Asmaa Alhameli, recently spoke to Zajel at the Zajel-Abu Dhabi newsroom.
Miss Almazroui, a converged media graduate, said that she first majored in public relations but then felt like that was not what she wanted to do in life. In addition, Miss Alhameli, also a converged media graduate, said that she was also unhappy majoring in public relations and changed to journalism.
“I despised journalism and I thought I would take any job except journalism,” Miss Alhameli said. “In my mind, a journalist will write day to night and they don’t have a life. All they do is write, write and write.”
However, Miss Alkhoori, also a converged media alumna, had a somewhat different story.
“I’d never thought I’d be a journalist until I met the professors at ZU,” Miss Alkhoori said.
Miss Alhameli said that when she graduated, she was not entirely happy with her degree choice — at least for a while.
“When I got a job at The National newspaper, the first month was OK, but then I started liking it because I felt like I was doing something different,” she said.
“I realized by going into journalism that I can make a difference in society,” Miss Almazroui said.
The alumnae talked about the difference between the university and work environments.
“We had more relaxed [flexible] deadlines in ZU, but when you work, you learn how to write fast because there is a short deadline,” Miss Almazroui said.
Miss Alkhoori said that at ZU she would have two to three days to finish an article, but at The National she only has a few hours to work on a piece.
“At The National, I have had to go to weird places I haven’t been to before, like Al Wathba and Al Falah,” Miss Alkhoori said. “I needed to do things that were outside of my comfort zone.”
Miss Alhameli further added that at ZU the work was more theoretical but at The National it’s more practical.
“When I was at ZU, I was forced to read the newspaper, but in newsroom I read with passion,” Miss Alhameli said.
While they were studying in ZU, both Ayesha Almazroui and Asma Alhameli had articles published in The National.
Miss Alhameli’s article was about modesty and how some girls are submissive at home but the complete opposite when they are at university.
“I was like, ‘Be yourself. Why are you having these double standards?’” Miss Alhameli said.
On the other hand, Ayesha Almazroui wrote an article about integrity.
“I noticed many students here [at ZU] cheating on exams and getting their assignments [written by others], so I wrote a comment piece,” Miss Almazroui said.
Miss Alkhoori, who is a general assignment reporter, said that she had three big major events to cover so far for The National: The Government Summit, The International Defence Exhibition and Conference (IDEX), and the trial of 94 activists in the United Arab Emirates.
“We all have challenges,” Miss Alkhoori said.
Miss Almazroui said that the biggest challenge is the language skills.
“As you write more, you learn more,” said Miss Almazroui, who was the president of the ZU Student Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.
Miss Almazroui, who works as a leader writer for the opinion section at The National, recently won two SPJ Mark of Excellence Awards. The MOE competition is for college journalists. She writes a weekly column for The National on a variety of issues. She is also working on a master’s degree in international relations from ZU.
“At The National, you don’t get to read a lot about Emiratis because the expats don’t have much access to the Emirati society,” Miss Alhameli said. “But when I started interviewing Emiratis, they responded to me and they encouraged me.”
Three ZU graduates are something of a trend at The National, which has an expat-filled newsroom. They are being followed by two more ZU students, Murha Al Ameri and Dhabya Rashed Al Mehairi.
The infusion of Emirati talent into The National is giving the newspaper’s readers a bit of a different perspective. Indeed, Miss Alkhoori and Miss Alhameli have a blog post every week about their experience in the newsroom.
“Usually, whatever I am working on, I link to my personal feelings and I talk about it through the blog,” Miss Alkhoori said.
The two bloggers are also getting publicity around town as The National is heavily advertising their blog, occasionally with a full-page ad.
With the fame comes a new dynamic, as Miss Alkhoori has discovered. She has written two posts that have received considerable feedback, one about the stigma attached to being a female Emirati journalist (which makes it a challenge to get married, she wrote) and another about lowering the driving age to 16 — in which she admitted to poor driving practices on her own part, something that incensed some readers.
To follow their blog, you can visit: http://blogs.thenational.ae/others/my-year-at-the-national.
This story was originally published on April 3, 2013. It was re-uploaded on Nov. 2, 2020. The photo that accompanied this story was lost due to the loss of the domain name.
