Woman Who Fell From the Sky - Jennifer Steil [39]
His response could hardly have been more satisfying. “Holy fucking shit, are you kidding me? Are you out of your fucking mind? You’re crazy! You’ll die over there! I can’t believe you are seriously doing this! Why?”
This was a much more exciting reaction than I had expected. I had never seen Bill lose his cool like this. He ranted for a while about my questionable sanity, but when I finally calmed him down and explained what I was doing, he seemed to understand. He told me that it had been a swell five years and that the magazine would miss me. “We’ll hire someone to do your job,” he said. “But we’ll never replace you.”
The rest of the staff of The Week and most of my friends were just as surprised, although they expressed this in a slightly less dramatic fashion. Several people promptly sent me names of companies that provide kidnapping insurance. My parents, who know me fairly well, just said resignedly, “We thought something like this might happen.” One friend, a journalist for the Wall Street Journal, forwarded me a cautionary note from a woman who worked for the Foreign Service.
Yemen’s not too bad (beautiful country), as long as one stays in Sanaa. I wouldn’t recommend traveling outside of town, as people will take pot shots at you (generally just small arms fire) in some parts of the country. Also, Yemenis tend to kidnap foreigners for ransom—the most recent was only a few months ago, so one has to be incredibly vigilant. Lots of unsavory characters have been known to move through there on their way to other places.
On the other hand, it is gorgeous, and it has the largest open air arms market in the world, which is pretty cool. And the history is absolutely amazing … [But] why Yemen? There are lots of English language newspapers in the world that need editors.
While this was less than encouraging, around this time I found the following article on the website of the Yemen Observer, which I had failed to notice before.
Professional Journalist Raises Yemen Observer’s Standards
By Zuhra al-Ammari
Jul. 4, 2006
The American journalist who has been teaching at the Yemen Observe, Jennifer Steil, was presented with Jambia, necklace and various gifts at a farewell dinner on Sunday night in Al-Shaibani restaurant.
“We are paying farewell to a friend and to a teacher,” said Faris Sanabani, the publisher of the Yemen Observer as he presented Ms. Steil with the jambia. He thanked her for making a change in the newspaper in term of technical writing, and appearence,” he said.
Jennifer, “This is my first time in Yemen and the Middle, it has just been remarkable, you are the most open-hearted and friendly people ever, I love you guys and I hope to come back and can be with you again. Thank for you again” Everyone feel satisfied to the noticeable progress in their performance.
However, they feel sad too to say “farewell” to her and hope that she comes back. Adel, a journalist, said “I like this teacher for her spirit of volunteerism; she has been a patient teacher. I benefited a lot from her experience. I learned how to better my writing. She is really a queen.” Hassan, a journalist, said “Really, she is a smart journalist. It is enough for me to listen to her experience in field of journalism. She taught us modern principles of editing news and how one could do his or her news professionally.”
Arwa, a journalist, said “It was the first training course for me in English. I benefited by learning how to write. She is one of the best journalists I have seen. I make sure to attend all her classes. I benefited tremendously.” Radia, a secretary, said “She is a perfect woman. She is like the candle, she burns to give light to the others. I benefited a lot from her” Jennifer Steil has come from U.S.A to teach the Yemen Observer’s journalists some of the press skills.
She was observing the progress of every journalist. She gave them the advices for which they upgrade heir profession.
Copyright © 2004–2005 Yemen Observer Newspaper