JMK/Sida course - Week 1

this is a brief overview of the first in a four-week programme organised by the stockholm university journalism department and sponsored by the swedish agency for international development cooperation (sida). a group of 24 working journalists and related professionals from malaysia, indonesia, bangladesh, china, thailand, the philippines, burma, laos, cambodia and sri lanka arrived at arlanda airport in stockholm on oct 1-2.

well, what can i say. i'm in stockholm... and it's autumn! i'm enjoying the bright, sunny days (so far, so good) and breathing lungsful of crisp, fresh air. we're staying at the acapulco hotel, a neat quaint-looking place in sodermalm, near the skanstull tube station. definitely excited...alas! i've only captured images on film but no worries, managed to get some nice digipix, thanks to my dear fellow coursemates bunga, neuf and chu.

the course took off with the usual round of self-introduction and familiarisation trips to places of general interest and official addresses such as the parliament and the international press centre, conducted by no-nonsense mark comerford. the city walkabout included a stop at the sida office. indoors, mark and roland stanbridge took the group around the jmk library. a small welcome was organised by jmk/sida staffers and students complete with a traditional swedish smorgasbord.

For the duration of the course, participants were granted 24-hour access to jmk and the computer lab which was specially reserved as a classroom throughout the course period. mark shared extensively on research and publishing tools available on the internet (also available on his blog). roland complemented that by sharing tips on retrieving digital information, a necessary tool to obtain the best results given tight newsroom deadlines. häkan lindhoff later briefly outlined the 500-year historical developments of the swedish media.

the group's first assignment was to prepare a 20-minute presentation for a seminar at örebro university on oct 14, a friday. The group split into south asia and southeast asia regions and participants agreed to prepare a skeleton country report for collation. monday's exercise was to create a blog, which a few participants were already familiar with. unfortunately, mark had to leave for home early due to a bout of flu and the onset of fever.

programme coordinator åsa petersson was most helpful since i landed from day 1. gifted with a bright and sunny disposition, she showed participants useful places such as specialty asian foodstores and pharmacies. the city's public transport - metro, tram, boat and bus - was a boon too, thanks for the pass card each received. by the way, öppet (i think) means either open or entrance... or something along those lines. one thing really worth mentioning and which is the most striking feature of the tunnelbana (underground or subway system) commonly-called the metro - distinct and unique artwork found in each of the 100-odd stations along the blue, green and red lines.

sunday was spent outdoors. took a boat ride to skansen, walked around the zoo admiring the beautiful trees and many animals not found in asia. the view from the nearby hills was breathtakingly beautiful and the weather was absolutely gorgeous... couldn't have asked for more!