Global Communications: Skills, Strategies & Storytelling Across Four Continents - My Life As An International Journalist (Chapter 6)

[This is the latest chapter published in my "Global Communications Toolkit" newsletter. To subscribe - or to read previous chapters -?please click here. This book project spans my career, to date, and I’ll publish one new chapter per week. I dedicate this project to my three cherished children – and my beloved brother-in-law, Dr. Joseph F. Scalia, who recently died at age 53. Both a brother and a friend, Joseph was always encouraging. As for my kids: If you ever wonder what my life was like during your childhood – amid our journey from New York, to Central Europe, to Southern Africa, then to China – this book is for you.]

CHAPTER SIX:?The Flourishing Freelancer

After my two-chapter detour of strategizing how to impact editors (Chapter Four:?What Editors Want) and how to impact readers (Chapter Five:?What Audiences Need), I now return to the storytelling of how I nurtured my budding career as a freelance Foreign Correspondent, based in Budapest, Hungary.

This chapter not only contains a vast collection of my newspaper and magazine articles from the late 1990s, but strategies I developed to explore new topics – and attract new clients. Includes my coverage of the 1999 Kosovo conflict.

The Monitor & Me

By 1996, with an esteemed new client on board, I was now 27 years old and ready to roll. The?Christian Science Monitor?proved to be an ideal match for me, as I’ll show in this chapter – with the range of compelling stories that I produced over the next several years as a Budapest-based freelancer.

I wanted to explore serious topics: The region’s traumatic transformation from Communist dictatorship to capitalist democracy. Its complicated integration into the European Union and NATO military alliance. The post-war repercussions and recovery for the newly independent Balkan states.

So many other topics, too. Corruption. Nationalism. Immigration. Minorities. Press freedom. The list was long. One by one, I explored each hot-button issue?du jour, eagerly sinking my teeth into meaty stories that not only confronted individual countries, but Central and Eastern Europe, as a whole.

In the?Monitor, I found a newspaper with a similar appetite for weighty themes, even editors who demanded them. Their aim – to better inform and educate their smart, curious, skeptical audience – deepened my respect for the editors, and fueled my pride to represent such a prestigious publication.

At the same time, while working as the?Monitor’s Budapest-based correspondent during those years was the backbone of my identity – and core institutional affiliation that cemented my credibility in the field – I’d go on to contribute pieces to two?dozen?publications. And even two radio programs.

Below, then, is the archive of stories I generated during the mid- to late-1990s, with more explanation of how exactly I did what I did, and why exactly I did what I did. That said, I can’t recollect my entire thought-process, nor piece together my daily progression and exchanges with specific editors.

All I can do is state facts: The pieces I produced. At least, the stories found online. Or stacked in boxes in my parents’ attic. I’m not even sure I found them all. The Internet then wasn’t what it is today. Lastly, a word on how I present stories: not quite chronologically; more by topic and category. For the sake of space, I only link and show a screenshot of the story’s intro, then flow the rest in the?Appendix.

A Certain Type of Freelancer

But first, I should explain what kind of freelancer I was – in terms of my preferences and what the market reality presented me. Especially for any reader here tempted to follow in my footsteps. (More on “How I’d Break into Foreign Correspondence Today” in?Chapter Twenty-Seven:?Freelancing.)

From Budapest, I’d surveyed the landscape, carried out my market research, identified where my opportunities lay – as well as my comparative-advantage. As a freelancer, I realized it would be futile to compete head-to-head with major news organizations and global wire-services. Nor did I want to.

Not only was I no longer a daily reporter working on daily deadlines, but my preferences no longer aligned with that mindset. It’s not that I couldn’t handle the pressure. I’d already proven that I could, as most of my California experience (detailed in?Chapter Two:?A Journalistic Journey Begins) was in daily-deadline journalism. Yet, I found the nature of the content and coverage inherently superficial; there’s just so deep you can dive into a subject when you have mere hours to produce a story.

Instead, I wanted to delve deeper into topics that piqued my interests and passions. Take my time to research, learn, pitch, fact-gather, interview and write. (Eventually, to shoot photos, as well.) It was a time-consuming process, certainly, yet ultimately more gratifying to carve out a slice of that topic.

These types of stories, I realized, didn’t fall into the more traditional categories of?News Writing, nor was it?Feature Writing. They were something in-between:?News-Feature Writing. News Writing?includes the standard elements of who, what, where, when, how and why. (In?Chapter Four, I explain why?Why??and even?Why Exactly??Are the most important questions in all of journalism.)

At its core,?News Writing?is timely, and spotlights what just happened, what’s happening now, or what’s about to happen. News you need. Or that editors think you need. On the other hand, a feature story is what we might call “an evergreen” – sturdy, long-lasting story, with a potentially lengthy shelf-life. It could be published tomorrow, next month, next year. Anytime. They can be colorful, broader in scope, highlight the human condition, etc., rather than the meat-and-potatoes of politics, economics, breaking news, and so on.

However, a News-Feature is a hybrid of both. Feature-ish, yet also possessing a “news element” or “timely hook” – with a clear, compelling argument for why an editor should publish this story?today. Likewise, a compelling reason for why our audience should consume this story?today.

In?Volume Two, I explain how in Beijing I developed a strategy to frame China stories for an international audience, through what I call the?Three Hooks of Storytelling from China. This includes my strategy for how to successfully pitch such stories to Western editors.?For now, here’s a visual:

Fortunately, my preference was in sync with the reality of overseas opportunities that existed for a freelancer: Global wire-services like AP, Reuters and AFP already cranked out day-to-day news from each country, while major Western media covered news-events that warranted wider attention in the West. Both also had their bureaus and staffers, scattered worldwide. (As I noted in?Chapter Two.)

Back then, most of the remaining mainstream media paid for, and relied upon, both of those news sources to supply them with daily news. It would’ve been redundant and a waste of time for someone like me to chase those stories – and hope to live off of that. On the other hand, as I’d learned in the run-up to?My Big Break?(Chapter Three), there were plenty of publications willing to pay extra for special contributions from the field. Some even had a budget: not just for the story, but to cover travel.

Between these two layers of stories, I surmised that a freelancer like me could deliver added-value with in-depth news-features. I was already on the ground in the region, so could reach these countries with relative ease and modest expense. This was my opening – and comparative-advantage.

The major-media staffers couldn’t be everywhere, covering everything – nor cover everything well. I sought ways to deepen their coverage, exploring fresh angles, illuminating new perspectives. Or I’d return to a story they’d covered previously, but which warranted a follow-up. I looked for gaps: not only in what clients covered, but what they?didn’t?cover – but perhaps should. I learned how to “open a window” onto an entire region – by connecting dots between one country and the broader trend – in ways that only someone living there could. (More on this in?Chapter Thirteen:?MJ’s Storytelling Filters.)

These types of stories became my specialty, my so-called “bread & butter” – as you’ll see below. Fortunately, money wasn’t my top priority. I was still a young guy, entering my late 20s. No wife, no kid, no debt. Budapest was a wonderfully inexpensive place to live. Which was lucky, because Western clients like the ones I found didn’t pay particularly well. For?the Monitor, I recall starting at just $175 per story, and working up to $225, then $300. (On a per-hour basis, it was darn close to McDonald’s wages.)

That wasn’t problematic, though. For a while, I lived in a clean, cozy studio in central Budapest – rent was just $300 per month. So, one story could practically pay my entire rent. Anything above that went toward living expenses and savings. To impose discipline upon myself, I realized it was better to be too busy than “un-busy” – which led me to never say “No” to an assignment. As a result, I continuously churned out stories, most of them in-depth; on average, authoring about four to six pieces per month.

Meanwhile, just as a top priority was now to write about topics that appealed to me, equally important to me was to travel across the region, dreaming to hit each country, one by one. Following my trip into Croatia to secure?My Big Break, the travel-bug had bitten me – and I was greedy for more.

The War Ends, Yet the Story Remains

As a reminder, that first exhilarating trip to Zagreb came toward the end of the Bosnia War, which officially ended in November 1995, with the signing of the Dayton Accords. The former Yugoslavia was now divided into six new states: Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia, Slovenia, Macedonia and Montenegro.

Having sidestepped the risk of truly “covering” the war, on the ground, I realized the story had simply entered a new stage. So, rather than launch myself too far afield, I sought ways to cover the conflict’s aftermath, from Budapest. As indicated in?Chapter Three, I discovered Hungarian angles to the story, and planned for modest travel to neighboring Serbia, down across Hungary’s southeastern border.

Looking back, six of my earliest pieces for?the Monitor?were war-related – about Serb refugees, exiles, trauma, recovery, rebuilding, elections, etc. They also included two short trips into Serbia:

Carving Out My Beat

That said, there were still plenty of big-name correspondents covering the Bosnian conflict. So, I abegan to focus on creating my own niche: as a correspondent covering Central and Eastern Europe. To do so, I needed to learn for myself how to make this region my “beat” – or sphere of responsibility.

I covered stories specifically unique to Hungary, yet with a regional dimension. This is how I learned one way to enhance the value of my stories, for both editors and readers. For example:

Yet I also developed a new strategy to produce regional stories, without ever leaving Budapest. Even to report a story while “still in my pajamas.” The trick was to first identify an interesting situation in Hungary; then, rather than think narrowly in terms of a Hungary-specific story, ask this crucial question: Is this situation here unique, or part of a broader pattern or trend across the region?

Either way, I realized, would enhance its value and make a story more compelling to an editor. Here’s how: If we believe (or are told) that it’s unique, then work hard to prove it is, with enough research. Next, explain exactly how and why it’s unique to this one country – and definitely unlike elsewhere. Support my argument with evidence that?proves?how other countries contrast with Hungary.

On the other hand, if this situation is actually part of a wider trend, prove it with enough research and credible evidence. Explain why it is. Further support it with examples-anecdotes from other countries across the region, which I’d pluck from my research and/or phone interviews conducted from my Budapest home, with experts, observers and others “on the frontlines” of the story.

When writing my story, I’d make Hungary the “spine” of my story, then weave in the broader regional context. As in:?Meanwhile, the situation in Poland is …?Or:?On the other hand, in Romania …?And so on. Here are several of my earliest examples, before I learned to refine this “regionalizing” technique:

https://www.csmonitor.com/1996/1204/120496.intl.global.2.html?Hungary: Stolen cars, smuggled from West to East.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1996/1122/112296.intl.intl.2.html?Hungary: Political leadership swings from right to center.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1996/1217/121796.intl.intl.4.html?Hungary: Organized crime grows roots, some blame the West.

The Past Pervades the Present

Beyond my coverage of?Big Picture?issues affecting the region, I also monitored the many fascinating ways in which the past intruded upon the present. Specifically, how each society tackled – or tried to ignore – the tensions unresolved since World War II, which had ended a half-century earlier.

Such topics – like who did what to whom, how and why – had been frozen for four decades. As if in amber. From the late 1940s onward, each Communist regime across the region wanted to move on and avoid reminding people about (or potentially stoking) either their nationalist fervor, or their ethno-religious persecution. Moreover, to erase societal-historical distinctions between Christians and Jews, between rich and poor, between landowners and peasants, between educated elites and illiterate poor.

Instead, the Communist regimes aggressively squelched such topics, imposing a brutal police-state and harsh censorship. Everyone should now be “comrades,” working together to build “a Socialist paradise.” Those who resisted would be crushed – which created countless new victims, region-wide. In Hungary, this meant suppressing all talk about the 1956 Hungarian Revolution: both its root-causes and how ruthlessly it was extinguished, with Soviet Red Army assistance.

However, starting in 1989 with the parting of the Iron Curtain, all sorts of freedoms swept through the region, both good and bad: From the unleashing of nationalist sentiment and rediscovered religiosity, to open debate of a re-examined past, which led some to push for historical truth and justice.

That said, it was much messier than in a country like South Africa. There, the post-Apartheid “Truth and Reconciliation Commission” – inspired by Nelson Mandela’s willingness to resist retribution for the abuses committed against him and legions of other black South Africans – allowed for a relatively candid national conversation about past injustices. (As I’d learn after moving to Southern Africa in 2011.)

Anyway, here are several history-related stories that I produced from Budapest, for the?Monitor:

https://www.csmonitor.com/1996/1024/102496.intl.intl.1.html?Hungary: After fleeing Iron Curtain, exiles return to democracy.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1996/1024/102496.intl.intl.2.html?Hungary: ’56 Rev veterans face generation fed Communist line.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/1113/111397.intl.intl.7.html?Hungary: Anxiety over Communist-era secret-police/spy files.

Moreover, as more Central Europeans grew fed up with their dashed hopes and disillusionment – having believed it might be a relatively easy transformation from Communist-era deprivations to the capitalist-fueled affluence – another psychological phenomenon emerged: Nostalgia for the past.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/1224/122497.intl.intl.1.html?Hungary: Nostalgia for Communism’s greatest hits, music

Integrating East with West

Another dominant theme from that era was the national consensus – shared across Central and Eastern Europe – that during four decades of the Cold War, the Soviets had forced these countries to be loyal to “the East.” Specifically, to Moscow. Or face the consequences.

Yet with the last Soviet troops expelled from the region in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the national consensus on how to move forward was clear: Cast our lot with the West. As small nations straddling East and West,?neutrality?was not an option. The reality is: they must choose their loyalties.

With the fall of the Berlin Wall still a fresh memory, public sentiment was overwhelming to align with Washington and Brussels, not Moscow. This meant prioritizing efforts to join a) the European Union – and its rules on issues like economic transformation and internal borders; and b) the security umbrella of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, whose guiding mantra is “An attack on one is an attack on all.” (As of August 2023, we can see how Russia’s attack on Ukraine has sent this region into a panic.)

Yet, those transitions to EU and NATO standards were easier said than done. Here’s a quartet of my related stories for the?Monitor, from 1997, produced through the prism of Hungary’s experience:

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/0929/092997.intl.intl.2.html?Hungary: International Court o Justice, environment hydrodam

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/0723/072397.intl.intl.4.html?Hungary: Think piece on free-n-fair elex in post-Comm orbit

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/0710/071097.intl.intl.2.html?Hungary: US clout, NATO admits three new members. H, P, C

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/0522/052297.intl.intl.1.html?Hungary: Tension, ensuring civilian control over CEE militaries.

Old-School Archiving

Budapest, by virtue of being a beautiful, affordable city – and situated smack in the heart of Europe – was an ideal base for many foreign journalists. I came across colleagues from Holland, France, Britain, Germany and elsewhere, working for newspapers, television and radio back home. That Hungary borders a remarkable?seven different countries also whet my appetite for more journalistic adventures.

However, I wasn’t thinking like a bold backpacker, who’s willing to lay their head wherever they could find a bed of straw. Instead, I now viewed myself as a budding entrepreneur: I was looking to travel only when it made financial sense to do so. In other words, if I could profit from it, somehow.

So, how to detect potential profitability? Well, as I explained in?Chapter Four, it all starts with a sparkling story idea that an editor or producer believes will deliver value to their audience. But where to find such ideas? From keeping your eyes open, your antenna up, your nose constantly sniffing for something interesting. From research, too. Which research? Ah. This was still early in the Internet age, while simultaneously at the tail-end of the now-bygone practice of newspaper staffs creating a library: “clipping” out each article from the paper, to file them in a vast archive of clips, divided by category.

Many journalists became their own archivists, too – clipping articles they figured to be relevant or useful, either today or in the future. They’d stash them away, typically in manila folders, which were then sandwiched in a metal filing-cabinet. Sounds archaic, no? But I did it, too. That’s what we all did.

There I was in Budapest, sitting on a couch in my apartment, recognizing the need to build my own archive of relevant stories and publications. The purpose was for me to somehow create a logical, coherent, even systematic way to cover Hungary, specifically, and the region, at large. Strategically, I recognized my need to “connect dots” across the region, to offer more salable, region-wide stories.

It was natural for me to start to create physical files, as well as store them on my computer. I’d collect issues of the three English-language papers in Budapest, plus regional magazines like the Prague-based?Transitions?(which had published a longer version of my?Born of Rape?story). Sometimes also a Hungarian-language publication, as I’d learned enough of the language to decipher key elements.

Online, I’d save a daily Hungarian English-language news service and the iconic, regional?Radio Free Europe(to whom I later contributed several pieces). I’d surf mainstream media, setting news-alerts for Hungary, Central Europe, Eastern Europe and individual countries. I monitored regional media – mostly in English. Local-language media, too, if their reporting was a primary source for my research.

The stories I’d copy-and-paste into my categorized computer files were a mix of either country-specific pieces, or spotlighting the region. I literally wanted to explore every country in neighborhood.

On the one hand, I built up story-rich material, for each country. I knew that for the?Monitor, if I’d hit a certain threshold of high-quality, country-specific story ideas, it might earn me an expense-paid work-trip. Yet this was no ordinary “work”; I soon saw it as the most thrilling form of?Adventure Travel.

At the same time, I’d try to detect patterns and track trends. I jotted notes, by pen and keyboard, brainstorming ideas that appealed to me journalistically – and as a freelance entrepreneur who’d then have to “sell” that idea. Like digging for raw diamonds, I sifted through the grit for topics I could potentially polish into sparkling ideas. Which might eventually land me an exciting assignment:

Hmmm. The Czechs are grappling with the same issue as the Hungarians, on what to do about the old files collected and kept by the Communist Secret Police? Should they be exposed to public scrutiny and denunciation, or kept closed – in hopes of avoiding societal uproar and fresh emotional trauma?

Then, maybe a month later:?Wait, the Romanians are now arguing over the same thing? Time for a story? Is it worth pitching? What does it say about the region today? Why would my client’s audience care enough to read about this? What can they learn from it?

Such an emerging pattern might lead me to do additional research:?Let’s see how the Poles, the Slovaks, the Bulgarians are handling this …?Over time, I’d conclude: This is clearly a “regionwide trend” – which would ring a bell for me.?Ding-ding! Now I have a good story worth pitching!

Indeed, I was learning that this regional-trend argument was vital to make when pitching my?Monitor?editors, or anyone else:?This story isn’t about just one country; it spans the entire region.

This seemed to strike a chord with editors, as a measuring-stick when deciding which ideas to accept, and which to reject. Their rationale appeared to be:

We have precious budget, so must choose wisely which stories we publish. They should either be unique and interesting enough to be country-specific, or more important and meaningful if they open a window onto an entire region – and spotlight several countries at once.

I eventually developed another technique to produce a regional story, regardless of the topic – even if there wasn’t a demonstrable trend across the region: If a situation in one country is truly unique, one way we prove and show this is to?contrast?it with similar circumstances in neighboring countries. That story-line and core-message might read something like:?While the situation in Country XXX is YYY, elsewhere in the region situation is ZZZ …?More on this approach in?Chapter Thirteen:?Storytelling Filters.

Meanwhile, there was another reason why I’d clip articles that helped establish a pattern: They became pieces of evidence to prove my story. When writing, I’d have to cite the credible source of my evidence, with names and dates. As a young journalist, this is how I excitedly realized that my chosen vocation also features some aspect of detective-work: I was always sniffing for proof, to make my case.

Moreover, moving forward, I’d marshal all this into a lawyer-like, evidence-driven argument. Firstly, aimed at the editor; then, at my smart, skeptical foreign audience. (You may recall that I described this need for a?"Lawyerly Argument"?in?Chapter Five:?What Audiences Need.)

Overall, the lesson-learned: Researching and archiving pays off – in multiple ways. Not just because my story-ideas improved in quality and salability, but it helped me carve out my beat. That’s how, by Fall 1996, I more confidently set my sights on expanding into the region. Specifically, toward Hungary’s eastern neighbor: Romania, to explore its internal and external challenges.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1996/1004/100496.intl.intl.5.html?Romania: EU/NATO prod Hungary-Roman to sign peace treaty

https://www.csmonitor.com/1996/1011/101196.intl.intl.2.html?Romania: Preview of crucial elections, Iliescu accuses US.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1996/1031/103196.intl.intl.2.html?Romania: Peasants may turn government rightward in election

Country-Topic-Publication

After deriving some success from of my archiving-tracking system, another formula crystalized in my mind. There were essentially two different ways to approach story-idea development. First, start by looking at one country, specifically, for a critical-mass of quality story-ideas. Then, persuade my editors. That was typically my priority, since I was curious to taste each society in the region, one by one.

Second, start with a topic: a meaningful issue that wasn’t just salable, but impassioned me enough to want to chase it for days, weeks, maybe even a month or two. Such as the pursuit of historic justice. The fate of migrating populations. Or how to illustrate the rocky post-Communist transition.

Next, figure out which country might be most representative of that issue, to form the narrative spine of my story. It might be Hungary or elsewhere. In fact, I sensed the?Monitor?wouldn’t even want me to produce all my stories from Budapest. They liked having a variety of datelines, from exotic locales – just as I did. Especially if I could justify going “off-the-beaten-path” for a story, which I was eager to do.

Why? Because the editors could demonstrate the?Monitor’s reach to readers, to show that both its coverage and correspondents (whether full-time or freelance) spanned the globe. Which was true.

I just needed to pitch my editors enough high-quality stories, to plausibly justify slicing a portion of their precious budgetary pie – to allocate it for, say, three of Michael Jordan’s stories from Kosovo.

Over time, I realized a third route to successfully pitch story ideas: Target a specific publication. There were certain publications that I admired, even revered, to whom I would eventually pitch stories. (Not always successfully.) Publications like?The New Republic,?The Atlantic,?The New Yorker,?Harper’s.

I’d spend significant time researching a publication that appealed to me: to identify what, if anything, they’d produced from my region. Or from individual countries of the region. And when they’d produce it. Then I’d connect dots with trends that were now on my mind, as I gained a greater grasp of what was unfolding across the region: repeating patterns, shared commonalities, unique situations, etc.

I wasn’t scared off if a publication had previously published stories that trammeled the same or similar terrain to what I was mulling – as perhaps they’d done so several years earlier. Nevermind, because I’d find a timely hook for why that publication should publish my follow-up story?today.

I also wasn’t turned off if a more recent story had explored a tangential angle, because I gradually grew more confident in my ability to find fresher, more interesting angles – or to produce a story in a fresh way. For example, bring it to life from different, unique locales, or draw out unique stories from unique people affected by a situation. Then, back it up with fresh evidence of a new trend.

By studying these publications – and “doing my homework” – I could match up if they were a media outlet hungry to consume the kind of product I might want to (and be able to) produce. In short, if our supply-and-demand dynamic aligned. This calculation is what fed?The Intersection of Self-Interests, detailed in?Chapter Four:?What Editors Want, as I matched what they want with what I could offer.

On the flip-side, this research enabled me to avoid an embarrassing misstep that’d harm my professional reputation: to directly approach a client, without doing any advanced research, and be utterly clueless that they have zero prior interest or track-record of ever covering my countries or topics. Or perhaps they’d done so, very recently. They might react with disgust at my pitch:?Look at this guy; he’s pitching us without knowing who we are, what we do, what we want. He hasn’t done his homework.

With this approach, I failed to hit my target with those elite magazines named above, despite extensive efforts. Nevertheless, I claimed some victories by publishing in other prestigious publications.

Beyond the Monitor

While I was proud to be reporting for the?Monitor, serving as their correspondent wasn’t enough to satiate me. For three reasons. First, because the paper didn’t have?that?much appetite for coverage.?A story per week from Hungary??No. With all due respect to the Hungarians, from a Western-media perspective, it was – and continues to be – a small, relatively insignificant country.

Never did my editors clamor:?We need more stories from Hungary!?Nor did they hunger for more Budapest-based regional stories; Central Europe was not a hotbed for content.

Second, parachuting elsewhere in the region was a time-consuming process. From the moment I’d intensively research ideas, pitch editors; await approval; take several weeks to prepare for reporting, schedule interviews and arrange travel logistics; spend one week in-country for reporting; then, once back home, take two-three weeks to write up my batch of stories – it might total two months.

According to my archive, I did indeed average one trip every two to three months. Amid all of that, I continuously juggled other assignments, while simultaneously collecting ideas for the next trip.

The third reason is that the?Monitor?wasn’t the appropriate outlet for all my ideas or interests. As I explained above, besides the countries I wanted to visit were the issues that gradually impassioned me: like the military, the media and minorities. Focusing on those topics led me to new clients.

For example, with so many NATO-related developments across Central and Eastern Europe, I became more interested in regional-security issues. I also figured that since I was already researching, interviewing and writing about related issues for the?Monitor, though from a more socio-political perspective, perhaps could I spin off that effort by writing for a military-industry publication.

I was now thinking as an entrepreneur, to maximize my investment of time and energy – and achieve a “bigger bang for my buck.” If I make all this effort, why not squeeze out two articles for two publications – as well as two fees? Especially if I could find a second publication with an absolutely different target-readership, so there’d be no inherent conflict in writing and selling a piece to both.

That’s how I came to learn about?Jane’s Defence Weekly, which at the time was widely viewed as “the Bible” of the military-security news industry. I learned what topics they typically covered, surfed the?Jane’s?search-engine and researched their archive – to ascertain what they’d published previously, from where, and when. All to glean a sense of what, if anything, they might want from the region?today.

Could I produce something that was fresh – and included a newsy “timely hook”? If they’d done something more recent, how could I do it better than what they’d done before? If they hadn’t done anything, might they be interested now? In short, I learned how to match my products to their needs. I pitched?Jane’s, successfully, and eventually served for a while as their Budapest correspondent.

Similarly, I became interested in media affairs – and how heavily-censored, Communist-era journalists had adapted to a vibrant, diverse, largely free marketplace of new publications and freedom of expression. But for whom could I explore these issues? I researched online, then came across the Vienna-based International Press Institute. In particular, their publication:?World Press Freedom Review.

In?Chapter Twenty-Six:?Minority Journalists, I’ll show one more issue and category of content that eventually held my attention. When I began to focus in more on the plight of the Roma minority (a.k.a. more derogatorily as “the Gypsies”) of Central and Eastern Europe, I often explored the unique position of women. That sparked a thought: Might a women’s magazine be interested in this story? If so, which one? That led me to the most famous women’s-issue periodical in America:?Ms. Magazine. Again, I did my homework, then approached them. Eventually, they’d publish two of my articles.

In short, I began to think more about how to “kill two birds with one stone”: meaning, when weighing the worth of a story idea, sometimes one sale wasn’t enough. Can I turn this into two?

This wasn’t just about maximizing my investment of time and effort, but maximizing the profitability of trips. It even helped facilitated travel: I learned how to piggy-back one client onto another’s trip. If one was willing to chip in, even pay half, it might persuade the?Monitor?to pay half, too.

To summarize, here were my three routes toward mining salable story-ideas:

1)?????Zero in on a specific?country?you’re drawn to … then figure out what to write about there.

2)?????Identify a specific?issue?that moves you … then figure out which country best illustrates it.

3)?????Target a media?outlet?that appeals to you … then figure out which story may be the right fit.

Meanwhile, my journalistic interests expanded. I even invested in some professional radio equipment, to venture into radio-work: for?Christian Science Monitor?Radio (which went defunct in?XXX)?and a Budapest-based radio program called?Central Europe Today. Still, I was a newspaperman at heart.

Anywhere in the World, If …

These strategies benefited me, for years. I honed my technique of pitching ideas to editors – and reveled in this rare form of?free?adventure-travel. One by one, I’d identify remote countries I was curious to explore, then “parachuted” in: from Albania to Uzbekistan, from Eastern Europe to Central Asia.

I was thrilled by my journalistic “sense of purpose,” which distinguished me from an ordinary tourist. A tourist’s lone interactions with locals are typically limited to a hotel concierge, a taxi driver, a restaurant waitress, and so on – those on the frontlines of the tourism-service industry.

Meanwhile, I felt empowered with the “right” to interview anyone willing to talk: farmers, factory workers, shopkeepers, teachers, journalists, lawyers, doctors, politicians, professors, students, police, generals, leaders, followers, victims, perpetrators, and on and on.

As my relationship developed with the?Monitor?in 1996-97, and trust deepened with its editors, I felt increasingly loyal to the publication. This made me curious to meet them face-to-face, since I was still relatively new to the notion of a long-distance-only relationship between freelancer and editor.

On one visit home to my family in New Jersey, I carved out time for a five-hour drive up to?the Monitor’s offices, in downtown Boston. The?Christian Science Center?is a vast, impressive example of modern architecture, highlighted by what they tout as?“The world’s largest mapparium”?– built in 1935.

During my meeting with then-World Editor Clayton Jones, as we discussed my current and potential future coverage, Clay motioned toward a traditional map of the world, hanging from a wall. Specifically, he pointed at the vast space that encompasses Eastern Europe and Central Asia, sandwiched between Russia to the north, Turkey to the south:

Clay noted that the paper already had established staffers or reliable correspondents in Moscow and Istanbul. For all the smaller, less-significant countries residing in the neighborhood, only freelancers produced an occasional story. He made me a tantalizing offer, which I recall went something like this:

Michael, you’re doing quite well for us. We’d be willing to send you anywhere in the world …

My jaw dropped. Is this my dream, coming true? No, not quite. Clay finished his sentence:

… But we’d only send you, if you could guarantee us at least three front-page-quality stories.

Ah-ha! That’s a high threshold. But fair. Understandably, this “free” adventure-travel came with strings attached. For the?Monitor?to invest in, say, a one-week reporting trip (paying for a correspondent’s flight, hotel, interpreter, meals, taxis, etc.), their return-on-investment must include at least three top-shelf stories. Even if each weren’t ultimately published on the front page, they must be of high enough caliber that they?could?appear there.

These ideas, naturally, should be pitched and approved, in advance. No problem! Clay was dangling a golden opportunity in front of my nose. It wasn’t an actual “deal,” but more a professional challenge. It was also an additional boost to my confidence that I was on the right path. I took it as incentive to further sharpen my skills and hone my story pitching-and-producing method.

I returned to Budapest, determined to seize this opportunity. Over the next handful of years, for the?Monitor?and others, I’d “parachute” into countries like Albania, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Czechia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, Romania, Serbia, Ukraine and Uzbekistan.

Working as the?Monitor’s Budapest-based Correspondent – again, one of the few prestigious American newspapers with consistent budget for freelance contributions – kept me plenty busy. At the same time, my stable of clients continued to expand, sometimes even without me seeking out new clients. (As a freelancer, while still climbing the ladder, that’s one thing I learned early on: Never say “No” to a client – it kept me well-fed, as well as disciplined, for how it forced me to manage my time.)

While they were occasionally of the word-of-mouth, hand-me-down, prove-myself variety, I freelanced regularly for the military-industry bible,?Jane’s Defence Weekly, and media-evaluating?World Press Freedom Review; and contributed often to the global Jewish news agency,?JTA. (Farther below, then?in?Chapter Seven:?The "Jewish Journalist", I explain my coverage of the region’s unique Jewish communities.)

This combination worked well, because each of these publications had distinct, non-competing audiences. I learned how to cobble together and pitch a 7- to 10-day trip, whereby I might stuff my days with reporting and interviewing for multiple publications.

Each client would contribute to my travel expenses, then pay for the stories produced. With my notepad packed from 20, 30, 40 interviews, I’d start writing only after I returned home to Budapest. (I’ll provide more of my samples in?Chapter Thirteen,?to illustrate each of?MJ’s Storytelling Principles.)

I recall one such trip to the ex-Yugoslav republic of Macedonia – today renamed Northern Macedonia – where I reported for the?Monitor, about a broader socio-political trend story; for?Jane’s Defence Weekly, about that country’s military; for?World Press Freedom Review, about that country’s media; and for JTA, about that country’s tiny Jewish community.

Sometimes, interviews overlapped: I might interview one subject for two separate stories, if their voice was relevant. I also learned how to spin one core story for two publications, with a slightly modified focus and some differing content. Once from Lithuania, I even wrote one core story about the country’s few remaining Yiddish-speakers – then spun it for?three?separate publications.

By my standards, I was evolving into a well-oiled freelancing machine.

The Budget: Deal-Clincher or Deal-Breaker?

Again, this freelancing is a business. I couldn’t just tell the editor “I want to travel to XXX, to explore YYY.” Let’s say I hooked an editor with my ideas, and they replied positively:?We like them. We’re interested.?But the next words out of their mouth might be:?How much would it cost us?

As a freelancer-entrepreneur, I now had to learn more about the business side of this freelancing life. Selling story ideas is one thing; selling the cost to produce them is another.

A newspaper or magazine might be willing to invest in a good story, but not to write us a blank-check. They need more than a “guess-timate” about how much it’ll cost. They expect realistic numbers. That meant I had to do the leg-work, from my home-base, to research and create a travel budget.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t enjoy the job of a travel-agent. (Unlike my older son, who relishes finding the best travel deal out there, in terms of cost, logistics and efficiency. Over the years, he’s become my go-to travel-agent. But back in the late-90s, he didn’t yet exist.)

Most major media usually have staff assigned to arrange and book such travel for journalists. As a one-man operation, though, I had to do it myself. And I detested it. In fact, I quickly learned that this is one of the hidden costs in a freelancing field where “time is money.” Meaning, the time we spend on a non-revenue-generating activity is time taken away from activities that could actually earn us money.

Yet, at this point in my career, I had no choice, so invested countless hours with that stuff. At the same time, I knew the?Monitor?is indeed a church-owned, not-for-profit publication. While they had strong appetite for foreign stories, I sensed their tight budget and cost-consciousness. Still, I desperately wanted to travel and produce stories for them. My task was to persuade them to pony up expenses.

The message they delivered to me was:?Travel on a shoe-string. So I made it work, as inexpensively as possible. First, I searched for the most affordable, most direct, most sensible flight. Or, took a train. For example, the trip to Belgrade, the Serbian capital, was a?five-hour?ride from Budapest.

Besides travelling in coach, of course, I’d have to find myself budget hotels. I was never like those high-falutin’ Foreign Correspondents whom you might visualize, parachuting in with an entourage of a production team, ushered to the Four Seasons, and so on.?Can I find any sample-budgets?

I recall the envy I felt once, in Macedonia, while reporting on the ethnic-Albanian refugees from Kosovo, following the NATO bombing of Serbia. (See below for those Kosovo-related stories.)

I saw CNN’s?Matthew Chance?on television reporting from perhaps the fanciest hotel in Skopje, Macedonia’s capital. Yet I was hoofing around Skopje, hitching rides or taxis out to the refugee camps outside of town, then returning at night to my no-frills hotel. I can’t remember the precise details, but recall Chance even saying something like: “Here I am, reporting from a hotel near the refugee camps …”

I remember thinking:?That blankety-blank is staying at some five-star hotel, centrally located? While I’m having to scrimp and save??Beyond the “luxury” of accommodations, I resented how he might be enjoying the luxury of fully concentrating on the quality of his journalism, instead of the logistics.

Oh, well. That’s OK. My envy soon dissipated. I wouldn’t have done it any other way. Mine was an up-by-the-bootstraps, on-a-shoestring form of adventure-travel. Mostly off the beaten path. It’s a trade-off: as a staffer, with its pros and cons, or freelancing freedom, with pros and cons of its own.

Beyond the flights and hotels, figure in food. However, at that time, all of these countries were very reasonably priced – to foreigners lik e me. For locals struggling with the transition, and rising cost-of-living expenses, residing in the capitals was surely pricey. But I can’t deny the fact that my US dollars went a long way, fortunately. So, I could get away with spending $100 or for the week, on food – and even eat like a king: soup, appetizer, meat, starch, dessert, not to mention beer, wine and liquor.

But that was only the food for my personal consumption. I often had another mouth to feed.

The Fixer

Indeed, there was one last expense to factor into the budget, which was oh-so-necessary. The interpreter was often much more than that; they were my Mister (or Miss) Fix-It.

Indeed, that’s what they’re typically called:?Fixers. It’s an entire profession of folks who cater to foreign journalists, especially in hot-spots around the world, where such assistance is necessary. Whether the journalist is based there, or parachutes in for stints, into places like Iraq and Afghanistan.

For me, I became increasingly reliant on my interpreter: not out of laziness, but to improve my own efficiency, and maximize the precious time I had on the ground, in-country. For example, early on I would have landed in an unfamiliar airport, in an alien country, disoriented. Then, have to steel myself to run the gauntlet of rowdy taxi-drivers, who might prey upon and gouge a gullible foreigner like me. Next, I’d have to figure out if I was heading to the right hotel, along the most direct route.

Eventually, I opted to pay a bit extra, to have my interpreter await me at the airport, to corral a taxi-driver and lead me to the hotel. Or they’d drive me in their own car or a borrowed car (with me paying for petrol). Or we’d be joined by a driver we hired for longer-distance driving in the countryside.

That interpreter would usually stick with me throughout the day, from morning until evening, trouble-shooting, helping me navigate taxi, tram, train, bus, subway or car-rental. Just as important, we often became partners in this adventure, as I’d solicit their insights into the situation or our reporting.

Only a few times in all my years did I have to pay through the nose for a top-of-the-line fixer, or for a professional interpreter – if I had absolutely no choice. My preferred option, as always, was to create a win-win situation: For me, this meant saving money by finding a smart, young, English-speaking student from a local university; not a professional, but eager, capable and willing to follow instructions.

Ideally, they’d recognized the win-win for themselves. They might earn decent money for the week (maybe $200, or $50 per day?), but also benefit from the invaluable opportunity to practice their English with a native English-speaker. Even the chance to gain a fresh perspective of their own country.

I recall several students-turned-interpreters who told me how they’d learned something new about their own society, through my eyes and exploration. By tagging along with me, they’d observe how I would think and function, the people we met, the questions I asked them, the answers we’d receive, and how I processed it all. Often, it was just as eye-opening for them as it was for me.

So, rather than pay $100, $150, even $250 a day for a professional interpreter – which would have overwhelmed my editor and deterred them from approving my proposal – I recall always trying to assemble a budget that might total $800 or $1,000 or $1,200 for an entire trip.

Later, when the?Monitor?set this standard for me, of three-high-quality-stories-guaranteed (as described above), I sensed that $2,000 was their magic number: to derive maximum value from the investment, they’d look to spend no more than $2,000 for the entire package, including my story-fees.

Was it worth it? My editors’ calculation seemed to be:?If the stories enhance coverage, with meaningful reportage or unique storytelling that sets us apart from other papers, then yes, it’s worth it. In short, those are the kinds of stories I was able to produce: those that added value, somehow.

Learning to Parachute

As I began to regularly assemble all these elements for jaunts into the region – typically starting a month in advance, after I received approval from my editor – it occurred to me that my job felt analogous to a certain military specialty: I was “parachuting into” unfamiliar terrain. Like a parachutist, I hoped to not land with a thud, but to “hit the ground running.” As smoothly and seamlessly as possible.

Meaning, not just arrive at the airport, head to the hotel, drop off my bags, and plop myself on a couch in the lobby, then wonder: “What do I do now? Where do I go?”?Visual: Parachuting from plane!

No, this was business. My client was now investing a significant sum in me. I’d promised three, sometimes more stories. My time on the ground, in-country, was precious. There was no time to dilly-dally. Not only was the client counting on me, but I counted on myself to come through: if I hoped to enjoy more all-expense-paid adventures like this, I had no choice but to deliver the goods.

So, it was essential that I’d land with a clear idea, already in mind, of where I’d go – and why there – as well as whom to meet – and why them. In fact, I’d pre-plan more: to hit the ground running, I’d already have my first, second, third interviews lined up, for that initial day. Often the next day, too.

From there, I’d have an armful of interviewing possibilities I identified from home, or even made initial contact with other sources about likely meeting them during my week in-country. Yet, I needed to build in some flexibility, too. I was now on the ground, learning more about the reality, maintaining an open mind about even better places to visit – and even more interesting characters to interview.

Later, I was so confident in my approach, I developed a curriculum and taught my “Parachute In” method in Prague, twice a year, as the Lead Journalism Trainer for a unique, 10-day?Foreign Correspondent Training Course. More on this in?Chapter Eleven:?The Course I Always Wanted.

In?Chapter Twenty, I republish the two?Parachute In?chapters I wrote in 2014 for the Deutsche Welle Training Academy, which evolved into a European Union-funded handbook,?Beyond Your World:

Publishing my two how-to chapters –?Unearthing the Idea?and?Assembling the Story?– was significant because I was then deep into my Prague-training and Hong Kong-teaching experiences. I now wanted to publicly share my intellectual property, detailing my before-trip and during-trip pedagogy.

As I always told my Prague trainees, I designed that short-course in a way to mirror the way I myself did it. Here’s a range of stories I produced in 1997 through this same Parachute-In approach.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/0213/021397.intl.intl.2.html?Albania: Ponzi/pyramid scheme scams newly capitalist Albans

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/0303/030397.intl.intl.4.html?Albania: I interview “Mandela of Albania,” discusses freedom.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/0403/040397.intl.intl.5.html?Croatia: Serb family in Krajina finds they can’t go home again.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/0414/041497.intl.intl.2.html?Czech Republic: Madeleine Albright’s Czech roots raises hope.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/0425/042597.intl.intl.1.html?Croatia: Vukovar/Croat & Serb police jointly patrol beats. Unity

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/0703/070397.intl.intl.4.html?Albania: Why election/voting is so symbolic for Albanians

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/0807/080797.intl.intl.5.html?Albania: Return to eye-for-an-eye, blood feuds, Kanun.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/1002/100297.intl.intl.5.html?Serbia: Nationalism in Serb media-monopoly, alternatives.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/1008/100897.intl.intl.3.html?Serbia: Elections, ultranationalist Seselj says he’ll ignore Dayton

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/1210/121097.intl.intl.4.html?Macedonia: US troops will remain in another Balkan hotspot.

An Awakening Identity

Now I’ll elaborate on why exactly Budapest was so meaningful to me?personally. Ancestrally, too. Not because this book is a memoir,?per se, but I want to share how my identity became relevant to my journalism, my journalistic choices, and a prism through which I detected stories over the years.

My father and his family had deep roots in Central Europe – particularly within the Austro-Hungarian Empire – that traced back generations. At least since the late 1700s, we discovered.

They were?Hungarian, yet simultaneously – in the eyes of some –?not Hungarian. They spoke Hungarian, lived among Hungarians, worked among Hungarians. They even felt Hungarian, in many ways. Yet weren’t?ethnicHungarian. No, they were a separate historic, ethnic tribe:?Hungarian Jews. Surely part of the wider Jewish diaspora, who for various historical reasons had settled in this region. I’m no authority on the subject, but if you’re curious, feel free to?read more about it?here?and?here.

What I can tell you, though, is that during World War II, most of my Hungarian Jewish family were rounded up, deported and murdered in Nazi-run concentration camps. In Auschwitz today, in the exhibit of Hungarian Jewish victims, two Jordans are inscribed: Viktor and Jeno Jordan. Brothers. My father’s uncles. Both exterminated, along with many more of my father’s relatives.

Growing up in the States, I’d learned something about the fate of my family. My father, his older brother, and his parents, had survived, barely. Dad had recently turned 3 years old when the Nazis invaded on March 19th, 1944, and joined forces with the Hungarian fascists then in power. But most of the family perished. I once wrote about this for a high-school assignment, but it felt too abstract, from?the old country. As for the rest of Hungarian Jewry, I wasn’t well-versed before arriving in Budapest.

In terms of identity, I’d grown up feeling not particularly Jewish. We weren’t religious, at all. I was an American kid – a first-generation American, in fact. Both my parents still possessed subtle accents, a lingering badge of flight from their respective homelands in 1956 – and arrival on US shores.

My father and his family, as refugees of the Hungarian Revolution. My mother and her family, as Jewish refugees from Alexandria, Egypt, during the Suez Canal Crisis. In 2006, I commemorated their unique golden anniversary with a two-part series about how their journeys intersected:

Bratislava/Family/Hungary/Budapest:?https://www.jta.org/2006/10/25/lifestyle/1956-a-tale-of-two-crises

Bratislava/Egypt/Alexandria:?https://www.jta.org/2006/10/25/lifestyle/1956-crises-decimated-two-communities

Dad had conflicted emotions about Hungary, though I was unaware of that during my childhood. He still had family living in Budapest – including his favorite aunt and cousins – and we’d visited them in 1990, on a family trip. But I sensed something was amiss when, shortly before I departed for Hungary in 1993, my father erupted one night: “Michael, you have no idea what the mentality is like over there!”

He was right, of course. I’d soon learn it for myselI recall two of my early epiphanies in Budapest. The first was familial. I got to know my Hungarian cousins; retraced my father’s family history in Budapest and in the rural countryside; and explored historical areas like the old Jewish quarter, the grand synagogues, and dilapidated cemeteries.

My connectedness was growing, to both the land and the Hungarian Jews who remained. (Back then, in a Hungary that totaled some 10 million citizens, the number of Jews was estimated at anywhere from 80,000 to 100,000. Some suggested with mixed-marriages and hidden identities, the total could be as high as 250,000. Regardless, it was by far the largest Jewish community in Central-Eastern Europe.)

Then in 1996, I took my first trip to next-door Romania. Reporting for the?Monitor, my visit coincided with a Jewish holiday. I dropped in on the main synagogue in the capital, Bucharest. The place was packed, evidence of revived Jewish communal life. Within this large crowd, I looked to my left, spotting an elderly fellow who looked remarkably like my maternal grandfather. Mom’s father. I scanned to the right and saw a middle-aged guy who reminded me of my paternal uncle. Dad’s brother.

Isn’t that odd??Or maybe not. I began to sense a tribal, genetic connection that transcends borders. The Yiddish term for it, I later learned, is?mishpocha: a family network, linked to peoplehood.

Over time, I redefined my own identity. While living in the US, I was an American who, if you’d pressed me for other identifying traits, might have said?Hungarian American. Or, if you asked my religious affiliation, I might have described myself as a?Jewish American. Linguistically speaking, the?American?was the core – the noun – with the?Jewish?part being the modifying adjective.

Yet now, in Central Europe, a revelation: I felt more like an?American Jew. Meaning, at my core, a Jew – who could’ve been born anywhere. Indeed, any country that would have taken in my refugee family in 1956-57, I would’ve been born and gained citizenship there. It just so happened that the United States had welcomed them – for which they were grateful. (I shall always be, as well.)

To me, that made the?American?bit the adjective, with the?Jew?part the noun. There’s a subtle difference between Jewish American and American Jew – but it became meaningful to me.

The Holocaust: Still “Alive”

The second epiphany was about the region’s history. In Budapest, in the mid-1990s, I’d ride in a tram, along architecturally-scenic boulevards – and daydream about how fortunate I felt to live in this city. Then I read Daniel Goldhagen’s epic 1996 book,?Hitler’s Willing Executioners: The Germans who looked away, who didn’t actively participate in the cleansing of Jews, still knew what was happening.

Suddenly, the elderly folks who shuffled along Budapest sidewalks looked very different to me:?The Holocaust only ended 50 years ago. These Hungarians are 70 or 80 years old. Which means, they were already adults during the war!

As I learned more about the Holocaust – and its world of victims, victimizers, and the complicity of those who turned away or said nothing – I’d view these elderly walking in a more nuanced way:?What were YOU doing 50 years ago? Which side were you on?

Even “neutrality” is a moral decision. If one person assaults another before our very eyes – and we do nothing – can we claim neutrality? Are we completely without blame, for not intervening? The analogy here is Switzerland, which didn’t take sides during WWII, despite the bloodbath on its doorstep.

That was just one topic that began to fascinate me, from 1996 onward. At a time of great economic hardship and anxiety for the majority of people, some of these issues – including, restitution and compensation for victimized Jewish individuals, families and communities – became the subject of intense national debate across the region.

In fact, these topics were so sensitive – and provoked such emotions from all sides – that I was struck by another revelation:?The Holocaust is still alive?… In its own unique way. The?Monitor?had some appetite for such weighty topics, and published several pieces from me. See here, here and here:

https://www.csmonitor.com/1996/0909/090996.intl.intl.5.html?Hungary: Now-secular Hungarians, relations w/ church, religion

https://www.csmonitor.com/1996/0912/091296.intl.intl.6.html?Hungary: Symbolism of re-opening historic Dohany synagogue

https://www.csmonitor.com/1996/1101/110196.intl.intl.1.html?Austria/Vienna: Jewish art-property restitution

Just as I’d explored growing religiosity, overall, I had a growing interest in the plight of various other ethnic minorities, across the region. Especially – as I mentioned earlier in this chapter – the largest, most visible and most marginalized minority: the Roma, known more pejoratively as?Gypsies.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1997/0806/080697.intl.intl.10.html?Remembering Gypsies killed in Holocaust

But in searching for more clients to sell to, I came across an outlet I’d never heard of before: the?Jewish Telegraphic Agency, or JTA. Telegraphic? Yes, as the name implied, JTA was founded?more than?a century ago, as a telegraph service uniquely focused on Jewish affairs and communities, world-wide.

JTA?had a strong appetite for news and features about the Jewish?diaspora, with freelance correspondents stationed around the world, steadily generating stories. Like mainstream news-agencies, and the clients who purchase their stories,?JTA?funneled its content to 100-plus Jewish newspaper-clients around the Anglophone world, from the US to Australia, from Canada to South Africa.

Eventually, I became their Budapest correspondent, as well. Nor was all my coverage Holocaust-related, of course. Much was about the revival of Jewish life – and the challenges of reviving that life. Working for?JTA?also meshed perfectly with my freelancing approach.

I’d plan a trip for the?Monitor?to, say, Albania, prioritizing my mission for that mainstream news client. Then I’d wonder parochially:?What about the Jews??I’d research to grasp the major challenges for the Jewish community there, pitch my?JTA?editors, then produce a story or two about them, as well.

One last tidbit. Once I began writing regularly for both the?Monitor?and for?JTA, I’d often get a humorous reaction from family, friends, colleagues and acquaintances. It came when I’d mention who my two main clients had become. (By “main,” I mean those who regularly accepted my ideas, published my stories – and paid me.) My answer? The?Christian Science Monitor?and?Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

The most common joke I’d hear:?So you’re serving both sides, huh??I’d tell them the reality, of course. But that gag still makes me smile, a quarter-century later. Within a couple years, my relationship with JTA would take center stage. But for now, I still had other topics that impassioned me.

A Balkan Conflict of My Own

Despite my growing interest in issues affecting Jewish communities and other minorities, my priority was still to pursue broader topics for a wider audience. Especially, topics that weren’t just “interesting” to the Western world, but even deemed “important”: like matters of war and peace.

Namely, the smoldering embers in the former Yugoslavia. By 1998, the region was once again on the edge of inter-ethnic conflict. This time, within Serbia itself, in the southern region known as Kosovo. The showdown was between minority Serbs, who ruled Kosovo, and the ethnic-Albanian majority. While terribly na?ve in 1995, I now felt on steadier footing, as my knowledge, experience and confidence grew.

I was secure with my clientele, secure in my niche. It wasn’t daily, breaking news, especially in a war-zone. Besides, the Western media had that aspect covered – particularly after NATO launched an intensive bombing campaign against the Serbs, in Spring 1999, to loosen their grip on Kosovo’s Albanians. I was now ready to contribute to the international coverage as fully as I could, from different angles – short of being an actual war correspondent. Instead, I identified gaps in coverage.

From Budapest, I discovered quite a few relevant angles. Then, more angles from another reporting-trip that I took to Albania, for the?Monitor, to explore the relationship between the Albanian homeland and their ethnic-brethren across the Serbian border, in Kosovo.

Meanwhile, I dug up a handful of Jewish-related topics for JTA. Later, I even visited with the tiny community of Jews in Kosovo, to explore how the conflict had impacted them. (One pleasantly surprising outcome was that my 1999 Kosovo coverage earned an Honorable Mention from the Rockower Awards – the most prestigious prizes in American Jewish journalism.)

Yet my real immersion in the conflict came well after Spring NATO bombardment. Five months after the last bomb had dropped, I parachuted into Kosovo for the first time.

I wouldn’t call myself a “vulture,” as if picking at the remains of a carcass. That sounds too opportunistic. I was also fulfilling a sacred journalistic obligation. As I noted earlier, the mainstream media generally does a fine job of covering the hotspot, when it’s in flames. However, one weakness is in our commitment to “follow-up” – and spotlight the aftermath. One month, one year, 10 years later?

My?Monitor?editors realized that their smart, curious, even concerned audience might wonder:?What ever happened to Kosovo, after we heard about it day after day, earlier this year?

Not only was I determined to revisit that conflict, but it’s worth a reminder: as a freelancer-slash-entrepreneur, I was fully focused on accentuating my comparative-advantage and value-added. My specialty was to produce some of what others couldn’t. Once the mainstream journalists had parachuted in, reported, then been airlifted out, they presumably moved on to the next global hotspot.

That opened the door for a freelancer like me, who wanted to do more than to contribute remotely. Here’s all my Kosovo-related coverage from 1998-99:

https://www.csmonitor.com/1998/0327/032798.intl.intl.3.html?Albania: Albanians reportedly gun-running to support Kosovars

https://www.csmonitor.com/1998/0402/040298.intl.intl.3.html?Albania: Sympathy, support for brethren across Kosovo border.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1998/0514/051498.intl.intl.2.html?Hungary: Serbs, Albanians convene, speak of harmony.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1998/1207/120798.intl.intl.6.html?Serbia: Anti-Milosevic professors plan new university.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1999/0324/p5s1.html?Hungary: Can new Eastern allies be trusted with NATO secrets

https://www.csmonitor.com/1999/0407/p7s1.html?Hungary: New NATO members didn’t bargain on joining war (with Lucian)

https://www.csmonitor.com/1999/0413/p8s1.html?Hungary: Serb/Serbian refugees flee across border, ahead of NATO action.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1999/0426/p7s1.html?Macedonia: Aid workers use cell-phone to assist Kosovar Albanian refugees

https://www.csmonitor.com/1999/0602/p6s1.html?Hungary: NATO recruits new member against neighboring Serbia, 4 Kosovo

https://www.csmonitor.com/1999/1119/p7s1.html?Kosovo: Profile of all-woman, ethnic-Albanian, demining team. Landmines.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1999/1122/p1s2.html?Kosovo: Post-NATO bombardment, Clinton visit US Military Camp Bondsteel

https://www.csmonitor.com/1999/1123/p8s2.html?Kosovo: From Macedonia to Kosovo, scenes of post-bombing chaos

https://www.csmonitor.com/1999/1208/p7s1.html?Kosovo: UNICEF education aims to break cycle of violence, young Albanians

My Budapest Chapter Draws to a Close

Kosovo wasn’t my sole focus, of course. My personal life became “a story,” as well: I got married in late August 1999. Nearly 30 years old, I’d lived in Budapest for exactly six years. The best years of my life! As I’d describe this immersive, hands-on experience as “like a Master’s and PhD, rolled into one.”

However, my Hungarian bride and I wanted to experience something new, together. We eagerly made plans to relocate to New York – six months later – to explore exciting possibilities for both of us.

Nevertheless, during my remaining six months in Budapest, I had my eye out for more stories – and travel opportunities. Including, one last trip. It wasn’t quite a follow-up to?My Big Break, but it did bring my first stage of foreign correspondence “full circle”: What began in Croatia, ended in Croatia.

Here were my final stories as the?Monitor’s Budapest-based correspondent:

https://www.csmonitor.com/1999/0625/p1s4.html?Hungary: Cold War strategists, historians gather to dissect what happened.

https://www.csmonitor.com/1999/0810/p1s3.html?Hungary: Who do they love Robin Hood character who’s robbed 28 banks

https://www.csmonitor.com/1999/1213/p6s1.html?Croatia/Hungary: Croats bury Franjo Tudjman, mixed emotions, elections.

https://www.csmonitor.com/2000/0103/p7s1.html?Moldova: Struggling between East/West (piggybacked on trip for UN Mag?)

https://www.csmonitor.com/2000/0126/p6s1.html?Croatia: Croats vote, rejecting nationalism. Just five years after war.

https://www.csmonitor.com/2000/0207/p8s2.html?Croatia: Ready to leave cults of personality behind, replacing Tudjman.

https://www.csmonitor.com/2000/0209/p7s2.html?Bosnia: Mostar, home to famous bridge, rebuilds; ethnic polarization.

https://www.csmonitor.com/2000/0216/p1s1.html?Hungary: Epic poisoning of Romanian river affects neighbors/environment

https://www.csmonitor.com/2000/0224/p7s2.html?Hungary/Austria: Hungary courts the Austrian far-right movement

Next:?Chapter Seven:?The “Biased" Journalist

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