Part four – brilliant pieces, holy halls and wasps

During their research trips in Mykolaiv and Rivne, the participants of the Summer School were quite busy collecting material for their journalistic pieces. They met, interviewed and portrayed a variety of people, ranging from students and radio moderators, via LGBT-activists, IDPs, fighters from voluntary battalions to musical Cossacks and businesswoman.

Back in Kyiv, it was all about finalizing the pieces under the guidance of the experts of the Mohyla School of Journalism.

During the time of writing, the group had the chance to visit UT Ukraine Today TV channel. “Ukraine’s first international TV news network” was founded as a reaction to the Kremlin-steered channel Russia Today and broadcasts news around Ukraine-related issues in English language.

Another visit led to the 9/11 Frolivska Volunteer Run Humanitarian Aid Center for the Refugees from the War Zone right in the heart of Kyivs Podil district. It was very touching to see the variety of help that is provided by volunteers, while the state still doesn´t have the capacities (or the will) to coordinate the support for IDPs who fled from the war zone in the east of the country. One group spend the whole day there as a part of their research for an article about Ukrainian IDPs.

Not only that every group was able to complete their pieces within the pressing deadline (Sunday evening 20:00 pm), which can be considered a realistic foretaste for the upcoming daily struggle for those who are going to work as journalists, but their submissions were also of a very high quality and have good chances to be published in prominent journalistic outlets. Hence, the individual presentations of the projects on the following day took place in a constructive and rewarding atmosphere.

The official last part of the Summer School ended with a wrap up and get-together in the honorable hall of the old part of the Kyiv-Mohyla-Academy. Larysa Chovnyuk invited the participants to come back to Kyiv and to visit KMA. They will be always welcome here!

The participants had the rest of the day off – time to relax and to prepare for the very last part of the Summer School: a boat trip with a barbeque on one of the Dnepr-islands. The grilled food was tasty, the wine was cold, and the water of the river refreshing – after the participants finally had overcome their resentments against the water quality: YOLO.

That also seemed to be the motto of the massive wasp brigades populating the island. Their aggressive stance against those who they perceived as intruders seemed to stem from the fear that never again in their live they will be able to attack the tanned and sun-creamed skin of a human being.

Various remains of people proved that fear wrong. Maybe exactly these burned mattresses and uncontrolled dump sides are the true reason for their aggressive behavior. In this sense, our efforts to keep the site clean might contribute to a more positive connotation of a term that one of the participants heard during the study trip and that resembles rather negative historical feelings: «Немцы в городе!»

It was an amazing time with lots of stimulating (and controversial) discussions. Thank all of you very much and see you somewhere in Ukraine!

Rivne Day 4: More interviews, critical meanings and a very special visit

Our fourth day was dedicated to the media in Rivne. The radio moderator and dean of the juristic department of the university of Rivne Andriy Vasilovych Matviychuk told us first of all, that it was surely no coincidence that we came to Rivne. Rivne was, according to him, one of the three most active cities during the Maidan (with Lviv and, of course, Kyiv). He explained the active participation with the engaged mass media and public organisations. There are all together 170 registered mass media sources in Rivne. He introduced us to the biggest newspapers and radio stations.

Mr. Matviychuk was very critical to the media. He said that sooner or later the Internet would destroy the traditional printed media. In the discussion we were surprised that very few people in Ukraine actually read newspapers; most of them consume TV or radio for information. “Not every pensioner in Ukraine can allow himself to buy a newspaper even for 2 UAH”, he said.

Alla Lichayeva, head of information services for the radio station “TREK” was even more critical. She said that she was glad to work with the radio and not on TV during the Maidan time. She conducted a lot of interviews and tried to have an objective view at the events, which was as she commented, very hard for her. “We are not just journalists, we are also people.”

She was very critical about the media reporting about on events taking place in the Eastern part of the country. She was not there, in the East, so she has to rely on information somebody gives her and retell stories somebody told her. She has the feeling that the Ukrainian media has no idea how to inform people about what is going on there. She only hears the figures, hears how many people died and it is in general hard to imagine what does that really mean. Also the terms are unclear: How do you call those people in the East? Terrorists? Separatists? Russian aggressors? Ukrainian media has not yet found a solution for that problem.

Alla Sadovnyk showed us some pictures about the Maidan in Rivne.

After the lunch we had a very special visit to the administration of the Rivne region. Ivan Solodukha, member of the party “Svoboda” and head of the department of culture and tourism, agreed to have an interview with us. He told us about himself (his grandmother is German, since 2010 he is a member of the Svoboda party and he spent two and a half months on the Maidan in Kyiv) and answered our questions.

Later he showed us his office, the cups he won and the letter of thanks he received. That impressed us a lot … well, a bit! =)

written by Anja Lange