I walked into The New Paper (TNP) newsroom on July 8 expecting to be treated like an intern.

This means following a senior reporter out on her assignments so that I could learn from her, but not having to write the story.  This means doing simpler things like translations, or writing snippets from press releases where there is no need for interviews and journalistic skills (which they may not trust interns to possess).  This means, after one week or so, graduating to having a senior reporter follow me out - to guide me along:  She asks the questions, I write the stories.

But no.  It was not at all like what I had expected.

An assignment was thrown to me straight on my second day. (The first day was a half-day induction.)  "Go chase this story," the crime cluster’s supervisor Saw Tek Meng said to  me.

And "Camera!"  The action started.

From that day onwards, I had no time to think back to that day:  Was I prepared; should I have been preened and pampered first before I was pushed out into the real reporting world;  should I ….. ? Well, I did it.

At the end of the hectic, exciting six months, all I know is that I enjoyed it, I learnt a lot, and I want to be a journalist.

Learning is made easy for you at TNP, simply because the going is tough.  The Paper, in many people’s eyes, is a sensational, thrashy, irresponsible tabloid.

Many a times when I tried to interview people or when I called up newsmakers to arrange for an interview, I had to first overcome the hurdle of gaining their trust.  "Don’t want lah."  "Don’t want to talk to you. Your paper always exaggerates and twists the facts around."  "You’re from The New Paper ?  Oh, then I’m not free."  "No need to ask me. Just write what you want. Isn’t that what you all always do?"

Just in case you’re beginning to snigger, I did not make those quotes up.  These are things that some newsmakers had said to me.  Often, I managed to convince them, but not before they had their share of abusing the Paper.  Many times, I could not even speak to them, for they just walked away or hung up on me.  You don’t get as much of this if you work in a more credible, respectable paper like The Straits Times or Lianhe Zaobao, though journalists generally are an unpopular lot.

All the distrust and snide remarks spurred me to work even harder, and to prove these people wrong, although the first one I had to convince was myself.  I made sure I got the facts right, I made sure I did not misquote them.  Many of them called me after the article was published to thank me for the article.  Most satisfying.

At TNP, life is pretty much the same for a full-time journalist and a still-green journalist.  Stories are assigned, either days in advance, or most of the time, on the day itself.  After getting the brief on the assignment, one is left on one’s own to call up people, or to go out to chase the stories.  After the information is gathered, one must report back to one’s supervisors who are assistants to the editor.  A discussion on how to write and angle the story then follows; thereafter, one goes back to one’s terminal and start writing the story within the deadline.

Because TNP is an afternoon paper, printing starts at mid-morning.  What this translates into is  the very, long working hours.  My record:  working from 9am to 3am the following day.  But don’t let me frighten you.  You don’t usually run into such extreme bad luck.

Life was exciting, and always on the go.  I’ve been to accident scenes where you see spots of blood everywhere on the ground, to crime scenes like the Geylang night lounges where fights took place, to hospitals to speak to accident victims with bandages all over and who could hardly speak, to funeral wakes where I had to pluck up the courage to speak to mourning relatives, to courts where real-life drama could be witnessed.

Not all stories are so bleak though.  I’ve been to the zoo to "talk" to celebrity orangutan, Ah Meng, been out in a powerboat at sea to witness the release of the turtles which had hatched from the eggs on the East Coast beach last year, been to the Singapore Discovery Centre to try out the rides before anyone else did, and been to the Election Department  with ministers and opposition members on Nomination Day of GE’97.

For someone who has always yearned to be a journalist,  I am grateful for the opportunities given to me by supervisors and the editor at TNP.  I experienced more in the six-month internship than I ever did in the past 22 years of my sheltered life.

I simply loved every minute of it.