Making Waves in the Media: Kickstarting a Documentary Series

In order to become a travel journalist, I figured being an active part of the media was essential, and this is a big part of the reason why I'm taking it at AS Level.

As part of my course I created the opening two minutes of ScandalWire: Big Brother Nation, the pilot episode of a scandal documentary series (a more vibrant, visually pleasing version of Dispatches, if you will), with this episode focussing on the epidemic of mass surveillance sweeping across the United Kingdom at an alarming rate.

The target audience is 15-35, and the typical viewer is an intelligent social leader who is an active part of society and media, and cares deeply about their sense of freedom and liberty.

Take a look at some of the A5 promotional adverts to be released in The Guardian Guide in the order they are shown here, one every weekly episode. Bear in mind that here, they are smaller than they would be in the publication







Any feedback in the comments section would be greatly appreciated.

Here is the most important part - the opening two minute sequence. It features a highly experimental yet ultimately successful Trafalgar Square time lapse sequence. Hope you enjoy it!

The Backpacking Adventure

I am eagerly anticipating the much-needed arrival of summertime. An end to the bleak,cold weather will also signify an end to the AS Level Exams, and I have ensured that all of the hard work and adaptation to change will be subject to a sizeable paying off come the 23rd July.

Do I trust the British weather throughout the coveted, fickle British 'sunny-season' these summer months.
No. No way.
I've taken things into my own hands.

This summer, my best friend James and I embark on a two man backpacking mission, with our Saturday jobs having already produced the fruits of two one-way flights from London Gatwick to Zagreb, Croatia and two return journeys from Mykonos, Greece to London Luton two and a half weeks later. Though perhaps shy of a full on, gap year adventure of a lifetime, this is set to be one of the defining moments of our lives so far.

How are we getting about inbetween? Here, there, and everywhere, thanks to the wonders of an Interrail pass that will grant us exclusive free access to every train in Europe.

Eager Beaver - Attempting to book my pass so far in advance that the  Interrail site wouldn't allow it. So much for saving up for it!

I am literally bating my breath for planned excursions to the renowned Hobo Bear Hostel on the first night in Zagreb, through to sea-swimming, beach bumming and and island hopping in Greece, through to sampling the apparently impressive nightclub scene in Serbia.

http://belgradeatnight.com/clubs/

Above is a small sample of our plans. We are banking on a lenient age identification process throughout Eastern Europe! There are hopes to sightsee, take night trains, have a crack at jetskiing and other watersports , go camping, and check out Tomorrowland and Off  festivals in Poland and Belgium. Any oppurtunity that comes our way for activity, we're taking it. Such oppurtunities are begging to be grabbed onto, and we are quite prepared to do so!

 Hostelbookers has shone light on remarkably cheap accommodation. Also I may have somewhere set up to stay with a family in Romania for free, which is a godsend. A fine opportunity to return to my rude introduction to alcohol with the fabled local brew, plum soika, along with some of the best food I have ever tasted, upon my first excursion to Romania.

Having someone as ill-advised and adventurous as myself there will be truly excellent. I've thought about this trip a ridiculous amount, and personally can't wait for the (mis)adventures to begin!

James and I will be sure to keep you updated on the progress of an adventure certain to reach epic proportions.

The Great Escape

It may seem farfetched, ridiculous even.
But I have a masterplan which I am completely prepared to make a reality.

So here I am, in the current, present bubble that is reality. Sitting here, comfortable in bed, yet somehow still bitterly cold from the increasingly ridiculous entity that is British weather.


A more grounded part of me loves my life here in England. I've grown up in a familiar and supportive family that happily provide me everything a person could ask for to live comfortably. I also have some fantastic characters for friends, and thoroughly enjoy embarking on the inconceivable kind of misadventures with them that you do when you're an A Level student sparring with a formidable workload.

This book captures everything that I aspire to be.

Yet somehow, my life has steadily become more and more focused on the beautiful and buzzing universe that exists outside the UK. Less interested in participating in the expected lifelong grind to get a high paying job, spend my whole life working at something I'm not entirely sure I enjoy. All in an industrialized, upper class, and restricted nation. Here, opportunities for adventure and cultural enlightenment are present, but already seeming minimal. Seventeen years here, chipping and grinding away at the school system as a product of society seem quite enough. Call me foolish and misguided, but I'm ready to move on.

I first caught the travel bug at a very early age, when my parents decided to return to Asia (after having lived and travelled there for five years) with my brother and I to visit Vietnam. I was 11 years old and remember vividly every moment of that trip, because it was such a sensory adventure, and so different to anything I had ever experienced before. Soaking in the bustling sense of vibrancy in Saigon made life itself seem so much more engaging and purposeful.

Not to boast, but I was a fortunate child. In later years, family holidays spanned Thailand, India, Morocco, Italy, Spain, Greece, Romania and the USA. I felt like the world was at my feet the whole time we were away.

More recently, I had the oppurtunity last summer to fulfill a driving ambition of doing charity work abroad by being part of a five-man school expedition to Tanzania in order to teach at a school and work at a disabled crafts workshop called Neema Crafts. Travelling so far without my family into such an unknown world was a phenomenal experience, and one during which my masterplan was created. I loved the experience of working with people in a fresh new setting so much that I decided that this was definately what I wanted to do as a job.

I will never forget the rabble of Saigon motorbikes that whole families occasionally piled onto, obeying no  discernible laws of the road. Accidents galore. Being among it is as terrifying as it is a thrill ride.

Team Tanzania at Mikumi National Park. Honestly such an incredible day!

I plan to complete my A Levels, take a journalism course at university and usher my way into work experience at a forward thinking media company, after which I hope to become a travel journalist.

As I said.

It may seem farfetched, ridiculous even.
But I have a masterplan which I am completely prepared to make a reality.