media
madness

T2T staffers experience

live journalism at

"A Fair To Remember"

By Gabriella Ring

had been looking forward to the Jewish Federation of
Metropolitan Detroit's "A Fair to Remember" celebra-
tion of Israel's 60th birthday at the Michigan State
Fairgrounds for a long time. I don't even remember when I
first heard about it; but once I was aware, my mental clock
was furiously counting down the days until Aug. 21.
I worked at the event at the Teen2Teen booth as a report-
er and photographer. I received an All Access Pass/Vendor
pass to wear around my neck, along with the press cre-
dentials I had used earlier in the week to cover the JCC
Maccabi Games. My T2Tmedia badge was pinned
to my bright green T2T staff T-shirt.
I arrived at 2:10 p.m. to help set up before the
event opened at 3 p.m. We finally located our booth in
the shuk, or marketplace area. It took a while for us to set
up the two laptops, spread out our copies of the most re-
cent T2T and put out the water bottles we'd be giving away
on this hot Thursday afternoon.
The,ultimate goals, of the booth were to attract readers to
Teen2Teen, to raise awareness of our monthly paper and to al-
low staffers to cover a live event as members of the working
press. Everyone who stopped by was asked, "Would you like
to be interviewed for Teen2Teen?" followed by, "What do you
think of today's fair? Or what is your favorite part of the fair?"
and maybe even, "How do you support Israel?"
Speedy typers and writers, including fellow T2T staffers
Stephanie Steinberg and Rachael Vettese, took down people's
responses.
With the T2T staff camera, I snapped a headshot of any-
one who provided a quote. Instantaneously, I uploaded the
person's quote and photo to the PartyPages section of jnt2t.
com, under the party "A Fair to Remember."

Photos by Don Cohen

feature: "A Fair To Remember"

T2T summer Interns Stephanie Steinberg, 18, and Gabriella Ring, 15, work

to upload quotes while T2T executive editor Kell Guten Cohen looks on.

We also took turns roving the fair and writing stories that
were uploaded to the Web site as well. Roving reporters in-
cluded Seth Samuels, Jordan Birnholtz, Michael Higer, Laura
Katznelson and Jamie Goode. Meanwhile, T2T staffers Josh
Loney and Jordana Hoffman were broadcasting from the fair
over Temple Israel's WJEW radio, based in West Bloomfield.
Most visitors picked up a complimentary T2T water bottle
for answering our questions — and many did without, too. Al-
most 600 bottles were distributed, a fraction of the estimated
16,000 attendees.
By 7 p.m., and after working 4 1/2 hours, it was time to close
the booth for the evening.
I finally ended up eating a falafel sandwich
for dinner before walking around with my
abandoned family.
My mom called me a workaholic, but I
love doing what I do. {

T2T staffer Jordan Birnholtz, 17, interviews protesters outside

the fairgrounds.

Gabriella Ring, 15, is a sophomore at Berkley High

School.

Son, God can't make all our
prayers come true_
He's very busy.

Teens interested in photography
and/or writing stories, reviews and
essays for our monthly publication
should e-mail Keri Guten Cohen at
kcohen@thejewishnews.com . Include
information about yourself.

by Josh Loney

B2 teen2teen September • 2008

iN

visit JNt2t.com