Behind the scenes at the two sessions

The guy took my jacket. Accidentally. I’d tossed it to the ground to film a quick segment during the two sessions at the Great Hall of the People.

The journalist from the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region kindly picked it up to keep it clean.

A knot of reporters from other media formed a ring around our cameraman and me, waiting. They hoped to get a foreign journalist’s perspective on the just-concluded National People’s Congress and National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference.

In the ensuing ruckus, I didn’t have time to grant interviews. We scurried out. It was only after the Xinjiang reporter boarded his bus that he realized he was still clutching my coat.

He called my colleague repeatedly to apologize profusely. My response? No problem. I understand. Really. This incident says something about exactly how frenzied covering the two sessions is.

About 3,000 journalists frantically dash to produce the best reporting they can during the major national political event, chasing the roughly 5,000 participating deputies and advisers.

It’s a kinetic enterprise, and media strive to operate like perpetual-motion machines.

One colleague wears trainers so she can sprint faster to literally get ahead of the competition.

She likens covering the sessions to hunting.

Many journalists refer to it as a “war zone”.

Another colleague compares journalists to fighter jets that can be scrambled anytime, anywhere. True. I’d also equate it to a marathon. This year’s sessions required 13 days of fullspeed-ahead charging without pause.

I saw one reporter trip in a heaving crowd brandishing cameras and microphones. He was fine. Staffers not only picked him up but also dusted off his back, which I thought especially courteous.

For most of us, it’s perhaps a time in our lives when we’ve gone the longest with the least sleep and food — and in my case, consuming the most coffee.

I filled two thermoses every day to squeeze in more sipping time during the ride.

One night, I fell asleep on my apartment’s floor, to the sympathies — and amusement — of my wife.

Another day, I absentmindedly tried taking a bite out my coffee cup.

I understand how the journalist didn’t realize he was carrying my thick jacket. Really. It often felt like I was dreaming, both in the sense the world seemed unreal but also in that we were chronicling and, in some ways, making history.

The journalists who live like this during the sessions are proud to grasp the opportunities to tell the world about how China will chart its course in the coming year.

I’m honored to become China Daily’s first foreign journalist to cover the two sessions from the Great Hall of the People.

The series I hosted, Two Sessions, One Minute — Lianghui Chinese with China Daily has earned tens of millions of views on videostreaming site Miaopai alone.

It shows the world truly is watching the two sessions. I hope viewers learned a lot. I did. By the way, I got my jacket back.

Contact the writer at erik_nilsson@ chinadaily.com.cn