The wonderful story of a newspaper and a city
A former editor rediscovers the essence of journalism in the corridors and newsroom of Khaleej Times
The best stories in KT are about Dubai’s childhood, adolescence, and the benchmarks it is setting. KT is the story of 200 nationalities, the laser-beam aspirations of its people.
My journey in KT, and Dubai, began about 30 months ago. I came to refresh journalism, I left a wiser person after rejecting my own leanings. A global workplace in a global city does that to you. You get tempered, you stop debating the future of journalism with the frenzy you have been used to, you blue-ice the jargon you have loaded yourself with. You become comfortably numb. You get to know the real story.
The real story, and my own tidy answers about the future of journalism, lie in KT’s office, in KT’s favourite city Dubai; and in the Middle East’s greatest story collection, The Arabian Nights. We chant MoJo (mobile journalism), InstaJo (Instagram journalism), DaJo (data journalism), QuickJo (quick-read journalism) without understanding journalism’s true mien. After all, it’s a raconteur’s profession with a raconteur’s passion.
Before we browse for answers, here’s a question: what was the most talked-about talking point in the recent Mark Zuckerberg hearings? Without doubt, it was a senator’s question that went something like this: “Would you be comfortable in sharing with us the name of the hotel you stayed in last night?” It was a simple attempt, not clickbait or Zuckbait, to sum up Facebook’s privacy mess. It didn’t require MoJo to viralise it. It went viral the moment it was said. A senator just unravelled a secret: how to tell a story, make it stick, and then turn it into the week’s — maybe year’s — classic. So, what are we recanting here?
The real story, my real story, begins right when you enter KT. Here, front pages stare at you as they chronicle the stories that have changed the world and the UAE in the last 40 years, since April 16, 1978, when KT was born. The paper these stories are printed on is maturing but the stories, all intelligently told and displayed, have a life of their own. They look as fresh as the day they were born. In a surreal world, they would have jumped out of their frames and flown viral. In the real world, they give journalism its cutting edge: the art of story telling. A great front page editor makes a page talk. And each of KT’s front pages visualises a story with a rare late-night artistry that only the best editors can conjure.
How do you write the story of a newspaper that was inspired by an ambitious city and then went on to inspire journalism elsewhere in Dubai and the UAE? When the founders, the Galadari Brothers, launched KT, Dubai was getting ready to grow mega; it was crafting its own narrative. They stocked KT with global talent to chronicle a city that would one day become the Middle East’s showpiece and the world’s envy. As Dubai grew, journalism was driven by restive narrative zeal. The best stories in KT are about Dubai’s childhood, adolescence, and the benchmarks it is constantly setting. KT is the story of 200 nationalities, the laser-beam aspirations of its people, and the single-most obsession of Dubai: to be the best. Could any story be stickier? In its hurry to be overly interpretative or investigative — and, yes, viral — journalism forgets its humbler roots: the art of narration. But it takes a sharply focused city to correct it and connect it back.
Dubai’s relentless ambition of being simply the best has turned writers into chroniclers: global storytellers who position Dubai in the eyes of the world. There are hardly any days when KT does not have a Dubaiachievement lead story. The imposing Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest, is a symbolic beacon to the city and its future chronicles. Dubai is narrative journalism’s true mojo, its viral Muse. While newspapers in other capital cities around the world, including India and Pakistan, scrape the bottom for stories on urban achievement, Dubai strives to excel on every parameter to make urban living a delight. Somebody once told me that Dubai is not a city, it is a conversation to make urban living smarter and better. So deep is this conversation that journalism cannot afford to miss its subtleties, overtones and degrees. It’s this nuance that differentiates a story.
Let’s check out celebrate, a verb that has many shades: honour, solemnise, laud, glorify, honour, applaud, commend. None of this is adequate enough to describe good living in a good city. Nonetheless, a newspaper must make its readers feel at home by describing their city at its best. Call it expat expectation, local attachment or a happiness narrative; you are drawn into uber-celebrating the city. When KT took a call to celebrate the city, it became part of the Dubai Conversation: let’s make a great city greater. It was discovering journalism’s unselfish gene: good news is sticky news. It was turning Dubai into journalism’s only (heart) beat.
The art of story-telling would be incomplete without The Arabian Nights, the world’s greatest collection of stories. All stories recounted by the passionate Shahrajad, each with a potential to survive another thousand years. Sindbad, Alibaba, Aladdin all have the ability to mesmerise audiences through simple tenets of storytelling. They celebrated the cities and its rulers, turned ordinary men like Aladdin, Alibaba and Sindabad into heroes, and sharpened the craft of narrating by opening the main plot into subplots. And, of course, let’s not forget the “lived happily ever after” ending.
In our wholesale quest to digitalise the newsroom’s very own nights, we have lost sight of what makes journalism tick. We have been chipping away at the magical art of storytelling. The form is the substance. The story is the future. Senator Dick Durbin’s question was Zuckerberg’s ‘Hotel California’ moment. Storytelling could well be journalism’s. The future of journalism is not only about rubbing mobile screens. It’s about rubbing the lamp of narration.
That’s what I learnt all this while. It looks simple when you are in KT and have a Muse: Dubai. It looks tough when you are in India, searching for one. I (will) miss Dubai. I (will) miss KT. Both are organically linked. You cannot always detach yourself from a past that has taught you so much, virtually taken you from “crayons to perfume”. That’s where my journey begins.
Vinay believes there’s only one adrenaline rush; it’s the smell
of ink when the paper rolls out