Back to the old school, back to my roots

Well, I've reached the final round of the World Traveller Intern competition, and just uploaded my final application video, which is on my lovely hometown Nottingham:



The whole competition has rushed by so quickly I haven't really had much time to reflect on it. It is still very hard to believe that I have made the top ten, especially considering I only heard about the competition two days before its deadline, and had to be persuaded by a friend to even put my first video up.

This last part of the competition has left me feeling very strange. Every time I watch one of the other videos, I get a queasy feeling in the pit of my stomach. The reason I suppose that is, is that at this point of the competition, everyone is so talented, it's very hard to imagine who might win. All my friends keep telling me that this is the perfect job for me, and I know they are right, but then all the other applicants get the same comments and I just think: what makes me special? We all have different sets of skills, so what are STA looking for in their interns?

I want to win this more than anything, mainly because its the opportunity I've always been looking for and now its so close to my grasp it will be very difficult to let it go if I don't win. I think I could make a good job of it, after all my career plans revolve around travel journalism, and it's something I'm going to be doing regardless of whether I win or not, but to win the competition...well I suppose that would really help me get my foot in the door of a notoriously difficult career.

I feel like I've really stretched myself during the competition, and that is definitely a good thing. I've learned how to make movies, improved my blog, and found out a lot about social media that I never knew before. These are all such great skills, and I'm so thankful that STA gave me the push that I needed to learn them.

My plan for if I don't win is to get a job teaching in Sri Lanka and save up money until I have enough to travel around for a year. Then I'm going to attempt to make some socio-political documentaries in Asia. If that sounds interesting to anyone reading this, please get in touch as I would love to build up a crew - I still have a lot to learn and I think I could learn a lot from the other WTI applicants, as well as other travellers.

If you liked my video, feel free to vote for me here, it would really help my cause!