But after interviews with his dad and our grandmother, he beelined for the door. "Let's interview people on the street," he suggested.
Not wanting to stand in the way of initiative, I let him lead the way. My grandparents' house backs up on an alley that leads to a commercial street, Ford Parkway. There we could find plenty of shops, a gas station and a mostly elderly clientele.
How would Ari present himself and his mission? I figured this usually quiet kid would turn around as soon as he realized how hard it was to approach strangers. No such luck.
We started off with a captive audience. The man behind the counter in the gas station was busy, so we turned to an elderly man pumping gas. I had forgotten to coach Ari on how to introduce himself; what would he say?
"We're two young reporters," he said hurriedly, prompting a stifled chuckle from me and the interviewee. The man seemed to acquiesce, so he proceeded.
Often when people are interviewed, they are on guard, wary that they may say the wrong thing or be misinterpreted. The more controversial the question is, the more guarded the answer. When we first introduced ourselves that day, people put up their guard, unsure what was coming.
Never have I seen guards dropped as fast as when Ari asked the first question, "What do you think of the nice weather we're having?"
People seemed relieved that: 1) they weren't forced into answering a confrontational query, 2) they actually cared about the issue they had to discuss and 3) the reporter seemed to agree with them that, indeed, the weather was nice. Not exactly a primer to objective, investigative journalism.
ARI'S notepad was packed with a list of 1 to 3 for each subject. For most questions, he lost interest in taking notes after the first few words. So his pad reads something like this: "1) nice 2) dolls now 3) liter" and "1) fantastic 2) none 3) losy, teach more" and "1) great 2) great 3) bombs."
Ari felt quite comfortable with the interviewees. After a man waiting for a haircut told us his concerns about air pollution, Ari recommended a restaurant to him: "You ought to go to Denny's; it has your same name."
When "Dug"--the name Ari wrote in his notepad for the xerox store proprietor--suggested building higher smokestacks to alleviate the problem of acid rain, Ari knew exactly what he meant. "That way the pollution would go into outer space." But then the potential side effects began to disturb Ari. "It would pollute the Martians."
Ari compiled a good list of subjects, including Bart the gas pumper, Yi the Cambodian high school student at the bus stop and "Jhon" the construction worker. It made our jaunt sound more like a trip around Mr. Roger's Neighborhood than interviewing.
We discovered that many interviewees didn't have many toys when they were young--they said they made boats out of bark and pretended a lot; we also found that most people are terribly concerned about the environment, but have no clue what to do. Everyone seemed pleased with the weather.
Ari had eagerly approached each subject, asserting confidently, "We're two young reporters," and launching into his questions. He seemed genuinely interested in scouting out the trends of the times. After our 14th interview, weary but elated with our findings, we headed home.
When we arrived, we got yelled at for talking to strangers. So much for a budding career in journalism.