Focus Assignment

Sometimes the public perception of a person is straight on or completely wrong. When it comes to talking about Anderson Cooper he is exactly as what he appears to be to the public. Anderson Cooper comes off to the public as a very serious news anchor, who works a lot while traveling to many dangerous places. Cooper doesn’t try to be anything he is not and does not hide his true feelings of important matters during serious interviews. His life has had a number of ups and downs that turned him into the man he is today.

Cooper comes across as a man who is very passionate about work but his life as a kid explains a lot about him now. His coverage’s usually involve a lot of tragedy and disaster. People know he can relate to this tragedy because he has had many losses in his life too. At the young age of ten, he lost his father due to a heart attack and later on his brother committed suicide, leaving just him and his mother. Cooper lets people into his life by his work so there are no surprises when it comes to actually getting to know him.

The public knowledge of Cooper is that he is a hard worker and he is not afraid to share his strong opinions and he is exactly that. When he was in New Orleans he got to interview Senator Mary Kandrieu. He was not happy with her responses to his questions so he kept on asking important questions until he got an answer. He wasn’t trying to be disrespectful but just thought the audience at home deserved an honest answer. People respect him for this because they know he is only trying to get the truth. Through his work and interviews Cooper acts exactly the same as if no one was watching.

When he travels to different places and meets new people, he acts with such passion and seriousness that people assume that this is how he appears all the time and they are safe to assume so. When you think of Anderson Cooper you think of the news and that is what he is thinking of most of the time. He is always trying to get to the bottom of a story and won’t give up until he has discovered it. An example of this would be when he went to Sri Lanka. There was a report of two kidnapped children and Cooper didn’t stop until he found out the real truth of the story. People can rely on Cooper to bring the real facts to a story and not pretend to be anything he is not.

Anderson Cooper’s can portray stories in such a way that his viewers are keen to hear his next story. His audience feels that they already know him because he always shows his true personality. With Anderson Cooper you may never know what he is going to report on next but you can always be sure that he is showing his true self.

What I already know about Cooper Anderson

• He is an anchorman for CNN
• His father died when he was 10
• He has travelled to a variety of countries filming documentaries
• Some of his big stories include Hurricane Katrina, the war in Iraq, and the tsunami in Sri Lanka
• Risks his live reporting some areas of the news
• He finished high school early and traveled to Africa

pg 1 to 19

Introduction and it starts about the coverage he did on the tsunami in Sri Lanka

• Talks about his past and how his father died at at young age
• He dislikes New Year's eve because when he was 10 all he can remember was that his dad was in the hospital after suffering a heart attack
• Talks about his parent's backgrounds and how they met
• His mother came from a wealthy family
• His mother is an only child and was taken away from her mother at a young age and was forced to live with her wealthy aunt
• His mother just ended her third marriage when she met his dad
• His father didn't have a lot of money growing up
• His father wanted to be an actor growing up and came from a large family
  
  Also talks about his trip Sri Lanka
  
  
• He feels anxiety when he is traveling to different countries
• Wasn't able to sleep on his plane ride to Sri Lanka
• Discusses the deaths in Sri Lanka and how he had interviewed survivors who have lost family members
• Also talks about the biggest accident that happened in Sri Lanka which is the train accident

pg 20 to 46

He relates the tragedy of Sri Lanka to his life

• Talks about how his father died on the operating table so he can relate loss in his life to the Sri Lanka tragedy


• When his father died he grew farther apart from his brother


• Went to Yale University


• April 1988, his mother and him noticed that his brother was acting differently than normal, he later learned that his brother had recently broken up with his long time girlfriend.


• His brother was still acting differently than usual and when he went to visit his mother he went to the balcony, where he committed suicide right in front of their mother


• He reacted to his brother's death with mixed emotions because he was sad that his brother was gone but was also angry that his brother could leave his mom and himself

In Sri Lanka

• He and his camera crew investigated an article that states that during the tsunami there have been a case of kidnappings where two siblings have been taken


• While investigating the kidnappings of Jinandari and Sunera, he learns that the children were in a car accident. At the place where the accident occurred, Cooper asked the local hotel manager about the newspaper article. He said that the children had died during the accident.


• The only problem with this story is that the article said that a man on the motorcycle took the children


• When they managed to catch up to the man on the motorcycle he said that he saw the little girl and she still had a pulse. He tried to take her to the hospital on his motorcycle but on the way she died


• He was only doing a good deed but instead he got a bad name for trying to help someone out


• Later Cooper learned that some stories are only written to attract readers and they do not always publish the truth

pg 47 to 67

In this section of the book he talks about the war in Iraq and relates it to the war he did coverage on which was in 1993.

• When he was in college he read a lot about the Vietnam war and thought it would be exciting to do coverage on it


• He got his first job at ABC News which involved answering the telephone and getting coffee


• He had a difficult time getting interviews for anchorman positions even with a Yale education


• He got his big break through when he went to Thailand to film a story on Burmese refugees. Later he sold the video he filmed to Channel One and knew from that moment that this was the career which was meant for him

Sarajevo March 1993

• This wasn't the first war he did coverage on but had said it is the "deadliest"


• Channel One hired him but he was still shooting stories with his home video camera


• He was afraid while investing the war in Bosnia and even admitted that he was afraid to sleep in his hotel room at night because he thought someone might try to kill him


• While traveling through Sarajevo, the company he was working for didn't even buy him an armoured vehicle, which made it more frightening shooting a story there


• Before leaving Sarajevo he was doing one last coverage when a gun shot was fired where he was. He wasn't sure if the gun shot was fired at him but it was very close. His camera was set up during the gun fire and captured the whole thing on film. While replaying the video he saw the scared look on his.

After he got back from Sri Lanka

• His got great reviews for his work in Sri Lanka and was asked to go back to Iraq to do coverage on the war


• When he went to Iraq he experienced driving across the most dangerous road in the world which is "Route Irish"


• On this eight mile route there was cases of suicide attackers, kidnappings and snipers, which made him think that this would be a good spot for a story. He wasn't able to make a story because his guards didn't think it was a good idea due to security problems
  

pg 67 to 85

Talks about his first trip to Sarajevo

• During his first trip to Sarajevo he wore his protective vest all the time


• After several more trips there, he barely put it on


• He didn't put it on because he thought it was disrespectful to where it front of people he interviewed


• Felt that if the people he interviewed weren't safe from the war than neither should he

The First time he went to Iraq for CNN

• He first went in July of 2004


• Got to spend two days with the Ambassador J. Paul Bremer


• Got to ride with the Ambassador in his Black Hawk


• Spent a lot of time working in small houses that CNN rented for them


• When he stayed at the Palestine he had to board his room with wooden two by fours
  

pg 86 to 120

Next he talks about his trip to Niger

• Decided to come to Niger to report the starvation problem


• He was vacationing with some friends in Rwanda where he saw a short broadcast where they were reporting about the starvation happening in Niger


• The next day he was on a plane going to Niger


• In Niger, he went to a hospital where he interviewed a doctor named Dr. Tectonidis


• The hospital helped children who were dieing from starvation


• While there he interviewed many different mothers who had sick children


• One particular little boy at the hospital named Aminu got his attention. He was going to a story on him but wasn't allowed because Aminu wasn't "sick" enough for the viewers at home to pay close attention to tv screen

Also talks about how he lived in Vietnam

• He was twenty-five years old when he moved to Vietnam


• Lived in Vietnam for six months after Channel One bought some of his footage


• Took Hanoi language lessons while shooting some more stories there


• While living in Vietnam he often though about his brother who committed suicide


• Sometimes people reminded him of his brother, Carter.


• One time he even thought he saw his brother while eating at a cafe but he knew it couldn't be him

pg 123 to 142

Talks about the coverage he did on Hurricane Katrina

• He was on a boat with some friends in Croatia where he got a phone call to do a story on Hurricane Katrina
• Katrina was the sixth major hurricane he did a story on it the past sixth months
• Volunteered to do coverage on hurricanes because he was fascinated about the hours that happened before and after the hurricane
• Often thought that hurricanes were like a war zone
• He stayed in Baton Rouge and while filming there he kept saying to his viewers the same thing, "It's really blowing now and the rain, it's torrential". The weather stays the same and and there is nothing really more to say.
• While reporting the story he couldn't even see the camera lens with all the rain that was in his way.
• Noon the next day, the storm is over and is moving on towards Mississippi. After every hurricane he does coverage on he wants nothing more to do with the storm.
• On the way to Mississippi they stop to do a broadcast, and later on stayed at a casino so he can finally get some sleep
• In Gulfport where he claims that Sri Lanka and the tsunami is the closest thing he can compare this disaster to.
• When they finally arrive in Mississippi, they go with a bunch of rescue workers to help find a missing women. After some searching the searchers came to a sad realization that the women had died from the impact of the hurricanes

pg 143 to 162

While still in doing Hurricane coverage

• He gets to interview Senator Mary Kandrieu
• He doesn't get much time to prepare since he was only told that she was going to be on the show a few minutes before
• During the interview he is getting a little upset because she is getting off topic and is not answering the questions that he would like her to
• The next day he is off to New Orleans
• His team of workers is getting larger as they have to travel in fifteen vehicles to get them all up there
• While there, CNN got them a boat so they could capture on film the remains of the city

While in New Orleans he thinks a lot about his fathers family

• His father's family moved there in 1943 and his father was only six years old
• His father first brought him to New Orleans when he was nine years old
• He liked it there because it reminded him of a "Dirty Disneyland"
• His dad showed him places where he use to hang out when he was a kid and also showed him his old high school
  

pg 163 to 182

He talks about the aftermath of the hurricane

• While doing coverage on the aftermath he had to sleep in trailer parks
• Talks about moving on with life and can relate to this because when his father died his mother would move on by moving her family from one town house to the next
• In New Orleans he ran into Dr. Phil and was asked for an interview for his show
• While touring the city he goes to the Superdome where many people had stayed during the hurricane
• The Superdome is so messy that it needs miniature tractors to help clean it up
• Also he discusses how in every disaster he has done coverage on that someone has to make money out of it
• In New Orleans he met a real estate agent who was already ready getting clients to buy property there
• The real estate agent claims that there are prices that fits every one's wallet
• He thinks that the women is trying to move on too quickly

pg 183 to 200

He is still doing coverage on Hurricane Katrina

• Stayed for the aftermath of the hurricane for three weeks
• Stayed at the Hyatt Hotel
• Everyday him and his camera crew would gather in the hotel lobby where there was only silence because there is nothing much for anyone to say
• After the hurricane had hit there were still people who refused to leave their homes
• He saw one women who was blind and wouldn't leave her home because the officials wouldn't let her dog come with on the evacuation helicopter with her
• She needed her dog or else she would have no one else help guide her
• He said that normally he doesn't like to interfere in people's business but felt sorry for the women so he talked to officials and told them that there was a new policy that let people bring their pets on board
• This new policy was true and the women was very greatful to him for helping her get her dog on board the plane

pg 201 to 217

Epilogue and Afterword

• After he was done reporting in New Orleans he was told to talk a vacation. He decided to go Oaxaca Mexico to celebrate the Day of the Dead
• He went there because he wasn't sure where else he could take a vacation to
• When in Oaxaca, that is when he started to write the beginnings of his book
• On October 31st is when they celebrate day of the dead, he thought mostly about his brother and his father
• He still wishes he could have known what his brother was thinking when he decided to throw himself over the balcony
• Also during the Day of the Dead he reflects on all the places he had traveled to and thinks about all the tragedy he has seen
• He says that he started writing this book after Hurricane Katrina but admitted that he started to write this book in his head years before