I went looking for it
For 20 years I have been accused of "asking for it." In reviewing many of the trips I have made to countries ravaged by wars (Somalia, Algeria, Eritrea, Afghanistan, Iraq) I have come to the conclusion that yes "I went looking for it," but that is the only way to do the job of a journalist as I believe it should be done: by going out and finding news on the ground and then verifying it, even when one risks being overwhelmed by war propaganda from both sides. Through 30 years of travel I have also told how the way of reporting has changed. Sadly, however, according to many of my colleagues, war journalism is still a male profession: "If a journalist comes back in a coffin from a country at war, surely she will have been killed because she had made a scoop, if she comes back alive then she had gone for it."