USD Magazine, Summer 2003

..

Scott Heidler '90 passed up a comfortable

career to document life in places where war

rages, poverty abounds and hope often

seems beyond reach. Each stop on his

journey was a rite of passage, revealing

more than he expected about the

world, its people and himself

Story and Photos by Scott Heidler '90

the U.S. Congress and D.C.-based media to what was happening in Kosovo and how this leader, Ibrahim Rugova, was crying to change the situation. Seeing and reading about him in a fight for his people made my job, what was supposed to be my passion, seem frivolous. The collision of these feelings spurred me to an action chat has for– ever changed my life and my perspective. I quit my job and, just over a month later, landed in Skopje, Macedonia, to start a new career - and a new life - as a volunteer for a humanitarian organization. Skopje was where the world's media gathered to cover the endless stream of refugees crossing the border from Kosovo. I volunteered as a public relations representative for Mercy Corps, a humanitarian and development organization chat works to alleviate suffering in crisis zones, and to write and snap phetos-for the group's Web site. During the Kosovo crisis, Mercy Corps ran one of the hllif-dozen camps in Macedonia chat provided food and medical services.

ON Tl-It rull.PACt, / HAD A JO~ TO ~t P/1...0VD OP - uPPt/1... MANAGtfV\tNT IN A ~OVT1Q.Vt NE:w Yo11...K PvH.,c ll.f:1-AT,oNr P1ll.M, A window overlooking Fifth Avenue, cool clients - but there was something missing. Something big. le was a gloomy March in 1999, nine years after I received my bachelor's degree from USD. I found myself punching through the ceiling of a career, a life, chat was starting to take on a form of its own ... and it no longer seemed to be mine. The firm I worked for handled travel accounts, primarily in the Caribbean, so the perks were amazing. But I was having difficulty promoting these clients, because to me the job was selling a destina– tion - beaches, good drink and food, and packaged experiences. There were two aspects I thought were misrepresented or left out entirely - the culture and the people. I was house-sitting for a friend who had just returned from a two-year stint in Bosnia as a freelance photographer and newspaper reporter. My first job out of USD was as a journalist at CNN's Washington, D.C., bureau, and something in me stirred when I saw my friend's amazing black and white photos and read his articles. There he was, in a far off place, watching history unfold and, through his wol'ds and imagtl6, celli11g thousands of people what it was like. At the time, Yugoslavia's president, Slobodan Milosevic, was wreaking havoc on the ethnic minority Albanians in the Serbian republic of Kosovo. Just after my CNN days, I had done some work with the leader of the peaceful resistance there. At the time, I was at a public affairs agency that was attempting to bring the attention of

This was the first stop on a trip that has lasted more than four years, taking me to Mongolia, e;uatemala, Pakistan Afghanistan and Iraq, where I llQW write this. I've never considered myself an adventurer, but I've always been a traveler. People are what make travel enriching and invigorating, not just the sights. I'm fascinated with how people react to me, how differently they live

and how at the same time they have the same joys and sorrows. But the biggest reward is what people around the world have caught me about their lives and culture. I've discovered a world you cannot get from a two-minute news report or a three– page magazine article, a world chat

only comes from being close to people, sharing a meal, a cup of tea or a long bus ride.

11

SUMMER 2003