I went directly from secondary school into journalism without ever getting a university degree. In other words, I jumped right into the everyday world of grinding out a newspaper without getting any kind of theoretical background. So when the chance to become involved in an overseas university program presented itself, I was eager to grab it.

In 1973 I was offered Fulbright grant to study at Stanford University. It came at an opportune time, since the newspaper where I’d been working had just been shut down. Fortunately, the program at Stanford didn’t lock me into any particular lineup of courses so I was able to take whatever interested me, mainly courses related to development issues: political economics, management, transfer of technology and so on.

As a practicing journalist I’ve always been somewhat skeptical of certain theoretical concepts. Yet I learned a lot from this immersion into the theoretical. And as someone who’d often been involved in contention, this allowed me a broader view and some new insights. Being a journalist means living a kind of fragmented life, sometimes switching subjects by the hour. This Fulbright year provided me with an extended period of continuity and reflection, so I came away with a new perspective.

In a sense, being on a university campus means stepping back from daily reality. But you can often see things more clearly. For instance, computers were in their infancy back in the mid-seventies. But it was obvious from the perspective of that university setting that computers would revolutionize our profession.

So much has changed today. Our Indonesian newspapers have always had a tradition, dating back to the time of the independence struggle, of being highly politicized, almost like pamphlets. But now we have now come to recognize the needs of the urban reader for lots of basic information. Being among Americans during that period — people I view as highly pragmatic — helped me to appreciate that need here.