I confess I have seen a lot. I have just celebrated my 20th anniversary as anchor of Univision's nighty news (seen here and in 13 Latin American countries). So, I would like to pause a bit to tell you what I have observed over those years.
I've dedicated a good part of my life to chasing the news. And, truly, there are few professions as interesting as mine. Journalism has been my ticket around the globe. I have seen the world change before my eyes. A sampling: the Berlin Wall (1989), the World Trade Center attacks (2001), groundbreaking elections in Nicaragua (1990), Venezuela (1998) and Mexico (2000).
Nothing can beat being a witness to history. To be able to say: "Nobody told me about it, I was there." Few things in life can make you feel more alive.
Being a journalist means having your feet on the ground. We belong to the here and now. Actors and actresses can live many lives through their roles. Not journalists. Ours is just one _ enormously intense _ life.
That's more than enough.
There is no bigger test for a journalist than war. Apart from surviving, you have to report. A dead journalist is, sadly, of no use.
I have to confess that covering wars elicits a certain fascination for me. In war, you see humanity's best and worst. And no one forces us to go. Let's tear down that myth once and for all: Most war correspondents I know go to a conflict zone by their own will. No one pushes them.
Who can understand such madness?
For a journalist, covering a war is like the lottery. There, careers can be made or great reporters die. And it might your turn for either fate. To return home safely is itself a great feat. I returned from El Salvador, Kuwait, Kosovo, Afghanistan and Iraq. Others, braver than I, stayed. Forever.
"Weren't you afraid?" I've been asked many times. "I was terrified the whole time, with a knot in my stomach," I answer. People covering war zones who say they're not afraid are lying. The challenge is to overcome the fear and live to tell the story.
The biggest price we pay when we choose this "terrible and wonderful profession" _ as the late Oriana Fallaci described it _ is at the personal level. News, as you surely know, doesn't have a convenient timetable. So we miss birthdays, anniversaries, parties, weddings, christenings and funerals. Few wives or husbands can put up with that. And one day, when we take a long look back, we realize we have become strangers to those who love us the most. That is the hardest part of being a journalist.
In spite of all this, I know few journalists who have quit. This is more than a profession: It's a mission. What we do not ask, what we leave unsaid, remains never to be known. That's why we have to ask the uncomfortable questions that can be cutting, even as they make us feel uncomfortable and cut.
I was once censored in Mexico _ when I was young and green. And I am proud that I quit instead of putting up with it, and chose to try my chances in another country.
When I first anchored the newscast _ on Monday, Nov. 3, 1986 _ there were about 20 million Hispanics in the United States. Today, we are almost 50 million. I am riding the crest of the Latino wave.
In the last two decades, I've observed how the United States, reluctantly, has become a mixed-race country. If it dared to look itself in the mirror, America would realize that it actually stopped being predominantly white a long time ago.
We Hispanics have changed the face and voice of the United States. There are parts of this country where the English language is not necessary. Spanish _ or Spanglish _ is spoken more widely here than in Colombia, Argentina or Spain. There are more Spanish-speaking people only in Mexico.
I've seen three Hispanics be elected to the U.S. Senate, and I hope to be here to see the first Latino in the White House. A Ramirez, Rodriguez ... or Ramos.
Now, 20 years later, I nonetheless feel like a foreigner _ both in Mexico and in the United States. I don't know where, but at some point in this adventure, I lost my home. Often, my home is that little corner of a hotel room where I talk to my kids on the phone.
Journalists are full of ideas. How wouldn't we be when we interview the men and women who change the world? We are not a blank sheet. Our job is like that of a judge: Every day, we have to decide what news is important, relevant, meaningful, and what can be discarded.
And a good reporter must put his own opinions aside, or defend them tooth-and-nail if he is writing an opinion column. People are smart. They know we are not acting in a vacuum. We just have to make it clear whether we're writing a report or an editorial.
I don't believe in objectivity; I believe in journalism with justice. You have to afford everyone what they deserve. You cannot give equally unbiased interviews with a dictator and the victims of his dictatorship.
Another personal achievement I have reached in these 20 years is being able to get on an airplanes countless times in spite of my dread of flying. One of my frequent flier cards shows I've flown more than a million miles. Every mile is suffused with the sweat of my hands!
Finally, it seems quite appropriate that this 20th anniversary has coincided with more news: the recent Nicaraguan elections. The world also changes in Managua.
Those were my 20 years of history. Now back to the news.
P.S.: Deja vu in Nicaragua. I cannot go without saying something about the results that gave Daniel Ortega the presidency in the Nicaraguan elections. After the first results were made public, I saw the Sandinistas take to the streets just like they did in 1979 after the Somoza dictatorship collapsed. It was amazing.
Ortega had prepared for this moment for 16 years.
First, he managed to have the Constitution changed _ an amendment that would declare a candidate a winner if he had the most votes _ even if they were less than 50 percent.
Second, he managed to attract the votes of 16- and 17-year-olds. That was his electoral genius; these young people (and others, perhaps a bit older) have no memories of the mistakes he made when he was president.
Third, Ortega gave almost no press interviews, and that strategy of silence worked for him.
Ortega and his wife, Rosario Murillo, who handled his campaign, knew the Sandinista candidate was very vulnerable _ because of his friendship with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Cuban leader Fidel Castro, his animosity toward the U.S. government, the sex abuse accusations against him by his stepdaughter, Zoilamerica Narvaez, and his terrible handling of the economy during the Contra war.
And finally, the liberals: By having two candidates, they divided their vote and gave the victory away to Ortega.
However it was, I again had the chance _ and good fortune _ to be in the middle of history. That is why I love this profession.