Radio--A Visit to KFUN (Jan. 22, 2011)

Today, a Saturday, started rather early (too early, if you ask me). However, there was an important reason behind the early start--a radio interview! There is a small, local radio station in Las Vegas, called KFUN (or KLVF) that allows the Las Vegas Peace and Justice Center to have a one hour talk show on Saturday mornings. Called Community Peace Radio, the show airs from 10-11 and invites members of the community to come on the show and discuss varies issues, topics, etc. As UWC students, we were invited on the show to discuss how we did MLK day.

MLK, or Martin Luther King Day, is a national holiday in the US, based around service. At UWC, we took MLK day pretty seriously. A pastor from Newark, NJ, Paul Graves, spent the weekend with us, learning about the UWC movement and educating us about Martin Luther King's philosophy. The weekend ultimately culminated in a day of service, designed to get all of the students out into the community. The service that I did was to clean the hot springs. The Hot Springs are natural springs that sit out to the west of the campus. They're owned by the college, but open for public use. Our job was to drain the hot springs and then scrub them clean. It was a really fun job that involved being both hot and cold at the same time. (The Hot Springs are rather hot, even when drained, while the outside temperature hovered around 50 F (12 C))

Moving back to today, I was asked by Tom Oden, the Vice-President for Academics at UWC to go and give an interview about MLK Day (He needed a Student Council member). Moving on to the actual event, Naomi, the CEC coordinator at school, asked me to be at the Welcome Center at 9:20. In true UWC fashion, I arrived at 9:25, followed by Naomi at 9:30. To be perfectly frank, time is often regarded as a guideline rather than a rule here. When Naomi arrived, Prestige (one of my co-years from Swaziland) and I hopped into the car. We drove to the outskirts of Las Vegas, to a portion I had never been to before. Suddenly, sitting high up on a hill above us was the radio station.

Although there's a massive interstate running through where that bridge is, the picture is relatively accurate. We drove up the hill towards the station, turning off the main road onto a gravel track. It certainly didn't feel like the way to a radio station! Once we arrived at the station, however, I was very impressed. Crammed into a small building was an entire radio station, showing off the best of local radio. The studio portion of the station looked something like the picture below.

The show host sat on the side closest to you and we sat on the other side of the wall, where the guest mikes were set up. Pat, the head of the Las Vegas Peace and Justice Center and also the host of Community Peace Radio showed up just after we got there. We went into the radio station and got ourselves situated. Before we knew it, we were on the air! Below, I've attached the link to the show. It's archived on the website of the Peace and Justice Center. I won't go that much into the show, after all, you can listen to it yourself! I come on about a third of the way into the show. Alternatively, you can just leave it playing until my voice starts floating through the speakers. I apologize in advance if I sound awful...I did have a cold at the time.

To be honest, going into it, I wasn't terribly enthusiastic. After all, I did have to get up at 9 AM on a Saturday morning. What horror. By the end of the show, however, I wound up really enjoying it. There was a certain satisfaction in returning to campus and seeing people just starting to wake up...having already done something productive yourself.


--The Link to the Show: http://lvpeacecenter.org/radio/youth-radio-samaritans-and-service/