By Hannah Eden
After six airplane journeys, eight in-flight meals, 12 passport security checks and 6,574 km, I have finally arrived in Dawson City, Yukon. And what a wonderful place it is!
I have dreamed of traveling to the Yukon since I was a young girl. My mother is Canadian and my father is British, and having been raised across the pond in England I have always dreamed of living near mountains and wildlife, and experiencing Canadian culture.
Following this dream I moved to Canada in April 2013 and have been living and working in Toronto. I started pursuing my goal of being a photojournalist when I moved to Belleville, Ontario in September 2013 to start my two-year photojournalism diploma at Loyalist College. Walking through the halls of the greats, I hoped to one day work anywhere I could document people’s lives.
My greatest dream is probably the smallest to most people: to tell the whole truth about a person. It is an honour and a privilege to have a unique look into an individual’s life.
So began eight months of lectures about the history of photojournalism, learning how to use my camera and studying other people’s work. Soon, I gained an interest in multimedia and started filming short news videos of various events around Belleville. I rapidly grew to love the idea of visual storytelling more than I had originally anticipated, and in January 2014 I made the decision to book my golden ticket to the Yukon!
I had heard so much about the community in Dawson, its people and landscape, and I made the decision to do documentary work. It wasn’t until April when I heard that the Klondike Sun was opening their doors to a new summer intern, and within two days of landing on Dawson soil, here I am as the Sun’s new friendly face!
Dawson has always been a far away place that I imagined myself being a part of – a small community of friendly local faces – and now that I am here, I realize that this in indeed a very big community of kind hearts and good fun. So, at the grand old age of 20, I look forward to a summer of stories.
Hello, Dawson, thank you for having me stay!