this post also isn't on Uluru...

In typical Xu fashion I'm not serving up what I promised, which was an epic story on my journey into the heart of Australia.

Instead, this post will chart the journey into the heart of Vogue... Entertaining + Travel. (Brought to you by popular demand from Christie, Lauren, Chris, and any number of other people wondering what a pre-med is doing at Vogue Entertaining + Travel.)

Let me preface this by saying that everytime someone asks me where I am doing my internship, their eyes inevitably glitter with excitement when I reply "Vogue..." and then fill with opaque confusion as I finish, "...Entertaining + Travel." Yep, that's right folks, Vogue Entertaining + Travel, affectionately abbreviated to VE+T in the office (because let's face it, Vogue Entertaining + Travel is a mouthful, and to just say Vogue would be misleading...)

A magazine published exclusively in Australia, VE+T celebrated its 30th “birthday” in October 2008. VE+T was originally published as a supplement to Australian Vogue Living in 1978, but by 1979 it was published as a separate magazine called Vogue Entertaining Guide. The vision for the magazine was for it to become an authority on the best Australian cuisine and a showcase of a new wave of creative Australian chefs. Although it's published under the "Vogue" brand, it really doesn't have much connection with the typical image of Vogue that we've got in our heads from watching Anne Hathaway suffer in Devil Wears Prada.

Nevertheless, even people who I explain VE+T to still get mislead into thinking that I am working amongst fashionistas and a new wave of creative geniuses that will set the lifestyle examples for the rest of the middle class population. Well, I'll give you part of the former and most of the latter. The people I work with aren't fashionistas, although some of the women in my office would like to think they are!, but instead they are ordinary people who are a bit artsy and sophisticated in an off-the-beaten-track, I've travelled-around-the-world sort of way. They are, side note, inordinately skinny for the most part. And the writers and creative team are not exactly lifestyle trend setters, but they do have an eye for "the luxe life," a phrase that VE+T likes to throw around to explain its vision.

Essentially VE+T is a bi-monthly magazine dedicated to providing fresh travel stories and the scoop on the best restaurants, regions, hotels, etc. around the world. They have oodles of recipes included with each feature. There is also a fashion page and a... CAR page... to sort of round out the magazine as more of a lifestyle magazine than just a food and travel mag. (The regular car feature really confused me, since our target audience is "smart, affluent females, aged 30-59, looking to be inspired by the latest food, travel, entertaining and lifestyle trends." Essentially, a population who I don't think really care about cars... but I guess there's something for everyone.) I'm also working for VE+T's sister magazine, delicious, which is more geared towards recipes and foodies and less on travel.

What surprises me about the magazine? That the staff is SO tiny. Unlike the huge magazine teams you see in American movies and TV, VE+T and delicious rely on a small editorial team of about six each, who are responsible for all of the content in the mag. (Occasionally the odd freelance story gets included, too.) For example, my senior editor wrote this month's feature on Wellington, New Zealand, and she is currently in Perth, Western Australia to do research on the next issue. We also have stories on Sri Lanka and the Piedmont region of Italy in this month.

What exactly do I do for my internship? Well I work Tues-Fri from 9-5PM and somehow I manage to fill the time. My internship fits into almost all areas of the magazine's structure. I'm given lots of odd jobs and tasks, nothing glamorous, and most of the jobs I am trained for on-the-spot. Basically, I help where I am needed and I learn as I go along. I contribute mostly to the editorial side of the magazine since my interests are in writing, but sometimes I'll help out the art director. I do tons of mind-numbing fact checking (i.e. are the phone numbers for all these restaurants correct? Maybe? Why don't you call all of them to see?) but I also get to do some fun stuff too. I went with a designer of delicious one day to the in-house photo studio to watch some products being shot for a page that I helped to write. So far I've written really tiny bits of editorial content for VE+T and delicious. First was an “advertorial” (advertising/editorial) in which I wrote snippets on several products that VE+T recommends to its readers...($40,000 Rolex watch, anyone??). I also wrote the “Club VE+T” page, detailing the prizes that subscribers can win this month. And I also wrote three short introductions for our featured contributors in the June/July issue. None of these were too big, but it's going to be exciting to see my name printed in the magazine!

Essentially since the teams at VE+T and delicious are so small and interrelated, I work with all aspects of the mag and have fun doing it. Plus--big plus--people will come in with free cocktail samples (I got INCREDIBLY flushed at work one afternoon as the result of this) and tons of free pastries, teas, anything-under-the-sun to try to bribe the editorial staff into writing about their product. Yay for freebies!

Okay, so hopefully this post will satisfy anyone with even the tiniest bit of curiosity on what I do at VE+T and delicious. And truly, it's been quite an eye-opener for me--who knew that so much work went into creating the "look" of the magazine... or that a job as a "food stylist" exists???

Peace and Rolex watches,
Xu

PS I linked the websites of both VE+T and delicious if you want to check it out for yourselves. :)

PPS Thao, you would love my job because pretty much all it is is massive amounts of food porn, and we all know how much you love food porn! (Okay, well I know, and now my parents who are reading this blog also know, hah.)