Leipzig

“Sawatdii, Khun Punnee, nai Leipzig”, Welcome, Punnee, to Leipzig. As of yesterday, the local news desk of the Leipziger Volkszeitung is more international. Punnee Amornviputpanich – her complete and admittedly rather unpronounceable name – is the new colleague from Thailand, who will work for the next four weeks in the city on the Pleisse River.

Khun Punnee, the customary short form of her name, is here on the invitation of the Goethe-Institut in Germany. The organization, which has represented the Federal Republic of Germany in international cultural policy matters for over 50 years, is conducting a journalism exchange project called “Close-Up” for the third time, during which the guest reporter gets to know the professional routine of the respective local desk of their host paper and, in the case of this new co-worker, report on culture, everyday life and politics from Leipzig and the surrounding region. The Leipziger Volkszeitung is the first newspaper from the east of Germany to take part in this project and Thailand is the first country from Southeast Asia to be a partner.

The arrival yesterday took longer than anticipated. “We departed from Bangkok an hour behind schedule for unknown reasons, so since I arrived in Frankfurt late, I missed my connecting flight to Leipzig,” reports Punnee with a smile. Such things are taken more in stride in the kingdom on the Gulf of Thailand. “No problem,” that the twelve hours stretched to fifteen. In Bangkok, Punnee works as Senior Reporter for the high-circulation tabloid Kom Chad Luek (sharp, direct, in-depth). Over half a million copies of the newspaper, which belongs to the Nation Multimedia Group, are printed daily in the Thai script and language. Her main focus is on topics of human rights and environmental protection. Asked about her first impressions, she replied, “I’ve been a reporter for over ten years and thought nothing much could amaze me. But the plane drawbridge at the airport was very exciting,” Punnee says. She had never seen anything like it before, although she’s travelled in Italy and France. “And friends of mine told me that Germany is ‘the land of no smile.’ But here in Leipzig I already have seen many people smiling during my very first tour,” she says appreciatively.