How will you respect me in the morning?

The three new reporters CIN has hired are at work this week undergoing intensive training. For their benefit today I became Ruza, the prostitute.

The lesson was difficult interviews so Drew set up a scenario in which the new reporters had to try to get information from a trafficked woman brought from her native Ukraine to a seedy bar in Bosnia. The reporters had to figure out how to approach me to both offer me the incentives that would get me to talk and ease my concerns about what would happen if I gave an interview. Drew played the role of bulky Dragan, a cafe bouncer obviously keeping an eye on Ruza.

Role play feels a little odd if you are doing it for the first time like our reporters but Drew and I were totally in character. He swaggered, flex imaginary huge muscles and periodically interrupted the earnest advances of the reporters with announcements like: "Hey Ruza, what are you doing? There's a basketball team asking for you," or "Ruza, move it along, the mine is about to let out for the day." I tried to make it hard for the reporters. When one reporter paid a fake 300 Euros to get Ruza alone in a room away from Dragan so he could interview her he said, "I want something different," to which Ruza replied, "Kinky will cost you extra."

I do love to make reporters blush.

All of this, let me add, was being played out through a fast-talking interpreter.
"I really need to talk to a woman," another reporter tried, using a different approach.

And eventually I broke character."I don't know if I can do this," I said. I mean can you boss people who have propositioned you. "Will you respect me in the morning?" I asked them.