Good afternoon, Anti-trafficking forces of Chicago,
The sun has set on 2011, and we’re now in the waking hours of 2012. I’m Brooke Hennen, Traffick Free’s Convention Outreach Director, and my hostile takeover of TF’s blog is now complete. Thank you, Laura Ng (TF’s Executive Director of External Relations and Shared Services) and Morgan Anderson (TF’s Executive Director of Operations and Program Development) for this honorable opportunity. Let it be noted that these posts fall beneath the scrutiny of my beautiful wife Richelle (TF’s Volunteer Director), so thank you, Richelle, for your willingness to babysit me and make sure I don’t break the blog.
While the TF team turned our events up to eleven last year with the great panels and our first 5k, it’s obvious that our focus was on live events. The blog on the other hand only had five posts. The content was great but the frequency was lacking. This year, I’m going to turn our blog up to an unprecedented twelve! (Something I’ll have to do to even attempt to compare to the events planned for this year.) You see, Traffick Free’s 2012 is already loaded with explosive (trafficking awareness) rounds we’re ready to unload on Chicago.
...and as it turns out, I’m stuck with the task of one-upping myself because I’ve planned an event. Well, it’s not like it’s my event, but rather, I’ve staked out my own little headquarters at a special locale. You see, 2012 is the year we suit-up. I’ve acquired some capes, cowls and grappling hooks so we won’t be out of place at Chicago’s premier vigilante event. Our mission...infiltrate the Chicago Comic and Entertainment Expo (C2E2) and expose them to our compassion to end human trafficking in Chicago.
And as much as I’d love to get my monologue on at the moment about going to C2E2 2012, I’m going to leave off here because if you’re like some of the people I’ve told in person, it’ll take a few minutes to process what comes after the “C2E2? What? Comics? Why?” So feel free to check out c2e2.com and leave some comments or email me.
One last thing before I sign off. Weekly posts will be arriving on the blog between Tuesday afternoon and Thursday afternoon (Wednesdays are designated to my final grad class that evening). I’ll be covering different topics from talking about where I’ve seen trafficking presented in comics, television or films to event coverage, and once I’ve got a few interviews lined up, we’ll be seeing those as well. I hold a degree in fiction writing, not journalism, so don’t necessarily expect short, dense exposition or fluff coverage. This shorter post is an exception because I’m focusing on introductions rather than delving into a particular observation or topic.
Thank you for your time everyone. I have to get along to figuring out what to treat my wife to on Valentine’s Day.
(PS: If you're interested in battling trafficking on our blog, shoot me an email - brooke@traffickfree.org)
