A female football host has found her own narrative｜WSJ Chinese version

2022年世界杯期间，我是在小红书上偶然刷到Gloria的，她在巴塞罗那做足球节目的主持人，这似乎是一个光鲜亮丽、远在云端的职业。我对她产生了好奇。深入足球女主持的生活，我发现她在这个男性主导的行业里，以最性感的姿态说着男性的足球语言。她被凝视、被消费、被限制在一个花瓶角色里。离开电视台后，她创办了自己的创意公司，商业内容与足球的结合让她有了更广阔的创作空间。这个故事关于，一个足球节目女主持人，找到了属于自己的足球叙事。

The original article was first published in the Chinese version of WSJ

Interview and writing: Shifan

Editor: Lu Ying

In the photo, Zhang Qian is standing in a TV studio, with neat short hair and a professional suit. He looks like a perfect model, showing a standard smile, and is surrounded by famous football stars. Her social networking site introduction states that she is the host of a football program in Barcelona, ​​Spain. This seems to be a glamorous career far away in the clouds.

During the World Cup, Zhang Qian went to Qatar to work as a reporter. After work, she chatted with the front desk of the reporter's apartment and the cleaning staff of the news center. They were laborers from Africa who received low wages and supported a world carnival. She writes about these “invisible women.” She said that the just-concluded World Cup in Qatar was the World Cup with the lowest number of women.

At the time of the interview, Zhang Qian had already left Spanish TV. She has been a female host of football programs for two years. For her, this is a role with a lot of imagination and a false aura. In the eyes of many people, the "ceiling" of this job is dating a star. "Everyone is proud of me except myself."

In this male-dominated industry, Zhang Qian speaks the male football language in the sexiest manner. She is stared at, consumed, and confined to a vase role. After leaving the TV station, she founded her own creative company. The combination of commercial content and football gave her a broader creative space. At the same time, she also continued to do football reporting to understand the football culture outside of the game and more stories of ordinary people. She found her own football narrative.

Here's what she said:

absurd

I don’t know why people like to see those pictures of me as a football presenter so much. That kind of life is far away from me. This is the first time I have posted these photos publicly on social media. I rarely showed this side of myself before because I didn’t recognize this job from the bottom of my heart. During my two years as a football presenter, I played a mannequin. Stand there and say what they want me to say.

A day in the life of a presenter is ridiculous. When I started from home, I was an ordinary girl. When I arrived on the TV station, I became a "celebrity". The stylist will prepare three or four outfits for me to try on and match. Then the makeup artist does my makeup, which takes more than an hour. The stage makeup was so thick that to cover the dark circles under my eyes I would use half a box of powder.

The female host has to wear ten centimeter high heels when recording the show. Technically a decorative item, it was so tall that I couldn't walk around in it. So I always walked to the studio wearing slippers and high heels, put the high heels on the designated spot, and then stood on them. During the entire recording of the show, I was locked into these shoes.

My job is to read the manuscript written by the editor into the teleprompter.

The main language of the program is Chinese, which broadcasts the football league's matches and scores, and adds some comments. At the same time, I also have to interview the stars in Spanish and English. The TV station I work for, La Liga TV, is the second largest audio-visual content producer in Europe. In the 1970s, the boss bought the copyrights of many sports programs for decades. In the 1990s, the television era ushered in, and he became a super rich man. In this giant television factory, programs are mass-produced. A photographer has a dozen different SD cards, one card representing a show. This program, along with many sports programs, was packaged and sold to overseas TV stations in the United States, Canada, Malaysia, Singapore and other countries. The target audience is overseas Chinese groups. Therefore, they need a host with a Chinese face.

I got this opportunity in the mixed zone at a football game. At that time, I was studying for a postgraduate degree in sports management in Spain. I spent every weekend at the stadium, helping domestic sports platforms to watch games, conduct interviews, and write articles to make a living. One day, a middle-aged woman who looked very capable asked me if I was Chinese and if I could speak Spanish. After getting a positive reply, she handed me a business card. Later, I went to the TV station and went through several rounds of auditions and got the job opportunity. The whole process is actually quite dreamy.

When I first started working as a host, it was very happy and enjoyable. I was able to meet many stars I had admired since I was a child. But after a while, the sense of repetition and absurdity caused me to have more and more self-doubt. Spain is a country with a strong football atmosphere. If I stand with the big stars, everyone will naturally classify us as the same person. In everyone's imagination, after recording the show, the female host will be taken away by the star's luxury car and go on a date with them. Every time I tell someone about my job, the response I get is, "Have you ever dated a sports star?"

In fact, after I got off the high heels, I had nothing to do with the so-called "high life". Football stars, stylists, and makeup artists did not exist in my original life. I take the subway home from get off work and take off my thick stage makeup. Sometimes after half an hour of makeup removal, I still have a layer of powder after wiping it off with a makeup remover.

vase

As female hosts of football programs, everyone thinks we are vases. In fact, this is indeed a vase that is stared at and consumed.

The last time I went to a TV station to audition, I met Sara. At that time, she had just finished recording a show in the studio. She was wearing a sexy suit, had a hot figure and was very beautiful. I thought to myself, this must be the wife of some football star. She greeted me kindly and taught me how to stand and read the manuscript. What impressed me deeply was that she told me, "Be careful when working here. Everyone is jealous of us. It is normal to have no friends."

Later I understood the meaning of this sentence, and Sara became my only friend in Taiwan. We always had lunch together. On the station, the salary of the female host is three to four times that of other employees, which is equivalent to the salary of the president of a regional bank in Spain. It is a truly high-paying job. In the eyes of other colleagues, we only have to stand there and read the manuscript beautifully, and the working hours are short, so we are easily hated by others. Once, after wearing high heels for a long time, I said, "My feet hurt." A producer immediately responded in a sarcastic tone and said, "Yeah, this job is really difficult."

One Christmas, a football star gave me a bottle of perfume, which was seen by my colleagues. In the next month, every time I went to work, they would come close to me and smell it, "Is this what it smells like?" In fact, I have never used this bottle of perfume, and I have never interacted with that player again.

In the eyes of many people, the "ceiling" of this job is dating and marrying football stars, rather than becoming a good journalist.

In fact, including myself, I also had such a stereotype towards female hosts at the beginning. For example, when I first saw Sara, I thought she was a sports star's wife because of her beauty and hotness, which shows that I have been affected by this toxic concept. In reality, in Spain, the job of host is indeed a job for ordinary girls to climb up and cross class. Some female hosts have become football star wives. Including the current Queen of Spain, who was also a TV host.

It’s nice to have someone who can comfortably adapt to this role. It's just that I can't.

On my first day at work, when I walked into the fitting room, I was shocked by how exposed the clothes were. They were all low-cut clothes and short skirts, with the emphasis being on "tightness" and highlighting the curves of the body. In the environment where I grew up, the examples of female hosts were Dong Qing and Lu Yu, who were dignified and intellectual. In Spanish football programs, the first task of the female host is to be "sexy". My colleagues are also big-breasted beauties with big waves, like "porn stars."

I told the stylist about my resistance and that there was no way I could work in something like that. They later purchased a batch of professional-looking clothes for me.

In fact, in China, my figure and appearance do not conform to the mainstream aesthetics, so there is definitely no way I can be a host. Since I was a child, I have been discriminated against because of my dark skin. When I was in college, I went to interview to be a flight attendant, but I was rejected because of my dark skin and too big hips. As a result, in Spain, I became a sexy host. This feeling is very contradictory. On the one hand, I am very happy that my figure and appearance have been greatly recognized here. On the other hand, I don’t want to deliberately sell sexiness and just be a vase.

Before, someone saved photos of my life in my circle of friends and posted them in my name to forums where male fans gathered, such as Hupu and Qiu Di. They commented freely on my face, legs, waist, and even my bust. There are also football editors I know who will ask me in a begging tone if they can post my photos on the forum. At first, from the perspective of my colleagues, I thought this was their job, but in the end I found out that it was just a scam to consume women’s bodies.

Sara is now in the United States and is a political correspondent for Spanish national television in Washington. She has always had journalistic ideals, and women in the journalism industry have a much stronger say than in the football industry. She felt that as a woman, she would never be truly respected and recognized in the football community.

Men's football language

After standing in the studio and reading the script for more than a month, I proposed to write the script myself, but the program team rejected it. They thought it was unnecessary. After all, in the eyes of those male editors, it is impossible for women to know more about football than they do.

In the setting of the program, one male editor is responsible for writing the manuscript, one is responsible for translating the manuscript, and I am only responsible for reading the manuscript. It's a long way around and I can actually do all the work myself. Besides, I think their manuscripts are very poor. I can write better than them.

I was broadcasting some game scores and tactics, "The forward should be pulled forward a little! The center should be dragged back a little!" "Who should the coach take off the field ten minutes early!" This is what I read, and this is what I think The most boring part of football. This is related to the fact that the audience of football is mainly male. Men like to talk about tactics and satisfy their illusory sense of being the master of football matches. In front of the TV, everyone is the national team coach.

I was in Qatar recently, and the way some veteran reporters communicated with me was to "test me." They would test me, "Xiao Zhang, do you know this player?" (a Brazilian player in the 1960s) "Do you know that Brazil beat France in 1970?" I don't know this, which shows their knowledge. Erudite. It seems that if I like football, I must recite the 500-year history of football like them and name many players from ancient times.

But I've been to those countries and seen them play. I know Spanish and can watch player interviews. When I talk about the culture behind football, why is football played this way in this country? Is it related to the climate, history, and culture of the entire country? Many men are clueless about these.

What's even more outrageous is that when a female colleague of mine said, "I don't know (this player)," the male reporter said, "Yeah, he's not handsome. Female reporters like you only know those handsome players." Female reporters Everyone can be questioned like this, let alone ordinary female fans.

In this male-dominated industry, I was asked to project female sexuality and then host with a man's tone and language. In fact, during the audition process, the assessment criteria were to see whether I was photogenic and whether my language skills were fluent, but not whether I understood football.

Our TV station has more than 30 hosts, one-third of whom are male hosts. The selection criteria for male and female hosts are completely different. In football programs, the male host has to perform the duties of a brain. Among our male hosts, there are no handsome guys, they are all middle-aged men. The important qualities are intelligence and humor. In live football programs, they need to respond and comment quickly. They need to be informative and effective, just like a football talk show.

I want to be a male host, and I'm sure I can do the job. But it’s set up as a man’s job.

my football world

When I was a kid, the furthest thing I imagined about my future was going to Spain to watch a football match. Looking back now, I have reached a place beyond my imagination.

I grew up in Honghe, Yunnan. There were only 100,000 people in our county. There were no museums or concerts, and there was a lack of spiritual life. Football became a spiritual sustenance for me. I would save up my pocket money to buy Football Weekly and memorize the names of the stars. When I was in the third grade of elementary school, I joined the school's women's football team and stayed on the court to train after school three days a week. I play as a midfielder because I'm very strong and I'm responsible for corner kicks, free kicks and penalties. When I was in fifth grade, our team won the Yunnan Primary School Women's League Championship.

After graduating from college, I went to South America to work and live for three years. There, I learned Spanish from scratch and was influenced by the extreme and enthusiastic lifestyle in South America. One year in the South American Liberation Cup, the Chilean Estudiantes played against the Argentine Boca Juniors. It was the craziest football scene I have ever seen. Since morning, the streets have been packed with enthusiastic fans. During the competition, everyone stood on the chair and sang from the first second to the last second. Outside the stadium, ambulances and fire engines were on standby. Later, fans from both sides fought outside the stadium. Fans of the Chilean Estudiantes lit hundreds of red fireworks. The sparks fell and ignited a tree on the roadside. The hat of a fan not far from me was also set on fire. Burned.

The Boca district of Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina, seems like a place dedicated to football. There is even a Maradona church in Argentina, and the church is painted in blue and white, the colors of the Argentine national team. A cross was hung inside, a sculpture of Maradona's head was placed, and fans worshiped wearing Argentina's No. 10 jersey.

This is the case in South America, football is higher than life. This World Cup is known as "Twilight of the Gods". Some Argentine fans I interviewed in Qatar even sold their house to come to Qatar to watch the game because of the economic downturn in Argentina and the very high prices in Qatar. "I will regret it for the rest of my life if I don't come." "

For me, football is a way for me to get to know a place, a culture and a society. When I was a host, I also had a location program on the TV station, where I went to various stadiums in Spain to watch football and experience the local food, drink and entertainment. A city in Spain usually has two or three different teams, divided by class. Workers have workers’ teams, elites have elite teams, and intellectuals also have their own teams. I have learned about many interesting clubs. For example, there is a place in Spain that mainly produces cucumbers. Most of the club members are farmers who pick cucumbers, so their logo is a cucumber.

Nowadays, British clubs are developing better than Spanish clubs, and it has something to do with operations. Because they are completely corporate, the club is like a company, and the boss has absolute say. Spanish clubs insist on democracy and everything must be voted on. Football is the largest sport in the world. To me, it contains history, culture, politics, and everything interesting. Compared with these, I don't care at all whether the forwards should move forward or retreat in a certain game.

In 2020, due to the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic, all major football leagues were completely suspended, and I also faced arrangements for being transferred. So I simply resigned from the TV station and started my own creative marketing company in Barcelona to do sports-related projects, discover the stories of football clubs, and build their brand image. This year we also made a documentary for FIFA, which filmed the story of young Chinese players receiving training in Spain and pursuing their football dreams.

Creating commercial content is more interesting to me and has more cultural malleability. Once when I was working on a creative idea for the Spanish club Real Betis, I first asked an old man to read a newspaper by the river, because the Spaniards’ favorite way to obtain football information is actually reading newspapers. Then there were a few young people playing football by the river, passing the ball to a flamenco dancer, who finally kicked the ball into the stadium. Every part of the film was integrated into my impression of the city. observe. The creation itself is pleasurable and has a lasting sense of meaning for me. Rather than broadcasting a football program repeatedly, the next day this thing is out of date and nothing is left.

invisible women

The World Cup in Qatar is probably the World Cup with the lowest female participation. I rarely see women on the streets, in the stadiums, and in reports. In the past, "football babies" and "breast goddesses" were highly discussed during the World Cup, and the media gained attention by consuming the sexiness of female fans. Now, due to the generally conservative religious atmosphere in Qatar, women are not allowed to wear revealing clothes, so even this bit of exposure is gone.

In the stadium at the University of Nottingham, in the vast audience, I felt that the woman had disappeared. I was surrounded by a bunch of shouting male fans, which was actually quite scary. I like football. This sport has its charm. So many people are united by football and even regard football as a belief. But I'm not that into the masculine fan culture, which can be very vulgar at times.

So I want to see women in the World Cup. The World Cup is not only about the stars and fans, but also everyone who works hard. Bella, the receptionist at the journalist's apartment where I live, is from Rwanda. The "World Cup" was her opportunity to come out and have a look. She originally thought she was here to receive "stars", but it turned out that she never left the reporter's apartment. Tina is a cleaning staff member in the news center and is from Ethiopia. She hopes that the World Cup will be over soon so that she can go back and buy a new schoolbag for her son. In Qatar, there are nearly 3 million migrant workers like Bella and Tina who came to Qatar through outsourcing companies. They are the capillaries of this prosperous world. With low wages (about 3,000 yuan) and high consumption in Qatar, they can do nothing.

I love chatting with these regular people. During my career, I interviewed hundreds of stars. Many times I felt that I had no real communication with the stars. My questions were superficial, what they said was very limited, and neither party opened their hearts. The most glamorous part to everyone is the part I care least about.

This year I also opened a brokerage company. Being a broker is to understand a person again. This player may have been a star so far away that our knowledge of him was limited to his performance on the court. But when we work together, I have to understand what his story is like, how we want to tell his story, and how to "sell" his story.

For example, when I get to know a star, I want to know what kind of environment he grew up in and what made him who he is today. For example, after some stars become famous, they stop playing football and lead a life of debauchery. Maybe he had a hard time as a child, and playing football changed his destiny, which also caused a backlash. Now that he's rich, he just wants to enjoy himself. We can also discuss that there is actually nothing wrong with this and that he has no obligation to be a moral role model.

This makes me feel that this job is particularly vivid. I can get to know a person who once felt out of reach in multiple dimensions, and gain the trust of the other person. People used to think that football hosts were so dazzling, and these compliments were too vain for me. In fact, those players didn't remember my name at all. Now I have professional cooperation with some stars, and have gradually established some personal relationships. Now I gradually feel confident that I am equal to them.

This year I cooperated with a domestic platform and came to Qatar to work as a reporter for the World Cup. In fact, I wanted to go to the 2018 World Cup in Russia, but I didn't get the opportunity at that time. Now that we have entered the video era, more women need to appear on the platform, which is why there has been a significant increase in female reporters at this year’s World Cup.

This industry restricts women, but it does not deny women opportunities. I have seen some very powerful women. I rode a media bus with a German-Taiwanese photographer every day. She is over sixty years old. I have photographed sports events of all sizes for more than 40 years, including the Olympic Games and the World Cup. She was wearing a photography vest and had to carry several boxes of equipment by herself, and those telephoto lenses were extremely heavy.

I have mentioned so many reflections on the work of female hosts, but it is actually because this job is considered "too good" by everyone. It is undeniable that this work experience is still a very valuable experience. It gave me the opportunity to enter the sports industry, build up my own network resources, complete the transformation from female host and reporter to entrepreneur, and also have a better understanding of myself. A deeper understanding. I believe that whether it is the football industry or world trends, all women are ushering in an era of more openness and initiative.

In recent days, I have also done live broadcasts for some platforms. A lot of comments and comments still focus on my figure and appearance, and I feel like I'm back in the cycle of being a vase. This also made me realize that even after many years, I still couldn’t adapt to this role.

find me:

@小红书: Shifannn (will put some personal words)

@Email: 729568646@qq.com