I'm a host and senior producer at AJ+:

My job today involves, pitching, researching, scripting, fact-checking, shooting, video-editing, producing, and (gasp) hosting quirky short documentaries for "Eat This with Yara,” an award-winning AJ+ show I launched that explores the intersection of food with society, politics, and the environment.

Since we launched “Eat This with Yara” – which was formerly branded as “In Real Life” when we launched it in 2018 – the show has amassed tens of millions of views across YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and gained recognition from some of the most esteemed bodies in the world of journalism and online video, including the Webby Awards, the Capital Emmys, the James Beard Media Awards, the Shorty Awards, and more.

Anyway, who cares about views and awards! Watch some of my work and let me know what you think.

Before launching Eat This with Yara:

I worked on AJ+’s news team, where I produced hundreds of news videos – short and long – that generated hundreds of millions of views and millions of shares/retweets across Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. My work generated meaningful discussions among AJ+'s worldwide audience and helped grow the company's Facebook presence from five million followers to more than 11 million.

As a news video producer, I produced/edited short-form viral news videos, hosted and produced in-depth studio explainers, and occasionally made experimental self-hosted short docs. I helped devise social engagement and audience development strategies for my videos and also worked remotely with video journalists in the field to produce quirky evergreen video features.

Near the end of my time in this position, I hosted and co-produced a four-part short documentary series on Iranian Americans and their immigration history.

Before working at AJ+:

I moved to Iran in 2013 to work as a freelance journalist for a couple months...but ended up staying for two years.

While there, I freelanced articles for The Guardian's Tehran Bureau, surprised unsuspecting pedestrians with my camera for Humans of Tehran (a Facebook page modeled after HONY), whispered live Persian-language translations into people's ears for a TEDx event, swashbuckled from Southeast Asia to Western Europe as an evangelist for an Iranian animation studio, and roamed the streets of Tehran trying to make viral videos with a bearded-warrior-in-a-kilt puppet.

Before moving to Iran:

I was a student at NYU who also got to do some cool internships. These internships had me: stalking foreign dignitaries at the UN and climbing telephone poles (to film Occupy Wall Street protesters) for Al Jazeera English, covering the five boroughs at New York 1 News, learning a thing or two about PR and Silicon Valley at Yahoo!, and interning at the online video game publication I'd worshipped since I was a kid, 1UP.com.