After the events of 9/11 and the Taliban subsequently leaving Afghanistan, Jessica Soho took advantage of journalists being allowed into the country. Her hope was to share the real experiences of those there.
Her moment came when the Filipina broadcast journalist and her videographer decided to go to a city being demined. Moments after an ambulance drove away carrying a deceased miner, another land mine went off.
“You know how in the movies the explosions come in waves, in heat waves? That is so true because I felt so hot on one side of my face, and I actually saw the waves,” Soho said during a virtual keynote address for RootsTech 2026, which was released in February in advance of the March 5-7 event.
She described it as being an “ordinary news day for a journalist, probably.”
Soho is from the Philippines. At age 8, her mother died, leaving just her dad to raise her. She remembers him always watching the TV news, which became a big reason for why she became a journalist. She attended a Catholic school, where she learned to read well due to how many prayers were said each day as part of the school schedule.
“It was prayers that have sustained me, because I’ve had a lot of dangerous assignments. Had I not learned how to be prayerful enough in life, I don’t know if I’d still be here,” Soho said.
She said that journalists are the ones who tell the story and experience exactly how it happened, without any bias, just the truth. It is a privilege to have a front-row view of history, she added.
“We’re the storytellers; we are not the story,” Soho said.
Using the FamilySearch Family History Discover Experience, Soho learned that some of her family members held significant government positions. Her great-uncle, Alipio Aspiras, and his wife, Carlota Selga, were given honorific titles in their burial records.
“We’re rich; I can afford to retire,” Soho said with a laugh.
The Family History Discover Experience also showed Soho’s parents’ marriage record and other family documents. Soho had done some of her own family history previously, but she had not seen those records before.
“I just want to be known as someone who told good stories and tried to be a good person,” Soho said. “That’s enough. That’s enough for me.”
