Collaborations
Throughout my career, I've had the privilege of partnering with diverse organizations worldwide across multiple disciplines. For a complete overview of these collaborations, please visit my LinkedIn Profile.
‘The word flies faster than the bird of heaven / Carve it in stone before it is lost to the wind.’"
— Aramaic Proverb of Ahiqar (5th c. BCE)
R.T. Hickey is a 21st-century creative who embodies the Renaissance ideal of multidisciplinary inquiry—driven by boundless curiosity, deep compassion, and a refusal to accept conventional boundaries. Her work reconnects the frayed threads of identity while rediscovering the vibrant tapestry of our natural and cultural worlds.
Across her 20-year career, she has championed courage, conservation, and cross-cultural dialogue. Her projects transcend mere documentation, actively reviving the wisdom embedded in nature, endangered heritage, and vanishing languages. She operates at the critical intersection where art meets science, East engages West, and conflict transforms into reconciliation.
For Hickey, storytelling remains fundamentally a purposeful exploration of both self and society—a sacred act of preservation in an ephemeral world.
Her Story
R.T. Hickey's multifaceted career embodies the ancient wisdom: "Plant trees in whose shade you shall never sit." As a pioneering journalist, she has reported from war zones, former Soviet states, border regions, and isolated enclaves, specializing in the MENA region, Eastern Europe, and Canada. Her unique approach weaves together heritage, history, and culture—interviewing tribal leaders, researching ancient manuscripts, and amplifying marginalized voices.
With a family tree as diverse as her subject matter, she grew up on great stories of ordinary people doing extraordinary things and learning how one person can indeed make a difference.
"I used to stutter, and I struggled with dyslexia as a child. Therefore, I avoided talking or engaging in conversations and would spend most of my time with rescued animals, and just observing the world around me.
I didn't have much access to books in then conservative Saudi Arabia or communist Poland, and so whenever I found a book in someone's house, I would gravitate towards it, even if it was complicated.
Then, once, my uncle, a Polish priest, gave me a notebook and a pencil and took me on one of his rounds. He visited community members, including those who needed extra help, like the elderly, and he would help find them pets like abandoned kitties and dogs as companions. He asked me to write down what I observed and read it to him later; that was my first introduction to writing what I felt and thought.
I fell in love with the magic of writing then.
It was also the first time I didn't stutter…." — R.T. Hickey
Beginning her career in 2003 as one of the first women covering conflict zones, Rym developed a signature style of in-depth storytelling that goes beyond breaking news to document lasting impacts. She combines her training in psychology, economics, and journalism with religious studies to create nuanced narratives. She returns to stories, conducting forgotten follow ups of events and the people impacted.
"As a woman of multiple heritage with a keen understanding of the depths and intricacies of the various cultures, I am able to support the families in sensitive areas to tell their raw and — more complete — stories." — R.T. Hickey
Now focusing on cross-cultural environmental storytelling as an editor-in-chief at a cultural institution and National Geographic Alarabiya Explorer, Rym integrates her Slavic and Indigenous Sami roots with tribal wisdom. She advocate for biodiversity, animal advocacy and protecting natural habitats as a 'Women for Nature' member of Nature Canada.
Her work includes exclusive interviews with royals, members of tribes, political and cultural figures. This has included historical figures of note - His Holiness the Dalai Lama (who named her a Peace Ambassador) Dame Jane Goodall, Nobel Prize laureates Orhan Pamuk & Olga Tokarczuk, 'Poet of the People' Prince Badr bin Abdulmohsin Al-Saud, Alexis Leonov - the first man to walk in space and many more.
A dedicated advocate for sustainability and ethical living, Rym and her husband practice what they preach—from plant-based living to biodiversity conservation. She shares her home with rescued animals, embodying her mission to create a kinder world through daily choices.
"I try to employ compassion, inner peace while foster cross-cultural understandings in storytelling to inspire global harmony..." — R.T. Hickey
Awards & Recognition:
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Psychology Research, Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) Award (2000-2001).
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Selected for the Department of Foreign Affairs International Notebook program (foreign correspondent). Represented Ontario (2004).
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Long-listed for the MICHENER AWARDS for excellence in journalism, sponsored by the Governor General (2006).
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The National Newspaper win: UN Foundation Prize for Humanitarian Reporting (2010).
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Short-listed documentary script “One Blood” on a traditional desert tribe and an expat family: ‘Shasha’ Competition (2011).
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EUROMED Anna Lindh Foundation Mediterranean Journalist Award (2014).
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R.T.’s multi-media community cultural work on the FIND (Forming Intersections & Dialogues) project was selected for inclusion by Google Cultural Institute (Google Arts & Culture). led by R.T. in partnership with New York University (NYU) Abu Dhabi/New York. R.T.`s contribution—comprising 78 cultural items, including art, poetry, currency, stamps, and old photographs—is part of a broader initiative championed by Google Arts & Culture to bring the world`s art and culture online making it accessible to anyone anywhere.
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The Abu Dhabi YAS Excellence Award for “field” journalism (2016).
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Recognition by The National Archives for discovery of forgotten chapters of UAE-Vatican & EU history via old photos (2018-2019).
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WebAwards for original 'content' and 'design' Ithraeyat Magazine (2021).
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Platinum & Gold MarCom awards for R.T.’s columns in Syndication Bureau and Ithraeyat (2022).
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Finalist in the Ernest Hemingway Short Story (2023)
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Winner of the Writer's Digest Competition for Children’s/Young Adult Fiction (2023).
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Recognition of R.t.'s ‘Cultural Contributions and Media Impact’ by (ALECSO) The Arab League Educational, Cultural and Scientific Organization (2024).
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Nominated for the UNESCO Sharjah Prize for Arab Culture (2024).
Inspirational Quotes:
Wisdom from the Field
“Inner peace will lead to a peaceful individual and then this peaceful individual will build a peaceful family, then a peaceful community then a peaceful world.” — HH The Dalai Lama told R.T. Hickey while visiting his residence in India.
"Every compassionate act towards nature, is a seed of positive change..."— Dame Jane Goodall told R.T. Hickey during her visit to the UAE.
“I write because I have never managed to be happy. I write to be happy…” The Nobel Prize winner for Literature (2006) Orhan Pamuk discussed with R.T. Hickey the 'Art of Writing.'
"Look to the stars, there’s still a lot of wisdom there... We are never ever truly lost, because we always have the stars,” An old Emirati tribesman and sailor (the late Khamees bin Zaal al Rumaithy) told R.T. Hickey, passing on one of those pearls of wisdom that we may already know but take for granted.
“There are many misconceptions about the Druze, and so one of the ways to tell our story is through our home, where every corner of the house has a story ... The cedar tree planted by my great grandfather turned 100 years old this year. It is symbolic of the survival and endurance of an ideology and love for a home and country,” the late Princess Diala Arslan, one of the younger members of the oldest secretive Druze families, told R.T. Hickey in an exclusive interview and tour of the royal residence that has never been opened to the public.
"There was a time, when I blamed my companion if his religion did not resemble mine. Now, however, my heart accepts every form ... Love alone is my religion.”
In an era of hate, fear and extremism, remembering these words of wisdom by Ibn Arabi (1165–1240 AD, 560–638 AH), also known as Al Shaikh Al Akbar (the Great Shaikh), is more important than ever.
He is not as well known to the wider world as Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi, the popular 13th-century poet and scholar, but his work is just as important.
Part of a philosophical/theological series led by R.T. Hickey.
"The refugee Ahmed is more than a number ... he just wants a future... A child becomes a refugee every minute, it's time for us to do something about it," wrote R.T. Hickey in a special series dedicated to refugees.
“It has been said that ‘our secret is in our nature’ very literally ...When others rely on psychotherapy, Finns have always put on their rubber boots and headed to the woods," Katriina Kilpi, co-founder of International Forest Therapy Days told R.T. Hickey part of project that explores nature's wisdom and healing powers — "Trees heal, even in the desert"
"The origin of writing is not very romantic, I am afraid ... Writing was not invented for poetry and storytelling," Dr Irving Finkel, curator of the Middle East Department at the British Museum told R.T. Hickey as he shared one of the oldest cuneiform tablets, which is a 5,000-year-old receipt for clothing, sent by boat from Ancient Mesopotamia to Dilmun - what is now Bahrain.
“Art is everywhere...You can’t stop art; it will find its way to express itself...” — The late HRH Prince Badr Bin Abdulmohsin Al-Saud (1949 - 2024), the legendary poet, in his last interview, shared with R.T. Hickey a different artistic side in the edition dedicated to the 'Desert.'
"Several times my friends and I dressed up as Saudi men—donning the long white robe known as a kandoura or dishdasha and tying up our hair under the ghutra scarf—to try our hand at driving..." R.T. Hickey wrote for the National Geographic as part of a bigger piece on the driving ban in Saudi Arabia before it was lifted.
“I have a friend in a cave, he is the ‘AlJoun’ (white and black), who accepts me with all my flaws and doesn’t speak against me. He looks at me with sharp eyes as if throwing arrows in my way but keeps his distance…” reads another translated poem from the Umayyad era, the first Islamic rule (661–750 ce), a poet known as AlQatalah Alkilabi, who was from Madina — an area where Arabian Leopards lived— and he too befriended a leopard who he would visit in a cave, and where they would share food and water with each other, and even other beings. As featured in the National Geographic Alarabiya cover story on the 'Masters of the Mountains: Return of the Arabian Leopard."
Debut in 2021 of the late Prince Badr bin Abdulmohsen's other art: His paintings first time shown to his fans. Known as the 'Shakespeare of the Desert,' he was a beloved of the people.
