"The purpose of our lives is to be happy".
Dalai Lama
When we are younger, there is undoubtedly pressure to conform, to behave a certain way, to hang out with the right people. But as we get older, or at least as I do,
those pressures seem to become less and less.
It is not that those pressures are no longer there, it is that I simply
do not feel a need to live up to them.
My current involvement with Model United Nations is a case in
point. Here I am, going to regular
Tuesday night meetings with a bunch of students, a few years after I have
graduated. And then on some weekends I
trot off to some city to pretend to be a country at a conference for a weekend and if I am lucky I get an award for it. The path I have chosen is an unusual
one. But it is one I cherish.
My first year of involvement with Model United Nations did
not start off on an especially exciting note.
For one it was clear that the current President at the Bristol club
clearly did not like me. I happily reciprocated
this attitude by choosing to play the small island nation of Tuvalu every
week. We could of been discussing the
Syrian Civil War and I would choose to be Tuvalu just to annoy her. MUN conferences were very weakly advertised
so I went to my first one at UCL. To be
honest I wasn't overly impressed. I was
Togo on the UN Security Council and we discussed drug trafficking. Togo is too small and poor to have much of a
drugs problem.
I was starting to wonder what the big deal was about MUN
conferences when I went to the Bath MUN conference of 2014. I was Egypt on the Disarmament Committee
where the main topic that was being discussed was nuclear disarmament. Egypt didn't have much to say on the
matter. Egypt's nuclear ambitions pretty
much died when Israeli intelligence assassinated all of it's missile scientists
many years ago. Early on, the debate
seemed to sway towards the established nuclear powers who talked down the rest
of us, literally (they were on the higher seats in the lecture theatre) and in
terms of tone. They dictated what they
wanted, pretty much their continued dominance of nuclear matters and then went
out of the room for a smugly congratulatory smoke break. In the last hour a delegate arrived who
helped kindle my love affair with Model United Nations. He had a cheeky grin and he was here as
Pakistan. He asked me if I wanted to
wipe the smile off the faces of the nuclear powers. I nodded in approval and watched with wonder
as he darted around the room with some furious lobbying. In no time at all he came back an sat next to
me rubbing his hands with glee. When it
came to voting time I could see why he was so happy. One clause after the other we shredded the
resolution that was dictated to us by the nuclear powers. The developing world cheered at it's
successful rebellion.
At the end of my Masters degree I watched the changing of
the guard as the despised President of our Model United Nations Society
left. As I turned to leave the door the
new President, Mark, asked me what I would do upon my graduation and whether I
would still attend the club sessions. I
expressed doubt, after all I was no longer a student and now a mere
civilian. Mark replied that I should
consider coming back to MUN and if I did I would be most welcome. Something touched me about what he
said. I thought back to the strange little
debates on a Tuesday evening in a cold room of the University of Bristol's
Students Union and of course of that eye opening encounter with the delegate of
Pakistan. I wanted to stay, and so I
did.
My civilian career in Model United Nations is when it really
took off for me. One of my first
conferences after graduation was Reading MUN.
On this I was Russia on the Security Council and we were discussing
Syria. Needless to say things got heated
very quickly. I wielded my veto like a
serial killer wields a bloody machete in a horror film. I met Western horror with standard Russian
Government lack of concern and disdain.
I even got to make a guy's life hell who was deliberately rude to me
before sessions began. All in all I was
having a lot of fun. It was also a
fulfilling conference on a personal level since I met a good friend of mine who
will now be a Stag Do attendee and friends from Israel and Palestine on the
same committee. The formula appeared to
be set; dead end job during the week and vulgar displays of power at the
weekend.
My time with MUN became a big confidence booster when I
started to win awards at conferences.
The first time I did was during one of my most emotional MUN
battles. This was at the Bath conference
a few years ago when I was New Zealand on the Historical Security Council where
we were discussing the 1994 Rwandan Genocide and the Bosnian War. I felt determined to make this performance a
spirited one so I invested in purchasing the book "Shake Hands with the
Devil" by Romeo Dallaire, the former UN Force Commander of the UN
mission. While this book was incredibly
helpful for debate research it was extremely harrowing. Dallaire, who had a nervous breakdown after
the mission, threw all of his tortured guilt and anger at the UN hierarchy into
the pages he wrote. It was impossible to
not get emotionally invested. So I was
pretty hyped up when it came to the actual debate, since New Zealand was one of
the few countries who at the time who wanted to intervene to stop the killing. The next debate was interesting too with a
sinister visiting speaker from the Republic of Srpska claiming to have not
ethnically cleansed any of their Muslim citizens, who seemed to have vanished. "You can't make us prosecute our
generals and politicians!" they cried.
"What kind of country does that?" she wailed. "Germany", I responded.
The debates can get especially emotionally exhausting if you
are playing a country whose views you are completely opposed to your own. I remember the eyes boring into me with
discomfort and alarm when as the Pakistani representative (always a
troublemaker it seems) I announced to the Human Rights Council at Belfast MUN
that all gay people are basically born criminals. At a recent debate I felt pretty dirty inside
articulating Russia's views in the South Sudanese War. This basically cast me as a merchant of death
with a veto preventing an arms embargo at all cost. My political brief prevented me from
admitting that I was arming pretty much everyone in the region including the
parties to the conflict and would probably ignore any arms embargoes if any
were set up anyway. At the same time a
very confident and determined British delegate called me on pretty much all of
the bloody lies I was spreading. I had
maximum respect for him and yet my position made me root for the bad guy in
this Blofeld versus Bond scenario. This
was also the first time after years of trying that I won a Best Delegate award
at UCL MUN, which meant a lot.
But winning isn't everything and it usually takes losing to
remind people of that. My winning streak
this year came to an abrupt pause at South West MUN. I admit my ego was riding high at this
point. I had expected to walk away with
something, but stiff competition prevented me from doing so. Despite walking away empty handed awards wise
I had a fun weekend and yet again met some lovely people.
Not winning at South West MUN made me reflect on my unusual
situation philosophically. Here I am, a
graduate, some years older than my colleagues due to my large study gap between
my respective degrees. I tend to use MUN
conference weekends as an escape from whatever humdrum job I tend to have. I reflected on whether I should act my age,
but then I remember a piece of advice my soon -to-be wife gave to me; "life
is too short for you not to do things you enjoy". I also wondered about how I used to attend
clubs during my undergraduate degree in which , no matter how hard I tried, I
never felt accepted. I never felt that
way at MUN, there this strange wanderer has always been welcomed. And my rude interruption in my winning streak
taught me something else, despite my MUN experience I still have much to
learn. But I am fine with that. My philosophical musings also revealed
something interesting and slightly disturbing; that I tend to win awards when
representing illiberal countries. Does
that mean if I represent the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) I can
go the distance? Well there is only one
way to find out I suppose.
And so I carry on with my rock and roll time with Model
United Nations. My weekends going to
conferences have a certain rhythm. I
come to some interesting (usually) city or town, find vital utilities like a
Wetherspoons or late night take-away outlets and then go in search of my
lodgings. Belfast is probably the most
interesting city I went to with interesting tours of former paramilitary
occupied areas, and yes a Wetherspoons.
My lodgings tend to vary from hostels of varying quality to Airbnb rooms
with similar hazards, although at the last one I was spoiled rotten by my
hosts. I usually walk into conference
each morning listening to my music to make me determined, or angry up my blood
if I am playing a particularly hard-line or brutal country. Then there are the debates which are such a
hive of activity that ours go by feeling like minutes. But the traditional farewell at the end of
MUN conferences is one thing that I find the most touching. Traditionally delegates write messages of
congratulations or good wishes on their colleagues' country placards. That way
in the future one can look back on these messages and smile. I have kept most of my placards and yes they
do still keep me smiling.
