DAY 2

Like the previous day, today started out with lectures by guests, but this time, not one but two speakers address the assembled conference.

The first speaker was a rather eloquent Australian by the name of Thom Woodroofe. He is a political writer for numerous prestigious publications and an adviser to all manner of political mucky-mucks as well as the founder of the first non-partisan, youth think tank, Left-Right, in Australia. Last year, he was voted one of the 100 most important people in Australia and this year he turns 21.

Though his ego seemed more than a bit inflated (his presentation was very me, me, me oriented), he also really seemed to be deserving of it. Living in a house with no power, gas, or running water until he was 17, Woodroofe attacked the world of politics with a brash vigour altogether uncommon in today’s society, simply pushing and pushing and refusing to give in to defeat, even though it apparently did rear its ugly head from time and time again.

Based on his experiences, Woodroofe spent a good deal of his time talking about what he had learned and his ‘ten step plan’ for project implementation, which I personally found fascinating and while fairly intuitive, a really useful list of talking points.

The second speaker was a recent Boston University graduate and TYA alum named Sid Efromovich who spoke about the one successfully implemented TYA group project Hug Don’t Hate, which he started during his time year at BU. Over his student career, Hug Don't Hate grew from simply one guy with an idea to a huge organisation with many branches that sponsors hundreds of events every year.

While Efromovich and Woodroofe were both successful in similar ways (if not scales) there presentations couldn't have been more different. Efromovich or Sid as he liked to be called spent most of his hour and a half pressing into us the importance of being happy and how people truly happy seldom to bad. He also was extremely high energy and just bounced around the entire time, seemingly barely restrained by his clothes.

After both of the speakers, the participants could barely wait to start on the projects and so we delved right in. We immediately returned to the list of projects that we had come up with the day before and continued adding to it from the new ideas that the participants had garnered from the speakers in the morning.

Once the metaphorical well of ideas had run dry, my participants headed to the computer lab to do some research. Their task was, based on all the brainstorming that we had done thus far, to look up some aspect of gender issues in their country that could be wanted to do their project about.

After about an hour the participants came back and each did a short presentation about what they had wanted to research, what they had found, and what ideas that they had for their project. After everyone had a chance to speak, we then a short discussion about the project ideas that people had and then set them to work, which they did dilligently until it was time to leave.

What I really like about my committee is that they are always positive and upbeat, something I really appreciate. When we were listening to some of the speakers, there were a few participants from other committees who were being a bit obnoxious and trying to steal the 'spotlight' for themselves, but my participants were always receptive, respectiful, and representative of what real togetherness and cooperation is like

Day 1.5

This evening, as a bonding activity, my committee organised to go, en masse to a restaurant located in the sleepy beach town of Scheveningen (only sleepy due to Winter's inclement weather). Due to various curfews and tight train schedules, we ended up scheduling at early dinner starting at 6:30 but inevitably, when it came time to arrive, we were all late.

The restaurant that we had chosen was Het kleine Pannenkoekenhuis: a restaurant which specialised in pannenkoeken or dutch pancakes. For those of you that do not know, pannekoeken are not like traditional pancakes at all, but instead more like non-sweet crêpes. Additionally, while you can get them served with sweet toppings ranging from the traditional butter and powdered sugar to the more exotic: Grand Marnier, apple, and ice cream, most people prefer to eat them savory (my personal favourite: Spek en Kaas, or Bacon and Cheese). Irregardless of which you opt for, pannenkoeken are delicious and definitely a full meal as they are normally more that 30cm in diameter.

Though some of my participants could not make it, most everyone did come (including some extras from one of the American delegations who were required to travel in packs). Also, though many participants were wary about the concept of 1) pancakes for dinner and 2) savory pancakes, they all were raving about the food by the end of the meal and having a blast.

I always really enjoy the committee dinners that we have in TYA because it really gives people an opportunity to relax and enjoy each others company without having to stress about their projects or the fact that they are spending 8.5 hours a day discussing politics. So much about this conference is about being excited and passionate about the issue that the participants are discussing and working on and that is really helped by promoting and ensuring a positive space. To me that is what these committee dinners are really about, connecting people and making sure they feel comfortble and at ease with everyone else in the committee so they don't go into the conference trying to compete, but instead trying to cooperate.

And on that note, the dinner was a success.

DAY 1

Even though Monday technically falls on the second day of the conference, in all actuality Today marks the first day of the conference.

The morning started with a guest speaker, Elsa Van De Loo, the recently elected Dutch youth delegate to the United Nations who spoke about her position as a the voice of the Dutch youth and the overall point of youth actors in the oft patronising world of international politics. Though some of the more spirited participants often lead her off track, on the whole she was a very interesting speaker with a lot of good things to say.

After this we split into our committees and for the first time were able to see the people who we would be spending the rest of the week with. My committee started out with a few ice breakers — a name memorisation game where everyone tried to remember everyone else's name as they tossed around a ball, the game two truths and a lie where everyone trys to guess which is which, and new anti-stereotype game that was all about debunking cultural stereotypes since all the participants were from all around the world. After all this, we then joined up with another committee or yet a fourth ice-breaker so that the participants would just know people in their specific committees, but the conference as a whole. Once we all had had our fun though, myself and my fellow coordinator, an Italian graduate student named Mattia then got down to business.

For most of the morning, we had the participants discuss their motivations for being in the committee on Gender Issues and what their personal stance on the matter was. Some ranged from living in a repressive society that they felt was archaic and in need of changing while others lived in liberal 'equal opportunity' societies, yet they still felt the same need to try to improve the lot of people in life.

After lunch, our discussion continued, turning more towards the specific. We talked about what Gender Issues really meant and came up with a series of buzzwords that we felt effectively encapsulated the subject.

• The glass ceiling/pay gap between women and men
• The illegal trafficking of women
• Domestic Equality
• Same-sex marriage
• Women's image/self confidence
• Men's image/self confidence
• Transgender rights

The participants were extremely receptive and while they seemed to be divided almost perfectly in half on the issue of women being legally equal versus inferior and tipped slightly in favor of same-sex marriage and the transgendered being a stone's through from daemonic spawn in terms of their country of origin, all-in-all none of them seemed to share any negative beliefs/predjudices.

Finally, at the end of the day, the committee started brainstorming different ideas for things that could be done as projects on the topic of Gender Issues. Immediately there was a cry that we should all take initiative and try to start and finish a project that we could implement by the end of the week; people were shouting about possible T-shirts we could design or bracelets that we could and it almost dissolved into an enthusiatic awesome puddle of excited, empowered individual. When calmed down though, the participants were very positive and really thought outside of the box to com up with difference things that they could due about the ranging rom the ubequitious poster campaign to peer counselling groups and radio spots.

Probably the best part of the day was when, right we were leaving I looked out over my committee and asked them what they thought of the day and I was greeted by one unanimous response. It was awesome :)

The Beginning of TYA

As many of you know, my winter term project this year is coordinating a committee on Gender Issues at an international youth political conference in the Netherlands. During last January, I was the deputy president for the previous conference (which meets anualy) and this conference intself will mark my fourth THIMUN Youth Assembly experience.

For those of you who don't know, the conference (which is different than it years past) is basically focused around the idea of equipping [future] youth actors with the skills and knowledge to create and implement, from scatch, a political project (such as an awareness campaign). The participants are given advice on how to craft a project in a specific topic (ergo the different committees) but the end-all-be-all aim is that they will technically be able to transfer the skills to any sort of thing they are interested in doing.

Anyways, the conference started earlier today (actually yesterday, I just forgot to post this) with a very nice opening ceremony followed by a conference wide 3 course meal at a local Dutch restaurant. Due to some transportation issues I unfortunately missed the opening ceremonies but I did make it for the dinner which was very nice and by the end of it I was already befriending some of my participants.

After the dinner, many participants were eager to hit the bars (those not from Europe edging to get the full European experience and those from eager to get some non-european experience ;p) but as I was rather overzealous with my bar hopping the night before I opted to return to the apartment I am renting with a few friends for an early night.

Over the next week or so, I will be spending approximately 9 hrs a day with my participants and fellow coordinators and in honour of this I have decided to maintain a daily blog of my exploits of the conference both in and out of the committee itself. This will not only serve as a nice little update from me to you about the fun that is my old home but will also probably form the basis for my WT report.

enjoy.

p.s. sorry about the rambling nature, it was very late and lets just say I have not been getting the requisite amout of sleep.

Respekt für harte Arbeit (respect for hard work)

Participant: Christoph Schöneseiffen

Committee: Gender Issues

Specific issue: Improvement of reputation of women doing eldercare

Title of the project: Respekt für harte Arbeit (respect for hard work)

Outline of the Project:
Improve reputation of eldercare by presenting the hard and necessary work taken care of by these women in public.

Aims:
Improve reputation of eldercare

Indicators of success:
- More applications for the job
-more people appreciating the job and its importance

Target audience:
Adults and seniors (maybe even younger people). Their attention will be caught by radio discussions, tv documentations and posters hanging in the suburbs of Bonn.

Scope:
Bonn

Duration:
2 Months

Resources:
-posters
-local radio
-local TV stations

Costs:
Differs depending on the amount of posters and the frequency of advertisement in the radio being broadcast

Other people involved:
-Nurses and patients for documentary agreeing to be videotaped

Feasibility:
Achievable since theres several local radios and TV stations that could be approached. And in the long term one will be able to find enough patients willing to be videotaped

Timeline /critical path:
Februrary
20th - send proposal to local TV stations and radio (about 3 weeks) & desing a poster (5 days)
25th - hang up posters in the city (3 days)

March
13th - start radio campaign and find a day for a discussion on radio and peoples view on eldercare

Risk analysis:
-Advertisement on the radio can be very expensive;
-people might be unwilling to be videotaped
-TV stations might rejected approach and not broadcast documentary

Risk management:
Contact all local TV stations (3) and local radios (4)

Contingency: none

B-eat-it

Participant: Naila Imad Eldin

Committee: Gender issues

Specific issue: eating disorders

Title of the project: B-eat-it

Outline of the project: I want to boost girls self esteem in my school to prevent eating disorders.

Aims: I want to raise money through bake sales to cover the expense of folders and other materials that should be provided to all girls attending my school.

Indicators of success: If I am able complete my project and see if people respond in favor of my campaign, I will know it is successful.

Target audience: The girls in my high school.
I will ask my friends and promote my campaign with the help and aid of my school’s CED.

Scope: Just within my school

Duration: 1 or 2 weeks.

Resources: money, folders, pen
Cost: 300 $

Delegation of tasks/involvement of others:
Whoever wants to help will be welcome to promote is welcome. I need help for the design of the logo etc

Development:
If it works well, I will continue the project and event next year.

Feasibility:
I think that it is really feasible because the money and expenditure required to run the campaign is a reasonable sum that I can gather.

Timeline/ critical path:
I would like to finish it by May.


Qualitative/main risk:
Gathering the money and obtaining the approval of my school to run the campaign.
Quantitative measurements of uncertainty and probability:
Both are really small.

Risk management
Response to main risk:
I will persist and continue trying to search for open doors – even if it means gaining permission from a school other than mine.
If I don’t have enough money, I will look for alternative venues for obtaining the materials such as the folders.
Contingency: Try again but change some points to make the whole campaign catchier.

Freiheit fuer Frauen

Participant: Yannick Saive

Specific Issue: Women Trafficking, Sex Slavery, Forced Prostitution

Title of campaign: Freiheit fuer Frauen

Project outline: Design Flyers, get governmental permission to hand them out, get a sponsor, print flyers, and hand them out.

Aims: Raise awareness about women trafficking, sex slavery and forced prostitution in the red light district of Hamburg among men visiting the area.

Indicators of Success: Running out of flyers while handing them out.

Target Audience: Men at the red light district of Hamburg.

Scope: A local project in Hamburg.

Duration: Until summer vacation of 2010.

Resources: Paper

Costs: 50 Euros

Delegation of tasks/involvement of others: Bartenders in the red light district, and friends visiting the area of it.

Feasibility: Easily achievable.

Timeline: During TYA: Create Flyer
Before March 1st: Speak to government about permission.
Before March 1st: Find a sponsor.

Risk Analysis
Qualitative- main risks:
Government forbids handing out my flyers.
Bartenders wont help.
Quantitative – measurements of uncertainty and probability:
Not finding a sponor or having problems printing.

Risk Management
Response to main risks:
If government forbids my project I will have to end it.
If bartenders wont help me I can simply leave the flyers in the bars.
Contingency:
If there are problems handing out flyers in the red light district I can still just stick them into flyer stands, and The message would be spread.