Macedonia. Do you know where that is? If not, don’t feel bad. I didn’t know either, and we were supposed to be representing them at the University of Pennsylvania Model United Nations Conference (UPMUNC).
What is model United Nations? Take roughly 1,500 college students and assign them to different UN committees, bring them together for four days at a hotel in downtown Philadelphia, and make them talk about international relations. The result? Surprisingly, a lot of fun.
Showing up at the Sheraton on the first day, we saw a big group of well-dressed young adults sitting with suitcases and bags and binders, gathered on the sofas in the luxurious hotel lobby. Music floated above the buzz of conversations. Opening ceremonies were loud, and I didn’t expect quite so many students. But there were a lot. People kept coming in, both delegations from dozens of other schools as well as representatives and chairs of committees from U Penn. And once it was done, we all went in search of dinner. Our team wound up at a little Irish pub about a block and a half away from the hotel, and I tried my first Philadelphia cheesesteak. It was surprisingly gross. It was disappointing.
The first session happened after dinner. We debated the topic of discussion – UN peacekeeping – for a little over an hour, and then dove right in to the material. People wrote notes and passed the tiny pieces of paper to form blocs of countries so that we could work together and discuss our ideas for resolutions, which is the ultimate goal of working together in a United Nations committee. When we were done with the first committee session, it was past 11 p.m. and all we wanted to do was sleep.
This repeated itself, with a few breaks for food, drinks, and games of Cards Against Humanity, for the next two and half days.
My committee, the UN’s Legal Committee, was tasked with the reformation of UN Peacekeeping operations. We worked from Thursday to Saturday night on a single paper and combined and crammed as much information and “diplomatic language” into as few pages as possible, which was incredibly exhausting. We deserved those breaks. But, working together with students from around the country, we ultimately prevailed. We created resolutions that all passed within our committee, despite our ideological differences and distinct national interests, and each accepted paper was met with a round of applause.
As we moved to finally close the last session of the conference, the delegate for Poland adjusted his glasses and raised his placard.
“Motion to change topic to law of the sea.”
Jack, a delegate for China, turning around, shot back, “This is why you keep getting invaded.” Laughter filled the room.
A motion to adjourn later, we celebrated. Then we went to party. Welcome to UPMUNC.
Written by Molly Greenwald '17, Politics & Society
