Choosing the right future

This year will be my last year in school. The next thing I know, I'm off to college and all the the small worries of my school days will be replaced by considerably bigger ones.

We spend the first 15 years of our lives in school having no say-so what so ever. We are integrated into a system and we are forced to adjust. Adjusting is hard in itself, but then we get used to it, and we start reveling in the ease of not having to consider all the choices and deciding which one is best and which one to go with because everything has been chosen for us. 

Then we are expected to make our own decisions.

We are stormed by representatives from different universities each chanting the qualities of their own and bashing on the others'. We are introduced to a million different majors and a million different careers and are considered as undoubtedly capable of making the right choice. Sure there are student guidance offices and many loquacious employees ready to explain everything in great detail, or even try to analyse us and help us find the "perfect" major. However, if we haven't received the training necessary to be able to search within ourselves and define who we are, our preferences, our ambitions, how can we expect someone else to be able to do that?

Suddenly we have to think for ourselves and envision what the rest of our existence will look like. And even though everything we decide on when we are eighteen might change the second we go to college, or a bit later, when we graduate and set off to find a job, we still fear and believe that those choices will make or break our future. And instead of telling us that we should choose something that feels right for now and reassuring us that we can always change our minds, everyone around us only makes us feel like we are sealing the deal with the devil who's going to come asking for retribution if we don't eventually graduate with top grades in the field we chose.

No one can know for sure who they want to be so early on. It's absurd to claim that we will be able to control every single aspect of our life. Instead, we should remind ourselves that no matter how things turn out, whether it was because of choices we made or because of  pure chance, we will always have the power and freedom to want to change our situation.

And where there is will there is always a way.

I should learn to shut up sooner...

It's really unfortunate that I find myself, more often than not, in situations where, simply for the sake of saying something, anything, I end up saying the worst thing that could possibly be said.

The truth is though, that what I say usually just slips out unintentionally when I'm searching for an excuse to talk to someone or to prolong a conversation that I'm already having with them...In those situations I'm generally not myself. I'm stupid and neurotic and I just want to keep talking because I'm happy and enjoying myself...

I've recently demonstrated such idiocy.

I was talking to someone that I really like and admire and was about to leave when suddenly pops into my mind one last excuse for a conversation. In the heat of the moment and out of desperation and sheer stupidity, out of utter imbecility shall I say, I blurted out the most offensive, politically incorrect thing that I could have said.

It was a major, MAJOR! faux pas.

I didn't get the wits to notice how wrong I had been saying that until five minutes after I had left - probably the time it took for me to come back to my senses.

Trust me when I say that the gut-wrenching feeling that took over me when I was first hit by the reality of what I had said was honey compared to the incredulity towards my actions which had paralyzed me throughout that evening.

I still cannot believe I could have been so...I can't even find a word to describe how awful I feel about myself and how shocked at having behaved in a way that's not like me at all...

I always try to be as diplomatic as possible especially considering the fact that I love meeting new and different people and realize that in order to be successful at befriending them I have to be unprejudiced and even-minded. Luckily, I'm usually successful at demonstrating such tact, but it's really painful when a whole day of such good behavior is ruined by one gauche action.

Concerning the title, I admit it's not as refined as I usually hope my titles to be, but I put it anyway simply to remember that I do need to learn how to shut up sooner every time I see it...

In the hopes that this will be my last run in with senselessness...

Until next time :)

MUN starts again!

Yesterday was the first MUN training session at LAU.

This year I would be accompanying the participating students from our school as an adviser. 

I had to fight to earn that privilege considering the fact that our school adviser couldn't grasp the point in any of us, past MUNers, going through the trouble of participating this year as advisers. I'd eventually managed to convince her that it was a personal matter and that no trouble would dissuade us from going, and she'd given the permission to accompany my friends.

It was a hectic day from the start. I was dangerously close to not being able to attend because of the same old problem which is transportation, but I managed to find a ride at the last minute. The trip from school to LAU was one filled with anticipation and inquiries about the smallest, most irrelevant details of the program and was garnished towards the end by the driver getting lost a million times and everyone starting to panic about being late.

Then we were there.

It felt like stepping into a souvenir...

All was exactly as I remembered it, and not just the campus and its surroundings, but the actual atmosphere and the almost tangible excitement that filled it. My own excitement contributed greatly to the general awe.

I decided to leave contemplation for later and hurried my friends into the main hall so each could join his class. A few moments after everyone had found out which floor their classes were on I decided to just patrol the corridors and make sure they were all OK.

I was on the twelfth floor checking on the last two when I heard a voice that was strikingly familiar. It was Naji, my chair from last year.

I admit I wasn't really surprised that he had come back after graduation...I would have done the same. It was still great to see him.

His voice brought back memories of conference rooms and speeches discussing eradication of poverty and I found myself standing outside his classroom staring in and listening and was, even if for a moment, convinced that I was attending a training session again. He was my only link to last year's program, everyone else had left and I felt ecstatic at the fact that I could still hold on to a small piece of my own experience.

I hate to admit it, but truth is that I was a bit jealous of all those who were sitting there starting to learn about the UN not knowing yet that this is probably going to be the best experience of their life.

It was completely different and quite uneasy to experience it from the hallways.

I spent the afternoon going up and down stairs, into and out of the building; my feet were so sore by the end of the day that it still hurts to walk, yet I feel happier than I did in a very long time. I met so many new people merely from standing outside the classrooms; I saw so many new faces and laughed so much that I remembered a part of the why I had grown so fond of MUN last year which I had forgotten about.

It's because of all the acquaintances...You barely get the time to get bored of people there and every new person you meet teaches you something new. You're given the opportunity to discover new sides of your personality, and be whomever you want to be, and say whatever you feel like saying without having to worry about being judged because you're probably never going to see each other ever again, and because that fact means that everyone around you really doesn't care where you're from or what you do as long as you prove to be good company.

I saw Naji during the brake and talked to him. I felt like I was still an MUNer; like I was again a delegate who's just starting out. I talked to him again at the end of the day even if it slightly meant that I was abusing  the source of comfort that he was to me. I told him how sad I had been when the program had wrapped last year. I had been really sad indeed. I had invested so much time and effort into it, so much of myself, that when it was just over one day I'd feel like I'd lost my baby...

The ride back to school was really joyous and filled with hundreds of stories of how everyone had spent their day. I felt strangely happy being there, strangely optimistic, and I say that noting that I already am an extremely optimistic person. I went home having gotten back that sense of purpose which I had spoken about in my earlier post.

I guess all I can say now is that a great year lies ahead, and that I feel extremely lucky to be able to do this again.

However, thinking about how happy I was yesterday, I feel the dread of confusion starting to creep up on me again since remembering how happy and at home I feel at LAU has made mess of all the things I had planned for the future...

Until next time :)

Courage and disappointment....

Displaying courage in familiar situations is easy; being able to show it in unfamiliar ones, however, is what sets people apart...How sad it is then when said courage creates in one a false impression of hope that disappointment haunts down and kills over time...

I've recently been put in a situation where I had to act on my feet and demonstrate a sort of courage which, until then, I wasn't completely sure I was capable of.

Long story short...I met a guy in circumstances which meant that I was probably never going to see him again in my life and was presented with the choices of either introducing myself or never seeing him ever again...Considering the fact that the guy was one of the cutest I had ever met, the fact that he was a commando (to whom I have a pronounced weakness :P), and the fact that the adrenaline from the show the commandos had given that day had fueled me with a sense of invincibility, I decided to talk to him.

So I went up to him and started a conversation using some absurd subject I can't even remember as an excuse to talk to him. I was funny and charming and used the best tricks in the book. As I was about to leave, he asked me if I were on facebook and - being someone who hates to wait endlessly and pointlessly; which I told him - I gave him my name and number on a piece of paper.

I went home that day feeling light as air and barely ate anything or listened to anything that was being said around me. My delight was increased when I got a message from him, and then again when we spoke a couple of days later, and two other times that same week.

Then, however, came old dreaded time and started to work it's magic...

Our first meeting was about two weeks ago and already we're talking less and less. I'm already starting to feel that I'm making to much effort...Too soon, the person that I first talked to is starting to change and I don't know how I should act exactly. That's only two weeks into the thing - whatever it may be - that might be staring between us.

That's how I link courage and disappointment. 

The first tricks you into thinking that every happy moment leads into elongated happiness because, well, it has to, doesn't it? The peasant has to marry the prince...The second comes then and shows reality as it is and stabs the fairy godmother in the back and turns the carriage back into a pumpkin...

In a larger sense, courage represents all those moments where we have to act and choose to do so, and disappointment represents the failure of some of those moments to deliver the results that they're hoped to deliver...

In the hope that happy moments succeed, more than not, in bringing more happiness, I say until next time... :)

School's on the horizon...mixed emotions...

It's only 26 days until school starts again on September 15 2011.

As always when school is about to start, I start having these weird dreams in which I usually end up going to school in my pajamas by mistake, or where I have an extremely important exam on the first day and which I haven't at all prepared for. 

These dreams usually have me awoken in the middle of the night reassuring myself that I still had one month and that there were no exams on the first day of school. After that, I would recite the dates of several important days, the one where we were supposed to register for the new year, the one where we were going to buy the books and the date of the first day of school, just to make myself go back to sleep peacefully.

However, it's not all bad dreams and sleepless nights. I actually miss school.

Don't get me wrong though. I don't miss homework, exams, or sitting in an uncomfortable wooden desk for seven hours. What do I miss then, you might ask? I miss waking up in the morning and having something to do during the day, something that would make me use my brain and be active. Not that I don't appreciate summer's laziness, but rather that I can appreciate better once I've lost it to winter's boring routine, and that having it for two months is enough to make one feel like one's slowly degrading into a pile of nothing.

I certainly miss my friends. They are probably the reason why I feel eager to go back. I miss laughing during breaks at things that are incredibly stupid and unworthy of laughter when you think of it, but which in the boredom of class schedules seems the funniest and most entertaining matters in the world. I also have to admit, though slightly guiltily, that I miss the gossip. I miss the chit-chats about this couple and that couple and spreading and listening to not-always-innocent rumors. Mostly, I miss having common stories to discuss and current events to comment on on every single social website available.

And I actually miss the cold. I miss the rain. I miss not sweating my way to dehydration or my skin sticking to whatever it came to contact with. I miss rosy cheeks and the small puffs of opaque breath exhaled into the cold air. I miss lighting the fireplace in our living room and falling asleep on the armchair next to it for a few minutes at night, swept along by the comfort of that worm and cosy corner.

I miss that time despite the fact that it means hard work and discipline (yeah right! :P).

However, no matter whether I like it or not, it's coming, and it's coming soon, and I all can hope for is for this year to be just as full of good memories, fun and rule breaking as all those which came before it.

Until next time...

The MUN experience -part four-

Sunday 10 April. The day of the final formal conference is here.

My friend and I arrived to LAU Beirut and it was still early in the morning. There were already quiet a few people there. The level of excitement in the air was much less today than it had been yesterday. It was obvious that many were still a bit tired from the previous night's festivities.

Before you knew it, it was 9 o'clock and people were starting to rush in separate ways to get each to their committee's conference room.

The session was as tiring and maddening as expected. Everyone was shouting at everyone else in an attempt to get their idea heard and the lovely Chair and co-Chair did nothing about it because apparently that was part of the learning experience. 

Finally, after 13 hours of screaming at each other, the session wrapped, the Chair spoke some words of encouragement for the future and congratulated us on being, and to everyone's surprise, the best committee he's ever had, we clapped and cheered and laughed, and then , everyone went their separate way.

Of course, considering the story wouldn't be mine if it didn't have a romantic part, I had developed a crush on the chair during the mock simulation and had hurried to talk to him at the end of the final session before all the crowds stormed in and had given him my number.

My friends from school and I gathered outside the university grounds waiting for the cab to come pick us up and drive us to UNESCO where the closing ceremony would take place. My smile was up to my ears.

The closing ceremony went great! There was a lot of laughing and making fun of some who were handed the microphone to speak without at all being deserving of such a privilege, but mostly cheering for when, against our wildest expectations, our school won an award. And we won three, me being one of the lucky winners of a Position Paper Award.

It was definitely a night to remember. Tired, no, exhausted, after a full day and waiting for the cab out on the street in the cold for about half an hour to take us to Hadath from UNESCO, we finally arrived to our friend Fares' home where my friend's dad would pick us up. We went in for a moment, and as we sat and chatted about the day waiting for our ride, it finally settled in that it was all over now...The training sessions, the conferences, the dressing up, the new faces...it was all over. And it had been the best experience ever.

As we had all agreed, none of us went to school the following day. I spent my day at home crying at the feeling of loss of something that I had been working hard on for the past four months, that sense of purpose that was tiring at times but also made you feel alive.

After the small period of depression, it was all good.

I was eventually told that Naji (the chair) had a girlfriend, which I was surprisingly OK with. We still talk as friends though, and I'm still in touch with many MUN friends. The best part now is that we'll get to go through it again next year as advisers which I can't wait to do!

Until next year!

The MUN experience -part three-

The day is finally here. Saturday April 9th 2011. The first formal conference would take place today.

As opposed to customary, and after our school officials having agreed to provide transportation to LAU Jbeil where the first conference would take place, we headed off to Jbeil as a group. After a long and winding road, tarnished by anxiety and nervousness while we could have been enjoying the lovely sights, we finally stepped on the school grounds. 

LAU Jbeil was definitely a different sight then LAU Beirut. I can't really describe how, but it was.

Our first stop was the area where the Global Village was to take place, an event where each country is offered  a stand allowing the students to present traditional foods and accessories to help introduce their country to visitors. We had fewer people than bags of clothes, food and accessories thus had to leave everything behind until the time came for the actual ceremony.

We dispersed and each went their way to join the rest of their committee waiting for the conference to start.

The day was planned as such; three hours formal conference, one hour brake, three hours formal conference, two hours preparation for the Global Village and finally three hours Global Village.

Thankfully, the conference hours were everything I had hoped they would be. I only spoke once during the speakers list saying my general position speech. I was really nervous as my time to speak neared. I was seated in such an awkward place that I had to prepare myself one speaker ahead of time. As I stood at the back of room waiting to be called I had to chance to talk to, I think he was an official but I'm not sure, who was standing there. He noticed how nervous I was and gave me a few words of advice that I gladly followed. A I finished my speech and went back to my place I looked at him and was ecstatic to see his smile of approval.

That was definitely the highlight of the conference sessions that day in addition to me picking a fight with the chairman during the unmoderated caucus for constantly mispronouncing the name of my country "Saint Kitts and Nevis" and repeatedly calling me either Saint Kitties or Saint Kittens.

Finally, the Global Village was here.

A few of our school officials had dramatically lowered their grade and come up to Jbeil to see us. They only stayed for a few minutes which gave us a little relief as to their sanity being intact.

Everyone started working on their stands. Everyone looked so excited to be there, and even though our stand didn't turn out to be half as bad as we had expected to, we still didn't know what to expect from the event.

And then it started, and it was definitely the most amazing event I had ever been in my whole life!

The music, the dances, the costumes, the food!!! Some schools had worked so hard on making this an unforgettable experience for their visitors and had definitely succeeded. I couldn't get enough of it! I took so many pictures and to so many people and laughed so much and screamed so much that it started feeling like an outer body experience towards the end of it. I was mostly glad to have seen the three closest friends I had made, Nour, Maroun and Patrick which I hadn't seen since the last training session, nearly one month prior to the event.

It was truly the most amazing experience ever and the only thing that had some of those previously not so excited about MUN, absolutely willing to do this again next year as advisers.

Only one more day to go...

Stay tuned...