There is some confusion for you see my roomate is...

CHAMUN 2004 ended exactly 1 week ago. It was so great. I am now going to proceed in going over everything that happened in as much detail as possible partially because I don't want to forget anything, and partially just because I can. ^_~ So... expect this to be possibly long and boring in some sections yet very detailed... especially saying that I keep on going back and adding stuff... ^^;

*time elapses as Claire-chan writes types* Hmmm... this is going to be overly long... so I'm going to put it into 2 or 3 entries, posted all right now. No really... this definitely has the record for the longest post I've ever made. I'm currently at lunchtime on Wednesday and it's already longer than my former "longest post"

Where to start? I suppose the best place would be Tuesday night. So... I went to band, and then headed to the computer lab... I got a little confused because it wasn't the normal one, but I followed other MUN-ers and found my way to where everyone was. We were going to make hate cards, but the site we were going to use wasn't up, thus causing a few problems. So, we didn't end up making any. :( Instead, we looked up possible stuff, but couldn't find a whole lot, and some people were doing homework/writing a biology ISU test. We had pizza and some 2-bite brownies (yum!) and had some discussions, such as why musicals (in general and some particular ones) are good and/or bad. Turns out Stuart dislikes basically all musicals, preferring straight plays and operettas instead (he's a Gilburt and Sullivan fan), while Nikki's a lot like me... major musical lover, as well as that of straight plays and maybe going into the operetta side (I never asked about that end of the spectrum). We then headed over to the GO station in 3 cars: ( Marcello's, )

( Mr Lang (Ms Lang's husband)'s )

and ( Ms Lang's. )

While waiting for Lang to get tickets, we stood in a... well, somewhere between a circle and a blob... and talked some more, a few of us utilizing the washrooms there (Ms Lang thought that was sort of gross, but they were fairly clean...) We got on the train, and all managed to get seats, 8 of us sitting in 2 sections right across from each other. Numerous conversations ensued and I jumped back and forth from listening to one side of the aisle and then the other, being on an aisle seat myself. (I was seemingly invisible half the time conversation-wise... as I tend to try to jump in at every wrong moment possible...) :( There were some interesting conversations though. For instance, I am quite possibly the most "uncool" person out of our group (as well as the self-dubbed "unimportant" one), because I do not have a leather jacket, and I've never been to England (basically everyone I asked met one of these two requirements, and Alex was going on how she was cool for her jacket, and uncool for her non-being-to-England-ness). So then we got there, and were trying to figure out how to take the path from there to Metro Hall, which was where CHAMUN was to be held. We ended up looking all over for a map, and finally decided to ask for directions from a guy who said it would be a whole lot faster just to go above ground.

We did.

It was pouring rain.

None of us had an umbrella with us, so we all walked fairly quickly, with us "uncool" (due to lack of leather jacket) ones using our hoods, and going under covered areas to stay out of the rain as often as possible. Jeremy was singing some random Christmas carol (I forget what at this point), and I was saying that my pencil agrees with him (I have a pencil in my pencil case with Christmas trees all over it). I then asked why there aren't any Easter carols and he agreed that there should be. Thus, he started singing once again, "Here comes the Easter Bunny, Here comes the Easter Bunny, Right down the Easter Bunny lane, Floppity and Moppity and..." (that's as far as I remember, he might have stopped there... I've finished up the song since then on my own, and will post it near the bottom of the post). I laughed, and started singing an Easter based song I learned back in grade 1 "a bunny, a bunny, a bunny rabbit left it, who else could walk inside my house and be so very quiet?". LOL Rabiya was wearing a skirt, and managed to have a bit of a "Marilyn Munroe moment" as she walked over a vent. We (mostly I) haven't let her forget it since. ^^; So... we got there around an hour early. We headed upstairs, a few people grabbed some more pizza/water (they had some there...) and Lang-sensei headed over to the registration desk to... well... register us and get our stuff (folders and nametags). At some point fairly early in, we headed down to near the doors where we headed in to get a piccie of all of us on the bottom few stairs, and then headed into a little corner with a few benches. So... some sat on benches, others (like myself) on the floor or on the base of a column that was right there, and others stood in the general area. We were basically in small random groups, myself being part of a group of one at most points, and one guy going between where the rest of the boys were and where Nikki and Alex were... which was fairly close to me. I talked to Alex at one point about doing the wave, and she was coming up with ways that it wouldn't work. I made a sign that said "wave," and had an arrow pointing downward on it using a sheet from the pad I was given in my package. She said it could be misleading, and for an example, took it and pointed the arrow toward Stuart. I then took it back, and drew a wave on the bottom. More stuff happened in between all of this, such as me waving my hand, and talking about drawing a wave on my blue folder. 'Twas fun, 'twas fun. ^_^

So... we just chilled, looking at our packages and randomly chatting and such for an hour or so, then we headed back upstairs for the opening ceremonies, which were held in the same room as the General Assembly was over the next two days. We were all sitting in two rows, basically all of us in one, but then someone told us that some of us would have to move because they wouldn't be able to see the screen from where they were, so we moved closer together in order to try and get more people to be able to see. Some still couldn't, so they moved to the desk-ish things directly in front of us. 4 of us stayed on the bench. I was sitting between Stuart and Rabiya, with... I think Marcello (though it may have been Creighton, I really can't remember which) sitting on Stuart's other side. The lights dimmed, which I commented on... to which Stuart replied something along the lines of "I wonder what that could mean" (slightly sarcastically, of course). My response: It's a brown-out!! ^_~ That got both Stuart and Rabiya laughing. ^_^ Then we started coming up with a list of things to put in a survival kit for CHAMUN, that Rabiya was writing down, and I was telling her to add to over the next two days, though I doubt she ever actually did.( Our List )

So yeah... go the 87/88 babies on the Sinclair MUN team! ^_~ (I'm not including the last person on the bench with us because he didn't contribute to said list or the discussions that came out of it that much at all.) So... eventually the opening ceremonies did start. They introduced all the chairs and heads of things, and then had a guest speaker from Warchild come and talk about some things that are happening in various parts of the world, such as conflict diamonds, and genocide. Some of the pictures were a little gross to look at, but hey! You've got to be aware of what's going on, right? One story in particular was extremely gross. ( viewer disgression is advised )

There was one quote that she used to start off her presentation that is really true. "One person working towards peace makes news. Many people working towards peace makes history." Tis very true, no? During the entire presentation, Rabiya and I both noticed Stuart nodding at a lot of the facts. ^^;

The opening ceremonies actually ended ahead of schedule, so we were able to get back to Union Station and get on the GO ahead of time. It was still raining. Marcello and Creighton each got their 1st hot dogs at this time, and a few people went to The Second Cup and McDonalds to grab random food items, as we were waiting to even so much as find out where our train was coming in. A couple of us didn't though... myself included, and we moved over to a place that was a little more out-of-the-way, though Nikki stayed where we were in case by some fluke they couldn't see our current position (we were in plain view of there). Jeremy and Ms Lang had a conversation about age... in which Ms Lang is 50 and Jeremy is 12. Jeremy saw this as a good thing... it means he can live longer. ^^; My comment: this proves that saying that one acts their shoe size is more of an insult for some people than for others. (This comes from a 16-year-old with size 6-7 feet, depending on the shoe.) They joked about this whole age issue for the remainder of the week, and I doubt we've heard the end of it yet.

We headed to the platform after everyone got back, and made it there before the train, only to have another "brownout". ^^; So... then we got on our train and started the trip home. (This was the only time we were at the platform before the train on the way home if I remember correctly.) Near the beginning of the trip, we were claiming random stations... that was fun. At some point Rabiya said she felt tired and might go to sleep... this is when I suggested adding crash symbols to wake her up onto the list of things to put in our CHAMUN survival kit. We also talked about growing veggies, colorblindness, and Ms Lang's impression of dinner at the Wright household. The latter 2 topics both relate directly to Stuart, who was sitting facing Rabiya and I in the next section over, so we were innocently waving at him at one point and telling him we weren't saying anything bad about him. We weren't. Alicia (I think it was her, and not Ying Ying) had the wrong idea of what her purple pants look like to him. At least, I'm pretty sure they wouldn't look like fluorescent pink!!! -_-; We got back to the Whitby station, and parted ways to head back to our respective homes at around 10:00.

And that ends Tuesday. Now onto Wednesday.

I got to school at around 7:10... give or take a few minutes. I had left my backpack at school on Tuesday, so I went and got it and gave it to my mom before heading over to the front doors where we were meeting. I was the 3rd one there, after Rabiya and Alex. The Wrights arrived soon after. So... the 5 of us stood and waited around for a little bit, randomly chatting and me noticing that Lang-sensei was late for her own "be here at" time... until Marcello, Alicia and Ms Lang arrived. Sometime during this conversation while only 3-5 of us were there, I pointed out to Rabiya (who I had been talking to about hair the day before) that my hair could go overly curly with nothing in it (as I had defused it that morning). I also ran and hid very badly at one point, and blamed it on my blond-ness. Then... we waited a bit longer as we still had 3 missing... Nikki was the next to come which sort of surprised some of us, seeing as she was the one voted most likely to be last to arrive... so then Ms Lang sent Marcello off with Stuart and Alex while the rest of us waited for Mr. Dawson, who was supposed to help get us all over, and Creighton (Ying Ying arrived at around this time). Finally, seeing neither, Ms Lang went over to the other parking lot to see if either had gone there. Creighton arrived while she was gone, and she arrived saying Mr. Dawson was on his way to where we were. Rabiya, Ying Ying, Alicia and I quickly piled into the car (me in the front, the other 3 in the back), leaving the remaining 3 for Mr. Dawson.

So... we all get to the station. Ms Lang drops the 4 of us near the doors so we won't have take the long walk needed to get back there from where she needs to park. We go inside, and the 3 that left before us (in Marcello's car) weren't there (we didn't expect the ones coming with Dawson to be there, and indeed they weren't either). So... we waited and randomly chatted in a similar circle/blob to the day before, with everyone joining us as they arrived. We had to move over a bit at some point because we were a little in the way of people getting their coffee at the refreshment stand-ish thing there. Ms Lang was the last one to get there, and so she bought our tickets, and we headed to the platform, getting there minutes before the train did.

Oh, by the way, I didn't mention this last time, but the tickets we got were 2 family passes and a single, as there are/were 3 of us (including Ms Lang) who are 18 or older, and the rest of us that are not (due to later birthdays in 86 and being born in 87-89). So... since a family pass allows for 1-2 adults and 3-4 "children", we were able to get away with that. I always laughed at this, thinking about how old Marcello would have needed to be for any of us to be a "real" family. Nikki (or was it Alex?) put for a solution at one point saying maybe he was a very mature 4-year-old and adopted some of us or something. Still... that was fun. It was Rwanda day (set aside by the UN to commemorate the genocide that happened there), so I was also wishing everyone a happy Rwanda Day... with Rabiya telling me (rightfully so) that "happy" probably isn't the right word to use there (remember what it's commemorating). *heh*

We sat in the same basic spot on the train as we had the day before, taking up 2 complete sections with others in a 3rd on the 2nd floor of the train, although we weren't right across from each other this time. The same with Tuesday on the way home actually. During this trip, we had more random discussions and looked over our booklets and notes, some highlighting stuff they thought might come in handy.

We got to Union Station, and stopped because Stuart wanted some coffee. While he was in line, half the group went to get more coffee and McDonalds stuff and such. ^^; When we were all together, we laughed at Stuart a bit because he couldn't figure out how the tops on the cups work ("They've never given me one like this before!") he couldn't put it on... and was having problems figuring out how to drink from it. Apparently no one knew that Stuart so much as drank coffee... @_@ I think it was actually a cappuccino or something (I honestly wasn't paying too much attention to what everyone got, being a non-coffee drinker myself...) because he was commenting on how the foam helps to prevent the tongue from being burnt or something... *shrugs* anyways... either then, or the night before, we also went over what the best hot drink is somewhat. Most people prefer coffee. Me? Tea and hot apple cider all the way! ^_^ Anyways... after everyone was back from random-stuff-getting, we headed over, with myself and possibly one or two others telling Rabiya to beware of vents, even though she was wearing pants. ^^;

We arrived at Metro Hall on time, and headed to the room we were in on Tuesday for the delegate training session... but then half the people left when they figured out they should be in the rooms that their groups were in, and not the GA room that the other half of us needed to be in anyways, saying that half of us were in GA. *reads over sentence* Yeah... that sounds a little redundant. Meh... So anyways... they had the countries in alphabetical order, going around the floor in the desk-ish areas and then up onto the upholstered benches we were sitting on the day before. Since Zambia was the 2nd last country (to Zimbabwe), I was up on the 2nd bench in the 2nd (out of 3) section. They had these big placards with all the countries' names on them, so we could find our spots. We also used them for voting and to be noticed in order to make a motion or point (holding them up in both instances). When I got to my seat, the nearest person to me in my row was the girl representing Uzbekistan, and so the two of us introduced ourselves to each other. It was her first CHAMUN too if I'm not mistaken, but not her first MUN symposium. I think she hadn't ever spoken at one before, but she did over the next 2 days a couple times. ^_^ Vietnam and Zimbabwe came fairly soon after, and in that order. I talked to Vietnam a bit, I think her name was Mary (there were two girls at one point, and I think the girl on the Thursday was the 2nd girl to come on Wednesday, so I don't know who she was really...). Zimbabwe and I ended up talking to each other a fair amount on the other hand. Her name's Amanda. Throughout the day, I ended up telling her the names of various people from my school. She loves the name Creighton, and has a cousin who shares a name with Marcello.

It was now time for the General Assembly to actually begin. The chairs started out by introducing themselves and going over some basic procedural stuff, and then the primary speaker's list was opened, and times and default yields were set. After a fairly short debate, (the time spent on the Primary Speaker's List usually isn't that long...) we decided to start on the topic of UN reform. (We were given a list of topics before-hand so we knew what to research. This was, of course, one of them.) Although there was some talk on general reform and such, the majority of the time spent on the topic was spent on ways that the Security Council could be reformed. Countries on the SC (especially permanent members with vito powers) wanted things to same the same, while everyone else wanted change (for obvious reasons both ways). People on both sides of me were getting a lot of notes all day long, but I got none. Actually, I got one, because I was adding myself to the Secondary Speaker's List, and had an idea about trying to start a committee dedicated to seeing what changes could be made, to report to the GA on a regular basis. However, I wanted to see if such existed already, and was asking around during one of the many unmoderated caucuses we had. The girl from New Zealand, who was friends with Amanda (Zimbabwe) knew something of a group called the "Coffee Club" and so I sent her a note asking what she knew about it. She sent one back saying she didn't know much. :(

Come lunch time, I was 7th on the Secondary Speaker's List. We (the 10 of us Sinclair kiddies and Ms Lang) met at the top of the stairs, and headed down to the restaurant/cafeteria where they were having a special: any entree and pop/water for $5.75. I was one of 2 or 3 of us to go for lasagna, while others went for chicken-kabobs, sandwiches, pizza and salad, etc. Lotsa different choices, and pretty good food. ^_^ I was the 4th one to get to the tables we were sitting at, after Ms Lang and the Wrights. I ended up sitting across from Jeremy, with Lang-sensei on my left and Stuart diagonally across from me. Nikki and Alex sat at the next table to my right, and the other 3 girls were at a round table on the other side of Ms Lang. Creighton and Marcello both went out for their second round of hot dogs on the trip, taking their total up to 4 collectively. They then came and rejoined us, sitting at a table in front of the round one the 3 girls were at, playing cards while we ate and talked. At some point, Creighton and Marcello were trying to get me on either side of the SC issue... I said that I would abstain from the conversation... and on the issue... though I didn't completely stay true to the latter (I'll explain as I get there). Ms Lang told us she'd be meeting her mom on Thursday for lunch, and we went over how each of the groups were doing. Apparently, Security Council was going slowly but pretty well, and 1970 Canadian Cabinet was fairly boring, with a number of things happening that they had to point out as being wrong (they were getting press releases from the CNN -- which didn't exist in 1970!). Rabiya spoke in AU, but didn't think she did an overly great job. Ms Lang thought otherwise. Then, there was Nikki, who was supposedly leading ESCAP very well indeed, although the chair of this committee was not very good. (I don't remember whether or not Alex shared on her opinions... sorry Alex!) Nikki was about to speak, so Ms Lang was going to head over to ESCAP as soon as she got some coffee, and then come and see me speak. When there were about 5-10 minutes left, we all headed up to our rooms, with the exception of the Wrights who had already left (or Stuart left really early, and I left sometime after Jeremy... before most of the other delegates, but they weren't too long after me).

When we came back, we had role call, then stopped for a minute of silence to remember the horrors of the genocide that took place in Rwanda. According to Nikki, in ESCAP, the chair gave a little speech, and thought it was a current event (it was around 10 years ago!). It's horrible to think that so much hatred and so many deaths could happen. It's amazing, yet horrible. The minute passed rather quickly. Maybe it wasn't really a minute. Then again, time seemed to pass more quickly than usual there. Really! The days went by way too fast.

Anyways... as I said, I was 7th on the list when we came back. However, I never got to speak. :( We had some caucuses, and then 3 resolutions were put forth. The first one asked for all vito powers to be removed. The third wanted vito powers to remain the same, with more punishment for countries that go against their rulings. The second, which is the one I was for, asked for vito power be altered so it takes a majority vote from the 5 current permanent members in order to make it, rather than just one country being able to vito something on its own. The first and second ones put forth also asked for more members, both permanent and non-permanent in order for different parts of the world to be represented more equally. Someone came up at some point while we were talking about this (I think it was in the morning actually, but meh) and mentioned how a "little country from Africa" probably shouldn't have as much say as the major powers. Numerous countries raised rights of reply to this, and after the 3rd apology, he was just like "I apologize to you, and to any other country that felt insulted by what I said". That was great. After that, I was joking to Amanda (as I said before, she is/was the "honourable delegate from Zimbabwe) that someone should raise a right of reply and actually say "RIGHT OF REPLY!!! I feel that I have been attacked or slandered in any way!!!". That would've been slightly amusing.

Anyways... even though most countries seemed to be for changing the ways of the security council, the only resolution out of the 3 to pass was the one that asked for things to stay basically the same. How is that reform I ask you? Meh... Stuart would've liked that, even though he ended up losing his vito power anyway *giggles* more on that later though.

After we got through all three, a motion was put forth to table the debate, which passed. I put my name on the primary speaker's list, but it didn't get to me. I wanted to talk on the war crimes issues, but the first few people wanted to talk on the Israeli security barrier. This was decided on to be the next topic. The time limit was set to 4 minutes so that both Israel and Palestine -- the first two countries on the speaker's list for slightly obvious reasons -- would be able to have ample time to speak on their perspective on the issue. Most of us were confused by this, as Palestine was an observer nation, and, since its placard was on the other side of Amanda, we knew that there was no one to represent it. That's when they made the announcement "The UK has now become Palestine". LOL. Yeah... the guy doing the UK was from Chaminade (the school that runs CHAMUN), and had arrived late, so he missed a major portion of the UN reform stuff, which Palestine wouldn't have been able to vote on anyway, and he was able to change to cover that country instead, leaving the UK unrepresented. We got through both Israel and Palestine's speeches, and then it was time to call it a day. One topic down, a second one just started, and my time in the general assembly was already half-done.

All of us Sinclair people met at the bottom of the staircase as we ended. Creighton and Marcello left early in search of hot dogs #5 and 6 (their 3rd each), and Ms Lang gave the rest of us the option of leaving (we were still missing one or two people, at least one of which was a Wright if I'm not mistaken), but we decided to stick together and wait. When everyone was there, we started our trek back to Union Station. One thing I must point out, the area right in front of Metro Hall is extremely windy. It feels great to be there, letting the wind blow in your hair, but it can mess it up too. Luckily for me, my hair always looks messy, so I didn't have to worry about that. :P While we walked, there were always numerous conversations going on. I usually took part in one or two, but was more or less walking on my own within the group... I don't remember any of the exact conversations that took place this time.

When we got back to Union station, we headed towards the screens that would tell us where to catch our trains (as usual), but when we got there, everyone but Stuart, Ms Lang and I had disappeared! We figured they had all gone to McDonalds (which they had), and so Ms Lang started stressing and went off (either in search of them or to get a drink, I forget which), leaving Stuart and I by ourselves. I asked him about his colourblindness... he's got very weak/deficient red receptors (I was curious which type of red/green colourblind he is, since there are multiple kinds...). I told him about this site which basically goes over what it's like to be colourblind by showing you what images look like, and has a feature that allows you to "correct" images so that the contrast in colours is noticeable by colourblind people. I think Jeremy came around this time, or someone did at least, and confirmed that everyone was, indeed, at McDonalds. They came and joined us eventually, and we quickly went on to the train with minutes to spare.

We were too late to all get seats together so we went through a compartment or two, and then tried to get random seats in small groups. I ended up sitting near Nikki and Alex (there were 3 seats fairly close to each other which we were going to take, and then people were nice enough to move so that the 3 of us could actually sit together. ^_^ We talked about some random stuff including the origin of the quote on Alex's LJ icon (I'm a gigantic brain!), some stuff that happened in Nikki's school production of Oliver back in grade 8 (for her, not for me... I would have been in grade 7), random singers and their awesomeness (Nikki and Alex, not me... I was sitting quietly for this one), food (I went over that I had some citrus cheesecake in my fridge, and they were envious, and we went over numerous other kinds of good, yummy food that we all love), and the need to get Ms Lang some sort of thank you present. Sometime near the end of this, I noticed that the 3 of us were the only ones sitting on the level from our group. The others were down below, and supposedly some were sitting 3 to a 2-person seat. *heh* Yeah... the others wouldn't believe me that we were the only ones on our level, but I was right! (No, not Wright, right. :P ) I called home to mom at Rouge Hill. The conversation went something like this:

Mom:hello?
Me: Hi mom! I'm at Rouge Hill.
Mom: What?!?!? That far?
Me: Yeah... it's not like I'm in Pickering yet... (Pickering's the stop after this...)
Mom: Okay... I'll head over now then
Me: 'kay. Bye!
Mom: Bye.

Yeah... go short phone conversations that involve panicking mothers... -_-; I got back at around 5-ish, and left the group to get to mom's car (she got there right before I did). On our way home, we came up with the idea to get Ms Lang some Tim Horton's gift certificates for her presents, knowing how much she loves her coffee... so we bought them as well as a card for me to bring in with me the next day. In the evening, I did a bit more research on various stuff, went out to Swiss Chalet, wrote more parts to Here Comes The Easter Bunny, and went to bed semi-early-ish.

Thus ends Wednesday. Now onto the next entry for the last day...Thursday.

Unusually and exceedingly peculiar and altogether quite impossible to describe...

And now, Thursday. This day's entry is huge.

When we got to school, I asked my mom to drive me around to where we had met the day before, and was surprised to see no one there. As I got closer, I saw Rabiya and Alicia inside the 1st (of 2) set of doors. It looked like I was 3rd to arrive again. Not sure if I was completely right or not, as a few others (like the Wrights) came very shortly after and did not come from the front doors, but rather from somewhere in the hallways. I explained my idea of card + Tim Horton's gift certificate to everyone that was there at the exact moment (which was around half of the people...) and they all liked it, so I got out the card for people to sign, and started collecting money (it was $10, so $1 per person). We got the first one or two signatures on the card when Nikki came over and told us that our rides were here. Once again, everyone was there but Creighton. Ms Lang had her van, so she took all of us but Stuart, Alex, and 'Cello himself, who she told to wait for Creighton until 7:30, and then come over and meet us on the platform.

While in ( the car, )

we talked about how things were going in different groups, and ended up talking of female genital mutilation, and from there, circumcision. The general consensus was that female genital mutilation is gross because of a) the methods, and b) the amount of pain it causes (especially since you're old enough to remember it. Male circumcision happens when the subject is a baby, so he can not remember the pain, and it actually has been proven to prevent disease. I'm yet to hear of female genital mutilation being able to do this. Anyways... Ms Lang still thinks removing part of the male body to be basically just as gross. It seemed as if our topic moved more and more off female genital mutilation and more and more onto the male circumcision. It was around this time, after we had (almost) all stated our opinions that I noticed that only one person had stayed completely silent: Jeremy. The only guy in the car. LOL.

Apparently he was tired, and thus quiet, but still, it was a rather funny. Ms Lang said she had never heard Jeremy been so quiet, or indeed, Rabiya, Ying Ying or Alicia be so talkative as they all were during the car trips. ^_^ Me? Well, I kept on getting her on the point that the horns are there to hold up the halo, such as when the topic of Miss Congeniality came up (the actual award, not the movie) and then I brought it into the movie by talking about SING (shin, instep, nose, groin). Supposedly it disturbed Ms Lang that I knew this, so I pointed back to her to that quote. Nikki thought I was making a reference to a musical... but it's not as far as I'm aware. That's right, ladies and gentlemen, Claire-chan is not always totally angelic. Horrible, I know. ^_~

So, we got to the station, with Ms Lang dropping us all off at the doors before going off to look for a good parking spot. We stood in our normal blob waiting for her to return, and keeping a bit of an eye out for any sign of the others (though we doubted we'd see them...) while randomly chatting once again. Ms Lang came and bought the usual tickets (2 family passes and a single), and told us of how she had luckily been able to snag one of the last available spots in the parking lot, rather than having to go over to Iroquois Park to park. We then headed to the platform, and managed to find the others right away, as they just so happened to be right at the top of where we came up. It was actually fairly good luck, as there are two ways of coming up, and we managed to take the right one. (Either that, or someone was waiting downstairs and came up when he knew someone could see him or something... but I doubt that.) Ms Lang decided that we should wait for the train at an open spot in between crowds, beside the building thingy that shelters the stairways. I think 2 or 3 of us followed her there, but the remainder didn't. It didn't matter too much though... they were still fairly near us, and would be boarding at the same place.

When the train came, I noticed that basically everyone was going upstairs, so I suggested we stay down, which is what we ended up doing. Ms Lang said something about sitting alone, so I moved over from where I was in order to let her do so. I ended up alone in my section however... people were behind me, but no one was in my section with me. So... everyone suggested that I go sit back beside her. I protested, repeating what she had said, but she said it was fine, so I went and sat there. I wasn't the only "kid" in the section, because Stuart was there too. Right across from me. Y'know, it's weird. I was fine looking at him through the reflections in the windows in the trains earlier (see under the random section a the bottom), but I couldn't look directly at his face more than half the time here, because I was afraid of blushing. *heh* I did talk to him a bit though... I asked him if he had checked out the site I had told him about, (he hadn't, but has since, and it works perfectly... yay!) and he hadn't done the research Ms Lang asked him about either. Ms Lang asked him about a project she knew he'd need to do for one of the courses he's taking this semester. Turns out he's already done it... and he did whatever it was on Motzart. Ms Lang asked if he had played his violin, to which he said no. Apparently Motzart didn't write anything for solo violin, or at least nothing without accompaniment, and he didn't seem to like my idea of using taped or cd-ified accompaniment. Ms Lang had been reading a newspaper (the Toronto Star to be exact) that she had bought, and showed the two of us an article about eye jewelry. That is, jewelry that is surgically placed in the mucus membrane of the eye. The look on Stuart's face was enough to tell me that he agreed with me in the feelings of "ew!" and "Who the heck would want to do that?!?!?". Marcello asked us what was going on, and so we tried to explain it to him, and ended up showing him the article and the picture that went with it. He agreed with our sentiments after that. The only thing: I suppose it makes sense that it would be the next logical step since anyone can can get a tattoo and/or piercing basically anywhere they want... meh. It's still rather gross. Anyways... then Marcello, Creighton, and Stuart started talking about horse racing, which I honestly have no interest in whatsoever, so I just sat quietly. Then, at some point, Stuart decided to start reading the front section of the newspaper. I noticed it was a little weird, because he was reading it backwards, that is, from back to front. On the other hand, I suppose it doesn't really matter which end you start at...

When we got to Union Station, we had to stop for Stuart and Jeremy to get their coffee again. ^^; People were making fun of Stuart again because he couldn't even so much as get the top on his coffee cup this time. People were still surprised that he was getting coffee to be quite honest. For these reasons, people were saying he was "playing grown up". I think he was getting annoyed with this... the following 2 points in particular. Firstly, the comment was made that Jeremy was more "grown up" than him because he was able to use the coffee cups no problem while his older brother couldn't. Secondly, Rabiya, being the other /87 baby, commented that she too was "playing grown up" with her high heels. To this, he simply said something along the lines of "Look! I'm not trying to 'play grown up' okay?" Someone also commented that he could always refill the cup with water at Metro Hall and practice with it. -_- ( *sigh* )

So... we were finally ready to head over to Metro Hall for the last time. I might have warned Rabiya about vents again, I forget whether I did or not. The usual random grouping and chatting took place, and I had to remind the boys (Wrights in particular) that we don't cross at one particular set of lights because it's hard to go across the other way from there. When approaching the courtyard-ish area right in front of Metro Hall, I said to one of the other girls, "Here comes the windy area!". Yeah... that area is generally overly windy, and likes to mess up everyone's hair, but today it actually wasn't windy for once. I jinxed it, I swear! Sometime on the walk over, I think this was when Ms Lang came up with the ice cream incentive. In other words, if everyone talks, she'd buy ice cream for everyone. If someone didn't talk, they'd have to buy ice cream for everyone. Creighton and everyone in the smaller councils liked this... they had already talked. I pointed out that I had tried to talk, and that I would continue to try that day.

Ying Ying and I left for the washrooms when we got to Metro Hall, and we weren't sure if everyone had left or not when we came back, so we went inside the conference room, and seeing only one person from our school, headed back out to see if people were still at the bottom of the stairs. They were. So we told them we were there, and headed back in for the morning session of GA.

Before it started, I met the honourable delegate of Venezuela. He was on the other side of Vietnam from me, and didn't believe me that I was Zambia, even though there was only 1 country between us. I kept on saying "see, I am Zambia!" and he kept on coming up with reasons why I could be lying. 'twas fun. At one point, I showed him my name tag, and he was like, "well, I could be *reads*Claire Baker!" to which I laughingly agreed, since Claire, or at least Clair, can be a guy's name. ^^; Amanda and I wondered where James, a guy who had been in front of us the day before (for Pakistan I think) was, because he wasn't there now.

We started the GA off right where we had left off the day before, on the issue of the Israel/Palestine security barrier. I spoke for the 1st time here, motioning that the speaking time limit be placed back at 2 minutes since it had been set for 4 for Israel and Palestine to speak the day before. It was passed. ^_^ So then they took names to put on the secondary speakers list, since they had accidentally deleted it. I was put on said list. However, some people weren't too happy, since they had been close to speaking the day before, and were now at the bottom of the list. Thus, we started doing moderated caucuses. I didn't put my hand up to speak at first, because I thought it would only be about 10, 20 minutes long and then go right back to the list. However, it was extended and extended, and Alicia and Creighton both spoke (I was so happy for Alicia, and sent her a note congratulating her on this). I started raising my placard, meaning that I wanted to speak, maybe 2/3 of the way through, but I never got to speak. :( There were a couple fun moments during it, including ( a comment and reply between Isreal and Palestine )

There was an unmoderated caucus at some point, because we were waiting for a resolution to be put through the crisis centre and come back to us. During this, I went to join with the other GA Sinclair-ites, and was like, "Ha! I spoke!" only to be told that I needed to actually speak at a microphone either asking a question or giving a speech. I told them of how cursed I was, and asked everyone to yield their time to me, as that would allow me to finally get up. So, at this point, 2 of us had spoken (Alicia and Creighton), 1 was debatable (me), and 2 had not (Ying Ying and Marcello). When the unmoderated caucus ended, I headed back to my seat, only to find that Amanda had beaten me there. The day before, we had both always waited for others to get in before we sat down. Thus, I commented to her that "The honourable delegate of Zambia is both shocked and appalled that the honourable delegate of Zimbabwe did not wait for her to sit down,". She beat me back at every unmoderated caucus after this too, so I kept on repeating my comment.

Now this is where it gets a little fuzzy. I think that lunchtime was called sometime around here, but I can't remember whether or not the only resolution we looked at as a whole was put forth now, or after lunch. Meh... I'll go onto lunch anyways, as I know a lot of the questioning and answering, as well as the putting to a vote was after lunch.

So... we all met up at the bottom of the stairs. A few people beat us GA people, but we ended up waiting for Jeremy longer than anyone else. Ms Lang congratulated Alicia and I on speaking, and I was like "ha! see? that does count as speaking!" but then it did get changed so it had to be either a question or statement, and not a motion. :( When we were finally all together, Ms Lang left us to meet her mom for lunch, and the rest of us headed to an underground mall that's actually attached to Metro Hall (I think it's part of the Path). We were a little confused for a moment, but then someone was able to point us towards the food court. It was funny... we were walking along, and then I'm like... "oh!" because there's a big sign saying "Food Court" that you can see after you turn a certain corner. So, we get there, see the wide selection of food choices, and then split up. Nikki said, while most of us were still there, that we should meet at a certain spot, which we (well, all of us that were there) agreed to. I went to Taco Villa, and got a chicken, cheese, tomato, and onion quesadilla, with rice and salad on the side, and lemonade to drink.

When I got my food, I headed over to the designated spot, and sat down. I was the 1st to get there. Stuart was walking around with his Subway sandwich... and so I waved him over (he had missed us deciding on the eating place, and had been walking around looking for us since I was waiting for my food to come). He sat down diagonally across from me, and the two of us started eating. I asked him about Security Council, and he said he was enjoying his second year there. Supposedly it was slightly less organized, but more enjoyable than it had been, and had indeed said it was even better than the year before in his little blurb in the letter for Ms Lang. I took one sip of my drink, and swallowed, though surprised by what I had tasted. They had given me orange crush rather than lemonade! People started coming and sitting down, and I started passing the card around and asking for a dollar from everyone who hadn't already given me it. By the end, everyone but me had signed, and I had everyone's money (I was holding onto the card, and so I was able to sign it during the beginning of the afternoon GA session). LOL. When Jeremy sat down (beside his brother and directly across from me), he took a sip of his McDonald's shake (he had gotten chicken nuggets with honey, fries, and a shake) and commented "You ask for strawberry and they give you chocolate!" to which I replied "Well, you ask for lemonade and they give you orange crush!". Jeremy's reply: "I feel humbled by your statement, and don't feel so bad anymore." LOL. Nikki commented on how "that's quite a difference. I mean, one's carbonated, which you don't like, and the other one's not,". I was told that I should go return it, but I said it was fine, someone could have it if they wanted, because I had enough water to get me through upstairs. Stuart ended taking me up on that offer, and Marcello stole the straw, not having one of his own, and not minding that I had used it to take a total of one sip from my lemonade unwanted drink. Oh, by the way, Creighton went and got hot dog #7 at this time.

Yeah... Marcello was sitting beside me, and said that he wanted to defect to... Zimbabwe. He said he had just chosen a random country, but I told him that Amanda (who I explained was Zimbabwe) would be all too happy to take him. Jeremy had told us on Wednesday that he had become minister of finance, and might become PM, but wasn't enjoying cabinet as much as he hoped. He was singing to a different tune on this day though. He had asked if he could secretly join the FLQ and was given the thumbs up. LOL I remember talking to a girl sometime during lunch break, I think while waiting for my food, and she was saying what Jeremy had said: that someone had been (wrongfully) accused of being the traitor, and she thought it was either that guy, or someone who had been writing a lot of notes to him (I don't know if this was Jeremy or not...). So, as of lunch, Jeremy was betraying the cabinet quite successfully, though it didn't last... (see later on).

I was being a little paranoid, and was asking the time on a regular basis, wanting to be back on time. I ended up leaving with all the girls, with around 5-10 minutes to spare. Although there were many working papers going around the floor, including one from Israel which included the wall being taken down with peacekeepers being placed there, only one made it to the chairs (not that one though). It, of course, wished for the wall/barrier to be taken down as soon as possible. There were other parts to it, but I forget what half of them were. One of them, which was probably the most controversial, was that Palestine be made a free state, and not just a territory of Israel. During the question/answer period (which I do think started before lunch now that I think about it, because I remember saying that I'd ask a question on the next resolution if there was one, but everything I could think of had already been answered and I didn't want to be redundant), Marcello went up and asked a question, meaning now only Ying Ying and I were left to speak. The resolution passed, and since no other resolutions had been officially put forth, a motion was put forth (and passed) to table the debate, and the primary speaker's list was open once again (once again, I was put on the list but they didn't get to me). The topic of Saddam Hussein on trial was decided on.

This is where things really start getting interesting.

Firstly, since Palestine was now an independent state, it was able to change its status to "present and voting", and so we needed a new UK member. A guy named Justin (I'm pretty sure... it was definitely a J-name and he was wearing a blue dress shirt) came to fill this role, and he was always insisting that the UK get a bigger role. It was fun.

Secondly, I put my name down on the secondary speaker's list when it was opened, and was somewhere near the top. I started mapping out what exactly I wanted to say. I think there was an unmoderated caucus somewhere in here, but anyways, I finally got to speak!! ^_^ I had my speech all ready, and delivered it fairly well, but I don't think I did well on the question part. I messed up on one of my answers, and they all sounded too vague to me at least... Ying Ying asked me a question, and so we managed to finish off the list of people left to speak. That's right, everyone from Sinclair spoke... AND MS LANG MISSED SEEING US SPEAK!!!!!!

There were a couple unmoderated caucuses that afternoon. During them, I managed to ( ... )

I've basically figured out that the last hour or so of any MUN meeting has got to be a complete parody of the real thing. For me, this started when Georgia came and suggested that we use a traditional Georgian method of torture on Saddam Hussein. Basically, this method involves having the subject lie on their back, while one drop of water falls on them every minute for 2 days, causing the subject to go crazy! Mua ha ha... That got a large round of applause.

We went back to seriousness for a while, and a resolution on the situation was put forth and passed. I noticed that Papua New Guinea had only the "P" capitalized on the signatory list, and brought it up as a point of order, but I don't think they believed me. Amanda, and the PNG guy (who was sitting in front of me and was an excellent artist) agreed though, with the poor guy pointing to the 3 letters on his placard.

Then, a second resolution was put foreword that got everyone laughing and applauding. Some amendments were made to it, and it passed (I wouldn't be surprised if it was unanimous).( Here is the resolution )

Palestine then was asked to put forth a motion to close this session of the GA, but he didn't. Instead, he decided to motion for a 363-day-long (long enough to take us to the next CHAMUN) unmoderated caucus. The motion passed. So... I suppose we'll all just have to go back next year... ^_^

This, of course, brought the GA to an end. People were already starting to come in from other committees, since the closing ceremonies and handing out of awards were to happen here. I said goodbye to Amanda and got her email address, and then headed over to the other side of the section, where the delegates from my school had been gathering. We got to take our placards with us, which I thought was cool. ^_^ I ended up sitting next to a girl from security council, and Creighton, 4 in from the right end of the row (with Creighton being beside Marcello who was beside Stuart who was at the end). The guys asked Stuart if their plan had worked, and I don't think it did, but Stuart's vito power was taken away anyway. He had been invaded and taken over, and bombed, so he was now "Kentucky Fried Cheznia!" I loved that. Jeremy, who was last to arrive again, told us of what happened to him, past what we had already heard: he was shot. Basically, he had made a pact with the US, as well as the FLQ. The US revealed to the cabinet that he was the traitor, so they killed him (by "killed" I mean they said they shot him, and he was removed to the crisis centre.

The first set of awards given out were for individual delegates in each committee. (2-3 honourable mentions were given a certificate, and the winner was given a gavel for each committee.) No one I know won in NATO, but I know that the guy from Congo (DR Congo) won for African Union. Then they moved on to ESCAP. After giving out the honourable mentions, they guy started talking of the person he had decided to give the top award to. He first mentioned that it was a "she", and so I was thinking along the lines of 'Yes! It could be Nikki!'. Ms Lang had even said that she was being a good leader in it when she had gone in the 1st day. Indeed, it was Nikki that won. Us Sinclair people, especially the female ones, started cheering as Nikki went down and got her award. Then, there was GA. I wasn't surprised at who got awards for this, as they were definitely strong people within the group. China took the top award here BTW. Next was Security Council. I asked the girl sitting next to me who she thought would win, and she said she wasn't sure, especially saying that the two people she thought were strongest had gotten honourable mentioned. Sometime around here she told Stuart to "flex your muscles" which was an inside joke later explained. Anyways... the guy starts talking of who he talked to get the top award, and how he had been a good sport, and was forced to sing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star". I had been very hopeful for Stuart ever since I heard the word "he"... and, yes, it was him. More cheering from our section, and me exclaiming that we probably had "best delegation" now, since 2 awards had been given to Russia. The girl commented that Stuart has a nice voice, which I agreed to, telling her how he's to be the Scarecrow, and then proceeding to point out everyone else in our production of The Wizard of Oz that was there. Canadian Cabinet was next, and, although he was "dead", Jeremy won! Best Costume was then handed out, and it went to the head delegate from Amanda's school, who had been representing Romania (I'm not sure where). They then did best delegation, which went to... you guessed it, Russia! I feel sorry for Creighton... I was cheering loudly because I was excited and happy, and he was getting a bit of a headache from it if I'm not mistaken... :( Anyways... while our Russian delegation was making their way back, the award for best school delegation was announced, and they asked for the head delegate to come up. Let's put it this way... I feel even sorrier for Creighton, and laughed at the fact that all 3 of them headed back to the stage, rather than just Stuart. Yep... WE WON WE WON WE WON WE WON WE WON!!!!! A speech was given by the SG, and the guy who was Palestine in the GA went over some of the highlights from each of the committees ( the ones I remember... )

After this, there was a serious, short speech given, and then CHAMUN was officially over. However, the day was not. It just won't fit into this entry, so I'll put the rest of Thursday, and my random extra stuff, into post #3.

Blonde

So... if you remember from the last post, CHAMUN had just ended officially, with us being told to "give peace(/the Leafs) a chance". We headed out of the conference room, with a couple of us running off to the washrooms, after which we all met up at the bottom of the stairs. I was the last one there, and I gave Ms Lang her card. She was like... "Oh, you didn't have to oh!!!" yeah... guess when she saw the Tim Horton's gift certificates. ^^; A couple of us started singing "Happy Birthday To You" to her as we headed out (it's nowhere near her birthday...), and we headed back. We had to pass this one underground parking lot, and seeing one or two of us, one car on its way out and let us pass. I don't think she was expecting there to be 10 of us! LOL Jeremy was saying how he wants to do that with a band... have them going in 2s and 3s in a line, so a car stops, and they all innocently walk in front of it... all 50+ of them. We likened it to a row of ducks, actually. 'Twas fun.

After that, Rabiya and some of the others, including myself, were curious as to why Stuart had to sing "Twinkle Twinkle", so he explained it. Apparently, the chair had said something along the lines of, "and of course we can not conclude this meeting of the Security Council until the honourable delegate of Cheznia sings his favourite song!". So... Stuart had to sing something, and it was to be something childish or non-sensical or something, (whether on his or someone else's request, I don't know). So... he was thinking of doing "I'm a Little Teapot" complete with actions at one point, but decided on "Twinkle Twinkle" instead. LOL. Then Rabiya decided to ask him to sing it into her phone. She got it so that it would record, and held it up... Stuart's first response into the phone, "I do not wish to sing at this moment..." she kept on trying to persuade him... I mentioned that if she wished to hear him sing, she should support the school and wait for The Wizard of Oz to which he agreed. She didn't give up though, keeping on his case until finally somewhat conceded, singing/saying "Twinkle twinkle little st-- there you go!". A couple people lightly scolded him for this, and he was told to do at least the 1st stanza all the way through... so "Twinkle twinkle little star..." and then Rabiya was happy. I think he might have done the whole song for her by then, but she got all she wanted methinks.

When we entered Union Station, we passed by a newspaper/magazine stand, and Rabiya noticed Stuart looking him, and jokingly chastised him for looking at something "Playboy"-ish. Actually, he was looking at a scientific magazine. ^^; He went back to see if he could buy it, and Rabiya and I both agreed that we'd burst out laughing if he returned with a magazine like what she had been talking about, just to throw it at her. He didn't though... he didn't end up buying anything, because he didn't have enough money on him. Poor Stuart...

Since we all talked, Ms Lang bought us all ice cream/McFlurries. Most of us got McFlurries (mine was strawberry shortcake... I heard Jeremy asking for one and I couldn't resist), but Alicia (I think) got a chocolate sundae, and Stuart got a plain vanilla cone.

As we were heading to the platform to catch the train, I suggested waiting for the next one, partially because I didn't want everything to end, and partially because I thought we'd be more likely to get seats. We decided to go on that train though. Ms Lang found a seat (I think), but there were basically no more open ones, so she said that we could go look for some, but she was staying there. At least half of us went over 2 cars looking for spots, and then gave up and headed back. It was like some sort of high-school kiddie parade. -_-; So... we all ended up sitting/standing on/near this one stairway. Yeah... 10 kids, 4 or 5 standing at the top of a stairway, 4 or 5 others sitting/standing on it, and maybe 1 or 2 standing at the bottom. We had fun moving out of the way whenever someone had to get off... and then promptly stole their seats if they were close to the stairs. LOL. A man came to check for tickets, and so we all had to move out of the way for him, and change positions every time he went to a different section to check. By the end, more than half of us were sitting: Nikki, Ying Ying, and Alicia were sitting 3 to a 2-person seat in on the right side (facing the stairway from upstairs), and Creighton and I were on the left (me next to the window), with Alex across from him. LOL. When the seats that Creighton and I were sitting in opened up, I stole one, and then we asked if anyone wanted the other. First we asked Rabiya, who declined, and then we asked Jeremy, who was next on the stairs. I don't even know if he answered before Creighton came from behind and took it. He said that Jeremy didn't take it because he knew that he would have hit him. I disagreed... but meh. Jeremy still ended up taking the next available seat.

At some point, while I was still standing, I asked if I could "shamelessly self promote", to which I was told to go ahead. ^_^ So... I proceeded to tell everyone that we were singing "Happy Birthday to You" to the wrong person earlier, as it was my birthday on Sunday (thus it was 3 days from then). I was told that they would've sung to me, but they didn't want to get kicked off the train. ^^; Meh... some of them ended up singing to me in Musical Theatre the following Tuesday anyways... (I was blushing like mad when they were singing to me there... I blush easily).

Also, near the beginning of the trip home, when everyone was still either standing or on the stairs, Rabiya had her cell phone out and was letting everyone listen to her recording of Stuart. I listened to it, and had to giggle at his "I do not feel like singing right now...". Yeah... that was definitely the highlight of the ride home. ^_^ Oh, and while I'm on the topic of phones I think I win the contest for ( the shortest phone convo )

on this trip, with Alex's cell phone. Yeah... someone commented after I gave it back to Alex that that was one concise phone call. ^_^

Anyways... we got back to the station, and split up basically right away, because some people had to go to Iroquois Park to get Marcello's car, and Ms Lang's was over at the GO parking lot this time. So, our time at CHAMUN finally came to an end. It honestly felt way too short. I can't wait for our MUN symposium, SYMUN. I can't wait till next year's CHAMUN too... but unfortunately, half the people aren't going to be returning, as they're in grade 12 this year. I'm gonna miss them... there's some really nice, and(/or :p) interesting people that I'm really glad to have met, or at least gotten to know a bit better, through this club...

But yeah, that basically ends my look at what happened at CHAMUN. Now for some random stuff.

( breakdown of where everyone was )

( what Claire-chan is talking about )

( Here comes the Easter Bunny )

( random snippits that I can't remember the placement for )

( notes )

*deep breath* I think that finally wraps up this look at CHAMUN. Don't be surprised if I make minor modifications to it still... but wow! This is long... congrats to anyone who actually reads all of this.

( yep, I still have quizzies! )

Random fact: Hotmail has a limit for the length of emails. I'm not sure exactly how it works, but this CHAMUN thing is spread over 3 separate emails, because it wouldn't all fit in one, or even two! Thursday alone is over the maximum length!

Also, if you put all 3 titles together, you get a quote from the song going between the two main characters of Wicked, G(a)linda and Elphaba. ^_^