SCVMUN 2015 Speech

Yesterday I gave a speech to an auditorium full of high school MUN participants. It was fun, transcript below:

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Good evening, everyone and thank you, Sam, for that generous introduction. Today I don’t have a normal speech for you. But what I do have are three short stories from my own life.

The first story took place at this very conference, my first Model UN conference. When I was in high school, I was deathly afraid of public speaking. I decided to join Model UN to challenge myself and get better at it. When committee started, I was incredibly nervous. For the first few minutes of committee I did nothing but repeat what I was going to say over and over again in my head, basically tuning everything else out. And then my moment came: my turn to speak. “PRESENT!” I said. Nailed it.

The rest of the conference was a blur. Did I say anything after that? Who knows! Now, I’m not encouraging you to go comatose during committee or anything, but what I learned during my time in Model UN is that improvement comes from constantly pushing yourself out of your comfort zone, wherever that may be. The happy ending to this story is that I did become better at public speaking, one step out of my comfort zone at a time. Also, don’t feel bad if you’re not amazing at Model UN right away—I sure wasn’t.

My second story takes place in college where I ran WorldMUN—a 5-day model UN conference of 2,000 international college students from around the world—certainly not an easy task. At some point during day 3 of the conference, when it felt like everything that could go wrong was going wrong, a delegate from Venezuela stopped me as I was running down the hallway.

“Thank you” he said. “Thank you for organizing this conference. Without WorldMUN I would not be allowed outside of Venezuela.” It was his first time out of his country and his first time interacting with so many people from around the world.

Even though I had a million things to attend to I stopped and we stood there for a while speaking about Venezuela, its politics, and policies and I remembered that Model UN at its heart is about the amazing and interesting people that you will meet and the conversations that you will have. The rest of the conference had its ups and downs, but to this day what I remember most about that weeklong whirlwind was the people I met. So take the opportunity this Friday and Saturday to meet someone new. I guarantee it will be worth your time.

My final story is still ongoing, and it’s happening in law school. I went to law school eager to learn more about international law, after all, I had worked in South Africa, Japan, Taiwan, and Singapore and was familiar with injustice abroad. But during my two years in law school, what I began to feel most inspired by were issues within the US itself, barely contained under the surface.

After the grand jury decisions in the Ferguson and Eric Garner cases, Berkeley law school and the city of Berkeley erupted in protest. This reminded me that as riveting as warlords in Africa or human trafficking in Southeast Asia are—there are still many issues in our own backyard that need the skill, time, and passion of people like you. Train your critical eyes toward your own community, state, and nation—what bothers you and can it be changed? After all, the US is part of the GLOBAL community that we are all so invested in.

In the end, my three stories are more like three challenges that I know you each have the capability to successfully tackle.

CHALLENGE NUMBER ONE: step outside your comfort zone at least once during this conference—if it’s embarrassing, so what? People who make mistakes have better stories to tell, trust me.

CHALLENGE NUMBER TWO: meet someone new this weekend. The more people you know from different schools, the more proms you get invited to. Again, trust me.

CHALLENGE NUMBER THREE: you’re probably tired of hearing about how you are the leaders of tomorrow and blah blah blah, but it’s TRUE. You are already pushing yourselves to think about difficult issues that many people your age don’t even know exist. Take that knowledge and critical thinking and change your communities for the better.

There is no way for me to hold you accountable for fulfilling these challenges, but I hope that you will hold yourself accountable. Plus, you’ll thank me when you get invited to three proms. I wish you all the best of luck.

Winterbreak 2014 Recap

As winter break grinds to a halt and spring semester slowly but surely ramps up, it's time to reflect a bit about the past few weeks.

It's been really great to have the high school gang back together in the South bay. We certainly had our share of shenanigans--from highfiving each other from moving cars, to getting pulled over by bored Cupertino police officers, to setting up the epic Marriott suite bar (I think someone even used the Angostura bitters), to making Japanese octopus balls and beer towers (something I haven't done since my days with T-chan in Japan).

As my mom pointed out, this was also the longest amount of time I've spent at home for years! Although being at home can be restricting at times, it was great to spend some time with my family. We went horseback riding by the beach, vacationed at an amazing mansion in Paso Robles (essentially the less commercial Napa), got some legit shopping done (my sister and I made sure to check out all the ridiculously sparkly clothing gracing the racks these days), and got fat off of some yummy holiday food.

Finally, winter break was a good time for me to reconnect with my hobbies. I finished We are All Completely Besides Ourselves, Ocean at the End of the Lane, and American Gods. Currently reading Slaughterhouse Five. I also became re-obsessed with Deviantart and spent hours admiring (and being somewhat jealous over) all the amazing artists on the website. Determined not to be left behind, I took to pencil and paper and sketched quite a bit. With art, more than anything, it's easy to see my shortcomings because when I envision in my head is never what translates to paper. This makes drawing incredibly frustrating but it also makes the places for improvement crystal clear. Hopefully I'll find time next semester to improve my craft.

I also finished almost all three seasons of Bob's Burgers--so there's that.

But what's a first post of the year without some forward looking? Except that next semester is shaping up to be incredibly busy. On the stressful side of things: I'll be working at an international human rights clinic where my project is around the rights of tipped wage workers. I'll also be working with my highly-motivated professor to turn my really, ah, sub-par paper into something readable and perhaps even publishable. And on top of that, my journal responsibilities ramp up this semester as I work on organizing a symposium for an amazing keynote speaker from the Hague. I'll also be taking three regular classes on top of all that so... woohoo?

On the less stressful and more funfull side of things: I'm flying down to LA to visit MB and go camping at Joshua Tree National Park. Though I am not necessarily the biggest nature gal I do so love new experiences so am looking forward to it (and korean BBQ, haha)! A (steadily growing) group of Boalties have also booked a trip to Vegas for the end of February so it's time to hit the city of clubs and chubs once more. Fingers crossed that SW and I will book a trip for spring break--Puerto Rico? Jamaica? Oaxaca (ok, that's my dream, not SW's)? Cuba??? Only time will tell.

Looking forward to a stressful yet fun semester!

Tl;dr: winterbreak was low-key but funtimes at home; next semester will be busy with fun traveltimes interspersed in between.