Preconference Tour Reflection
The city of Malacca is a diverse city with a rich culture, and it was thoroughly enjoyable for us to experience. The many difference influences such as the Dutch, the British, the Japanese, the Portuguese and many others have transformed Malacca into a culturally unique destination. The city demonstrates the necessity of preserving cultural sites. It is a juxtaposition of the old world, historical villages, and the new, the towering hotels to satisfy the many tourists who visit every year. This experience has introduced us to many new aspects of South East Asian culture such as the game Congkak, the history behind baba & Nyonya and a new and exciting cuisine. The chance to meet and get to know other members of the conference before the conference itself is an advantage that allowed us to have pre-existing friendships so that we did not feel alone in the early days of the conference. In short, the preconference tour to Malacca offered us new experiences and gave us the chance to make new bonds of friendship that we would carry with us to the conference itself.
~ Tim Zhang '18 and Marshall Conover '18 |
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Conference Experience Reflections
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During my 5 days of the Singapore Conference, I would say that it is a life-long experience. First of all, this was my first time traveling by myself and to Singapore. I was surrounded by a thousand other students and teachers from all over the world; from India to Jordan to South Africa to Romania and to North America, there were 106 schools and around 50 countries. Never had I seen such a diverse group of students. We started our journey with some cultural music and dance. Although I had only met some people for 5 short days, I have already built strong bonds between these international delegates. My most vivid memory of my conference was my first Baraza discussion. We started off with simple ice breakers to gather our interests, then we talked about the UN Globally Sustainable Goals. We ordered them and thought about the causes and effects of our world and the consequences if one of them was to be abolished.
My favourite speaker? That’s hard to say out of the diverse speeches that I attended. My favourite was a speech about human trafficking done by Michael from the Blue Dragon’s association. He used to be a teacher in Sydney, but on his trip to Vietnam he found that Hanoi was his life-long destination and decided to quit his job in Australia to live in Vietnam. Commencing Blue Dragon was an “accident” Michael said, he was just hiking on a mountain in Vietnam and saw a child, running and asking him for directions. Later on, he found that those children were trafficked from other areas of Asia and were forced to work for 16 hours on a daily basis. Some of his main points were small is good and stupid mistakes are the reason that cause the global concerns. Overall, I had so much fun and I do not regret going on this journey. It is a life-long experience that I would recommend to all of you! ~ Kelly Cao '18 |
Five days in Singapore. A city that embodies wildness in the cultural sense and local sense. From hearing four different languages walking down the street and feeling the sweltering tropics on my skin. I have lived on two different continents and know the mixture that makes me, yet it was a humbling experience to be culturally shocked with a thousand students attending from over a hundred schools. I was expecting the obligatory “first day awkwardness”, yet I was surprised to receive none. I met my homestay family who were half-Filipino, half-Welsh who had three children, my co-billet Andre who travelled 40 hours from Argentina and then there was me. Suffice to say, it was a full house! I can remember my host family breaking us out early and taking Andre and to a Din Tai Fung restaurant. I remember meeting my Baraza group for the first time and becoming best friends with a girl named Winnie from the International School of Kenya, Max from Australia, and Berenike from Germany. At the top of Singapore in a tiny pod on the flyer, our group was dancing to Drake while looking through the hazy afternoon. I learnt that every single moment until now these people lived their lives radically different. Every breath, every sunrise, yet our lives are so similar – like parallel lines that never touch but are on the same journey. To act today and change tomorrow.
~ Ines Lupton '18 |
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