Today we had an MUN conference. I represented Indonesia, along with two other delegates from China and Korea. Before coming to this Forum we had written our position papers on " Education and Culture" and "Employment and Decent Work". I was more interested in education and culture so I joined the committee which discussed about them in the actual MUN conference. It was my second time participating in the MUN, I had only done it once before at the forum pre-camp with just the Japanese participants in August. I was not very sure yet what the MUN was about, what the procedure was and what sort of things were going to be discussed but I tried to participate as much as I could by giving the voluntary opening speeches (A short speech talking about the situation of your country/remarks related to the topic) and so on. What was most difficult I realised was where the end point of discussion was. I was not sure about what the outcome of the conference was going to be , I knew as much that we had to submit a report to the main board on the goals and targets we would like to achieve, but I didn`t have any idea of how specific we had to be or what kind of goals, targets and boundaries that came along with them were to be recorded in the final. On the other hand, all the Korean delegates were students who were awarded at the previous National MUN Conference so they had an clear image of what had to be done. Honestly they took the show; on top of them being vocal they had a vivid idea of what their country`s MUN was about, which led them to efficient back and forth conversation and speedy negotiations. I think often times discussions are a lot about compatibility of the ones engaged in it and the flow of the conversation. I`m not talking about people having the same ideas on an issue, rather they can be opposing but I feel that discussions flow so much more smoothly and fruitfully when they have similar views on what should be prioritised or what details could be left untouched. I had the same feeling of slight unease of the way the conversation was turning when I was casually discussing something with a Korean boy the night before. It isn`t the language barrier only I think, it`s just the natural sense of communication that you have fostered in the environment you have been in, whether it be your country, region, family or school.
The MUN conference that lasted for approximately 4 hours was finally drafted and handed into the main council. Again I was amazed at how efficient the experienced Korean students who mainly had a hand in this were. With the short time given , they managed to address various issue and collaborate them with their original ideas of how to tackle them. The skill to be able to look at the bigger picture, the impediments of education and the necessary steps that were needed to overcome them were well spotted I believe and and I would have never been able to do that alone.
Although I can`t deny some of the benefits that MUN can foster, such as negotiation, public speaking skills or being able to look at the bigger picture and efficient leading of the discussions, personally I was left with some mixed feelings about it. It seemed a bit to superficial to me, a lot of talk but less knowledge and first hand experience on what the real issue was about. In the end, maybe only what matters is how good one`s presentation skills are, but that can easily lead to what is really important being overlooked. It may have be due to the time constraint but I feel the issue was too big and sensitive to be wrapped up in just a few hours. Since students were gathered all the way from Korea, China I would rather have talked about issues that were actually related to us. Something that was more real and we had some thoughts about, rather than about things that we had simply researched about beforehand.
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