New friends and thinking BIG!

Friends, Neighbors, Countrymen,


I am now nearly halfway through this European adventure and it certainly has been a trip.  Along the way, I have met some fascinating people who are passionate about making the world a better place and having fun in the process, made some amazing friends, and experienced several "growth opportunities."


One thing that is becoming abundantly clear, as I attend these site visits in Geneva is that I am not cut out for being a lawyer in the traditional, American sense.  Socially and on a personal level, I adore my classmates, and some of them are truly interesting and insightful people from whom I believe I have a some things to learn, but I feel like I want something different from life than they do.  I am feeling a much stronger pull towards the public policy aspects of international law.  It has occurred to me since I've been in Europe that I am, first and foremost, a diplomat and a politician and that that is what I loved about Model UN.  


My professor, here in Geneva, has been taking smaller groups of us to lunch to get to know us better and give us an opportunity to ask career-related questions, etc.  I got pulled into the first group to go, because I roll with the A-Team, apparently (I know, I know, this shocks no one who knows me, but I still find it pleasantly surprising).  One of my friends was asking him if there were career moves that might cut her off from what she wants to do, ultimately.  His advice was to take every appealing opportunity that comes your way and see what happens, because you never know what you are going to like or where an opportunity might lead until you are there.  I have a lot of respect for this man and think that if I live as interesting a life as he does, I will have done quite well for myself, so it was comforting to hear that he has lived the same life philosophy to which I subscribe and it seems to be working out well for him, so far.  


All of that being said, I have not encountered anyone who does something that really excites  me, enough, that I feel compelled to pursue it, to the exclusion of everything else, which is a little disappointing.  If I'm going to do this international law thing, I need to be excited about pursuing it, and I'm just not enough, yet.  I'm looking for something that excites me and fulfills me the way MUN did.  It was suggested to me, the other day, by one of my MUN friends, that I finally give in and join staff at AMUN and he may have caught me at just the right moment, because I am very seriously considering it.  Beyond that, I guess I have to keep on swimming, but combine the lack of excitement with keeping myself together in unfamiliar surroundings and I'm deep-down-in-my-bones tired.  I guess the comforting thing about that is that I don't seem to be alone in it.  Everybody in my class seems to be experiencing a bit of culture shock and homesickness, too.  I don't like it, but it happens to everyone, I guess, so we just have to get through it.


I, at least, got a little bit of a reprieve from that, last weekend, when I met up with my folks in Rome.  I wasn't sure how I was going to feel about Italy, because it has never held any real appeal to me.  My last roommate here, Sara, was Italian, though, and she was pretty great, so I was willing to be open-minded about it.  I'm really glad that I have had all of the cross-cultural training that I have, between school, MUN, Rotaract, and working at Rotary, because once I got past the frustration of missing my flight to Rome and having to take the train to Assisi and the initial discomfort of the forced intimacy of the design of the train cars in Italy, I kind of fell in love with the Italians.  It took some conscious effort to accept the circumstances in which I was traveling, though, as it has in Switzerland, also (which is also exhausting).  Once I did, I was able to seriously enjoy what was going on around me.  The highlight of the train ride, from a cultural perspective, was definitely the middle-aged Italian man who appointed himself host of the compartment and gave everyone snacks and tried to engage everyone in conversation.  Even though we did not speak the same language, he got me to smile and made me feel included, which in my opinion, is a real gift.


I have really enjoyed meeting all of the new people, Americans and Europeans, that I have encountered during my travels, though.  It's funny how, when you are in a place that is completely foreign to you, a little thing like sharing a native language will make you share yourself with a complete stranger.  In addition to the charming Italian man who offered me a snack when I was on the train from Milan to Assisi, I met a very nice American man who came into the compartment where I was sitting by myself, pretending like I was going to study, and simply struck up a conversation.  I was so tired and a little lonely, at that point, that I was really grateful for the company and he turned out to be pretty cool.  We told each other our (albeit very abridged) life stories and basically enjoyed each other's company until his stop came up, then he gave me his business card and we agreed to keep in touch.


In Italy, we went to the Cathedral of St. Francis, where he is buried, and had Mass, in his tomb.  My parents are on a cruise with a church group, so there are a bunch of priests and nuns with them and they are having Mass, everywhere.  It's interesting to me, though, the way I can go months without even thinking about Mass and religion and whatnot, but then, when I need it most, something will happen that makes me feel like I'm on the right path.  The Prayer of St. Francis is my favorite hymn, because it reminds me that I often feel like there's something big and important that I'm supposed to do with my life, that that is not going to be easy, but that the feeling of rightness when it happens will be worth the effort.  For those of you who are not familiar with the Prayer of St. Francis, here's a taste from Princess Di's funeral.  

When I got back to Switzerland, I was so in my own little world, thinking all of these big thoughts, that I apparently walked RIGHT past one of my friends, here, on the street and didn't even see him.  I had headphones on, so I didn't hear him when he tried to get my attention.  I only learned that I had done this when I got back to my dorm room and had a facebook message from him (don't worry, he was nice about it).  Again, I know it won't surprise any of you who know me well that this happened, and I can even believe, most of the time, that you find it to be a charming quirk, but that doesn't really make me feel like any less of jerk when I do it, haha.  At any rate, I decided it was time to cut myself some slack and indulge in some activities that I find comfortingly familiar.  To that end, we went to McDonalds for dinner and paid an exorbitant amount of money for Cheeseburger Royal value meals (Quarter Pounders), but they were worth every penny.  Then we grabbed a bottle of wine and hit the swing set down by the lake.  You know how much I LOVE to swing, so by the end of the evening, I was feeling MUCH more like myself and ready to face the week, ahead.

Unfortunately, it was really hot here Monday and Tuesday and nobody got much sleep, because there's no air conditioning in the dorms.  That doesn't really surprise me, but there's also no screens on the windows which is a little bizarre because there are definitely mosquitos, here.  The good news is that it seems to have cooled off, today, and I'm expecting to sleep like a rock, tonight.  Of course, I am behind on the reading, because who can focus when salty, tired, and overheated, certainly not this girl.  And the final exam for this class is on Friday, then we move on to Strasbourg on Saturday, to start our last class of the summer, which is supposed to be MORE intense and involve even less luxurious accommodations than what we have in Geneva, but I have my friends, now, so I say bring it on.  


And with that, I should probably get back to studying, because this reading isn't going to do itself, and I want to make a good impression on this professor, because he seems like "someone who is good to know," as my former boss would say.  :P


Hugs and Kisses!
Emily

Boiling Pasta as the Italians Do and Other Lessons

Bon soir mes amis,


Again, I apologize for the delay in writing.  Things have been, as I'm sure you can imagine, a little crazy, in my world, lately, and I had trouble establishing a reliable internet connection, yet again.  The good news is, after 5 delicious and exciting days in Paris, we made it to Switzerland.  I'll have to write about Paris, later (I have notes on paper, so maybe I'll publish that, at some point), because I've been in Geneva for a week, already, and have much to tell you about that.


We, my new friends and travel companions and I, arrived in Geneva last Sunday and checked into the dorms, here.  We took a high speed train from Paris and, because I have a Eurail pass (which I will tell you about later, I have not been as impressed as others, but it has it's good points), I was able to sit in first class.  Let me tell you, I am not going back.  First class train travel is the way to go, if you can afford/swing it.  I had a window seat that didn't have any seats next to it and they served a little snack of fresh fruit and little, tiny slices of French toast.  It was delightful, particularly compared to the 2nd class travel we did on the way from Den Haag to Paris, which would have been truly miserable without my friends (I'm looking at you, Matt).


So, we arrived in Geneva and went looking for food.  The neighborhood where our dorms are is a strange place (as is much of the rest of this town, to be honest), it reminds me a little of Rogers Park, with it's serious melting pot character.  At any rate, we found a Mediterranean restaurant and, after the initial sticker shock, settled in to eat our meals of what was basically chicken tandoori.  Food is REALLY expensive, here, but the good news is that we have kitchenettes in the dorm, so there has been a lot of grocery shopping and pasta cooking (with wine, of course, lots of wine).  Tonight, I learned that my roommate is an Italian student working on her PhD in Literature.  She taught me how to make pasta, the Italian way, which just means putting one to two teaspoons of salt in the water.  She also told me that I should know how to prepare it like an Italian, because I bought good pasta (apparently, Italians really do eat Barilla, too), haha.  She's very nice and has been keeping me informed as to the way things work, here, at the dorm, because no one else has really filled us in about anything.  Apparently, tomorrow, we are to take our towels and sheets down to the laundry to be washed.  Good thing she told me, because mine need to be washed.


Despite my decidedly mixed feelings about Geneva, the class here has been really cool, so far, and the people are pretty awesome, too.  Last week, we had a German-Swiss International Public lawyer who is a professor at the University of Geneva (and arguing on behalf of Germany at the ICJ in a month, how cool is that?!?!) give us an amazingly thorough and easy-to-understand overview of International Public Law (how treaties are formed and what they mean for the parties, etc.) in just 12 hours.  It was pretty impressive.


Other than class, we've done some pretty cool stuff in Geneva.  It's relatively small, but it seems like there is always something going on.  On Thursday, we went to the World Health Organization and a medical expert gave us a lecture on WHO's efforts to contain and lessen the impact of HIV/AIDS throughout the world.  On Friday, I went to the History of Science museum with one of my new friends, had omelets for lunch at this charming little cafe on the south side of the river, and then, since it was raining and we were tired, stayed in watched movies while I worked on my paper for International Criminal Law.  I spent a decent amount of time, just hanging out and getting to know my classmates, because it was raining, on and off, all weekend, which was actually pretty great.  Last night, we had dinner in the dorm, accompanied with LOTS of wine, since that's the bulk of what I buy at the grocery store (not all that different from home, actually, haha), then went to a music festival in the Old City, which was very cool and super fun.  Today, I spent some time organizing my life, called my dad, and got to know my roommate, a little.  All in all, not a super touristy or busy weekend, but kind of normal in a much-needed way.  Things have been so up-in-air and foreign for the past 3 weeks, that it was really nice to just do some normal, fun, everyday things with people I really like.


Several of my classmates went to Monaco, for the weekend, and as much as I would have liked to add another notch to my belt of places I've been in Europe, I feel like there's plenty of time for that sort of thing, in my life, and I'm trying to just enjoy the moment where I am.  Like I said, there's a lot to see in Geneva.  For instance, another thing we are planning on doing is going to the CERN Large Hadron Collider.  http://public.web.cern.ch/public/en/lhc/lhc-en.html


In other words, SO NERDY I'M GONNA DIE!!  ;{D  Geneva is one of the most delightful places for geeks like me that I have ever been.  All of the museums are free and easily accessible.  In fact, there's a whole lot to like about this town and I'm beginning to suspect that my dislikes for this town have much more to do with the fact that I don't have the nicest accommodations (although, they are okay) and we had some trouble with the internet access, here, when we first got here and I'm getting a little tired of living out of a suitcase and sleeping in a twin bed, none of which really have anything to do with the city, itself.  Admittedly, it's not as friendly and clean and cute as Den Haag, but there's actually something comforting in that, too.  I'm not used to friendly and clean and cute, so this place is probably more my speed.


An interesting development that has oddly occurred to me, since I've been in Europe and away from Chicago, is how much I have accepted Chicago as my home.  The first symptom of this was that the person with whom I have the most in common and with whom I feel the most comfortable also happens to be from Chicago, even if he doesn't live there, now, and the other guy that I became really good friends with is from Indianapolis.  The next thing I noticed was that it REALLY threw my sense of direction to have the large body of water (the North Sea) in The Netherlands to the northwest, not the northeast.  Since we got to Geneva and the lake is in the east, where it belongs, I have had no trouble getting my bearings.  Finally, the weather is been exactly what I expect it to be for this time of year.  So far, it hasn't been a problem that I don't have A/C, here.  Hopefully, that holds true, at least for the rest of the time I'm in Geneva.  It's supposedly going to be super hot in Strasbourg, but I'm trying to take things one day (or at least one city/country) at a time, so I'll cross that bridge when I come to it, I guess.


I suppose my Chicago friends will be pleased to hear that I am accepting that I belong there, as much as I belong anywhere, but I should probably temper that good news with the fact that I'm here, in Europe, making contacts in hopes of landing an internship either, here, in Geneva, or Den Haag, or Brussels, or some other European city with a large number of Intergovernmental Organizations.  So, it's probably about time to move on and find a new home, anyway.  Sorry, Champs.  :P


Anyway, it is now almost midnight, here, and I have to get up and be in class by 9AM, tomorrow, so I should get to bed.  Have a wonderful week, my friends!  I'll try to be more consistent with the posts, but I make no promises, at this point.  See my point above about taking it one day at a time, haha.  


Bisous!
Emily

Thoughts from the First Week at Den Haag

Champs and Heroes,

My apologies for the delay in posting this, I've had blog issues and interwebs troubles and a general craziness that has kept me from writing.  I am taking the day off to get my life in order, today, though, so I thought it was high time I checking in with everyone.  I went pretty much the entire class in The Hague without posting so I'm going to break it up and hopefully catch up on my posting, in the next few days.  Here's the first part.

First off, let me say that I miss all of you VERY VERY much.  Don't worry, though, I'm having a grand time.  I've made some new friends, but more importantly, I WENT TO THE INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT AND THE INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE, LAST WEEK!  Yes, yes, the International Criminal Court for the Former Yugoslavia has been interesting, but I remember when the ICC was just a pretty dream in the international community, so I have am personally emotionally invested in it.  It was pretty exciting to actually see it, in action.  As for the ICJ, many of you know that that is also a subject that is near and dear to my heart as I have been involved in a few different simulations of that court.

Having said that, I probably should back up a step, and tell you about the ICTY.  The ICTY was established in the mid-1990s, by the UN Security Council, pursuant to Article VII of the UN Charter, which established the mandate of the Security Council, i.e. the protection and furtherance of international peace and security, to address the atrocities committed on all sides when the former Yugoslavia fell into civil war and the republic shattered.  Since then, about 160 individuals, primarily Serbs, but also Croats, Bosnians, and (I think) a few Kosovar Albanians, have been indicted and nearly all of them have stood trial.  Of those, 12 have been acquitted, 64 have been convicted, 36 are currently on trial, and the others have either been referred to the national courts in the Balkans, had their indictments withdrawn, or are deceased. These trials take several years, due to the overwhelming amount of evidence involved in proving not only that the specific atrocities alleged actually occurred, but also that the individual on trial was, in fact, involved in committing them.  Most of the people on trial here are former commanders and politicians, so it is much more likely that they ordered the commission of the various crimes for which they are on trial than that they were physically involved (i.e. that they pulled the trigger).  What that means to those of us who spent almost 2 weeks watching them is that they are exceedingly boring, haha.  

Still, it was pretty exciting to be there and see it in action.  It occurred to me the first day we were there that going into a UN building is kind of like walking into a church.  My thoughts from that first day are as follows:

Thursday, 26 May 2011, Den Haag, International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia

The colors and symbols are all thematically similar (these were my impressions on the first day, the ICJ, while also church-like, was an entirely different experience, but I'll talk more about that later).  Each participant has his or her role to play and vestments to suit that part.  The colors are UN blue and pale yellow and the decor is dated, at best.  It's interesting that the ICTY is decorated very similarly to the UN building in NYC because the Secretariat building has not been updated since the 1970s and the ICTY building wasn't even used for UN purposes until the mid-late 1990s.

The similarities, however, do not stop at the visible and physical surroundings.  There's a sense of solemnity and the power of people from all walks of life and cultures coming together to serve some higher purpose.  There's also something of an over-explanation of everything that is associated with the concern that everyone fully understand what is happening to what they are agreeing.

Sitting in the observation room outside of the courtroom, I find myself marvelling a little at the fact that I am here.  The man testifying for the defense oddly reminds me a little of my parents.  He and my dad have a lot in common: born the same year, lost a parent at a young age and the other parent remarried, married to an economist (my dad is an economist by training, my mom, by nature), two grown children, the younger of whom is a lawyer.  He looks like a regular father and husband and, yet, here he is, testifying on behalf of two alleged war criminals.  The prosecutor from the ICTY that we met yesterday talked a lot about how these people would not be criminals, at all, but for the war.  They were politicians, professionals, military men, etc., not the kind of people one would expect to see on trial for mass murder, but war does strange things to the paths of everyone involved with mostly tragic consequences.

It's striking that this man has been describing his career history for the past several minutes and it seems not unlike what one might hear in any other criminal trial, anywhere.  I'm not sure what I expected or that I expected anything different, it's just interesting that these trials are not all gut-wrenching testimony from mothers who lost their children or wives who lost their husbands in massacres.

Peter, the prosecutor, mentioned yesterday that the hardest task for the prosecution is to establish a link between the accused and the crime.  When these atrocities were committed, mass graves were still being used by criminals.  These mass graves left such significant disturbances on the land that the physical scars on the landscape could be viewed from satellite photos from space.  These relatively easily located crime scenes assisted the prosecution in the ICTY cases in establishing the existence of the crimes.  Unfortunately, since these trials started, war criminals have gotten smarter and no longer move people to grave sites to massacre them, rather, they just shoot people where they stand and leave the bodies in the streets.  This makes it harder to prove the involvement of the military and political leadership in crimes of genocide and wars against humanity.

One of the defendants in this case (there are two) definitely looks the part, he gives me bad vibes.  Because of the design of the courtroom, the defendants kind of face the observation room.  This courtroom is not like any I've ever seen, and going back to the church theme, for a minute, is oddly similar to a post-Vatican II church-in-the-round.  The tribunal is located where one would expect and the prosecution sits on the right and defense on the left, but that is where the similarities with an American courtroom end.  The witness "stand" if one can call it that, is more like a secretary with two computer monitors and microphones.  The interpreter booths are on either side of the dais and the room is an octagon with the observation room facing the tribunal, directly.  The defendants are on the left side of the room, in stadium seating, directly in front of one of the interpreter booths.

Another unique thing about the nature of these trials is that, in order to speak "in camera" (just the judges and the lawyers), the witness does not have to be removed.  The defense counsel just told him to take his headphones off, and the parties spoke in English.  It's like the UN equivalent of "ear muffs."

There seems to be a lot of detail (to me, at least, it seems to be unnecessary detail) in this testimony.  We have heard from a couple of different staff members and the professor that the length of the trials is a frustration on all sides.  I am trying to remain open-minded about that, though, because I have a couple of different thoughts on it, (1) these trials have something of a dual function, they hold those responsible for these crimes culpable for their actions, (2) they are essentially the first of their kind (Nuremberg and Tokyo, as I understand it, were not really about providing a fair trial for the accused, as they were about legitimizing executing the losers of WWII, deserved or not), (3) thousands of people died over the course of several years and hundreds of square miles in this conflict, we aren't talking about one or two murders, that can be relatively easily confined in space and time.  I think it's dangerous to not keep that in mind when lamenting the time and resources spent on this court.


Friday, 27 May 2011, Den Haag, International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia

It has been fascinating hearing two prosecutors talk about basically starting this court from scratch and their experiments and successes and failures.  I've found myself both jealous that they got there before me and inspired to continue the good things the people here and at the ICC have started.

One theme that continues to recur to me, over and over, as I watch these trials and listen to the players describe their perspectives is that, regardless of the primary method used, whether it be holding those responsible accountable for their crimes or providing an internationally recognized historical record of the conflict so the victims know its occurrence can never be denied, the sole purpose of the ICTY and it's sister tribunals is to bring healing and means through which all people impacted by these conflicts can begin to move on with their lives in peace and prosperity.  That being the mandate and calling of these courts, any resources committed to both methods are well utilized of their use furthers that purpose.  I understand that the UN has finite (and quite limited) resources and I can appreciate the criticisms of the length of the trials, but it seems to me that it is so important to remember that the focus must be on this healing and not get lost in the details when analyzing the rules of evidence and procedure for their usefulness, effectiveness, and efficiency of the court because this healing should always be the primary and highest goal of international criminal law.

From that perspective, I'm beginning to believe that the way these trials are being run is not so terrible, extensive and drawn out as they may be.  This is not simply a criminal trial, in a traditional sense.  It is also an incredible experiment in diplomacy and inter-connectivity among several different cultures and peoples, therefore, it is for the best that the people involved err on the side of consensus and conciliation, not adversity.  Cultural adversity created the need for these trials, in the first place.  The very fact of their existence is an important step towards vanquishing fascism and national/cultural supremacy movements everywhere.

Any time people are grouped and de-humanized through racial or ethnic or religious or any other kind of group subjugation and persecution, evil wins, and all of humanity loses something vital to whom and what we are.

In wars between peoples, it is necessary to do just this to justify the killing of human beings for tactical or strategic purposes.  Nothing can bring those people back, but having their stories told and officially documented and recognized by the international community, especially in a court setting, where the evidence is weighed and analyzed for truth and proper prioritization, restores their basic humanity and repairs some of the damage done to the dignity of human life, as a whole, as a result of war.

It also forces the people on both or all sides of the conflict to confront, if not to recognize, the fact that the people on the other side are people, just like them, with families and loved ones and vocations and a reason for being in this world which is no more or less than their own.  This is an important step towards healing, after an armed conflict has ended because too often, if not always, resentments among groups simmer for years, in some cases, centuries, and even though the armed conflict in question is over, as long as the degradation of the humanity of the other side continues, peace will always be tenuous at best, and allusive or non-existent at worst.

*Steps off soapbox*

I have a lot more to say about this subject, but I happen to be in Paris, right now (more on that, later), and have to go meet some of my new friends for dinner in the Latin Quarter.  :)

Have a wonderful weekend, my friends, I'll try to post more on my way to Geneva, tomorrow.

Hugs and Kisses!
Emily