Forum Daily 19th

May2011

The SecondIs-

sue

A F E T IIn similar fashion to many other committees, chair Ms. Schima Labitsch (sp.), started the day’s activities with a game page 1

A F E T I ICommittee on Foreign Affairs II started their committee work with a made-up crime story about the officials of the ses-sion.. page 2

A F c o IAFCO 1 had a smooth day in terms of work load. They did not start the actual work until after lunch.. page 3

A F C O I IConsisting of nationalities within and outside. the EU they create a very dynamic com-mittee. page 4

A g r iLydia and Ogulcan have done their best to make the commit-tee room attractive to their del-egates page 5

i t r e II joined the committee on ITRE as they were figuring out who had kidnapped our editress. page 6

I T r e I INine blindfolded delegates, anxiously waiting for any in-structions. What will happen? page 7

E c o n A great way to start commit-tee work is to motivate your-self. That’s exactly what the two chairs suggested for the team. . page 8

L I B E IOiınk, oink was the first thing I heard while I was still standing in front of the door of what I be-lieved to be LIBE I’s committee room page 9

L I B E I IHere are some fun facts about the LIBE 2 people. page 10

D E V EThey redesigned their room, we noticed because of the portraits they had drawn of each other. page 11

E M P LAlthough they were only wrap-ping up the morning’s activi-ties, there was a tingle of en-thusiasm and excitement for the upcoming day. page12

opening ceremony &

panel debate

Yesterday morning, an offi-cial Opening Ceremony was held, which was followed by the interesting and educa-tional panel debate. Read more about it on the pages I and II.

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c o m m i t t e e O N f O R E I G N a F F A I R S I

For AFET I, second day of the 6th International Istanbul

Youth Forum (IYF) began where the first day had left off, with team building games, and get-ting the delegates ready for the two ensuing days of committee work. In similar fashion to many oth-er committees, chair Ms. Schima Labitsch (sp.), started the day’s activities with a game based on blind folding the delegates, and making them find seven water cups spread around the room, without other communication than shooting out the finding or counting the number of mugs in possession of the group. The game, which relied on mak-ing the delegates more aware of their surroundings, concen-trating, and listening to the few forms of communication provid-ed, lead to a six minute search, accompanied by music. Following the initial scram-ble, the committee was to come up with various slogans which

would in the case of a loss of mo-tivation or enthusiasm result in the immediate uplifting of spirits. With mottos such as “Do not put your cleverness in front of com-munication,” “The impossible is possible, make it happen,” and “Nothing is impossible, the word itself says, ‘I’m possible.’” After the team building, which ended with the coming of lunch, the committee began with the actual committee work. Having been told by their chair that the session is mainly their experi-ence, and that they are in charge of the schedule and discussion, the delegates were able to flour-ish in the open environment. The delegates, who proved themselves very knowledgeable and ambitious from the begin-ning of brainstorming through the following episodes of discus-sion, quickly stated not only the financial issues facing modern Europe due to the growing pop-ulation and economy of china, but also the lack of nutrition for

the less well off citizens of China. The serious tone of the discus-sions was loosened up by the committee’s use of humour as a way of remaining motivated. During the course of the day, the committee went through a few of the phases of discus-sion such as, brainstorming and grouping, categorizing the post-its into ‘human rights,’ ‘Chinese economy,’ ‘Euro-Chinese rela-tions’ and the ‘Chinese system of governing.’ The many stages of discussion helped the delegates with staying on topic and having to choose only the most relevant material for the resolution. At the end of the day Ms. La-bitsch advised the committee to keep the resolution as straight forward and constructive as pos-sible. Their success lies in their own hands, and only the day will show what the committee has in store for us.■

by Deniz Ertan&Felix Makarowski&Lara Bideyan

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Committee on Foreign Affairs II started their committee

work with a made-up crime sto-ry about the officials of the ses-sion. Our lovely editor Sandra, supposedly the editor of a major tabloid, was kidnapped and the suspects were all among us. Al-though delegates ended up with very wrong first impressions, through this game they practiced communication, respect and critical skills. First of all, differ-ent accents of the delegates hin-dered the communication. Yet, they fought against it by trying to understand instead of giving up. It was harder but every del-egate was comfortable enough to say what was on their minds. Secondly, they analyzed the statements made about the sus-pects. They had to acknowledge that everything they read can be biased and misleading. They had to exercise their critical skills to see what motives each person might have. Lastly, at the very heated moments, committee looked like the 12 Angry Men by Reginald Rose and voices were repeating Ekin and Felix.

Then, it was the time to write the Golden Rules of AFET II. Since they had figured out that they needed to keep working on their listening skills, it was men-tioned at the very top. The gold-en rules also ended with a use-ful tip. When they reach a dead end, they should move on as all the games taught them. Middle rules had another theme: ‘Why so serious?’. They prohibited the ‘Friday’ song, punished the team members who forgot the name of their committee and praised the committee shout. Sakari (FN) brought fun to the committee with his made-up stories. When Sarp (TR) told him about Sakarya, which is a city in Turkey, Sakari claimed that it was named after him. He had support for his claim, too. He believes he was the president of Turkey in his previous life. AFET II accept him the way he is, even with his previous lives. With their feedback about the games, the delegates studied some dynamics of these two days and came up with lovely sayings that we are ac-

customed to hear from chairs. When one delegate pointed out the importance of listening, the other delegate summarized it in a more provocative sentence: “It is stupid to react without listen-ing, but it is also stupid to listen without reacting.” This holds the promise of a passionate debate. When I approached the commit-tee at a coffee break, they were talking about a sweet guy with inspirational speeches. It wasn’t hard to guess that it was Andrea. Delegates claim that he was able to lead them into a team very effectively. Andrea was also impressed by them. He stated that they improved their skills to debate maturely, unlike many adults do. Moreover, Andrea was busy with drawing a tree almost as tall as me. He later explained that the roots led you to the trunk, as from facts we reach to problems and from the trunk we travel to leaves, like our journey from the problems to solutions. With this visual and decorative method, there is no doubt in the inspiration he conveys.■

c o m m i t t e e O N f O R E I G N a F F A I R S I I

by Lara Bideyan

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AFCO 1 had a smooth day in terms of work load. They did

not start the actual work until af-ter lunch. They played the “party balloon game” in which everyone owns a balloon and they mix the balloon, then everyone writes sin-cere thoughts on the balloons about the balloon’s owner. Then, they ar-ranged their room in order to create the most comfy atmosphere to do the best of themselves and create the best resolution ever! While wait-ing for the lunch, they wrote their hopes and goals for this session, which was mostly “fun”, and sticked them to their “hopes wall”. They were so fast at everything they did that they had time left for two more games: “what to do with 100 left pair of the shoe” and “ninja game”. They did an amazing job by finding 83 ideas on what to do with these pairs including making shoe juice, using as housewives’ weapon against hus-

bands, sending to Africa, organiz-ing a shoe throwing contest, eating them and so on. Right before lunch they played “ninja” and witnessed some hardcore contest. After spending an hour at the lunch area and refreshing them-selves, AFCO 1 delegates were ready to rock the committee work. Their sweet chair Henna let them play another game that a delegate requested: the “Alibi game”, before starting off the though work. Two of the delegates left the committee and moulded an alibi, aiming to avoid the others to understand what they actually did. Finally, they leaned down to work and read their topic out loud: “Democracy polling badly: How to find answers to the ever-declining voter turnout in municipal, regional, national and European elections and the staggering low-trust levels in political institutions?” The drastic

fall of voting rates in the European elections (from 62% in 1979 to 43% in 2009) urges the authorities to take this issue into consideration. As a start, Henna offered them a differ-ent approach to the topic and asked them to write questions on the topic itself. “Do people really value de-mocracy?”, “How do we make vot-ing easier?”, “Should the voting age be changed?”, “What is the role of education in encouraging the citi-zenship?” were some of the striking ones out of the 22 questions. Then came the funny part, Henna asked the delegates to take some of the colorful post-its and do some brain-storming. They noted down every-thing that came to their minds and to finalize the day they separated them according to facts, ideals and solutions distinction. After a long day, they took off for the committee dinners. ■

c o m m i t t e e O N c o n s t i t u t i o n a l a f f a i r s I

by Deniz Ertan

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The Committee of AFCO II is discussing the complicated

issue of the Turkish European agreement and how we can over-come the problems of political deadlock, European skepticism and Turkish shortcomings in ful-filling the Copenhagen criteria as well as solving the ongoing conflicts with Greece and Cy-prus. Consisting of nationalities within and outside- three of them being from turkey- the EU they create a very dynamic commit-tee. Preparing the resolu-tion phrasing for problems their chair Pablo used the Walt Disney method, using three corners of the room consisting of discus-sion, brainstorming and phras-ing. For the first part, brainstorm-ing, Pablo explained that it is about “you and your brain think-ing about a topic” and that there are no limits on how many ideas you can write down, e.g. limiting to 5-10 post-its. This presented an attitude that was both respect-ful and encouraging towards the delegates. During brainstorming delegates were encouraged to write different problems within the already chosen key areas. They were very focused and devoted during the assignment. What one noticed about the team was that they were very respectful and encouraging to-ward one another. However, it was a bit unclear how the prob-lems should be phrased which

lead to them having to rewrite the post-its from long sentences to key words.. After the selection was made the chosen problems were discussed. Turkish delegates took the lead about the Turk-ish view of the EU. However, at times the discussion changed perspective to how the EU views Turkey which was a bit off topic. When the VISA question was dis-cussed, Turkish delegates ex-pressed much frustration. After sharing experiences they con-cluded that Switzerland, Norway and the Balkan area have trea-ties so that they do not require Visa but as Turkey Bosnia needs Visa. Considering these facts the committee questioned if the EU appears Islamophobic. Moreover, Nora ques-tioned Turkey’s motivation to join the EU because Turkey has refused to implement a trade pact with the EU. Good argu-ments made by one group of delegates were matched with current data from others which shows a good harmony and team working skills. Pablo kept the discussion in the right direction, helped with clearness and gave the word to one person when needed. He managed to be au-thoritative while keeping his re-laxed and friendly attitude. Later on the Committee dis-cussed the view that EU is highly “Christian” which lead them to the issue of a Turkish identity in the EU and their possible role as

an “outcast”. The discussion was very active from Nicole (Swit-zerland), Jake (Finland) and the Turkish delegates. However, del-egate Nora analyzed the com-ments and brought up different perspectives. At one point, the direction got to loud and some delegates could not express their point of view. Luckily, in a short while, Pablo implement-ed the “whoever holds the pen has the word”. Furthermore, the discussion was sometimes a bit unfocused when they started to feel time pressure which caused several delegates trying to make a point at the same time. The sit-uation was to a great extent im-proved by their chair taking the command and handing the word to one delegate. AFCO II worked ambitiously and at most times harmoniously to-gether which gave them good results during committee work. They showed great respect for each other’s different cultural perspectives which is a great quality for this committee espe-cially to have. It is safe to say that they all have the capacity they need to make a resolution that is theirs and that they can feel comfortable defending. ■

c o m m i t t e e O N c o n s t i t u t i o n a l a f f a i r s I iby Veronica Moitus

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c o m m i t t e e O N a g r i c u lt u r e a n d r u r a l d e v e l o p m e n t

Music, colored sheets of pa-per, felt-tips, pouffes... this

is how AGRIs committee work started. Lydia and Ogulcan have done their best to make the com-mittee room attractive proposing their delegates to decorate their committee work room. They brightened it up cheerfully and humorously and created a re-laxed atmosphere thanks to their drawings, cut-out posters and their Facebook profiles that they had drawn before. After having some fun, they got ready to start the biggest part of the session. When lunch was finished, they moved on to talking about their topic. Every committee work starts by writing the topic and rephrasing it. This is a step which really helps the delegates understand the entire part of their topic and familiarize them-selves with key words.During two days, they will be dis-cussing the question of the glob-al food market and they will pro-pose an answer to the question : “How to pursue a sustainable

competitive and internationally fair agricultural policy for the European Union in an interde-pendent global food market” ? After a short round around the table asking the delegates how they feel about their topic and how comfortable they feel with it, their chairs made them brainstorm about their knowl-edge of the topic. They brain-stormed peacefully and with a lot of care. The personal cogi-tate was quickly transformed in to a collective thinking session where they could share their different knowledges and ideas with each other. Then, they col-lected their knowledge on post-its and put them on a knowledge bank where they are free to con-sult when ever they want to dur-ing the two days of committee work. When all of them felt quite comfortable with the sub-ject, they decided to group the post-its in 6 main groups. They exchanged their ideas in pairs and then by groups of four peo-

ple to make a selection together so that everyone’s ideas will be represented in the future resolu-tion. They finished the day by presenting their ideas to the en-tire committee explaining why they chose to save it. This lead to lot of discussions and confronta-tions of opposed and different points of view. The committee of agriculture was then confronted with one of its first, and probably one of the most common, diffi-culties of committee work: how to collect all of their ideas and create a common voice for the committee. This stage is quite essential before organizing their ideas into what will then become their resolution. The result of their great work for today is quite satisfying : they made the difference be-tween global problems and Eu-ropean problem, that constitutes a solid base for the task remain-der of today.■

by Malvina Richer

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c o m m i t t e e O N i n d u s t r y, r e s e a r c h a n d e n e r g y i

I joined the committee on ITRE as they were figuring out who

had kidnapped our editress. With over half of the officials team being on the list of subjects this was not easy to figure out. For over half an hour ITRE I was formulating conspiracy theories and tried to figure out intrigues. They established that Sandra was probably a prostitute and that Jo-nas was having an affair. As the theories got more and more un-likely, Lavrentia pushed them towards an answer and so the committee pointed out Damla as their prime subject. We’ll find out if they are right in the near future, but I stay with my view; Sandra was never kidnapped, people just started missing her, as she is too short. As the committee on ITRE I had taken quite a bit longer than they expected, Lavrentia felt like demonstrating the principle of time to the committee. The del-

egates were asked to determine how long a minute was by count-ing with their eyes closed. Most of the delegates were pretty close to the 1 minute mark, but one delegate managed to score 3,5 minutes instead of the target 1.Keeping this exercise in mind, the committee moved on to the more serious business of their topic; how the EU’s industry can stay competitive in times of dwindling resource supplies and global changes. Since the topic ITRE I is discussing is rather technical, Lavrentia prepared a workshop for her delegates to ensure that every member of the committee fully understood the topic before they began. This workshop was rather extensive as it took up most of the day, but I believe that by the end of it everyone had a solid understanding of the topic and the related terms. Where at the start of the day everyone was

merely talking about fuel and the environment, by the end of the day subjects like the educa-tion industry were touched upon as well. I feel that through this workshop the committee mem-bers will feel more comfortable to speak their mind as they are now more fluent in the technical matters surrounding the topic. Having seen the commit-tee of ITRE I at a few points dur-ing the day I believe I can safely say they’re off to a good start. If you don’t chug copious amounts of red bull, keep on dancing to the YMCA every 45 minutes and keep the creative atmosphere going you’re certainly going to create something special.■

by Boaz Manger

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c o m m i t t e e O N i n d u s t r y, r e s e a r c h a n d e n e r g y i i

9 blindfolded delegates, anx-iously waiting for any instruc-

tions. What will happen? Why can’t we just enter our commit-tee room? What will our crazy Irish chair have in store for us next? Lined up and blindfolded they walked into the committee room, where lots of objects were laying around, objects to be used during the committee work. Their objective was to gather all the objects and explore their environment for the coming two days while not being able to see it yet. And they did, they even came up with a tactic on how to efficiently gather all the objects at the same place. One was ap-pointed “master of the bin”, making noises and staying at the bin so everyone knew where the bin was.After everyone got familiar with the room and was also able to see how it looked like they could continue where they stopped the day before. Eoin wanted them to write a personal reminder for themselves about why they are

here or a personal motivation and put it on the wall, so when they’d lose their concentration during committee work and wander off with their thoughts while looking around they’d see what they had written and start paying attention again. A cre-ative solution for a problem that always arises. Then, instead of writ-ing down ‘the golden rules dur-ing committee work’, Eoin gave them the outcome of the debrief-ing sessions they had during the teambuilding, these were all rel-evant for committee work and made them a lot clearer because the delegates could easily link the solutions they had come up with themselves to be relevant to the situations in teambuilding.Continuing with games they played one more game before starting off with committee work, a communication game where some of the delegates were told a completely random story about a dog that went for an ad-venture, then they had to pass it on to one of the three people that waited outside and didn’t hear

the story at first, repeating this process untill one by one every-one had heard the story. This was good for some laughs, and quite a usefull game as well since they noticed how terribly wrong pass-ing on information can go. Then finally they started work-ing on the topic, using the ‘Walt Disney’ method meaning they’d go through every part by brain-storming about it in the brain-storm corner, then dropping some off at the decision corner, discuss and go deeper on the ideas they decided on and work them out at the discussion cor-ner and at last make the ideas look really good by replacing all the easy words with fancy ones at the phrasing corner.ITRE II, you have given me high expectations for your resolution with your great communication skills and quick way of working and I’ll definately drop by from time to time to see how you’re doing and whether your resolu-tion will become as good as I ex-pect it to become. ■

by Laurens Kraima

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ECON’s first day of Commit-tee Work was divided in two

different parts: the first part in which they still worked on form-ing a strong team and the second part where they moved on to the committee topic. A great way to start com-mittee work is to motivate your-self. That’s exactly what the chairs suggested for the team. They each grabbed a piece of paper and a marker and wrote down the silliest, funniest and most inspiring quotes like: “Think again!”, “You are worth it!” and my personal favorite “If you’re finding it difficult just re-member that AFCO II is doing worse.” The extension of the teambuilding dealt with more complex games that stimulated both team work and the power of the debate. “Abigail’s story” switched the delegates into “brainy mood”. The day was still young but the group already had it’s leaders. An important thing that you must know is that you should become a leader through creativity and good manage-ment of the team and not by forc-ing others in to having the same opinion as you. There were both subjective and objective points of view but the leaders easily

got rid of the feelings that were involved. A subjective point of view sometimes means life ex-perience and you should not give up as easily on decisions based on feelings. Although some things did not go smoothly, all the delegates transformed into one at the end of the game. This game is a good preview for the committee work which is yet to come so if you don’t like the course of these types of games, you should try to talk about it. After playing “Abigail’s story”, Anil (chairperson for ECON) proposed a feedback from the delegates in which they had to evaluate the prepa-ration and progress of the team: 5 – best, 1 – worst with an aver-age of 3,75. This was not just a feedback for the chairs but also a self-evaluation for each of the delegates. Somehow, they needed to bring back the fun activities and so they did by playing the Ninja game (TO REMEMBER! – the game was won by a “del-egatress”). After this big hu-miliation, they moved on to the golden rules of the committee and proved that they are aware about the communication prob-lems that the group struggled with earlier.

Soon, the committee theme became present in the discussion. Every delegate was fast covered in post-its that they shortly shared with the whole team. The next step was dividing the post-its in problems & facts, goals and solutions. In a short amount of time, the division trans-formed into a debate session in which they were all so eager to participate. The hands were in the air searching for a min-ute of silence where they could share their thoughts. Enthusiasm can only mean one thing – good preparation, self confidence and courage in what’s yet to come. ■

by Emma Nita

Forum Daily

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The first speaker was a Robert Col-lege alumnus Nuri Çolakoğlu who

is a renowned journalist. His speech was about the changing world and he introduced some very interesting points that made the change in the world throughout history clearer for us. One of these points was that the world had two super powers in the 80’s: the United States of the America and the Soviet Union. Then the Soviet Union collapse and we had only the USA. But now, only 20 years later we five or six superpowers and the bal-ance in the World are fastly changing like no time before. Mr Çolakoğlu also mentioned the three turnpoints in the world history and those are: the invention of writing, made the ideas permanent; the invention of printing, spreaded the ideas and the last one is the internet, which is “the commu-nication revolution” and the greatest innovation. Secondly, Joe Welsch, dean of student affairs of Robert College, made a great speech on the changing world as well; however, his speech was so inpiring that Mr. Welsch got a special invitation from Jonas Dreger to make another speech in the Gen-eral Assembly. The next speaker was lovely Elif Sönmez, the advisor of RC-EYC. Her remark “By the way please have fun!” made everyone want to hug her. Anıl Eryılmaz, a board mem-ber of EYP Turkey, took the place and it was his first time on stage after he got his afro hair cut. He disclosed

the IS that will take place in Istanbul and highlighted that it will be the one and only IS that will take place on two continents. Then, the sweetest Head Organiser Duriye Damla Sevgi (aka. DDS) gave her sincere speech which is followed by the speech of the ses-sion president: “The Jonas Dreger”. He stated his aspiration to live in the world of future and also showed us what aspects the leaders of today are lacking: creativity, hope, cour-age and answers… The comparison of the world leaders seeing limits, to the young leaders (EYPers) seeing opportunuties, both seeking a better world, was quite intense. Finally, he displayed the world of children with-out limits and full of imagination, re-minded us why we should not let our child spirit go away. After the coffee break, the second part of the Opening Ceremo-ny took place, which is the panel de-bate. The topic was the investigation of the “National Identity” considering the alienation of the immigrants like the Turkish labour force immigrating to European countries after the World War 2. The speakers were ğener Ak-türk, an RC alumnus, Philip Esposito, an RC teacher and David Stork. The debate was almost an hour long and delegates from different countries brought many different aspects to the subject. It was one of the must fruitful panel debates..■

After a 15 minutes delay, the Opening Ceremony commenced with a few words from our adorable President Jonas Dreger. Having the three vices and the president up at the stage with formal clothes on, stirred the session spirit and everybody got into the session mood. The first part of the ceremony was full of inspiring speeches.

by Deniz Ertan

OPENING CEREMONY& Panel Debate

Forum Daily

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c o m m i t t e e O N c i v i l l i b e r t i e s , j u s t i c e a n d h o m e a f fa i r s I

Oiınk, oink was the first thing I heard while I was still stand-

ing in front of the door of what I believed to be LIBE I’s committee room. When I finally found the courage to enter I was more than surprised by the view of eleven formally dressed individuals who were welcomingly smiling at me. What I got to witness here first thing in the morning was not an interpreatation of FarmVille but an actual try at breaking the speed-oinking record - and that is of course serious business. Before finally focusing on their committee topic, there was one final transition excercise to be mastered. Since 2012 is ap-proaching with big steps, it was time to select people to travel to, and populate the moon. From the nine characters that were dis-cussed, a suicidal Scandinavian, a fertile Turk, a hyperintelligent 8 year old and a simple minded farmer boy were the lucky ones to receive a ticket. This choice might not seem optimal to ev-

eryone but I was glad to witness Carla Bruni and a slightly mental police officer being left behind. Since this was decided upon with a unanimous vote, it clearly needed to be followed by an ex-tensive debriefing session. Keeping in mind yester-day’s enormous progress and the discoveries they made dur-ing this previous task, LIBE I set up their working space. Match-ing the session’s theme it was Walt Disney whose working model was selected. With moti-vational notes posted on the wall the fun began at the first station: brainstorming. Due to the fact that the committee was talking about protecting one’s privacy, coming up with problems did not seem to be too difficult for them. Part time solo chair Paula showed herself content with the twenty-four points they came up with in only a few minutes and led the nine experts to the next working place. After seperating useful from irrelevant points, it

was finally time for some discus-sion. While certain delegates struck me as exceptionally ac-tive, others chose to hold them-selves back a bit and some even took over the role as the com-municator between people with very controversial points. Owing to their educational background, some of LIBE I’s members pre-sented a vast amount of factual knowledge, while others raised awareness of social issues con-nected to their topic. If ıt boils down to the question of rain or shine for this team I would definitely vote for shine. Not only have they taken over a lot of the chaır’s respon-sibilities and established their own system of debating, they are also a considrate and shiny bunch of ‘Oınk, oınk’. .■

by Teresa Stadler

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c o m m i t t e e O N c i v i l l i b e r t i e s , j u s t i c e a n d h o m e a f fa i r s I i

Stupid face? Confused face? Shocked face? Ashamed, lovely, cute, smiley playful fac-es? What’s going on? Although I could not understand the under-lying reasons, I could figure out that the delegates of LIBE II are really interested in all Evelin’s facial expressions. Moreover, you aren’t just interested but in the meanwhile you take photos and you picture her expressions. Incredible! I was impressed at the very first moment when I came into the room you were dis-cussing the “Code” game from yesterday. I have never before played the Code game but I will try to give you an insight of how it worked in the committee. What impressed me about the discus-sion was that, as far as I under-stood, Evelin was strict on not giving hints and made the game even harder by some additional and missing stuff, however even though the game was harder they successfully accomplished it. Steven Johnson claims that good ideas are formed in chaot-ic atmospheres in a group work and that’s what you actually did. First you tried to work individu-ally but when you realized that it doesn’t work that way you were working together as a team, as a committee all together. As Evelin says, it would have been fun to watch if there were some claims such as “there should be some connection with those codes and

the introductory and operative clauses” or “Wooow, this sign should be symbolising a minus sign let’s just subtract”. Regard-ing the fact that they might sound funny afterwards, those quotes show that you really tried hard and had a conclusive discussion. But bear in mind that it is good to go further and have the com-plexity, however sometimes the best solution is the simplest one but still you have to get through those levels. Let’s move on to Abigail’s tale; firstly it was impressive that Mollie made her mind up just in a few seconds. After 5 minutes everybody was done with their lists and it was fascinating to see the diversity in the committee. Most delegates thought that the most innocent ones were Abigail, Tom, Bob and the Mother. Some of the other delegates thought the opposite claiming that Abi-gail, Bob and Sinbad were the most evil ones. Especially Derin was totally in an opposite view but the committee finally came to a conclusion. Moving on to the irregu-lar stuff; Nash recieved a letter yesterday! To be clear it was a love letter. Apparently a girl – she wasn’t shy to write her name but I feel like it’d be better not to mention- is in love with him. Af-ter country presentations, their enthusiastic chat impressed her so much that she wrote a letter and just sent it to the committee

room. Let’s hope that Nash will add her on Facebook and that they’ll continue their chat. Let’s talk about the chair! What did Evelin say today which I could catch and note?“Oooow cooool that is really cool that is orgasmic” (while you were showing with your hands how much you are comfortable with the committee) “You were being sarcastic?” (all the time)“I was just being sarcastic” (all the time again)“hdbccjubdubduaıkıdlp” just once, when she was talking in English she was lost in words and she made fun of herself. LIBE II, she loves you and cares about you so much so take care of her. ■

by Ceren Hazar

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c o m m i t t e e O N d e v e l o p m e n t

Upon entering the committee room of DEVE, each of us

was overwhelmingly welcomed with a warm group hug. They re-designed their room, we noticed because of the portraits they had drawn of each other. We ob-served their work throughout the day ourselves, but also took two of their committee members, Khalid and Oisin, apart to ask how they felt about the day. We started off the inter-view by asking about the curi-ous drawings we spotted earlier during the day. Why did these drawings look as if some maniac was given a pen and a model. Apparently this was caused by a modification on the original game proposed by one of the delegates; instead of drawing an entire face themselves they passed their drawings to the next person after completing part of it. The combined effort resulted in a unique portrait of the delegates. When asked about the game we instantly saw a grin ap-

pear on the faces of Oisin and Khalid. It was immediately clear to us that this was one of the best games they played so far, as Oisin put it: “It was really good, because I messed it up for ev-eryone.” It also showed the char-acter of the committee; Wim fos-tered an environment in which the delegates felt comfortable enough to add to the ideas and games that Wim had. As such the committee moved forward as a whole. Moving forward to com-mittee work DEVE made sure that no one was left behind. Oisin felt that everyone took the oppor-tunity to express themselves in the discussion. Although he rec-ognised that some used this op-portunity more often than others, everybody took the opportunity in the end. We clearly noticed the more active people put effort in encouraging everyone to speak up and share their thoughts. We especially liked how these peo-ple valued the vision of every single person in the committee.

To sum up the interview we asked Khalid and Oisin for their expectations for the next day of CW as well as the chal-lenges they still see ahead of them. Oisin is expecting a tough day of discussions and is expect-ing the main challenge to be found in dealing with the rather personal experience some of the delegates have regarding the topic. Both Khalid and Oisin are people who have such a per-sonal experience. However Kha-lid does not see his experience as a hurdle but rather as an op-portunity to share his story with fellow EYPers, to promote better understanding of his story and to foster deeper understanding in the topic. After having spoken to these two passionate delegates and having seen the committee on DEVE in action we are confi-dent that they will have an inter-esting debate tomorrow and that they will produce an excellent resolution.■

by Boaz Manger&Laurens Kraima

Forum Daily

12

c o m m i t t e e O N e m p l o y m e n t a n d s o c i a la f fa i r s

Walking into the committee room of EMPL just before

lunch, I was met with smiling fac-es, colorful signs and an excited chair who was just expecting to see her committee’s newly deco-rated room which now contained a newly formed discussion cir-cle, brainstorming board and an inspiration corner. Although they were only wrapping up the morning’s activities, there was a tingle of enthusiasm and excite-ment for the upcoming day’s ac-tivities in the air. The happy expressions on the delegates faces turned into concentrated frowns as the com-mittee began their discussions after a very creative game of improvisational theater, lead by the session president, following

lunch. The game, which has the main purpose of stimulating the delegates’ creative senses, in-cluded all possible and impos-sible scenes and locations such as childbirth, meditation in rush hour traffic and dehydrated wan-derers in the Saharan desert. The discussions, which began with a series of definition quickly turned into a heated debate on the definitions and differences between the words reform and transform. For those unaware of the differences, RE-form means shaping something again, often with the purpose of improving it, while TRANS-form implicates a change of something into a different matter. Unfortunately, the committee is not discussing simple linguistics but rather the problems facing the European welfare system due to an aging population. Therefore the inter-esting discussion was conclud-ed on the chair’s, Ms. Anastasiia Ianovystka’s, recommendation in favor for a more constructive dialogue. A glimpse of panic passed through the room as Ms. Ianovyst-ka told the delegates that they would have to finish the first half of the resolution, the introducto-ry clauses, by the end of the day, but it was soon dispersed and replaced with more vigor and enthusiasm. “The committee has through-

out the process of the team building displayed incredible efficiency and creativity,” said Ms. Ianovystka when asked about her impressions and ex-pectations for the committee. “They are very polite, yet their personalities still shine through. Due to this, I have high expecta-tions for the committee and be-lieve in that they will come up with good, creative, ideas and create a smooth flow during the committee work.” Observing the committee as their secret stalker, sitting in a dark and lonely corner, I could feel my anticipation towards lis-tening to the discussion, and it did not disappoint. Seldom does one see a committee work as well together as EMPL in their quest to find, and define, all the problems present in the modern European welfare system in re-lation to the aging population of the continent. Leaving the committee room of EMPL, I felt a pang of disappoint-ment for missing the end of the end of the first day’s discussions, as well as not being there for the discussion and writing of the so-lutions and operative clauses of today. I would therefore like to wish you good luck, and many unforgettable moments, in the remaining days of the committee work and the session. ■

by Felix Makarowski

Editor: Sandra Stojanovic, Sub-editor: Didrik Helsing;

Journalists: Boaz Manger, Veronica Moitus, Lara Bideyan, Laurens Kraima, Teresa Stadler, Deniz Ertan, Emma Nita, Felix Makarowski, Ceren Hazar, Malvina Richer.