SMUNC/Majors/Cities/Knives

Froadac

United States6733 Posts

November 10 2011 07:14 GMT

Firstly, my Uncle is down at Cedars Sinai medical center. Had a stroke. Hopefully he's OK, it took forever for this wonderful American Health care system to get him transfered... Ew. Brain stem stroke. Seems to be in terrible shape =(((

The following takes up 4 parts. I talk about my MUN experience this weekend, the complication it involved when I saw successful eloquent policy people who didn't do it simply because of ineptitude in math, my recent thoughts regarding my lack of interest of suburban america, and continued choices in pocketknives.

Summary of my weekend:
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So I spent the weekend at Stanford for Model UN. I'm president of a club of 32+ people.

Because of SATs we took the noob bunch. By noob I mean indian freshmen.

In any case, my committee was odd. People yelled, then ended up winning for diplomacy. However our club came in second overall to Gunn High School. But they meet 4.5 hours a week and we don't

I collected the Outstanding Large Delegation award for California High School. (Short kid who walked up front to get plaque)

Also notable was an epic panel. Former US ambassador to Afghanistan. Martin Hellman. Of web encryption. And nuclear policy.

Stanford does have great faculty...

However, there were shittons of problems that lead to me being sleep deprived, and ill looking. (almost on the level of the former US ambassador to afghanistan, man the guy looked worn)

We arrive at the hotel. Some girl who helped organize it (but is probably the least self-confident person...) tried to get us checked into the hotel. However, when I showed up with the check, they tried to say we had half the rooms we had a contract for, for half the time. And we had half the money... wtf.

So after arguing for over an hour and a half I finally managed to get a manager. He literally said oops.

Oops. Well thanks for wasting my time. In the mean time I met some really nice advisors for another school.

So we go to the conference, and get back, and we have a bunch of single bed rooms. So we moved 4 rooms and got some other cots. By the end of it I had worn a suit for like 18 hours, and then just collapsed on bed. Repeat twice......

In terms of the conference itself for some reason France started yelling. Then never stopped .Dumbshit didn't realize that China would veto more sanctions on North Korea.... w/e

Majors
After listening to the keynote speakers I was like "Look, these people are competent, got graduate degrees, and now do highly interesting research." And have jobs. Good jobs. But there are only so many of them...

Well I'm going to be honest and say I'm probably primarily interested in business/finance/policy but I probably am capable of doing engineering but everywhere I'm applying I need to declare and really you need either a good high quality grad degree to do that kind of thing, but if I do engineering it might be better, but what if I go to a national merit school so then can afford grad, but what if I don't get in anywhere good. Should I just suck it up and apply useful engineering or do what I'm more interested in at cost of future.

If you look at grades I'm scoring mid of class in Calc BC, but like top 99% in AP Gov/history.

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Travel...

So... I went to Europe this summer. I promised to blog about it but epic failed. Anyways.

Recently I've been increasingly pessimistic about where I live. Perhaps that is because.

1) I don't go out much with friends.
2) Not near cities, nothing to do.
3) Fucking idiot americans
4) It's just so... suburban.
5) Europe and Asia are different. I like different.

I'm probably wrong because

1) Grass is always greener on other side of fence.

In any case, I've been thinking "why was it so awesome taking a train from norbury into london. Then taking the tube and doing all sorts of wonderful things. And why was the countryside so nice. And why was france shit, but nice at the same time. So I will post a series of images, and describe what I think of each. Admittedly these are pretty and tourist trap places, because I didn't take a picture in terrible looking places.

if you are living in Europe and asia how does it compare to boring suburban states? Man, I really want to study abroad or move overseas...

Deciduous forest is nice

Stone building. Not made out of concrete or terrible wall material. Oh yeah.

White cliffs. Wewt

Really nice public park in, I think, York.

Trafalgar square. Under an hour from the epic smokestacks of outer London. London is so cool like that.

Idiot Louis.

Old Buildings. Grand boulevards. What is not to like?

Castle. Yes

Older buildings in edinburgh.

In any case. What is it REALLY like to live in Europe. Asia. What is it like to not be a tourist. Would be especially great if you're from the States, or have lived here.

TLDR: Europe is cool. Asia is cool. USA is annoying.

Finally. Does anyone have a Leatherman Juice, or a Delica, or a Skyline. I'm choosing between those three. (I just have cash on hand for one atm, and it's either Delica/Skyline vs Juice.)

bRiz

United States113 Posts

November 10 2011 10:19 GMT

It really depends on your personality. I've lived in China for 2 years and Korea for 1 year, and it's very much a grass is greener type of thing with me now. I can't wait to come home, really. I used to hate and despise the USA for what is is/was/will be, and at first, any other country seems just amazing, pure, and the people are incredible. The magic wears off though, and after 2 years, unless you've really made a solid effort to get integrated with the local culture, can fluently speak the language, and are able to adapt being away from the familiar, then by all means go for it. I caution against being too negative about your home country though, because once you've been abroad for awhile, it might not seem so bad!

Kitkatzy

United States213 Posts

November 10 2011 11:49 GMT

My gf tried to get me to join Model UN, but I just couldn't grasp the charm after one meeting. Debate kept me flying across the country every 2 weeks, so I never got to experience a competition. So why do you participate in Model UN over Debate?

Imperium11

United States279 Posts

November 10 2011 14:23 GMT

Awesome MUN blog, you should try and get your school to come to CMUNC (if you wouldnt mind flying across the country that is).

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