KaMUN 2019 - The Black Forest Conference
The trip to KaMUN began, for Lilly and Friedrich, rather early, already on a Thursday. And our final destination for this day was not Karlsruhe, but rather Strasbourg, where we went to see the European Parliament and European Council. This extra trip was led by, of course, the infamous Secretary-General Jonas Bruns, who showed everybody how connected the Black Forest, Strasbourg and Karlsruhe really are. In Strasbourg, we had an amazing tour through the European Parliament, which was sadly not in use at the moment. There, we gained rich insights into the parliament's functioning, ranging from the processes of allocation of seats to the body's operating procedures. Afterwards, we visited the European Council, where you could feel the 70s come to life again, and where we learned a lot about this lesser-known institution.
Our delegation to KaMUN 2019 (l.t.r.): Teresa, Lilly, Julia and Friedrich.
Later, we were driven to a nice restaurant to enjoy some Alsace Tarte Flambée or Flammkuchen as Germans like to call them. But this was by far not the end of the evening; after a ride back home with a few drinks, the organizers of KaMUN invited everybody to a karaoke-bar, where the Mannheim-delegation could show off their awesome dance moves, fancy stickers and beloved voices before the group decided to end the night in another club.
After recharging, the KaMUN delegation united the next day, as Teresa and Julia joined in for a pre-conference breakfast/lunch. The opening ceremony was centered around the UN-Development goals and how to achieve them. It, therefore, included a panel discussion as well as a few inspirational speeches. Afterwards, we had our first session in our committees, where our delegation in the UNSC, representing Indonesia, ran into trouble with the P5-members, that vetoed their resolutions. The opening ceremony continued in an old brewery with Maultaschen, music and beer until late in the night. The next morning, arriving precisely on time, the discussion continued in the committees.
Julia represented the Kingdom of the Netherlands in the ECOSOC committee and tried to build coalitions as well as hold speeches to convince others of the importance of a clean energy transition. She was impressed by the innovative ideas of other delegates and enjoyed her first MUN-experience!
In the UNSC, the discussion over the Yemen civil war got more heated, as there were only so few topics to talk about, where most agreed. To ease up the situation, one of our delegates started to develop and spread memes to push the discussion in our favour. In contrast, another delegate tried to get a petition against the USA signed. In this hectic situation, we are particularly proud of Lilly, who influenced the debate as Peru with her co-delegate massively, even though it was her first time MUN-ing. In the evening, after a discussion of the conference with our delegation, we headed towards the last social of KaMUN: the Club-/ Karaoke-evening. Since KaMUN had rented the whole club (which had a closed Kebab shop inside), you could meet with all the people you work within the committees as well as all the other people you always wanted to talk to, e.g. the Secretary-General or the organizing team behind KaMUN.
The next day, we were in an advantageous position: because other committee members were not as focused as the days before, Mannheim-delegates could place their points even better. That was even more important as the last day is always crucial since all the resolutions you worked on the day before are passed around (after-)noon. This led to two of our delegates being honored as distinguished delegates by our committee chairs.
After all, I really can recommend KaMUN to everyone who wants to have a good time and get to know MUN (better). It is beginner-friendly, definitely great fun and right next to Mannheim. We definitely had a great time!
