by Colleen Dillon

I looked down at my ticket marked 3:43 a.m. “Departure Indianapolis, final destination Boston.” We all put our bags down by our gate and slumped to the nearest Starbucks. It would be our last coffee in Indiana for four days. Looking through my bag I pulled out a book on the history of the African country Chad, a tourist map of Boston, and a schedule for the 2011 Harvard Model United Nations (MUN) conference. It was finally the week our team had been waiting five months on.

“You’re prepared,” said my teammate Oscar, pointing to my tourist guide of Boston. It was true. In essence I had become a Boston groupie; reading travel articles, borrowing restaurant tips from locals via the web. It was the image, the reputation of the city through movies like Fever Pitch and National Treasure that intrigued me so much.

Aside from what I had seen painted in flicks, I didn’t really know what to expect out of Boston’s culture, people, and epitome of American excellence in academia: Harvard. What I did know is that our group of eight history and political science students from Anderson University would be entering into that academia. The thought was daunting.

Yet, by 6 p.m. the word daunting had transformed into excitement. We all left our hotel early to sight-see downtown and attend the opening MUN ceremony at the Plaza Hotel. More than 3,000 U.S. and international college students poured into the hotel’s grand ballroom. There wasn’t an empty seat in sight. The gavel was tapped, the room brought to order, and all eyes stared to the front.

A projection screen slowly descended on center stage. As our team struggled to see around all the students, images of poverty, homelessness, world crisis, human trafficking, war, natural disasters, and crime were flashed on the screen. It all hit me at once: I was a delegate and I was about to be tested. How much did I know? What could someone from Anderson University bring to the world political stage?

Over the next three days each individual committee would debate and present their final resolutions to solve their committee’s topic. My teammate Haley and I were both assigned to the Social and Humanitarian committee. Our first topic was the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip, and the second was international organized crime.

Haley and I hiked up the winding staircase to the hotel’s second floor and entered the “Columbia room.” It had marble pillars and plush red velvet chairs. But as we wound our way around the room we noticed all the delegates were networking with other countries. Discovering that we couldn’t survive MUN just by depending on ourselves, we eagerly accepted any handshakes or introductions (whether forced or not). As the committee progressed throughout the weekend, the African bloc started formulating their plan. We had marketed ourselves well enough to delegates of different nationalities and political leanings for our country to have a written clause in our committee’s final resolution. In the end, our bloc’s resolution was passed.

Our team of eight didn’t win the competition, but we all passed the test. As a graduating senior I learned more about how the real United Nations operates and how daunting delegates’ responsibilities can be. MUN success was about marketing personal ideas, public speaking, diplomacy with large nations, readiness, topic knowledge, and witty debate.

On day four we all boarded our plane out of Boston. Between the layovers and unusual amounts of snow, it was the unplanned moments within our team that made the trip memorable for all of us. Walks near the Charles River and historic districts with the Old North Church, rides on the “T” and lunches in local Boston and Harvard establishments made our team experts in Boston city life by the end of our stay. And in the process, we shared a little bit of AU culture in the spaces where we competed, debated, adventured, and explored.

— Colleen Dillon is a 2011 graduate of Anderson University

Anderson University is a private Christian university of 2,600 undergraduate and graduate students in central Indiana. Anderson continues to be recognized as a top Christian college: in 2010, U.S. News and World Report ranked Anderson University among the best colleges and universities in the Midwest for the seventh consecutive year. Established in 1917 by the Church of God, Anderson University offers more than 65 undergraduate majors and graduate programs in business, education, music, nursing and theology.