Reflection on the AIC simulation

Playing Syria was a difficult role as their outlook on how a country should be run is much different form Canada. Their human rights policites are the biggest problem right now as riots and protests are currently taking place. Syria has also received a ban on oil exports due to poor human rights which was a large problem for the economy.

Our NSA for this simulation was very helpful and left us with some positive feedback when the game was finished. The positive points that were made mainly had to do with our focus on getting the EU to communicate. We had trouble at first getting them to respond as we needed to gain back our oil exports for the country so Mr. Muallem (Meaghan) sent out a press release telling them that they had 42 hours to respond or we are going to open oil exportation. We did begin completing a press release on our plan of action for restoring our human rights by giving the citizens a vote in certain matters but ran out of time in the end to complete it.

The only negative feedback was that we started off slow at the beginning of the simulation. It was confusing in the beginning learning how the website worked but once we got everything figured out emails were immediately sent out with regard to our goals statement.

Overall this was an interesting experience and each of the games were very different. It all depends on the leaders of every country and their willingness to communicate. We were pretty lucky in this regard as almost all of the other Countries that we tried to contact, other then the EU, were open to discussion and wanted help that we could provide. It's interesting to see how teenagers are able to think of active solutions to so many of the problems that are happening in the middle east but grown men (and a few women) aren't able to negotiate.

Courage by Gandhi

“Anyone can give up, it's the easiest thing in the world to do. But to hold it together when everyone else would understand if you fell apart, that's true strength.” - Gandhi

Strength is not always something that everyone wants to have because sometimes, as human beings, we do break down. I find this quote over everything a strong motivator that to give up is to take the easy way out. To break down this quote I would say that there are 2 parts. The courage to admit defeat and the courage to move on. Sometimes it is not always possible to move on in all situations and the best path for everyone is to admit defeat. With this in mind it is also equally as courages to pick up the pieces and move on and this is really what is seen as remarkable. This is an attribute that is reflected in many global citizens such as Nadja Halilbegovich who is the author of My Childhood Under Fire. She had courage to write about her experiences and share her stories with the world as well as providing hope for the citizens of Bosnia by going on the radio to speak about her situation. Focus will come as a product of motivation and to be a global citizen it does require courage. It requires courage to stand up for what you believe in and most importantly advocate those beliefs.

"All that it takes for evil to triumph is for good to do nothing"

Inorder to decipher who a person really is there are three things that need to be foreseen. What that person says, what that person does and what others say about them. this can also apply to the object of good and evil. The good and evils of today aren't so black and white as there are many grey ares that do exist but there are some people in the world who clearly are just evil and their values hold no remorse. This quote suggests that it is easy fro evil to take power over good if nothing is done about it. This reminds of what my dad says about how you will never win if you don't try. An example in the world could be seen as the Americans on their peace keeping missions in Afghanistan. I am not necessarily saying that Americans are good but in this situation they are staking a stand to triumph over evil which makes them better then the countries who are doing nothing. The peace keeping they are doing is an attempt to triumph over the Afghani solders. This may be a far ways from triumph but it is this effort that will begin to start others to stand up against evils.

To Act or Not to Act

Question:

When have you experienced an opportunity to act, but not done it (or maybe you did act)? If you have never experienced this sort of opportunity, try to envision a hypothetical situation where it might happen. In this situation why did you fail to act? Or, if it was a hypothetical situation, what might prevent you from acting?

Answer:

When I was in grade 11 a friend who was graduating came to me with the opportunity to take over one of her major projects that she had been working on organizing with the school and inner city kids in Hamilton. She wanted someone to carry on Spread the Love to make sure that food would be provided to the Eva Rothwell centre for the children that attend the after school program. This was a problem for me as I was considering the work load of grade 11 and the fact that organizing alone would be very difficult. I decided to go visit the centre as I wanted to make sure that it was actually what it said it was and after spending an hour with the kids there I emailed Mr. Zelinsky to help me carry on Alex's project. The main thing that was preventing me from acting in this situation was my failed time management. I am a procrastinator as it is and knew that I would have other prefect duties and friends that I want to hang out with on the weekend. I feel this is one of the main reasons that people decide they don't want to act as it does involve work and action. You could be hanging out with your friends but you could do that any time, when else are you going to be presented with the opportunity to change someones life?