December 31, 2008

Music, Orphans and the United Nations

Birdy is at it again. Now that I am in school many opportunities are floating around, just waiting for me to grab hold. Because of Birdy's artistic and musical abilities, enthusiasm to help and willingness to brave public speaking, three week-long trips have come up.

The first will be the trip to the Hague (in the Netherlands) for Model United Nations. My MUN class will travel there at the end of this semester to a beautiful 4 star hotel on the beach. The only thing is we have to come up with the money for everything because the school will not pay for us to go. We done a few fund raisers to help lower the cost but I still had to pay about 360 euro for the hotel room.

However, I'm sure the money will be worth it. MUN is a simulation of the UN run entirely by high school students. I am in the ECOSOC committee which stands for Economic and Social Council. My class's country was given to us in the beginning of the year and unfortunately happens to be the Democratic Peoples Republic of North Korea. So in my committee I will be representing North Korea in all of the Economic and Social resolutions that come up.

The next trip will be to Oberwesel, Germany to participate in Creative Connections. I was chosen to be one of the 15 students to be in the Strings class. It will only be 200 euro to spend 5 days in an advanced arts activity with other musicians as well as 135 other artists. We will, then, perform or showcase what we have prepared during the week. This is a great opportunity that will help take my violin to the next level.

In April, I've signed up for a Service Project to Poland. This will cost $365 but will be so much fun and very fulfilling. We will help an orphanage there by building a playground, teaching children baseball and cooking meals, among other things. Lauren and I can't wait!

All this, plus graduation and college, is coming up soon but not coming cheap. However, these are wonderful opportunities I feel like I cannot miss!

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