Thesis and Telders!

Today I finally finished my thesis, I can not believe it is done! These few months have been extremely busy. Doing thesis and Telders at the same time took most of my free time. Even when this spring has been stressful, it has also taught me a lot. Now that I have at least some time before couple of last exams and thesis defense, I would like to tell you about our trip to the Telders International Law Moot Court Competition in the Hague, the Netherlands.

The competition took place in the Hague 17.-20. May. All the teams pleaded four times during the semi-finals, applicant twice and respondent twice. The best applicant (Leiden University) and the best respondent (The University of Cologne) competed in the final that was organized in the Peace Palace. Congratulations for the both teams for amazing work! Specially to the University of Cologne for winning the competition!

I would like to thank my teammates and coaches for making this experience possible for me. I have learned so many things during our journey together. I really enjoyed the competition in the Hague as all the teams were so friendly and cheerful. The atmosphere between the teams was great! It was nice to meet new people who also have passion for international law!

The Peace Palace! The final of the competition was held in the Palace.

Garden of the Peace Palace

Walking around the city after the first day of the semi-finals and the dinner together with the other teams.

The Hague was so beautiful city! Everybody was cycling everywhere.

Sunset from the beach. The last day of the semi-finals we had a barbecue and party at the beach.

This was second time for me in the Hague, but now as International law student, the city has more importance for me! I hope that someday I will be able to visit the city again.

To understand more about the competition itself, here is the previous post about the topic:

https://camillaonthefly.blogspot.fi/2017/03/telders-moot-court-competition.html

-Camilla

Telders Moot Court Competition!

January and February were crazy! So many things to do and learn. Now finally all the exams and Telders competition are over for now. However, our team won the Telders national round in Poland and our journey will continue in May in International rounds in Hague! I'm so happy!

Telders is a Moot Court competition, that means simulated court proceedings for students to compete and have experience. First we needed to research our topics. This year the task was related to diplomatic immunity, inviolability of diplomatic premises and a military agreement. We used couple of months just to research everything related to those topics. Every team needs to have 2-4 students and the work must be done for both applicant and  respondent. I have had the honor to work with three great and intelligent girls in my team.

The deadline for the written memorials was in end of January. Our both memorials (applicant and respondent) had 45 pages. Writing the memorials and editing took a lot of time. It was a great feeling when we finally had everything nicely printed and sent to the organizers.

After the written work it was time to concentrate on the oral rounds. We saw each other almost everyday practicing our speeches and getting ready for the questions the judges could ask. Applicant and respondent both have 40 minutes to speak during the oral round. That means that for every speaker there is about 20 minutes.

The national rounds were held in Warsaw 22. February. Our team decided to fly there a day before just to be concentrated to the competition. That was the best decision! The night before the competition we had so much fun and we laughed probably for everything. I really felt that we are a TEAM!

After the oral rounds we were so stressed, it was hard to say who was better. Of course we had a subjective view and I think that at least I'm always more critical towards my own performance. We needed to wait for the results for a long time! I was over analyzing every single detail. Finally after more than a week, we got the results from the oral rounds. We won the orals! And it was a clear win from the points, I don't know why we were so stressed.

However, we still needed to wait for the points from the memorials before we were able to celebrate the win of the whole competition. Finally we received the points from the written work and it is official, WE WON!

I really appreciate this experience and this journey we have had so far. I'm thankful for my amazing team and our coaches. Next chapter of Telders starts from Netherlands, I can not wait!

-Camilla