(Previous post is too big) S3 Summit Thread 2
(thread 1)
Where did my week go?
To one of the most wonderful experiences of my life, that's where
Today I actually made my class (woo hoo), and quickly sprinted (with food in hand) to the Connexus Centre for presentations of photos, posters and a few words from(what I now recognize as) the lovely president of Oikos. (I also helped her install ClamAV on her mac, which seemed to work ok for the most part).

Meka(regina), the s3 organizer has really done an amazing job. Between him, his wife, marie(utokyo), and the 2 or 3 other members of their community, they've created an international success, and have moved us all further towards international peace, prosperity and sustained peace and prosperity.

I finally "broke through" with (both of the) kosovans(sp?). Something about them just radiated unhappiness to not only my obviously biased and mal-functioning perspective, but also another one of the delegates (originally from Tehran). But once in conversation we found that she wasn't really unhappy at us; the whole thing was a cultural thing that we just were misreading. Inside they are both sweet, intelligent young ladies, who have just as much enjoyment out of a deep conversation on social issues as we did.

It's striking how different the result of my telling (not-marie?) about my sterility, compared to the delegate from india. In uTokyo culture, my activity would be weird and perhaps uniquely western, but at least it seems to make sense. In the culture of (christian?) new delhi, it's a deep act of incivillity, a mistake in the eyes of god, etc etc. Fascinating.

I spent quite abit of time with Mai(Thailand), today. Sometimes there weren't words; only admiration.

I taught almost a dozen people how to play pool; Not that I'm all that good, but everyone seemed to enjoy it. The music was too loud, so we often found ourselves outside; the smokers smoking, the drinkers drinking, and everyone discussing the issues of the day in broken and drunken english in the cool mist of newborn night.

I wish I could remember everyone's name, and country, but I just can't. There's too many for such a short time. I'm getting decent with faces, and events/history, but I'm confusing people with eachother still.


The green party just sent me a 'news' email today, so I responded with this:

Please; be proud of the University of Regina this week, for we have been hosting an international event, under the title 'student sustainability summit 2008' with members from all over the world, both developed and developing nations.

I'm too exhausted to write too much more(we didn't sleep much this week), but I've just spent one of the best weeks of my life exploring the issues involved with sustainability in between informative panels with the other students of the world. I'm one of the few Canadians who have followed in the footsteps(in Canada, at least) of our international friends, acting as council to their concerns and fears, as through language barriers we're coming to not only understand eachother better; but to understand our common and pressing concerns; The concerns of the developing world are now personal issues, since they are now things that concern our friends. We have friendships between delegates who's countries are normally not friendly at all. The whole world is being brought closer together through this event(and it's Regina chapter), something which hopefully will continue for many years to come, as wscsd continues to proliferate.

I am but a regular undergraduate student; not particularly talented or important; I found myself here by more or less dumb luck. But I've never heard of anything like this before, and I'm simply amazed by what this extremely talented group has in store for it, if we can keep this momentum, and ourselves together.

Info about s3regina can be found at s3regina.org, perhaps starting at http://www.s3regina.org/about_wscsd.htm

Thanks for your time,
Jeff Cliff
A Canadian Delegate to the Student Sustainability Summit (s3)
University of Regina



In closing(while I try to figure out how I'm going to find pants for tomorrow, and go to sleep), I'd like to say that although money is always an issue, it seems, at least I have somewhere to celebrate, all over the world, for my birthday. From kenya to delhi, from tokyo to rural thailand; I am a citizen of the world, and a friend of the world. It is with a heavy heart that I face the problems of tomorrow, but it's also with a newfound conviction that the problems of tomorrow are surmountable.

And to top it all off, I have a job offer that may rival the tarsands. We'll see about that one though.