Synergy #33 Spring edition 2003 - European Law Students ...
Synergy #33 Spring edition 2003 - European Law Students ...
Synergy #33 Spring edition 2003 - European Law Students ...
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26<br />
Iulia Vass<br />
Director for Human Rights<br />
ELSA International<br />
Four Years Of ELSA<br />
and Human Rights<br />
THE BEST FOUR YEARS OF MY LIFE<br />
It is almost the time to draw another important<br />
line of my life, as the University is ready<br />
to kick me out by the end of this year. It is<br />
almost the end of one of the best periods. A<br />
period that has also been the beginning of my<br />
maturity. It is not easy for me to tell the<br />
story of the last four years. So many things<br />
have happened, that many of them are only<br />
shades in my memory. But there are a few<br />
important episodes, which I would like to<br />
remember, laugh and cry at together with<br />
you, who left aside the ELSA work and the<br />
law books in order to read these lines. And<br />
most importantly, I would like to remember<br />
the faces, the laughter, the sadness and the<br />
love of all the wonderful friends and people<br />
I have worked with during these four years.<br />
How did I get involved with ELSA and<br />
Human Rights? Four years ago, after<br />
participating in the seminar “Rights of minorities<br />
– de jure and de facto situations”, I sent an<br />
application to Budapest for a project, which I<br />
intended to organize the next summer. It was<br />
something about organizing a group of law<br />
students who were supposed to go to different<br />
cities and villages in Transylvania in order to<br />
teach Romanian and Hungarian students about<br />
Minorities’ Rights. Being convinced that my<br />
application was one of the best, I managed to<br />
“fool” the Local Board of ELSA Bucharest to<br />
appoint me as Director for Human Rights. I<br />
did not receive the money for my grand project,<br />
and after a few months, I was still trying to<br />
figure out what ELSA was actually about and<br />
what I was supposed to do as Director for<br />
Human Rights. My motivation came from my<br />
first international ELSA event, one of the best<br />
trilaterals ever, in Fribourg, Switzerland,<br />
gathering members from ELSA Bucharest,<br />
ELSA Messina and ELSA Fribourg together.<br />
The summer brought with it the Coimbra<br />
<strong>Law</strong> School on Human Rights and Demo-<br />
Magazine of The <strong>European</strong> <strong>Law</strong> <strong>Students</strong>’ Association<br />
cratization. Two dream-weeks: Great courses,<br />
great climate, great town, great ocean, and<br />
most of all, great people. The fun, the<br />
adventure, the sadness, the sleepless nights…<br />
were all shared with great friends: Tove,<br />
Vassiliki, Dragana, Irena, Eszter, Ivan, Robert<br />
and Dora and so many other wonderful<br />
participants. Of course, I don’t forget the OC<br />
members, who offered us an unforgettable<br />
Human Rights experience. One of the outcomes<br />
of the Coimbra <strong>Law</strong> School was that I found<br />
out about the existence of ELSA’s ICMs.<br />
Which led to my next important step: the<br />
Oresund ICM. Understanding the international<br />
dimension of ELSA and meeting Cornelia<br />
Schneider, the newly appointed DHR ELSA<br />
International, were the best inspiration for my<br />
desire to bring a change in ELSA Bucharest.<br />
After these international experiences, I<br />
came back home and started applying what I<br />
have learned. By the end of October, I already<br />
had a Human Rights Working Group composed<br />
of 12 motivated girls, which immediately<br />
started working: we set up an IHL LRG, a<br />
practice at the Romanian National Council for<br />
Refugees and started organizing the<br />
International Human Rights Day Conference.<br />
It was the first time when I first understood<br />
how much responsibility organizing an event<br />
implies, even if only a one day event, as you<br />
have to think about so many things at the<br />
same time: academic programme, fundraising,<br />
speakers, rooms, materials, posters,<br />
participants, coffee breaks, parties, and most<br />
of all, organising and motivating people to work<br />
for the project. Luckily, it was a success!<br />
After being appointed DHR of ELSA<br />
Romania and President of ELSA Bucharest,<br />
in February I was a very happy person: being<br />
in New York as an ELSA delegate to the VIIth<br />
ICC Prep. Com. Entering the UN building, I<br />
had the feeling that I was both important and<br />
small at the same time. Meeting people like<br />
Benjamin Ferencz, former Nuremberg<br />
prosecutor, or Mrs. Paula Escarameia,<br />
Portugal’s delegate and member of the<br />
International <strong>Law</strong> Commission, I realized how<br />
lucky I am to be an ELSA member and to<br />
have the opportunity to sit next to living<br />
legends. But the charm of my New York<br />
experience was not only caused by the chance<br />
to talk and work with diplomats and other<br />
wonderful people. The UN Cafeteria<br />
breakfasts with Sofia, our “head of state”,<br />
the Spanish serenade in the hotel lobby with<br />
Melina and Iason, the New York sightseeing,<br />
Tiago’s disappointment for not managing to<br />
convince me to fundraise for ELSA by going<br />
to a casting of a modeling agency who tried<br />
to recruit me, are only some of the<br />
unforgettable people and moments of another<br />
ELSA Human Rights experience.<br />
Those weeks must have been some of<br />
the most tiring weeks of my life, especially<br />
since after only five days I joined the largest<br />
delegation ELSA Romania ever had to an ICM,<br />
to the XX Anniversary of ELSA and the<br />
Vienna ICM. Meeting old and new friends,<br />
working during the day and having fun during<br />
the night is something that we always do<br />
during the ICMs. But what made this ICM<br />
special was the Human Rights Working<br />
Group. I rarely saw so many ELSA Human<br />
Rights Enthusiasts in the same place. We<br />
made many plans, and even if not all were<br />
realistic, there was an important outcome<br />
of the Human Rights Working Group: we<br />
went back home wiser and ready to work<br />
harder. Therefore, the following months were<br />
filled with projects: conferences, seminars,<br />
editing ELSA Bucharest’s magazine, a<br />
training weekend, and ELSA Romania’s NCM,<br />
where, following the Vienna ICM example,<br />
I organized the Human Rights Workshop.