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[CHEERING]

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[APPLAUSE]

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Hello, everyone.

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It's so nice to know
how excited you are.

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My name is Edith.

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I'm a Junior.

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I am an international relations
and French double major.

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And, this summer, I interned
at the United Nations General

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Assembly in the Ghana Mission.

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And so just a little bit
about the Permanent Mission,

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it is an arm of
Ghanaian Foreign Service

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that's responsible to the
United Nations in New York City.

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And we are responsible for
representing Ghana's interests

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in the United Nations
General Assembly.

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And they're also responsible
for Ghanaian diplomats

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and delegations on
assignment to the UN

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from Ghana while
in New York City.

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So they handle things like
logistics, protocol, et cetera.

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So what did I do?

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I shadowed the
mission's officers

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in two major committees, in
the first committee which

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was for disarmament and
international security,

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and the second committee which
was for finance and economics.

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So a day in the life.

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I would catch the train,
check in with my supervisor,

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and go into the
things I'd have to do.

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I'd either have to head to the
UN, or stay in the mission,

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and perform mission tasks.

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So at the UN, I had to
check the UN journal, which

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was like a list of all the new
things ongoing at the United

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Nations that day and
[INAUDIBLE] to go

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to with each of our officers
was going, attend the meetings,

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take notes.

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Afterwards, network with
some of the other interns.

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I was very excited about the
internship because it let me

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and [? talk with the ?]
diplomats after all.

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And there were times when the
diplomats would take you out

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for lunch.

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And they always paid which
was good because [INAUDIBLE]..

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[LAUGHTER]

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And then after all that,
I would write reports.

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Yes, I wanted
[INAUDIBLE] that's fine.

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At the mission office, I would
do things like data entry.

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I worked with the
treasurer for [INAUDIBLE]..

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I worked for a little bit
with the peacekeeping arm

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for the mission.

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So I got to do those things.

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Sometimes, you do
diplomatic pickups, when

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we had delegations in,
had to go meet them

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at the airport with the
drivers, that kind of thing.

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So that's how I spent my day.

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And there were two
major conferences

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I attended I think are
relevant to this panel.

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And the first one was the 2017
High-Level Political Forum

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on Sustainable Development.

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And in short, it's called HLPF.

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And that's the picture of
me standing very awkwardly.

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HLPF is the main
United Nations platform

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for sustainable development.

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And they are responsible for
reviewing and following up

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on a 2013 agenda of
sustainable development,

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and just evaluates progress
with the sustainable development

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goals.

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And I witnessed what
development policy review

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looks like on the global scale.

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And it's primarily
through CARE review.

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And so what they were,
voluntary national reviews

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where member states
could volunteer to, like,

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inform the General
Assembly to prove that they

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were making different SDGs.

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And they have Question and
Answer sessions afterward,

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I guess like we are doing
here, where member states

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would ask, OK, how did you get
this to work in your context?

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And how can I make
it work in mine?

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Things like that.

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The next thing I
got to be a part of

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was an nuclear weapon ban.

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Which was actually
quite big this summer.

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And for this, I got to see how
international law is actually

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formed at the United Nations.

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So there are two major
paths with every negotiation

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of the document.

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And then there's voting.

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And negotiation takes
a very long time.

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It took about four weeks
for this one, maybe longer.

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One thing I noticed was
that the permanent members

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of the Security
Council were absent.

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[? They did ?] have a
[? all-states ?] [? meeting ?]

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of the global, so
naturally us then too.

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It was mostly neutral
states, and states

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that that they have in common
with [INAUDIBLE] mission

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which was interesting.

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And also, with
this, what I learned

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to track and translate
regional agreements

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into global agreements.

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So there is the
Treaty of Pelindaba,

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which was agreed on
at the African Union,

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and that the African
GLOBE working group

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on issues of transits--
meaning the global issue

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where-- should we
allow nuclear weapons

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to be moved into
zones where we knew

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they were going to be used?

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And so that kind
of issue came up.

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And the African GLOBE
was against that

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because the Treaty of
Pelindaba guaranteed

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that the entire continent
is nuclear weapon-free.

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So with that, we don't know.

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So seeing how it was,
we know and agreements

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interacted with the larger
global [? community ?]

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interesting.

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And I also got to see the
role of academics and NGOs

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and other non-state
actors in the commission

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of international law.

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And we invited lots
of people to, like,

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be panelists, experts
on the different issues

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to pinpoint some
of the loopholes

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that we might have
seen, to remind

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us to look at certain things
that weren't considered.

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And, yes, so that was
[? part of goals. ?]

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Actually, it may
be a good thing.

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I had to go and do a
diplomatic pickup, too.

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Again, [INAUDIBLE] happening,
which is a little sad.

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But it was adopted
and with one vote

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against, by the Netherlands,
which wasn't much of a surprise

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because they had been against
it from the very beginning.

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And there was one abstention
by Singapore, which was also

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in another regional agreement.

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That's right.

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So other highlights,
I got to take pictures

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with [INAUDIBLE] things
like with Kofi Annan.

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[LAUGHTER]

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And I got to practice my French
on the French media as well.

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Lots of people spoke French
at the United Nations.

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There was no time to
[INAUDIBLE] in like actual life.

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And I went to go out
networking, and I

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got a lot of mentors and maybe
possible future [INAUDIBLE]..

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Everybody was very
welcoming, actually.

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Everybody was interested in
knowing what you had in mind,

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where you wanted to go to.

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And all, they're willing to
give advice on how to do this.

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What also, a lot of exposure.

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Like on the average day, you
could have several internship

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offers, just from different
people who we have talked to.

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And they weren't always in
things I was interested in,

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but it was just nice to
know that in that space,

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I had all these
opportunities [INAUDIBLE]..

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And, of course, living
and working in Manhattan.

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[LAUGHTER]

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So looking forward, why
did I enjoy my internship?

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I don't think diplomatic
life is for me.

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And I used to think it
was because, like, I

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didn't want to do anything
in international law.

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And that's just how
I saw it [? for. ?]

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But after spending some
time in the [INAUDIBLE],,

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the type of
development where you

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can-- if the state [INAUDIBLE]
like that-- it has more

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to do with conversations.

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And conversations
are important, but I

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don't envision myself
having conversations

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for the rest of my life.

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So I think I'll
try tackle more--

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I want to be more handsy
with development work.

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And so that's kind
of what I'm thinking.

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I also noticed there are a lot
of intersections between law

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and policy that could be
leveraged for sustainable

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development.

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So I spent a lot of time
trying to take classes

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that may often have some
of these intersections

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and how we can
possibly leverage them

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with sustainable development.

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So I'm not terribly
sure what exactly I

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want to do with my job,
I have an idea of what

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I don't want to do
with my job, which

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I think is also important.

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Thank you.

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[CHEERING]

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[APPLAUSE]

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Questions?

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You have a question?

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OK, you.

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So first of all, where
concerning the UN,

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do you think that their
conversations, their meetings

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are very--

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making a lot of change
in Ghana and [INAUDIBLE]??

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In Ghana?

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Yes.

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I can answer that.

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I said-- I think
conversation is important.

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I mean, it makes
our world today.

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People have different points
of view to bring to the table.

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So it's definitely important.

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As to whether I can
see the conversations

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have like any direct
impact on the ground?

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I couldn't particularly
[INAUDIBLE] that.

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If you have a Ghana
Mission who will

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make some statements of
certain development goals,

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and I couldn't pinpoint that
goal, doing things like that,

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[? like where it adapted ?]
to the conversations

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we are having, and what's
actually been on the ground.

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So I would say,
I mean, there are

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other arms of the United Nations
that were more [INAUDIBLE]..

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So maybe within those
things, specialized agencies,

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we can have more then
the [INAUDIBLE] plan.

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But the General
Assembly conversations,

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I didn't see much
of them [INAUDIBLE]..

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Question?

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Yeah.

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How did you hear
about this internship?

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Did you hear about
it from The Lynk

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or from the alumni network?

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That's interesting.

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Actually, you know, I was
working with [INAUDIBLE]..

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We went to Yale
for a conference,

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and she was talking to a friend
who was working at the mission.

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And I overheard a conversation
and expressed interest.

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And I ended up going for it.

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So it was through a
conversation I [? had. ?]

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Can you talk about the gender
representation of the mission--

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and also [INAUDIBLE] you had?

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You were involved with it?

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Oh, actually, maybe it refers
to the general representation

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at the mission.

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The ambassador to the
UN for Ghana is a woman.

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And her second in
command is also a woman.

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In regards to a woman
holding [INAUDIBLE]

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leadership roles in the
mission, so that was good.

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Also, the Deputy Secretary
General, Ms. Amina

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from Nigeria, is also a woman.

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So, like, you could see that--

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I mean, it's never going to
be perfect, but like, I mean,

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that's pessimistic.

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But they had--
you could see some

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in the representation of women,
women in higher positions.

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So that was encouraging.

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So it was good.

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OK, one more question.

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For me, in my experience,
I felt like it was very--

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you had to do things
a lot on your own.

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Do you think that, maybe,
changed your view on how

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diplomatic relations work?

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Or does it mean, like, actually
like because it helped you

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to develop more on your own?

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I generally like working
on my own, so there's that.

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I mean, so that was good.

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But I don't think if I
had even more supervision,

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it would made me like
diplomatic work more or not.

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Like I still had a chance
to see a lot of things that

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happened behind the scenes.

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I think those very people--
you will know people

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if you're seeing what they did,
when they came in the morning

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and do like-- till the evening.

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I didn't think it was the
kind of thing I wanted to do.

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So who knows?

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[LAUGHTER]

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Any other questions?

259
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No?

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Thank you for that time.

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OK, let's move.

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That--

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[APPLAUSE]

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[CHEERING]

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