June

The 3 days in June I would remember

26th June - First Day of Natco, Skipping the whole amazing day and going to the highlight of that day. For me it was receiving a recognition, I accidentally saw my name just before they where going to be announcing the final recognition and I had no idea that I was being considered, hearing all those amazing things being said to me and having the guys behind me whispering things to me clam me down .. It was great.

27th June - Second Day of Natco, our guest speaker (Amal) was amazing. Reflecting back on the day my only thoughts of the day where I am going to work on my presentation skills until they reach Amal's level and I will do my best a VP X.

28th June - Last Day of Natco, reality started to sink in today, I was extremely nervous about allocation of people into teams, I think in the end I got an amazing X Team, I said goodbye to a few X members but I'm welcoming in a lot. There are a lot of memories on that day, mostly ones of when I first start AIESEC. We ended the day with singing like mad, just one of those time I can look across the room and actually feel comfortable with the people around me.

Reflecting Back

This post is just to reflect back on the previous 5 months of this year ...
It's June now .. the 6th month of the year which means that there are only 6 months left for the year to end ... How has the year been so far?

Lets Find out …

January - The year started with me traveling .. I was in UAE on the 1st of Jan ... I missed the birthday of 2 of my good friends, but I was forgiven ... I was actually Not looking forward to the year but that’s changed now... on about the 3rd of Jan I traveled to Thailand ... It was amazing and fun .. But I hated the shopping for clothes part but I enjoyed buying a lot of weird things! I'm glad I got to see Thailand.

February - AIESEC work had just start, I helped with the recruitment marketing materials and OC-ed for the Desert Rose conference .. I am sure that there where more projects I worked on but this is all I can remember at the moment. These projects/Events stood out.

March - Oh March is a month to remember ... Going to Morocco MENA LDS .. I will never forget March '07 ... and I also remember helping John (an AIESECer from Australia and one of the 3 AIESECers that manages AIESEC Bahrain on a National Level) search for students abroad to fill in our first newly raised internship here in Bahrain. Words cannot explain what I felt in march. Another person I have to mention is my mate Lyna .. I guess she added to the magic of March (and February ..).

April - I know that there where things that happened in April .. recruitment was going on, and Handled my own Mini training session. But you could say April was a resting period for me.

May - Another month that was crazy, It started off with me going to the Bahrain International Travel Expo (BITE) representing my Beloved Organization AIESEC , Helped an AIESECer called Aysha with the marketing Material for an upcoming conference and she and other AIESECers are organizing, Then there was the induction capstone conference ( this was a conference for the new AIESEC members) , the FAMA Awards which was organized by my friend .. It was fun to attend, there was also AIESEC E-Board elections taking place .. I ran for the position Vice President of Exchange (on a Local Committee Level) ... Running for the VP position was nerve wrecking, I was so nervous on the day ... but I so happy because I got it! Lastly .. the last event of May was the Youth Round Table .. This is some thing that my mate John has been working on for a while, I was amazed to see how an idea had been brought to life .. I got a lot of motivation from that conference ..

Now I await to see what June brings .. I have a feeling it is going to be an amazing month as well…

the firsts of MENA LDS

The conference had so many firsts for me its was unbelievable ...

I wore my first AIESEC bahrain T-shirt
Ate my first dish of moroccan food
Had my first international room mates
Met my first of "international friends", countries that i have heard of but never met people from!
My first time to speak in front of a crowd of abouts 230 people without being scared
Took the train for the first time
sang the first MENA LDS song for the first time
Met some very inspirational people and actually connected with them
sang alot of arabic songs and I mean alottttttt
hosted a discussion group …. which I want to continue doing …
had wondering dinner with AIESEC in the USA .. thank you lyna and shereen for making me go to it! Im so glad I went!
got my first cowboy hat from my mexican friend .. god I love that hat … I wish I could wear it to work L
saw a blue jelly fish for the first time it looked pretty .. but highly deadly
was taking care of by people not from my family but did become a family to me ..

well there are alot more firsts of the MENA LDS but i one thing i loved about all my first is that I had someone form the bahraini delegate next to me sharing my first ...

and i guess i would just like to thank the bahraini delegates for adding on to the magic of this wonder full conference ...

In order of love, i thank the females :
Nasreen (my first love) 2. Aqeela (my second love) 3. Bint al khawaja 4. Renad (bint al khawaja's friend) 5. dana ( we no longer have a speaking problem ) 6. Aysha (woman power) 7. lyna (sorry i met nasreen first) 8. yasmine (it was great being bored next to u on the plane ) 9. Mariam Kamal (it was fun to randomly show up in ur room) 10. shereen (my last love)

You girls are the love of my life …

And guys inorder of memory :
Ali ( fluffy_onion_diesal), Ali ( yah alawi ..lalalla that song is still stuck in my head), terbo (hahhaha I think u where the first person to lose his voice ) , fix (u bought F1 to morocco), momo ( I like ur punishment ) , aseeri (it was fun watch james bond with ya) and ghassan (I saw u smile for the first time in the conference .. before that u where just serious ) ...

Thank u bahrain ... I dnt think we would have won best delegate of the conference if any of guys where missing ... And so with that I end my blog entry by saying " The best first I ever had was that Bahrain is the first country to win best delegated of the conference in the first MENA LDS ever ... setting an example for all other MENA countries " and im so lucky to just share it with all of the people above ...

Sessions

Sessions for the MENA LDS where great, But the sessions that i will be mostly remember are the Bridging the Gap session and " the secret " I wish much more time could be allocated to these session!

Bridging the Gap is very important to me! Alot more than people know it! I aim to break down as many stereotypes as I can! Even my own personal stereotypes! And the MENA LDS really helped with breaking those stereotypes! Not only did I find that I had the wrong opinion about a certain group! I found out that they also had a wrong opinion about me, and personally it meant alot to mean to find out I myself have developed stereotypes without realizing it! and im glad I am now aware of it and when ever possible I would like to " bridge the Gap " between groups, countries or individuals. It is that important to me.

Going through the session "the secret" just reminded me the importance of being positive in any situation! And i generally am a very positive person but sometimes you just seem to forget that and concentrate on everything bad that has happened! But honestly I would rather say how fascinating after something bad has happened, then say why me! Why because your a much happier person when your positive then negative! If you manage to lose your money, and will in deep shit when you go home but your positive then your happy and when your happy you feel like you can take over the world (metaphorically speaking of coarse) or in simple terms deal with problems around you more easily. That is what the session "the secret" reminded me about. (although I can say I was a bit hesitant to apply the think positively idea in the begining cos I was an idiot I later on did and I worked well)

MENA LDS group activities!

There are only 2 group activities that will actually sick with me!
The bomb diffuse game and the carpet game! Oh how much fun i had in these 2 games!

First let me tell you about the bomb game!

My team lost miserably! we barely step on the grass before the faci's we shouting bomb exploded! It was hilarious (but had it been a real bomb we would have been screwed)! the one thing about the team was that they had high spirits! They didnt mind losing as long as they learnt something from it! so every time we failed we would do a roll call! I think we where the first to come up with a roll call that fitted our name.... I said a boom chicka boom ....
lol …..Team " the bomb " you will always remain in my memory!

Now the carpet game!

we had 20 people on a carpet and the objective of this game was to flip the carpet upside down without anybody's feet (or other body part) touching the areas outside the carpet! OMG it was a total train wreck! the bahraini delegates knew the solution but the other ones didnt want to hear the solution because they wanted to learn the lesson. So we shut up and OMG the things that happened in that game! people where crying from laughter when they where looking at us! i wish i have some pics! unfortunately i was with them doing the game and i had no camera! Imagine some of the girls where sitting on the guys shoulders to make more space for the others, and those poor girls keep getting thrown from one guy to another, the funniest part of all is when fix landed on his ass! It was one of those things you have to see.

heading to morocco!

It was Wednesday 14th march and we gathered at the airport at 8 pm! the bahraini delegation was all set to go out to morocco to the MENA LDS conference. I had no idea that I was heading out to a life changing experience. I didnt know that I would inspired and be inspired, be motivated and be a motivator. In short I never knew what a difference it would have made, the people I would of met and the special moments I would have had.

you can say that this conference is and always will be the turning point of my life! and im glad i never knew my life is going to change because sometime we all fear the change. But in this case ... well you can just say it suprised me ....

Desert Rose Day 2 ( saturday )

Saturday started out with me waking up early and taking a hot shower … hmmm then heading back to the Desert Rose conference. My poor sister volunteered to take me both days and I thank her very much. Once we got to the tent, we decided to take the gals to the bathroom. That took about 1 hour of our time. An hour later, back in the tent and preparing for day 2 of the conference. We just need to register a few people in, as most of them registered the first day! Then it was time for day 2 of the conference to begin!!! Wahooo! Opening ceremony went well and sessions started. The sessions during the morning where mainly about facilitation. How to write up a session and how to present it. It was really fun and interesting to do as we had to write up a session for someone else and we also had to present somebody else’s session, This was the most beneficial to me and I really hope to put what I have learnt into practice soon! Lunch was cooked by our LCP Terbo!!! Surprising enough it tasted good! He must teach me how to cook like that. The afternoon sessions where focused on how to market AIESEC, and we took a look at the plans, what we are supposed to achieve by the end of each month. Sitting through these sessions made me think about how I can contribute to AIESEC Bahrain. The whole time I was thinking about how AIESEC Bahrain started and how it is currently and how will it be in the future.

The conference was really worth my time and I look forward to being a more active member and giving more of my time to events like these.

Desert Rose ( Friday ) A weekend to remember

Spent the last weekend with AIESEC, and was truly worth my time! It was the desert rose conference and I was a member of the OC (organizing committee) which gave me a chance to work with people from outside my group and I hope to do that more often. OCing with me was Mai and Reem, im really glad I worked with them, I got to know them. Mai is so easy going, her sense of humor is similar to mine. workin with her is just a breath of fresh air, and Reem well I tired to describe her in one word before be couldnt but I think I can say she is lively, she is just full of life really fun to be around and to work with (and go to the coldstore with). Friday started out with me waiting for almost an hour until our OC president came along (he didn't put up the signs which I spent hours making but I forgive him!!), headed to the tent (oh yeh incase you didn't know the conference was in the desert in a tent) As I entered the tent I was amused by the thought of technology in the desert even if I didn't show it, come on we where having power point presentations in a tent in the middle of nowhere! whats not amusing? Then it was straight off to registering the delegates. Although I was initially being assisted by sarah as the other OC member weren't there, registration was a mess, but later on got better as the other OCers came to the rescue. After all that was done the opening ceremony took place … This was memorable! We had the perfect chair for the conference! She was great! The opening ceremony got us right in to the mood for this conference. We then had a message from our Romanian friend Mada … inspiring message. The conference flow went something like this. Our facilitator would give a speech and then divide us into groups and give us cases to work on. This worked effectively! I was part of the fire flames. My group members were mariam, ahmed and ghasan! It was fun to work with them. Mariam indeed deserves to be called a fire flame. This day was mainly focused on being a change agent. I wished we were given more time for the change agent characteristics, which ones we have and which ones we need to develop. After that session we had a prayer break, me and renad spent an hour together just driving to use the bathroom, using the bathroom and coming back ,as there where no bathrooms at the camp! As soon as I got back to the tent after my 1 hour long bathroom break! I was off to help Mai arrange the lunch for the delegates and the Faci ( facilitators), where I spent a good 15 mins washing apples! Lunch was served and we sat down to eat and joined the conversation(very interesting). Once lunch was over we cleaned up and headed to outside the tents to do group activities! We all where split into to 2 groups. Sahar was the faci ( I think that's the term) for our group (the good looking people), and I honestly have to admit that we have grown a lot closer as a team! We completed all of the challenges given to us, when compare to my first NATCO where we didn't, It is a big improvement. I can honestly trust the Bahraini AIESECers and I really do feel very comfortable with them. At the end of the day I feel like I can take what I learnt from this conference and apply it. The first day of the conference was a success, It ran so smoothly and there was a bit bad time management (we started late) but we covered a lot despite that.

Saturday and Sunday with AIESEC

Saturday 10th Feb
AIESEC had its first parents dinner! (Cant wait for the second) I was giving the chance to speak to the parents about exchange! Damn that was like my first speech in front of people I knew nothing about! It was soooo scary! But Hell I would do it again and again and again! Not because I enjoy shaking and panicking but because the AIESEC team is always there to support me! And I guess it is good to have so much support! And eventually I will become good at speaking. But it was not only me that was nervous there where a few others like me and we really did step up!
clap for ourselves!
Sunday 11th Feb
Selection of an Exchange leader! I was one of the persons running! WOW what an experience. Being interviewed by your team mates! Running against a team mate that supports you! and the lonnnnnnnnng wait before the results! the wait was the worst part! But im looking forward to them now, as I have this feeling that it will become apart of my life! Anyways I did lose but I was so happy after the results, Not because I lost but because It was a kind situation where I could benefit if I won or lost! But still even if im not leader I will put all my efforting into exchange! It is something that I want to see sucessful in AIESEC Bahrain!