Felipe Felix and PANAMUN: A Love that Never Fade

PANAMUN XXV has kicked off to a great start; everything is organized, everyone knows exactly what to do and where to go, and therefore, there are few to no complications. This success is largely thanks to our Secretary General Felipe Felix, who has worked hard to make sure that this PANAMUN will be memorable for everyone participating.

Felix is passionate about many things, including music and soccer. However, one of his biggest passions is debating, which he started doing in March of 2013. Felix expressed how debate is very important to him as he said: “it allows me to explore the aspect of leadership that I hadn't discovered in myself until I joined debate.” He also explained how something that excites him about debate is that he gets to “meet people from very different backgrounds that allows [him] to think about the issues that are faced by the world everyday.”

During and in his years in ISP, Felix has been part of the PANAMUN conference. In PANAMUN XXIV, he was President of the General Assembly, which he explained was very different from his position this year. “Last year was much more ground work,” he explained, while this year, he is “much more behind the scenes”, since he is no longer working directly with the chairs, admins, and/or delegates. Instead, he’s in charge of guiding those responsible for these participants and ensuring they know how to train them. Felipe said “it was very nice to be the President of the General Assembly because I got to work very closely with the chairs and I created some really beautiful friendships with them,” but he enjoys his current role because he believes “it is very important to have someone who is able to look at the big picture how these puzzle pieces fit into the greater picture.”

One of the many traditions in PANAMUN is to have the Secretary General give a speech in the Opening Ceremony. This year, Felix presented his own speech, which he was very proud of. “I am extremely passionate about the topic of inequality and I felt the need to address it in a way that it would make participants of PANAMUN feel touched”, Felix said about his speech. He had to make sure his speech contained all the information that he wanted people to understand about the theme of PANAMUN, “Closing Gaps”, which he believes he was able to achieve.

Unfortunately, this is Felix’s last PANAMUN event, as he will be graduating in the Spring. His experience in debate, among other things, has led him to know exactly where and what he hopes to study as well as what he wants to do in the future; Felix plans to pursue “political science or development studies in the US, and then he said: “I hope to get involved in events where I can discuss the issues that have been talked about in PANAMUN.” Debate has allowed Felix to cultivate skills in research and formal writing that he strongly believes will benefit him in the future.

For his last PANAMUN, Felix hopes that the conference will “break all records”. This means thatHe strongly believes that “in the end what really makes a difference is the way delegates approach the conference.” He encourages all participants of the conference to try to make a difference and ends by expressing how “we are living a tale of two cities” and wants all delegates to “go change that, [to] go turn this world into that world.”