Boston

At the end of February, I had the pleasure of competing in the National Animal Law Competitions at Harvard Law School, and in short: it was amazing! I learned so much, had such a wonderful time, and it was easily one of the most valuable experiences I have had in law school.

Due to our early morning flight in Detroit, Claire, Alicia, and I met up at some ungodly hour to drive to the airport. Before leaving the house (yes, I am an expert at applying filters to eliminate under-eye bags).

I am up way too early (3:30 a.m.), my hair is way too blonde, and I care way too little about neatly folding towels. 

Every time I go to Boston, I am immediately reminded by how much I adore it. I'm sure it probably has something to do with my New Kids obsession given that they're from Boston and have some wicked cute (see what I did there?) Boston accents.

As soon as we got out of the airport, all I saw was snow.

Accordingly, a series of pictures I like to call "your instagram feed wasn't lying; holy crap, that's a lot of snow!"

On our first day, we headed to a bar (Mead Hall) across the street from our hotel. Day drinking, party of two. We both had the Namaste beer, and it was pretty awesome. How cool is it that it came in its own cup?

We then headed over to Harvard, where I promptly fell in love. Prior to this trip, I hadn't explored Cambridge too much, and Harvard Law School was everything you can imagine and more. They had their own pub and cafeteria, and it was simply gorgeous. All of Harvard's campus looks like something out of a Harry Potter movie (or, at least I think so anyway; I haven't actually seen a Harry Potter movie), but the law school takes the cake.

I wonder if Harvard students pose near the MSU Law sign?

Can we just take a movement to bow down to the food at this conference? The whole thing was vegan, and I was in all sorts of heaven. This was one of the breakfasts.

Our competition started on Saturday, and I'm not going to lie: I was pretty nervous. Despite public-speaking for a living, I still get nervous about these sorts of things. Something about experts in the field firing questions at you while you're talking is a little terrifying.

But, I was pleased by how amazingly nice and encouraging everyone was! Some of our judges were among the premiere animal law practitioners and animal legal scholars in the United States. So, arguing in front of them and hearing their positive feedback gave me confidence and made me feel encouraged that I can use the skills I have learned in law school and apply them to real-life animal protection work.

Not only did preparing our brief before the competition allow me to improve my writing and learn more about the Humane Slaughter Act and how it can be improved, but my experience at the tournament taught me many skills. I was able to practice giving oral arguments in front of justices who currently serve as judges in courts throughout the country. In addition to providing practical experience in the rounds, I had the chance to ask them questions after the rounds about what they find persuasive when they are adjudicating cases.

I was excited by our second place finish, and I left the competition feeling inspired and encouraged to continue dedicating my studies and efforts to animals.

Our trip home was quite the adventure. And I can now say I've gotten a drunk guy kicked off a plane for groping and sexually harassing other passengers. Too bad I had a separate seat from Claire and Alicia and had to sit next to arguably the second most annoying guy on the plane (example: despite me repeatedly telling him I can't offer him legal advice, he kept asking me if he could pursue an assault with a deadly weapon case against a guy who spit in his mouth since the guy who spit might have had HIV; he also gave me a detailed history of all of the ways women have rejected him, complete with a sprinkling of swearing so heavy another passenger asked him to watch his mouth).

But, in the end, drunk guy and swearing-clueless guy couldn't wipe the smile off of my face for what a great time I had! 

Oh, and if you'd like to watch a video of our final round, it's here.