My first time in a moot is disastrous. I got cold feet; my arguments were semi-valid at best. I stuttered a lot, especially when questioned by the judges. Almost all of my arguments were thrown out of the window because I did not read the case properly. Despite all of the above, I did not give up and through this experience I learnt A LOT.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Writing a submission
I was asked to join the moot 2 days prior to the actual moot itself, with only a vague idea of what a moot was, I accepted willingly. I thought to myself, just go up and speak for a few minutes, what could go wrong? And so, after accepting the invitation, I waited. One day later an attachment student at ACC contacted me. Sent me 2 overwhelmingly long documents, and asked me to read it. I was rather free, stuck at home, and thus I proceed to read the documents without complains. But as I read on, I slowly realized that I had no idea on almost half of the issues present in the documents. I began to see; how real-life issues and situations are drastically different from what was taught in law school. How much I was lacking \u2013 input, applications, knowledge, experiences. I was later shown that there were connections to be made all over the place, but yet, due to my inexperience, I just can\u2019t seem to connect them. With these feelings in mind, I wrote my submission in agony. I was ashamed of how bad I am. It felt like I was dragging my co-council down, like dead weight someone would not want in their luggage. But at the same time, I was also thankful to my co-council for being ever so kind and patient with me. Though my submission itself was well below mediocre, if it wasn\u2019t for his guidance, I would not have been able to write anything at all and thus i am eternally grateful for his patience and guidance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Presenting the submission orally
Whilst in the waiting room;
Just a few minutes before the actual moot, I was afraid. I felt inadequate with my half-baked script. And to make matters worse, I was informed that there will be 2 guest judges participating in the moot. 2 ex-attachment students from ACC to be exact, who are now thriving in the legal industry, each with their great pile of achievements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
During oral submission
Seeing how everyone was delivering their part in a very well-versed manner, I was shookth. I was completely illiterate when it comes to court courtesy, the manner to address a judge etc. Fortunately, I was the last in turn to speak therefore I was able to pick up the common terms and managed to salvage some face albeit miniscule.
Although the script I prepared was flipped upside down when Mr Chang asked me about the nature of the claim (for context: the claim was legal in nature but I prepared a defence in equity), nevertheless I pushed on and somehow delivered my part.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The experience itself was very eye-opening, nerve wrecking to some extent. I realized my limitations and learned a lot. The judges, although strict with the law, were kind enough to give us guidance on what to work upon. I guess this just shows how much passion they have for the law. It is very admirable. I do wish that someday in the future I will be able to reach a tenth of their ability. Though not entirely pleasant, it\u2019s definitely a valuable experience to be remembered.
How Wen Jiun (Defendant Team \u2013 Co-Counsel)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My first time in a moot is disastrous. I got cold feet; my arguments were semi-valid at best. I stuttered a lot, especially when questioned by the judges. Almost all of my arguments were thrown out of the window because I did not read the case properly. Despite all of the above, I did not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1805,"featured_media":10198,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[85],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alexchanglaw.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10203"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alexchanglaw.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alexchanglaw.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alexchanglaw.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1805"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alexchanglaw.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10203"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/alexchanglaw.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10203\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10204,"href":"https:\/\/alexchanglaw.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10203\/revisions\/10204"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alexchanglaw.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10198"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alexchanglaw.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alexchanglaw.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alexchanglaw.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}