Let’s begin by acknowledging the fact that organizing a gigantic conference of parties from across the world, especially during an ongoing pandemic, is not an easy task. Facilitating global travel, arranging for quarantine and vaccination facilities, recognizing vaccines from across the world (even though not WHO-certified), and necessitating daily covid tests for participants required tremendous efforts, in-detailed planning, and robust infrastructure. And the UK government did a commendable job.

But when a global pandemic-induced economic slowdown leads to budget cuts and reduced travel, the representations from least developed and developing economies are inevitably restricted. This may not necessarily be a deliberate impingement but an unintended consequence. While developed country parties came with their own intimidating entourage, a smaller island country came in with a handful of delegates. A COP can get chaotic very quickly when multiple working groups break out for informal negotiations running parallelly across several rooms. A big country having a bigger delegation can quickly send people across rooms to participate. At the same time, a smaller country with a smaller delegation struggles even to make it to the breakout rooms. For example: During the long-term climate finance negotiations, the small delegation from Malawi mentioned that they were not consulted for a decision because they could not make it to the breakout room because they were in a different room tracking a different negotiation. How do you ensure equity here?

My second observation was that words in a climate conference could get very repetitive. Over two weeks, with so many side events and main events, the number of times you hear the following words is ear-bending: climate change, climate adaptation, climate mitigation, climate finance, 1.5 degree, 2.0 degree, etc. Having even basic surface knowledge about any of these words can qualify someone as a climate-conscious person and help strike a conversation with literally anyone. By the end of day 2, I realized that I would only be hearing the same words from different countries, although in different texts, tones, and languages. That’s what the world is facing, and many are pointing out, “a lot of big talks but no significant action.”

My third observation was that with thousands of people who are equally passionate (or appear to be) about the same things as you are gathering at the same place, COP26 can be a networking mecca. Having a drink with the Environment Minister of Greenland, spotting John Kerry casually walking around the conference campus and running into a US climate negotiator while buying a souvenir from a local Scottish store are some of the real-life anecdotes of “being at the right place at the right time.”

Being from the global south, I cannot stress how immensely privileged I feel for getting this extraordinary opportunity to attend the United Nations Climate Change Conference – COP26. From where I come from, not many people get to be at such places, which are looked at as places for the rich and wealthy. I am immensely thankful to Duke University and all those people behind the UNFCCC Practicum course to make this experience happen, which genuinely is (but I hope it is not), once in a lifetime opportunity.

Thank you for reading!