Day 0: Arriving in Brazil
Before coming to COP, I had no clue what to expect, or what to pack. This was both my first time at COP and my first time in Brazil. I spent hours looking in my closet and my suitcase, figuring out which blazers I could stuff into the tiny carry-on.
When I finally landed in Belem on November 9th after a 30hr journey from Montreal, Canada, I was greeted with a blasting 33 °C heat. The entire airport was covered in COP30 signs, with messages like “Save the Amazon.” To exit the airport, I walked through a COP30 red carpet. Outside was a hectic mix of cameras, music, and dancing: I was greeted with a cyclist parade cheering us on. It warmed my heart to see how many people were cheering us on. It felt like the whole world of people hoping for change. I crossed the group of dancing cyclists more times than I cared to admit.
After quickly stopping at the tiny flat I would be staying in, I walked to the venue to pick up a badge. I was one of the lucky few who stayed within a walkable distance from the venue; many stayed hours away. The walk was only 20 minutes, but the heat, humidity, and exhaustion made it feel like ages (and made my hair frizz up into a curly mess). The venue was impressive: a huge hanger with a giant “COP30” sign out front. I waited in one of the 48 check-in lines, handed in my passport and nomination letter, and got my badge with an incredibly unflattering photograph. Between the dim artificial lighting and the humidity, the photos looked more like mugshots than headshots. I didn’t really care though; I was so excited and nervous for the week to start.
Day 1: The first bit of chaos
I woke up at 7am the first day in our tiny little apartment shared with me and four other girls attending COP. We didn’t have a bathroom mirror, so I had to do my hair and makeup for the day in a little pocket mirror. Learning from the afternoon before, I slicked my hair back with industrial gel that felt like glue to try to make my curls behave. I ate dragon fruit for breakfast, chugged coffee, and tried scrolling through the COP30 app to find the official schedule for the day. Nothing would load, so I went to the venue as early as possible. It was a good thing that I did, because even the line to get into the venue was long. With 56,000 registered attendees, there were bound to be bottlenecks.
Negotiations, as I learned that day, don’t actually start until the second day of COP. The first day is full of side events, press conferences, preparatory meetings, and of course, the opening plenary.
The opening plenary is the first major, official event launching COP30. Nothing could have prepared me for the struggle to get a pass to the ceremony. At smaller conferences I’d attended, most people who wanted to go to the opening ceremony could; at COP, with the sheer number of people attending, you had to secure one of the coveted, limited tickets to actually get a seat in Plenary Amazonas. I went on a bit of a wild goose chase, but finally tracked one down. The entrance of the room was surrounded with a mob of reporters and attendees trying to fight for a way in. I showed my little pink piece of paper and walked in a bit late — but the ceremony was even later than I was so it was ok. I stayed for 30 minutes before having to give up my seat to another young climate activist, and moved on to my next event of the day.
I was part of the ClimaTalk team hosting our event “Decoding UNFCCC Language” alongside Youth4Capacity, where we aimed to help youth and first-time attendees understand the basics of complicated UN jargon. It was inspiring to see such a big youth presence at our event!
Because my main tasks wouldn’t start until the negotiations began, I had freedom on the first day to attend lots of interesting side events and press conferences during the day, from a climate science press conference, to discussions on technology and capacity building, to more logistical information on the BTR synthesis report. There was an overwhelming number of events to choose from, so I just went to some that I thought would be interesting.
Days 2-5: Settling into a Hectic Rhythm
On the second day of COP30, the official negotiations on climate policies began. As part of my role at ClimaTalk, I helped track discussions on Technology, Gender, and NDC/GST. The schedule was constantly changing, which meant a lot of my day was spent checking times and room assignments—and sprinting—literally, in heels—across the massive venue to make it to the right session. Being in those rooms, even as an observer, was incredibly powerful, and I tried to capture as much as possible through verbatim notes.
One of the most enjoyable parts of my week was running interviews. The ClimaTalk team invited youth to sign up for on-camera interviews, and over the two weeks, we had dozens of participants. It was such a privilege to meet other young people who had travelled to COP; everyone was inspiring, passionate, and full of energy. One unexpected challenge was timing the interviews around the weather: every afternoon, the bright sun would suddenly give way to thunderous rainstorms, amplified on the hangar’s metal roof. If we didn’t plan carefully, the microphones would capture nothing but the pounding rain.
Some notable moments in COP
Not everything went as planned. On the third day of COP, my shoes literally melted. The morning started off normal with interviews and tracking negotiations, and I went to a side event hosted by Al Gore. As he was leaving the room, I ran and caught up with him – and got a quick selfie. In the afternoon, I ventured into the Green Zone — the public space at COP filled with civil society organizations, vendors, artists, and activists (as opposed to the Blue Zone, where the official negotiations happen).
On my way back to the Blue Zone, disaster struck: the combination of three days of walking and sprinting, the heat and humidity had caused the soles and uppers of my stilettos to peel apart. My shoes had melted! To add to the chaos, I had to sprint between sessions — first NDC, then Gender — realized I’d left my charger in another room, ran back with my broken shoes in hand, only to find the session cancelled and my badge missing. I had to run back all the way across the giant hanger to the entrance to replace it. By this point, my shoes were completely destroyed, and I spent the rest of the afternoon walking barefoot through COP30. It was definitely one of the most stressful moments for me at COP. I broke down into tears. But it also taught me a valuable lesson: literally nobody cares what you look like at COP. I had been so stressed about if I was wearing the right shoes, the right blazers, the right pants — and then when I walked around barefoot nobody batted an eye. The next two days, I switched to the tennis shoes I had worn on the plane.
Some memorable moments outside of COP
Some of the most meaningful moments from my time in Belem happened outside of the negotiation rooms. On the morning of the fourth day of COP, I woke up at 7:30 and realized I had been admitted into a TED Countdown Event — which started at 8. I’ve never gotten ready faster. The TED Countdown House runs a series of events connecting professionals, business leaders, innovators, scientists to ‘reimagine what’s possible’. I went to an event called Bridging Continents – Scaling Minigrid Solutions from Africa to the Americas. I had expected a talk, but the primary focus of the event was an interactive workshop. This was a crazy experience, because somehow I — a lowly mechanical engineering student — was sitting at the table with top mini/microgrid developers, CEOs, and innovators across South America and Africa, trying to brainstorm ways to effectively scale these solutions. It was so inspiring and empowering.
Afterwards, I took an uber to the venue with an MIT professor and PhD student at Cambridge who happens to know the CEO of Engineers without Borders Canada — another organization I work for. The world is so small.
I was also grateful to be able to explore a little bit of Belem while I was at COP. There was a beautiful waterfront area on the riverside full of restaurants, shops, bars, and barges that I visited on multiple occasions. Inside one of the malls was an ice cream store that had a COP30 flavour of ice cream. I didn’t try it, but I’m sure it was delicious. At the end of the riverside strip, there was a truck selling acai ice cream (the sweet kind), which was the best way to end a chaotic day. I also visited the botanical gardens and explored the dark green forest full of little animals and colourful parrots.
Transportation was also fun. Once I discovered that you can take motorcycle ubers throughout the city, that became my primary mode of transportation. It was faster, cheaper, and far more thrilling than a regular car.
The Food
Of course, I can’t talk about Brazil without mentioning the food. Every morning, I ate fresh fruit for breakfast and quickly fell in love with dragon fruit. When I went to the TED Countdown House, I was served tapioca for breakfast with amazonian fruit and honey which was incredible. I love Brazilian food, and I tried to sample as many local foods as I could while I was there. Everything was so fresh and full of flavour. I also learned that acai can be absolutely delicious (when sweet) or…quite the experience when savoury. My favourite spot was less than a 15 minute walk from the venue: an unassuming spot called “Tacaca do Renato,” where I had some of the most flavourful food I’ve eaten. The restaurant was outdoors on a side street, and we sat on plastic chairs, sipping our soup from bowls. My second favourite spot was a little restaurant inside the botanical gardens where I drank coconut water straight from a coconut.
Day 6: Returning to Reality
Leaving COP was quiet and strange. I left for the airport just in time to see the sun creep over the houses in the little side street which I’d learn to call home, and listen to gorgeous Brazilian birdsong. Back in the airport, full of an eclectic group of diplomats, students, and activists, I saw the familiar posters lining the walls of the airport that I’d seen when I arrived: “Fossil Fuel Executives, You Choose What Our Children will Breathe”, one poster said, “Protect the Amazon Now.” This time, I really felt it.
After going through security, the guard took my passport, asked, ‘COP30?’ to which I nodded. He smiled, and gave my passport a second stamp with the COP30 logo. Now, everytime I see that little stamp, I smile so much.
