Parliament Parable

One of the major pitfalls of having such distinguished professors is that they are always cancelling class to attend highly confidential debriefings of returning British soldiers from Iraq or are invited by the Chechen President to the opening of a new mosque in Grozny. When one of my professors cancelled class because Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee requested him to provide testimony on Afghanistan, my classmates and I were already in the eye-rolling and thinking “again” stage of our education. However, this time, we were invited to come along (since British Committee meetings are open to the public not because we were special).

We became giddy with our academic fortune…again.

In our excitement we reached Parliament two hours early because we were afraid it would fill up, and we wouldn’t get sits. It turns out other than some frantically scribbling journalists and a school group, few people were quite as enthusiastic about Parliamentary proceedings.

Since we had just a tad bit of time to kill, a friend and I wandered around the grandiose halls of Parliament. We were both shocked on the amount of freedom we were given to explore. We kept expecting a burly security guard or Kevin Costner look-alike to jump out and escort us off the property, but it never happened.

We were only stopped once while we strolled down one of the oak-panelled Committee room corridors. Expecting the wrath of latent British Imperial might to smite us for our American presumptuousness, we were taken back by the immaculate politeness of a ridiculously unflustered staffer. “Pardon me ladies, are you members are the Corn Lobby?”

My first unfiltered thought was, “How could he possibly know that I’m from Ohio.”

My friend was a little more logical. “No. We are not”

The staffer apologized and simply stepped out of our way to let us continue snooping.

The actually Committee meeting was very interesting for what is was and for what it was not. Although sitting less than a foot behind my professor, I felt like I was in the mist of a hostile Congressional inquiry rather than an informational session. Of course, that sensation could also be because I wasn’t used to staring at the back of my professor’s head as he shared his vast amount of knowledge since typically he’s looking at the class.

The experience was definitely worth the pre-giddiness though I mercifully wasn’t the most over-eager of my classmates. This time I wasn’t the one who burst into a private Committee meeting and sternly told to leave by the less-than-amused Chair. Of course, I’ve already done that in America. I still can’t hear Congressional Appropriations Committee without cringing slightly on the inside.