University of North Texas

After flying from Austin to Dallas, we were met by Brian Lain, coach at our next stop of UNT, and also our tour manager. It was great to finally meet the person behind the whole operation! Upon our arrival in Denton, where the University of North Texas is based, we were filmed my student journalists and asked about our trip and the debate. A quick turn around later and we went to dinner with the debate team to a 'traditional English Pub'. They offered number of "English delicacies" I'd certainly never seen in England, or anywhere else for that matter, including 'English dipping sauce' (still unclear what this is..). We then headed to the University for the debate, which was on making development aid conditional on women's rights, which is a great motion and created a good and very heated debate, and the evening ended well hanging out with some of the team in one of Denton's bars.

After a hearty Texas breakfast in a cafe full of people with cowboy hats and lots of pictures of guns (some of which were accompanied with omnious signs such as "We don't call 911"), we dealt with an impending clothes shortage at the laundromat, and Lewis, as the most high maintainence member of this team, got his haircut. After more food, we headed to Dallas with the UNT debate team to judge at the Dallas Urban Debate Alliance tournament, an organisation aimed at spreading debating amongst Dallas's High Schools. We spent the first couple of rounds getting aquintated with judging policy debating, and the next day judged a couple of rounds. Like many of the equivalent and fantastic programmes in the UK, the organisation really seems to be making a difference to the aspirations and educational experiences of many young people in the Dallas area. We also got to do a show debate about Afghanistan at lunch time against a couple of the UNT debaters,.

After the Dallas tournmanent, we headed into downtown Dallas for a bit of sight seeing, first stopping by the 'Sixth Floor Museum', which is dedicated to the JFK assasination, and overlooks the spot where he was killed - . is a re-creation of the 'sniper’s nest' where the assasin shot from, and the displays really illuminate the very historic event. We then checked out the conspiracy theorists on the street outside offering alternative, inside job, explanations (the evidence for is offered at the bargain price of $30...), and took the obligatory photos on the 'grassy knoll', where some claim shots were also fired from, and on the X marked spot on the road. We then wandered around downtown Dallas, checked out a few tourist shops (Lewis tried on some genuine cowboy boots!) and had a great dinner on a Dallas rooftop restaurant. We then spent the evening back in Denton at the house of one of the coaches, where we enjoyed an evening of great company and beer pong.

Sunday started with an excellent brunch in Denton, followed by a workshop with the debate team, where we introduced British Parliamentary format to them (UNT does Policy debate), using videos of last years worlds finals. We then headed to an enormous mall in the Dallas suburbs somewhere, where we took advantage of the exchange rate and cheap American prices for cloths, as well as replacing some the items we've worn out/broken/lost over the course of the tour. Our time in Denton ended well, with Lewis's poker skills winning out in a game with some of the debate team (making some headway into counter balancing some of the previous gambling losses of the tour).