Miriam Abaya stands alone on stage. She gazes out at the empty seats of Temple University\u2019s Performing Arts Center \u2013 there is no audience for this performance. She sings Christmas carols and Adele, with a voice that is matched only by her wide smile and enthusiastic laugh.<\/p>\n
Abaya can still remember the moment she first fell in love with music. She was in the car with her family, on a 12-hour car ride into the mountains for a family vacation. \u201cWe listened to Paul Simon\u2019s \u201cGraceland\u201d the whole way,\u201d says Abaya. \u201cI now know the version of \u201cGraceland\u201d as the old cassette tape with the weird click outs.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her love of music intensified throughout her childhood. She sang in a choir and performed in musicals, and played the piano and saxophone as well. It is singing, though, that truly appeals to Abaya. \u201cI feel like it\u2019s the most emotive thing about being human at times,\u201d she says. \u201cBecause it doesn\u2019t really require you to find words to express anything. You can just put notes into some kind of sequence and play them with some form of expression and they can express something that you don\u2019t even know. And it\u2019s probably something that the composer didn\u2019t even mean to communicate to you, but it just comes out to you that way. That is an incredible thing to have happen. Music transcends language and culture. Everyone understands music.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although Abaya was born in the U.S., she grew up in Nigeria, attending an American mission school, with students from Korea, Syria, Lebanon, New Zealand, and Australia, as well as kids from local Nigerian towns. \u201cMy parents are Nigerian, and they came to the United States to get their PhDs,\u201d says Abaya. \u201cWhile they were here, I was born, and they had always planned to go back, and so when I was two, they decided to be missionaries and move back with my siblings and me.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was an incredibly diverse and enriching environment, though Abaya originally struggled to fit in. Most missionary kids lived in their own compounds and spent time with each other, while Nigerian children spent time in their own neighborhoods. Abaya, as a Nigerian missionary, wasn\u2019t sure which group she fit into.<\/p>\n
Growing up as a missionary was an overwhelmingly positive experience for Abaya. She credits her parents for showing her what it meant to be selfless and the value of hard work. \u201cMy parents work very hard,\u201d says Abaya. \u201cAnd I think it\u2019s taught me about the importance of when you\u2019re doing something important to keep going on and keep working and not forget what the end goal is.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat they do is not about trying to sustain their own lives or trying to achieve a certain quality of life for themselves,\u201d she continues. \u201cIt\u2019s more about empowering other people to do that instead, and that applies to us as well.\u201d Indeed, Abaya\u2019s parents broke with traditional Nigerian parenting methods in raising her and her two older siblings. \u201cMost typical Nigerian parents are very much about pushing their kids to be lawyers or doctors or engineers. My parents really didn\u2019t force that on us,\u201d says Abaya. \u201cI think they figured out that if they left us to our own devices and just focused on working hard that we\u2019d end up somewhere where we\u2019d pursue careers that were good for us.\u201d<\/p>\n
Living in Nigeria has given so much to me. It gave me a sense of community, world-view, and culture. It gave me an understanding of what it is to be joyful in times of trial. And I feel like walking away from that is irresponsible and it feels wrong to me.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Abaya\u2019s high school years were filled with frustration. Riots and violence were regular occurrences in her city, at one point threatening her senior year of high school, which struggled to meet the required number of school days due to closures and 24-hour curfews. \u201cIt just felt like after years of that happening that nothing was getting done. At some point it just clicked for me that I could work to make things better,\u201d says Abaya. \u201cMost people tell me that\u2019s an overly lofty goal, but it\u2019s important for me, and I feel like I wouldn\u2019t feel comfortable not pursuing that and not making whatever difference I can however small it is.\u201d Abaya ultimately followed her parents\u2019 lead, as well as her older siblings, by moving to the US for college. She majored in music at Haverford College near Philadelphia, but knew her ultimate destination was law school.<\/p>\n
Since arriving at Temple Law, Abaya has engaged in advocacy through awareness, shedding light on important legal developments in Nigeria through scholarship. It\u2019s not enough, says Abaya, but it\u2019s what she can do for now. \u201cFor others, clinics expose you immediately to the issues you\u2019re trying to advocate for,\u201d she says. \u201cBut when what you\u2019re trying to advocate for is across the sea, it\u2019s hard to do. I think for me, having conversations with people about these issues has been a new form of advocacy.\u201d<\/p>\n
She credits Temple\u2019s Law & Public Policy Program for helping her find her path. \u201cBefore the program I had a very narrow view of what being a lawyer is and what I could do with my degree, and that was being in the courtroom.\u201d When Abaya realized that she wasn\u2019t interested in that type of career, it was the Law & Public Policy Program that opened her eyes to new opportunities and helped her meet others with those same feelings of uncertainty.<\/p>\n
While participating in the program during the summer following her 1L year, Abaya wrote a policy paper on Boko Haram, an ISIS-affiliated terrorist group in Nigeria that has grown from a small regional terrorist group to a regional West African force. \u201cThe United States could play a role in helping Nigeria counter this threat,\u201d says Abaya, \u201cand not just immediately, but in the long run.\u201d Abaya was able to connect with a former US Ambassador to Nigeria to discuss the paper, a meeting she claims she never would have strived for without her \u201cfairy godmother\u201d Professor Nancy Knauer, who leads the program and strongly emphasizes networking.<\/p>\n
Currently, she is working with Professor Meg deGuzman on her International and Comparative Law Review comment about the African Court of Justice and Human Rights, which has proposed the addition of an international criminal chamber to the court. The addition would allow the court to hear charges that currently plague the African continent, such as human trafficking, trafficking and drugs, and corruption crimes to already established cases about genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and crimes of aggression. The problem, says Abaya, is that the same heads of state who want to prevent the new crimes want immunity from prosecution for those crimes until they leave office. \u201cThat seems ridiculous to me,\u201d says Abaya, who says her comment is about why the immunity clause should not be included in the expansion proposal.<\/p>\n
There is a raised degree of emotion in Abaya\u2019s voice as she talks about what plagues Nigeria. She is steadfast in her plan to return to her home after graduating law school. \u201cNot once,\u201d she replies when asked if she\u2019s thought about just staying in the United States. \u201cThere is no option in my mind.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cFor others, clinics expose you immediately to the issues you\u2019re trying to advocate for,\u201d she says. \u201cBut when what you\u2019re trying to advocate for is across the sea, it\u2019s hard to do. I think for me, having conversations with people about these issues has been a new form of advocacy.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
In many ways, it\u2019s personal to Abaya. \u201cI think because I feel like I\u2019ve had opportunities that many other Nigerians haven\u2019t,\u201d she says. \u201cLiving in Nigeria has given so much to me. It gave me a sense of community, world-view, and culture. It gave me an understanding of what it is to be joyful in times of trial. And I feel like walking away from that is irresponsible and it feels wrong to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s what this aspect of advocacy is for me. It\u2019s giving back to this culture and this country that\u2019s given so much to me and in a way doesn\u2019t know how much it\u2019s given and how much it can give to itself.\u201d<\/p>\n
Still, Abaya struggles to figure out the best path toward that goal. She could focus her work on human rights treaties, or help Nigerians learn to advocate for their rights. She could work for Nigerian organizations or United States organizations or for the government.<\/p>\n
It can quickly become daunting, which is where music comes in. Abaya says that music has become an outlet for her since she began law school. \u201cI realized after my first year that [law school] was really stressful and I had no real way to get out of my own mind,\u201d says Abaya. \u201cSinging allows me to just not think about any of those things, and renews my strength for when I have to focus again.\u201d<\/p>\n
And so Abaya stands on stage and gazes out at the empty seats in front of her. She sings, she smiles, and she laughs, until her strength is renewed and she is ready to get back to work.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Giving back. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":273,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","acf":[],"yoast_head":"\r\n
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