Written July 20
Lots of things have themes here. Some things you would expect to be themed are themed like the dances and some things are straight out of left field.
For example last Friday was “backwards day”. It was an awesome opportunity to mess with my kids. First I woke up my kids by saying “come on guys, it’s time to get ready and into bed” and then having a cabin chat with them asking what their favourite part of the day was. At first it took a while for them to get it but eventually they got into it giving answers like “I really enjoyed the soup at lunch.” I think I was the only person to wear my clothes backwards all day.
Last night we had an “all camp” which is an activity involving everyone on the boys side. In the last session and staff training this was a treasure hunt type game or a massive game of monopoly. Yesterday’s was a quiddich match. However rather than just the after dinner activity period the theme lasted all day. I was lucky enough to be chosen as a leader for the game which meant I was the head boy of one of the houses an in charge of getting the kids involved. The hype was at lunch and for the after the other leaders and I walked around camp handing out rewards for campers who were demonstrating the four core values. Dinner was then a Harry Potter feast followed by the game. The seniors in my house won.
There’s a lot of shenanigans here which all go into making camp what it is an you don’t get this level of intensity on any other job. Last night while we were waiting for pizza we added items to the job board such as “shave the pigs (blindfolded) ” and de-Krum the viking cabins.” my favourite quote from tonight’s unit meeting was “they covered Sam in butter so he stole their pillows. “
So much stuff happens here that I don’t have time to process it all. So far I’ve been keeping notes of all my kids highlights from cabin chat but on changeover this weekend I want to buy a notebook to take note of 5 things I’ve done in a day and quotes before I go to sleep. In lieu of that, 5 things that I did today :
1. Played base-ketball with my campers
2. Combined the tennis and drama interest groups
3. Embarrassed one of my campers by asking his camp girlfriend what her intentions are with my camper. She later told him that “your counsellor seems really nice”
4. Practiced “emergency dock switches”
5. Sneaked in the dark to pick the next speaker for cabin chat
6. Shrieked at people underwater
7. Showed up to the unit meeting only wearing boxers and thongs (a.k.a. flip-flops as they’re known as here)
O.k. so that was more than 5, maybe I should make it a list of at least 5 things I did today.
Amendment July 21
Today was the final day of this session, lots happened but I don’t want to do with whole post just for it. With that comes the midpoint of the time with the kids. As I don’t have a journal yet here is today’s (at least) 5 things.
1. Went polar bear pontoon jumping (after only getting to bed at 1am thanks to being on od). It’s not a normal thing and I only arranged a swim but the waterfront director loves one of my campers
2. Overheard a kid from my interest group say that he thought drama was going to be horrible but it’s actually a lot of fun
3. Had my drama group perform at closing campfire
4. Poked Andy 2 with Andy 1 while Andy 1′s bag was being sent up the flagpole
5. Conspired to have my co kidnapped on behalf of Chuckles the creepy doll
6. Did my first up the flagpole prank by sending up Chuckles for tomorrow morning
7. Had a really long cabin chat and got the kids to make a sheet of warm fuzzies for each other
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