Our last camp was Sports Camp. I hate sports, but I love Sports Camp. The sports staff members have their priorities in order - God first, fun second, sports third. They have their own program that they run, but they work to integrate it with what we have established. They participate, they get involved, they truly love these kids.
Our last campfire of the summer was Staff Gone Wild. Basically, Capt. Beverley and Spike planned for the staff to do all the gross contests and stuff that we can't let campers do anymore because of health regulations. Eating Ritz crackers with gross stuff on top. Pop-n-Sock (drinking soda through someone else's sock). Things like that. Too much to write about. A gross night that was a ton of fun.
On the last night of camp, the Program Team pulled an all-nighter. Spike didn't trust the younger staff to not sneak out and do something stupid, so we set up watch right outside all the staff cabins. Give me enough caffeine and I'll be up all night. Nothing happened, which meant it was a boring night, but the walkie-talkie conversations got really fun at times. Colleen and I were up by Sandy and we could hear Tasha and Danielle laughing down by Deep Creek View. I made it all night. I was cursing Spike about noon the next day when the caffeine wore off, but I made it the whole night.
The ironic thing is, we forgot to keep an eye on the sports staff. Major Tumey and Coach Tim T.P.-ed my car sometime during the night. I was told about it by at least 4 people, so I know that it was those two trouble-makers who did it. Revenge will be sweet.
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Summer - Part 2
The next moment that stands out for me is the end of All About Kids #2 Camp. There was a little girl named Serena who was very needy. I had spent some time with her walking back from campfire on Thursday night, giving her some much-needed attention. The seat beside her was open during our Friday church service, so I got to sit by her. When Capt. James gave the altar call, she turned to me and asked if I would go up and pray with her. Of course. When we knelt at the altar, I asked what she wanted to pray about. She said, "I want to ask Jesus to forgive my sins and be my Savior." Then she prayed the simplest, most heartfelt 2-line salvation prayer I have ever heard. Her smile for the rest of the day was radiant.
That why I keep doing this. Moments like that are what make the long days and short nights worth it. I could sit on my rear all summer and be essentially useless, or I could come and show God's love to a few campers. Camp changes lives for eternity and I am blessed to be a part of that.
To be continued. . .
That why I keep doing this. Moments like that are what make the long days and short nights worth it. I could sit on my rear all summer and be essentially useless, or I could come and show God's love to a few campers. Camp changes lives for eternity and I am blessed to be a part of that.
To be continued. . .
Summer - Part 1
So, I suppose sitting in the Anchorage airport is as good a time as any to get caught up on my blog. This summer was eventful, as a summer at camp always is. The lack of pictures in the next few blogs is because Tasha ended up with my camera at the end of the summer and I got all the way to Pendleton before I realized it!
Orientation started out on a good note. The first thing we're told is, "Don't drink the water. It won't kill you, but it tastes like chlorine." Combine that with the fact that it was too cold! It's summer, remember?! I don't think it got above 60 degrees all week. I was not okay with the whole cloudy/rainy/cold thing. I needed to thaw out, and that weather was not doing it for me.
Other than that, orientation was pretty typical. It got me thinking about leadership. I am not an "out-in-front" leader. The worst thing you could do to me is put me in front of a large group of people. I will do it if I have to, but I don't enjoy it at all. But isn't being up in front what leadership is all about? Not necessarily. I've come to the conclusion that there are different styles of leadership. Some lead from the front, some lead from the back, some lead with a combination of the two. I still don't have it completely figured out, but my leadership style is the place where my job and personality meet. My job, as head female counselor, was to lead/support/encourage the female counselors. My personality is shy and not willing to get up in front of people unless required. The point where those two (somewhat conflicting) things meet is the way I am most comfortable leading. It's a work in progress - I'm still trying to figure it out.
Our first camp was Music Camp. The tap water was finally drinkable, but Spike (the program director) announced at lunch (campers were showing up less than an hour later) that we were on water rations because something was wrong with the well. I can handle that. Then he announced that the honey buckets were on the way. (I know that he meant porta-potties, but for an Alaskan, "honey bucket" means a completely different thing. Try picturing a literal bucket in the bathroom. Upscale honey buckets have a toilet seat perched on top.) Oh, goodie. 100 campers on the way and an inability to flush the toilets. We had a lot of fun with that one. Try getting all 100 campers through the porta-potties after campfire. With 1 flashlight. Unless a camper was okay with taking care of business in complete darkness, we really could only use 1 toilet at a time. Luckily, the well was fixed by the next morning and we all got our showers and could actually flush the toilets.
The porta-potties were hauled away 3 or 4 days later, save for the 4 that got left outside the dining hall. The day after they disappeared, the ground in the circle started bubbling water. Generally not a good sign. A pipe burst or something and ALL water was shut off right after noon. No water at all. And only 4 porta-potties for the entire camp. We were all dehydrated by free time, but at least that cut down on the porta-pottie use. :-) Things were looking promising by dinner, but then a geyser erupted out of the hole in the ground. Apparently, the pipe wasn't as fixed as previously thought. Water was turned off again, but restored by the end of the day (11:00).
To be continued. . .
Orientation started out on a good note. The first thing we're told is, "Don't drink the water. It won't kill you, but it tastes like chlorine." Combine that with the fact that it was too cold! It's summer, remember?! I don't think it got above 60 degrees all week. I was not okay with the whole cloudy/rainy/cold thing. I needed to thaw out, and that weather was not doing it for me.
Other than that, orientation was pretty typical. It got me thinking about leadership. I am not an "out-in-front" leader. The worst thing you could do to me is put me in front of a large group of people. I will do it if I have to, but I don't enjoy it at all. But isn't being up in front what leadership is all about? Not necessarily. I've come to the conclusion that there are different styles of leadership. Some lead from the front, some lead from the back, some lead with a combination of the two. I still don't have it completely figured out, but my leadership style is the place where my job and personality meet. My job, as head female counselor, was to lead/support/encourage the female counselors. My personality is shy and not willing to get up in front of people unless required. The point where those two (somewhat conflicting) things meet is the way I am most comfortable leading. It's a work in progress - I'm still trying to figure it out.
Our first camp was Music Camp. The tap water was finally drinkable, but Spike (the program director) announced at lunch (campers were showing up less than an hour later) that we were on water rations because something was wrong with the well. I can handle that. Then he announced that the honey buckets were on the way. (I know that he meant porta-potties, but for an Alaskan, "honey bucket" means a completely different thing. Try picturing a literal bucket in the bathroom. Upscale honey buckets have a toilet seat perched on top.) Oh, goodie. 100 campers on the way and an inability to flush the toilets. We had a lot of fun with that one. Try getting all 100 campers through the porta-potties after campfire. With 1 flashlight. Unless a camper was okay with taking care of business in complete darkness, we really could only use 1 toilet at a time. Luckily, the well was fixed by the next morning and we all got our showers and could actually flush the toilets.
The porta-potties were hauled away 3 or 4 days later, save for the 4 that got left outside the dining hall. The day after they disappeared, the ground in the circle started bubbling water. Generally not a good sign. A pipe burst or something and ALL water was shut off right after noon. No water at all. And only 4 porta-potties for the entire camp. We were all dehydrated by free time, but at least that cut down on the porta-pottie use. :-) Things were looking promising by dinner, but then a geyser erupted out of the hole in the ground. Apparently, the pipe wasn't as fixed as previously thought. Water was turned off again, but restored by the end of the day (11:00).
To be continued. . .
Thursday, May 7, 2009
LOST
All this time-traveling stuff has officially blown my mind. That said, here are my (somewhat muddled) thoughts going into next week's season 5 finale.
1. The Jughead plot is not going to work. Either it won't detonate, or the detonation won't accomplish what it is supposed to accomplish.
2. Sawyer and Juliette aren't gone for good. They were on their way off the island, but I can't believe that they actually make it somewhere else. Those other people on the submarine get back to the "real world," but I can't believe Sawyer and Juliette are completely out of the picture.
3. Locke has gone off his rocker. I think Ben and Richard are going to take care of him, like kill him or something. I've never been a fan of Locke, and now he seems especially menacing and crazy.
4. Richard Alpert has something up his sleeve. Maybe Richard is Jacob?
5. The cataclysmic incident caused by release of large amounts of electromagnetic energy isn't going to kill everybody. The Dharma Initiative and the Others are still around in the 1990's, because that's when Ben kills them all. So, I don't see why Faraday felt the need to evacuate the island. But a hydrogen bomb explosion. . . well, it would at least give a lot of people cancer and radiation poisoning and cause birth defects in the future. None of which we see in the future Others. Maybe the hydrogen bomb explosion is going to happen, and that's what always happened, and the island is "course-correcting" as it goes along. After all, that's what Eloise told Desmond back in some earlier season: "History always course-corrects," and that's why Charlie had to die.
Whatever happens, it's going to be epic. Setting us up for an epic season 6. Or maybe they're heading for the final scene of the series being a massive shoot-out with everybody dead at the end.
1. The Jughead plot is not going to work. Either it won't detonate, or the detonation won't accomplish what it is supposed to accomplish.
2. Sawyer and Juliette aren't gone for good. They were on their way off the island, but I can't believe that they actually make it somewhere else. Those other people on the submarine get back to the "real world," but I can't believe Sawyer and Juliette are completely out of the picture.
3. Locke has gone off his rocker. I think Ben and Richard are going to take care of him, like kill him or something. I've never been a fan of Locke, and now he seems especially menacing and crazy.
4. Richard Alpert has something up his sleeve. Maybe Richard is Jacob?
5. The cataclysmic incident caused by release of large amounts of electromagnetic energy isn't going to kill everybody. The Dharma Initiative and the Others are still around in the 1990's, because that's when Ben kills them all. So, I don't see why Faraday felt the need to evacuate the island. But a hydrogen bomb explosion. . . well, it would at least give a lot of people cancer and radiation poisoning and cause birth defects in the future. None of which we see in the future Others. Maybe the hydrogen bomb explosion is going to happen, and that's what always happened, and the island is "course-correcting" as it goes along. After all, that's what Eloise told Desmond back in some earlier season: "History always course-corrects," and that's why Charlie had to die.
Whatever happens, it's going to be epic. Setting us up for an epic season 6. Or maybe they're heading for the final scene of the series being a massive shoot-out with everybody dead at the end.
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Oogrook
Melody and I heard early this afternoon that there was someone butchering a seal down near the store. We went down to see. They were outside the house of the mom of the guy who had killed it. We watched her (Helga) cut off the meat she wanted. The guy who killed it said he would probably give most of it away because it was the first one and they would catch more seals (and belugas, too!).
Just from watching her, I could tell she had been carving up seals and other animals for most of her (long) life. She was so quick to find where the bones where and where to best carve out the slabs of meat.
Helga taught us the Eskimo word for seal: oogrook. There were a couple of garbage bags of blubber sitting on the guy's sled. Helga and Ruth (another elder who was standing there talking with us) told us that they would put the blubber in a bucket and just let it sit. It would render into seal oil. Seal oil is what they used to use to light their lamps, and they still use it in a lot of recipes. We also learned that seal intestines are a delicacy.
Apparently, they scrape the meat part away from the skin of it and boil it up. Talk about using every part of the animal! :-)
Just from watching her, I could tell she had been carving up seals and other animals for most of her (long) life. She was so quick to find where the bones where and where to best carve out the slabs of meat.
Helga taught us the Eskimo word for seal: oogrook. There were a couple of garbage bags of blubber sitting on the guy's sled. Helga and Ruth (another elder who was standing there talking with us) told us that they would put the blubber in a bucket and just let it sit. It would render into seal oil. Seal oil is what they used to use to light their lamps, and they still use it in a lot of recipes. We also learned that seal intestines are a delicacy.
Apparently, they scrape the meat part away from the skin of it and boil it up. Talk about using every part of the animal! :-)
Crabs
Hard as it may be to believe, I've never tasted crab before. That being said, I was excited when Melody bought two crabs from a couple here in the village. They had just come back from their crab pot set out on the edge of the ice, and we got fresh, still-alive crabs. Melody had to go back up to the school right away, so we put the crabs in a box to cook later.
The big one in the bottom is upside down, and the other one looks like he's about to make a break for the exit. They were scrambling around a lot for the first hour or so. I thought they were going to get out and terrorize the apartment. At one point, the right-side up one managed to get himself halfway out of the box.
When Melody got back a couple of hours later, we boiled some water. The crabs were still moving a little bit, but were mostly dead. She picked one of the them up and almost got pinched as she dropped it in the water. As the steam from the boiling water hit the crab, he started scrambling and she dropped him to avoid a painful pinch. Good thing he was over the pot of water already.
We did the same thing with the second one while we were eating the first one. Fresh crab dipped in warm butter is good, I've decided. Cracking it open didn't work too well, but scissors worked perfectly. Just thinking about it, I think I need to go eat a couple of crab legs that are chilling in the fridge just waiting to be ingested. :-)
The big one in the bottom is upside down, and the other one looks like he's about to make a break for the exit. They were scrambling around a lot for the first hour or so. I thought they were going to get out and terrorize the apartment. At one point, the right-side up one managed to get himself halfway out of the box.
When Melody got back a couple of hours later, we boiled some water. The crabs were still moving a little bit, but were mostly dead. She picked one of the them up and almost got pinched as she dropped it in the water. As the steam from the boiling water hit the crab, he started scrambling and she dropped him to avoid a painful pinch. Good thing he was over the pot of water already.
We did the same thing with the second one while we were eating the first one. Fresh crab dipped in warm butter is good, I've decided. Cracking it open didn't work too well, but scissors worked perfectly. Just thinking about it, I think I need to go eat a couple of crab legs that are chilling in the fridge just waiting to be ingested. :-)
Friday, March 20, 2009
A Strange Sight
Last night, I was sitting in the living room and I heard something that sounded like a plane. Now, planes are not uncommon, and we've had plenty of them lately. The Iditarod Air Force (bush pilots that volunteer their planes and their time to shuttling supplies, people, and dogs to different destinations during the Iditarod) has been flying in and out and around the area for the few days. The sound didn't fade away, though, as planes do. I looked out our living room window and this is what I saw:
A helicopter landed out on the ice. My first thought was, "Iditarod Air Force." I had seen a helicopter fly over a couple of times from my classroom window on Tuesday, although I hadn't remembered it being such an ugly brown-ish/green-ish/gray-ish color. I knew that a couple of teams had scratched (dropped out of the race) in Elim, and maybe a helicopter has more room to haul out dogs and sleds. Of course, I wondered why it was parked out on the ice so far away from the village, airstrip, and/or checkpoint, but whatever. I saw a handful of people climb out and go across the ice towards the village. The helicopter just sat there. After about an hour, I saw two more people climb out and head towards the village.
I called the only other teacher that I knew hadn't taken off for spring break - he always knows what's going on. He told me that it was a National Guard helicopter. One of the mushers is a member of the National Guard. They recruited him to run the Iditarod; he's like their poster boy. The National Guard people were taking pictures and video of him at each checkpoint. That definitely explained the ugly color of the chopper. After about 3 hours, I saw the people come back, load up, start the chopper and turn themselves around:
They headed west. . .
And disappeared around the edge of the cape towards White Mountain, the next checkpoint. . .
See the tiny black dot in the middle of the picture? That's the helicopter as it went for the corner and disappeared. Keep in mind that the beautiful sunset in these pictures is happening after 9:00 at night.
A helicopter landed out on the ice. My first thought was, "Iditarod Air Force." I had seen a helicopter fly over a couple of times from my classroom window on Tuesday, although I hadn't remembered it being such an ugly brown-ish/green-ish/gray-ish color. I knew that a couple of teams had scratched (dropped out of the race) in Elim, and maybe a helicopter has more room to haul out dogs and sleds. Of course, I wondered why it was parked out on the ice so far away from the village, airstrip, and/or checkpoint, but whatever. I saw a handful of people climb out and go across the ice towards the village. The helicopter just sat there. After about an hour, I saw two more people climb out and head towards the village.
I called the only other teacher that I knew hadn't taken off for spring break - he always knows what's going on. He told me that it was a National Guard helicopter. One of the mushers is a member of the National Guard. They recruited him to run the Iditarod; he's like their poster boy. The National Guard people were taking pictures and video of him at each checkpoint. That definitely explained the ugly color of the chopper. After about 3 hours, I saw the people come back, load up, start the chopper and turn themselves around:
They headed west. . .
And disappeared around the edge of the cape towards White Mountain, the next checkpoint. . .
See the tiny black dot in the middle of the picture? That's the helicopter as it went for the corner and disappeared. Keep in mind that the beautiful sunset in these pictures is happening after 9:00 at night.
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