Ollie / Inka

So I thought I would share a whole list of songs that I play to send my campers to sleep.

Another thing I love about being a counsellor at camp, I can play whatever the hell I want and the kids cant do anything about it =P

Bop - Enjoy the moment (Unquote remix)

Synkro - Departure (Med School Music)

Circa - Ida (Med School Music)

June Miller - Neurosis

All the above being in the drum and bass minimal community.

John Legend - Ordinary People

José González 'Crosses'

And a load of the rest being more Jose Gonzalez and Foo Fighters CD2 of 'In Your Honour' naturally.

Soon to come part 2! - Songs to wake campers up (it gets a lot more interesting =D)

/Ollie

So today was possibly the funniest day i've had since i've been at camp.
It was my first day off having worked 10 days straight, and as expected, i tried to make the most of it.
As the nights off begin the previous night past 8.30pm usually, we (Me, Joanna, Peter and James) had planned to go to Boston for Peters birthday as he turned 21. As soon as the time hit 8.30pm and even before, we had been excited the entire week for it come about and naturally got slightly frustrated at how long the evening activity lasted, despite it being pretty boring for us counsellors as we just sat in 1 place waiting for the kids to walk in. The evening activity was Zombie Invasion and consisted of all the counsellors walking round camp like zombies and attempting to turn the humans aka the campers, to zombies as well by grabbing socks from their waists.
Anyway, after escaping from the activity and going to the liquor store (my attempt at remembering not to say Offy or Off Licence) , we parted with a considerable amount of liquid substances for consumption later that evening and arriving into Boston and sipping our first drink was a relief to say the least.
After meeting the housemates and throwing a few back without forgetting Mr Cuervo in between, we headed out to a bar and subsequently drank more and basically fed Peter with various concoctions.




We retired pretty early (I only bought 2 drinks) but were greeted to an awesome party back at the house with some grub to satisfy our drink induced hunger. Waking up in the basement the next morning, I felt like I had slept in the most awkward position and no matter where I moved, I couldn't find a comfy place to sleep. Then I realised it wasn't where I was sleeping, it was the dam heat! stupid hot countries!
Anyway after waking up and getting some breakfast whilst talking about the previous nights antics, we all headed back home and it started to piss down with rain.
This is where it got interesting..
So basically there have been problems down the street before with rain, and whilst they were never as bad as this, they still caused damage to various houses including the one we were in. The rain started to get worse and the thunder and lightning broke out which is notoriously more violent in America compared to England. It actually sounded like a gunshot right on the porch. I was enjoying myself with the cool temperature (which would probably be britain's hottest summer back home haha) but little did I know the events that were about to unfold.
Outside the back door, a fair amount of water had gathered and we were all talking about how deep it was (came up to the rims on the car).
All of a sudden the drains in the road had blocked and water was rising at an alarming rate and started to reach the garden. Whilst this wouldnt normally prove much of a problem for a typical english home, American houses out here tend to house cellars which lead up into the garden. After realising that there was a strong, if not inevitable, possibility of water going into the basement, we all run down into the cellar and were faced with water gushing through the doors. The first instinct was to find anything that needed saving (the guys who lived here had books, clothes, and unfortunately housed couches down there as a further chillout room) and to bring it upstairs to safety, but unfortunately as the water rose further, the couches were beyond saving and started to happily bob about the room whilst we went back and forth moving whatever was worth saving.
After the water level reached its peak, we decided to make the most of a bad situation and play out in the rain. First we decided to walk about in the road which came up to over our knees as shown here:





Followed by riding bikes:




Followed by, my favourite, canoeing:




In between we were performing some sort of public rescue service and pushing cars up hills to safety due to idiots thinking they are invulnerable to water with their stupid small cars. Whilst some people may think they can float on water, maybe checking the big ass Escalade in the road and realising the water comes up the grill might give you some idea that it isn't possible..



After the street was drained a few hours later, we then proceeded to head out into town and went round Harvard campus:


I also learn that the feet of this statue are pissed on by frat boys as part of initiation.. nice..




Random photos












Lila pretty pissed off with a haircut that cost her 50 dollaaaaassssss. Or should I say blowdry:



Bow to the indian chief!


Me using a parking meter


Showing Lila how high her 'pants' are


Pete on a slack line (giving him some credit he turned round earlier and walked back - he wasnt in the best state of mind to be doing it at this point






Right its now 1.22am and i gotta get up at 7.30am so ima hit the sack and will post up some more jazz sometime soon
PEACE!

/Ollie

So its another day and another rest period.
This week has been pretty eventful and a lot of fun! Most of the days I’m coaching at least 2 hours of tennis to the kids and the other 2 periods consist of something random (like in an hour I’m assisting a guy teaching kids but have never fished myself haha). Although for the forth hour of coaching I am taking a swim group which is now set in stone, so I only have 1 period to play around with.

Yesterday I decided to do kayaking and the day before I did a basketball period with Sara.
Sara’s an awesome girl who is into her basketball a lot and comes from NYC. I’m always teasing her about how she’s constantly asleep until 10.30 (not literally) but we are always having a laugh and get along pretty easy.
Without forgetting to mention Tara (also lives in NYC ) she’s also another awesome girl and in my opinion is about 1000 times smarter than I am. She has a very broad knowledge of things and is my agony aunt if I ever have a mental crisis =)

Lila is also amongst the girls and from the NYC again. She teaches dance at camp and has a lovely personality and is really easy to get along with. She always walks up to me with funny stories during the day and we both share the same stupid experiences haha . We have both started quotebooks at the random crap we all say and its building quite well =P
Amongst my other close friends at camp is a guy from Ted – your stereotypical frat boy American =D (just kidding Teddybear! =P). He’s sound as a pound, has a super nice car (Bluetooth to ipod music syncher, outside code sequence on the door in case you lock your keys in) and always has good banter when we are off shift.

Arturo the eye-tie is quite a funny guy. Always keepin’ it gangsta! We run tennis like no other and are usually on the same wavelength when it comes to humour. He never fails to make me laugh and is pretty quick off the ball – pun intended.

James aka North is another Brit here at camp and is pretty laid back. He is ALWAYS late when going out and loves to immerse himself in layer after layer of baby oil (pretty gay). However we share the same ideas and are always amased at the same things that we discover – the other day we found out americans call McDonalds Miccy D’s, pretty stupid if you ask us! And when we found fireflies we were absolutely amazed for about 30 minutes…Ok I still am I’ll admit it.
Hope to get more pictures up soon!

/Ollie

So Wednesday the 30th June the campers arrived! After a short motivational speech from the directors, we all ran over to the bus where the kids were getting off and greeted them with silly chants and lots of cheering to ‘get pumped’ as so commonly put here.
After a couple of hours all of our campers had arrived and we were introduced to 8 funny, small and intuitive kids.
The first one we met was Nicholas. Such a cool kid! Really open and down to earth with just about anything. Always a pleasant one to talk to when the opportunity arises.

The second kid to arrive is Gustavo. He lives next to camp and is always talking. Somehow, most of the talk always relates back to shooting or FBI or guns but I guess that’s just how he is. He’s the troublemaker of the bunk and has a bit of a tendency to disobey as much as possible. On the other hand, he’s a perfectly nice kid and always has something to say so you can rely on him to get some conversation going if need be.

A kid named August is the third one to arrive and is usually a bit quiet but again a very nice kid to talk to. He likes to keep things calm and doesn’t usually cause any problems (so far).

The forth called Nate H is a very outspoken person and has an obsession with high 5’s. Just yesterday we were at staff meeting and were telling funny stories when someone stood up to mention one about Nate H. Apparently one of the counsellors had walked up to him for a high 5 and had changed to a closed palm and said ‘Acorn’!, Nate then said ‘I got one I got one’, repeated the same high five and replied ‘Paper covers rock bitch!’ hahahahaha. Such a funny lad but very welcoming to the outsider in the bunk who I will mention later.

The fifth known as Nate W is the smallest of them all and looks fairly athletic. My director mentions how he is one of the top gymnasts in MA and straight away I ask him about it when first meeting him. Later in the week I challenged him to a handstand contest for a laugh. He had no problems shooting me out of the water with that one. Perfect handstand with both feet pointed upwards and clasped together. So far I think he’s one of those kids who is good at just about anything. Give him a sport and he will give it his all.

Rafa (Rafael) is the sixth to arrive and is from Spain! His Spanish accent is strong and without sounding creepy is the cutest kid of the bunk. You could almost fit him in your pocket! => I love to speak Spanish to him randomly and at dinner he tells me about how the Americans think he is good at football when in fact he says that ‘The americans are just a low standard’ which I sort of agree with haha.

The seventh kid to arrive is Josh. He is an awesome individual and talks the most out of everyone. He enjoys classical music and also likes to compose it…although maybe needs some guidance in how to write it but he tries which is always the first step! =) He is the slowest eater in the world (literally) and is always the last left at the breakfast/lunch/dinner table. I usually stay with him to motivate him to eat faster but its always quite difficult as he has a habit of wandering off mid-bite.
The last to mention was initially the most problematic as all the other kids had known each other before this year’s camp. His name is Aaron and is a rather interesting individual who I could write an essay on. When he first arrives he is understandably quiet and we all try our best to integrate him from the moment he arrives, into the rest of the group. For the first day he remains sceptical and the difficulty remains even throughout the evening. As the week has gone on, he has definitely shown signs of opening up to the other campers and loves the place more than he could of imagined. His ideals are adult in nature and his maturity exceeds his age significantly. Constantly he is giving opinions on things, which I find interesting, and sometimes bewildering how he could know so much about topics which I don’t. He likes to read the newspaper and his favourite sections are the business and stock market. Whilst I respect this highly, I myself have no opinion or knowledge on the matter and sometimes have questioned if I should too, read these sections to reach the level of the maturity that he has! Haha. I have formed a friendly bond with him and we still teach each other new things day in day out and I look forward to what the months bring ahead.

So that’s the overview of my campers but what is coaching really like?

So the day is split into various stages which are:
Wake up 7.30 and cleaning until 8am.
8am Breakfast until 8.45
8.45 planning session and period (refers to each hour of activity provided to the kids) presentation – you can present a small skit to make the kids laugh to entice them to attend your session and sign ups will follow.
9.45 – First period until 10.45
10.45 – Second period until 11.45
11.45 – 1st General – The idea is to make sure kids are doing something and you are involved with helping them in some way or continuing to develop their skills whilst at camp.
12.45 – Lunch until 1.30
1.30 Rest period until 2.45 (pretty much the only time to sit down or rest in the day) with the kids in the bunk but the rules are strictly to keep things quiet (which is where I am right now writing this as they are in bed reading or listening to music)
2.45 – Period 3 until 3.45
3.45 – Period 4 until 4.45
4.45 – 2nd General until 5.45
6pm – Dinner
6.45 – Evening forum (a meeting with all the staff and campers to discuss the day and any announcements such as someone scoring a bullseye in Archery or a birthday etc
7.30 – Evening activity – this ranges from building a boat with a load of materials in order to fetch something from the lake in groups for a laugh – pictures to follow which was very fun, to a campfire night which is where the whole camp silently meets up (emphasis on silent) and walks to the campfire whereby we all sing songs and have a laugh and are all read a story. Quite an emotional time if im being honest and emotions can run wild (as I found out). A very spiritual experience like no other and im very grateful to have some thinking time with soothing songs in the background with the whole camp singing along.
The evening activity can range in times from 8.30 finish to 10.30pm finish.

So theres a general overview of the day to day camp however Tuesday and Sundays are slightly different and revolve around inter-camp games and competitions and an extra 30 minutes sleep on Sunday (woohoo).
I will finish with saying, I have never treasured my free time as much as I have at camp. Every minute I get off is like a golden pearl and I treasure it whilst it lasts =P
Not to say I don’t love camp though! Haha.

Right.. time to get changed. I have tennis coaching in 5 minutes and then an hour of swim group teaching which will be nice to cool down with as its around 33 degrees today. So not used to this..

Peace!
/Ollie

So its now Saturday the 26th of June and so far so good!
The last few days have been pretty heavy schedule and work still remains to be done! Waking up at 8am (max) to a full day of training until 8.30pm has been pretty hectic to say the least. Whilst all the work doesn’t necessarily focus on theory and also contains various fun team games and simply designing stuff for my bunk, it can be a bit much after having got to sleep at 1am (much like tonight).
Also today was an awesome day because each of the counsellors were assigned to their bunk/cabins for summer and the age group of kids that they will be looking after. After much discussion and the possibility of choice for which bunk to take care of for summer, I opted to take care of 12 year olds due to my past experience and my ability to get along with them (lets hope).
So leading on from this, the kids will be arriving on Wednesday and we will see from there if everything works out =)
I also found out who I would be living with and sharing responsibility for the kids and they were the English guy I met on the way over, Billy Barclay, and a 16 year old counsellor named Julias. Both pretty down to earth, level headed people so it shouldn’t prove a problem in the long term. We look forward to meeting our campers and taking them along to paint their own name plaques (pictures to be uploaded as an example. Don’t take the piss out of my art skills, and yes I know im crap at it ok?).

We also found out which CIT’s (counsellors in training) we would be living with for the duration of camp as well and they turned out to be some funny, quirky, 16 year olds.
We had their names before they arrived so one of our tasks were to create chants for each one as we welcomed them into our bunk. Pretty stupid but it was hilarious to hear some of them.

Fun fact! : Each bunk consists of at least 2 counsellors (older applicants that have applied out of camp i.e. BUNAC, Camp America etc), a varied number of CITS (0-4 and we have 4), and campers that are the kids that come to camp(from 8-12, we have 8).

Sunday the 27th June
So I woke up today not quite sure what to expect as we are sometimes left in the lurk specifically (but not generally) about whats going on, however, after breakfast finished we were sent to play team dodgeball (frikkin awesome!). A lot more challenging than I expected but awesome nonetheless. After team dodgeball followed our practice at search and rescue. Explanations on how people found people in the lake were shown (looked very strenuous and a serious drill took place to show us the importance) and we were then taken through step-by-step stages on what to do following a blow on the emergency beacon. They told us that we should expect an adrenaline rush when they plan to run a drill in a few weeks when the kids are present, and that it can be quite a scary time but we just have to deal with it to the best of our ability. I am NOT looking forward to performing that one.. =<
The evening was the most fun as we had yet another random event. Camp was split into 3 groups (youngest bunks – middle bunks – oldest bunks) and the objective was to build a boat using provided materials and to then get a team member to row out on the lake and collect a fish (not a real one, so.. a potato) and then return to land. ALL the boats were funny and creative yet none were immune to the inevitable fate that was water (base materials included cardboard haha). We were even provided with harpoons (an air pump powered rocket) and had a side objective to shoot other boats. Hopefully if I can put some pictures up I will but I didn’t take any so will try nab some off another counsellor at a later date.
To say the rest of the evening was fun would be an understatement but I’ll leave it at that.

Monday 28th June
So today after waking up pretty early in the most expensive house I’ve ever set foot in, we went to the mall in search of a few things and I finally managed to get a phone and some extra clothes that I really needed. Pretty lazy day really, however getting back on shift at 6pm we were surprised with a hilarious evening event. We were all told to dress up in the stupidest possible way and were all told to meet by the car park. The camp counsellors also told us that this was the best idea they had thought of yet since the camp was built so after gathering and laughing for about 30 minutes,
An example of the outfits (Brian in this one)

we boarded the camp buses and were all pretty hyped up about where we were being taken. After having been driven round the block and straight back into camp (pretty funny at the time), we got off the bus into the canteen. The counsellors in charge of the camp had transformed the building into a disco, hilarious. We all had to queue up outside with ID and then were let into a manic (and about 40 degree) room full of people high on sugar from being served red bull and random energy drinks. We were specifically told to dance like idiots and anyone being seen dancing well would be kicked out =P
Such a funny evening and I’m amazed at the energy this place has. I’ve never felt so open to being an idiot/dancing like a madman/just doing whatever the hell I feel like in order to enjoy myself and amuse others around me.

Other stuff
Stuff that happened but I forgot what day (its all quite jumbled up at the moment)
Other stuff to mention that was pretty funny was the camp being on lockdown for the last world cup USA and England matches and had random pictures posted around camp. You'll get the idea from these pictures hehe





A scavenger hunt was also organised for the whole camp last week sometime whereby we were all given clues and had to drive off campus to find the locations and then met for dinner. The second we were given directions, our group SCRAMBLED and i mean that in the full sense of the word as you can see here:


And had to take pictures at each place to prove we had been there (pay particular attention to the women on the right side of one of the photos as shes pretty mad..although we found it pretty funny at the time)








Random photos



Ben-rich's swollen hand from a mosquito bite
They are quite itchy i have to say. Also I look like I have chicken pox 24/7 so going to load up on bug spray asap!


Ted and Harry playing the M.I.N.E. + swear game
Basically we started playing a game whereby anytime you say the word 'mine' you have to do 10 press ups no matter the place or time. Pretty hilarious to say the least. Also any swear words incurred a 10 situp fine. YOU'LL BE RIPPED IN 4 DAYS!


Eating a big apple in the Big Apple (Credit goes to Jose)


A super sick house I stayed at = HUGE.


Picture of all the tennis crew! From left to right: Tarrafa (One of the most interesting guys I have ever met. His words are very wise and his stories are incredible. Hes been through alot!), Arturo, Ben-Rich, Sammy, a mexican, and Rachel!


The lake at camp

So touching down in New York gave me butterflies in my stomach and the familiar ‘oh my god im in America’ feeling came back to me. Not entirely sure why I get that feeling although being here does excite me =)
After queuing up for over an hour to get into customs, all went ok and I picked up my baggage from the other side without any problems (despite me having a minor freak out that I would lose my luggage for no apparent reason).
Suddenly I got a tap on my shoulder and realise that this guy, who I have also been staring at throughout the zig-zag queue back and forth, is actually coming to my camp! Its Billy Barclay – he’s teaching football at my camp and we get along fairly easily and I finally get a buddy to travel with to camp? Wow that sounded gay.
All the other BUNAC’ers had congregated on the other side of the terminal so we went and sat down and joined them. Whilst soaking up the atmosphere of my first steps in the country, I bought a Mountain Dew! Man I missed that taste =)
So then we got our bus to NYC; further goosebumps were kicking in and the closer we got into the heart of the city, the more excited I became. After the initial orientation of what’s what, I get told im bunking with 9 other guys which was interesting to say the least. Despite having never met any of them (apart from Billy) we decided to all head out and get some dinner.
Heres a picture of my meal, pretty huge if im being honest, yet the picture doesn’t quite do it any justice as to how big it actually was.


I forgot to catch any of their names so could be slightly difficult to track them down once I decide to search for them haha – apart from one guy, Mustafa whos Albanian, was pretty talkative and was funny as anything. Anyway after we head back to our room after dinner, we all seem to pass out pretty quick and woke up at 7.30 to shower and head to breakfast.
After we hit breakfast, we were told to meet downstairs in the lobby at 9.30 to be sent off to camp – after getting our instructions we were sent down the subway to 42nd street (Times square) and caught our bus to Providence RI. We had an extra hour or so to kill so Billy and I decided to walk about a bit and hit the shops to see if there was anything that we fancied.




After we caught our bus and a lovely 7 hour trip passes us by, we finally got to our destination and met up with 2 counsellors Gill and.. crap I cant remember his name haha, who took us to camp and there we met my camp director Will and his wife Sandy and all the other staff. Immediately we are taken to get some food and greeted by some lovely pizza! The rest of the evening pretty much consisted of just talking to the other counsellors and getting to know them.
Sunday, Billy and I woke up and laze about camp whilst watching some football from the world cup and decide to session the table tennis pretty hard. Both of us acknowledged the fact that if we were able to continue our addictive sessions, by the end of the summer we are going to enter 2012 olympics however I’m, sure once the kids get here its going to be pretty hectic.
Monday is here already! Another early start (better get used to these) and straight after breakfast and a shower, we headed off to find something to do, plus today we have nothing on so we have a whole day to kill!
Me, Billy and Ted, one of the American counsellors who teaches lifesaving/swimming is your stereotypical looking American (not fat before you think; will get a picture up soon) and showed us what’s decent to kill time. I was CRAVING to play some basketball since I got here so fortunately for me, we all headed straight for the basketball court to play anything and everything we could get our hands on.



Basketball, baseball, ultimate Frisbee, throwing, American football, and rugby were all parts of the agenda and before I knew it, I was sweating like a waterfall on crack.
After lunch we decided to hit the lake and great grandmothers spatula it was warm! I actually got in without thinking for a split second that I was in the Antarctica. A nice change from crappy England beaches.
We swam to the other side and immediately straight back. It was pretty exhausting I wont lie, and having already been told that there are turtles that will bit clear through anything and I mean anything, I didn’t really want to hang about.
After dinner we all went to see Toy Story 3 and hung out at the Mall beforehand and had no idea how expensive jerseys were.. Christ they are like 80 dollars a pop… might rethink some gifts for that sake. I’m not made of money…
Anyway it’s time to hit the sack for me tonight. Im pretty exhausted (yeah from all this lazing about) from today and starting staff training tomorrow so should be interesting to formulate some sessions. World cup/ American open themed tennis are on the horizon for the kids so I got some planning to do!

Peace
/Ollie