Blog Of Notes

International Camp

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Heya, I came back from international camp on the 2nd of December, but was too busy to blog about it ... so here it is.

International Camp (28 Nov - 2 Dec)

Day 1
Well, day 1 was basically setting up of camp site and mingling around with other guides from other schools. So we pitched our tents and gadgets. We also learnt to say 'welcome' and Good Morning" by our Sri Lanka friends in their language :) I forgot how to say them already but nvm. We also got to meet our former guider, Ms Ng and felt she was a really good guider.

Day 2

Backwoodsman Cooking !!! Haha, it was fun. Unlike our normal outdoor cooking, we did not have pots or pans. We were taught to use green twigs as skewers by shaving off the outer layer and then sharpening one of the ends. We also heated it above the fire to disinfect it. I was in the turfing part though, so I didnt do the skewers. We turfed for awhile until we found that there were roots underneath, so we had to move to another place. The instructor wanted to quicken things up, so he helped us turf. haha. He was REALLY fast! He managed to turf a pit under like.... 20 seconds? The pit was really nice too, with straight sides and all that. Anyways, we started to firelight and finally after burning lots of wood to obtain enough ember, we could do ember cooking. Its like barbecuing :) The food took forever to cook though.... or maybe I was just too hungry...haha. Had a great time though:)

Recycling Art... kinda slack, but useful. I learnt toe-weaving.... sth like friendship bands. We had early bath time though :)

At night...
We learnt line dancing :) Quite fun:)

Day 3

Horse Riding... It was interesting having a tour around the stable and learning about how the horse behave and live. I even brought back a horse shoe which they gave for free. We also rode the horse. It was really nice to ride on a horse again.... we last time i rode was a long time ago. I found that horses are actually very sensetive as they can sense whether you r scared or not. They stop walking when they feel that you are afraid. That happended to me at the beginning as I forgot how it felt to be on a horse after so many years. We also took lots of pics:) They are really cute and friendly:)

Archery:) Archery was fun! I thought it was going to be very hard just to set the arrow flying but this was quite all right. I managed to shoot one balloon and the bull's eye once :) But it was all by luck.

Pioneering.... IT WAS SUPER COOL! We made this giant catapult out of spars and had a water bomb fight with the opponent team. Haha. Water bombs were flying around and I managed to make it through without getting wet. Woots:)

At night...
We went night cycling :) We started to cycled at around 11 pm. First, we took a bus to East Coast Park to get our bikes, from there, we cycled to Orchard Road, The Esplanade, Padang and then to Fort Canning Park, before cycling back. I loved cycling at Orchard Rd cos we were under the lights. Its was really cool cycling under rows and rows of christmas lights, seeing them approach me before "moving" behind me :) At the Esplanade we saw a lot of lovers by the river though. A bit gross. Anyways, when we went up to for canning park, we had a long rest. It was a little scary when we were on our way, cos due to the traffic light, xiao en and I were separated from those infront. So xiao en was the first person, but we had no idea which direction to go. Thus, we jsut went straight. We made it though, we managed to catch up with the rest. Paddling up the hill was too hard.... so I got down and pushed my bike half way through. Almost everyone did that. While most of the people went to take a nap, the 4 of us nygg decided to tell jokes... cold ones.... lame one........ with ms teng. Haha. Was really funny. Was laughing the whole time. Quote from ms teng... "examining my torchlight is more interesting." Haha. That was when we were talking abt those really lames ones... haha. We were super lucky cos all of us got treated to Macdonald's before we rode back. By then it was almost 5 or 6 am and there were more cars, so we had to be very careful. When we were back at East Coast Park, we were given the permission to speed....... haaha. Was really nice having the cool breeze on ur face. We had to wait for the bus to come pick us up though, so huijun, sarah, xiaoen and I sat near the beach and had a rest. I fell asleep. haha. It was funny how awake I was when I was cycling and then a moment later, when I got down, I immediately felt tired. Ms teng joined us too so the 5 of us just sat by the beach to rest. Finally, the bus arrived and we went back to Camp Christine. I slept some more on the bus and got a bruise cos my head hit the glass window when the bus turned, but I was too tired to care.

Day 4
We had breakfast and had a bath b4 going to sleep. The tent felt like an oven but I still slept. Xiao En and Sarah only managed to get abt 15 min of sleep while I slept all the way like Hui Jun. They said my eyes were 1 mm open when I was sleeping and Hui Jun talked in her sleep. Maybe we were too tired? Anyway, when we all woke up, the rest went to chat with the other guides as it was pretty much free time as there was a carnival going on and we were not involved in setting up a stall. I think stayed in the tent to fold my sleeping bag I think, cant rmb. When I was abt to walk out of the tent, a snake suddenly came in. I didnt notice it at first when it was on our shoes. I was like jumping about when its head shot towards my shin. The snake's head knocked onto my shine but it didnt bite. I guess it was frightened by my jumping and slithered away. Phew! Later, I saw my lil sis and my pri sch brownies at a stall and bought a magnet from them. Slacked around a bit and practised camp fire item.

In the evening, it was camp fire. Everyone was super high la. We also present our item...

on the 1st day of I-Camp we went to camp christine
we all look so neat and clean

on the 2nd day of I-Camp we went to ride a horse
the horse got crossed
and we screamed till our voices were lost

on the 3rd day of I-Camp everything went wrong
the shower queue was long
my mood was gone
and I started to sing a sad song

on the 4th day of I-Camp
We gained a lot of weight
6 meals a day
like horses eating hay
heaps and tonnes we ate
all because the food was really really great

BUT...
By the 5th day of I-Camp
We've made a lot friends
AGNES ROCKS MAN
Packed up all our tents and though the journey was tense
we all enjoyed the camp in the end

Btw, Agnes refers to our subcamp cos we were called Agnes Baden Powell :)
After the campfire and all the singing, we had this dancing thing when they played songs and we just started to dance anything we liked. We also learnt the traditional dances that were performed by the different nationalities.

That's pretty much all abt the camp. We went home on day 5 and had a good rest:)

International Camp was a really good experiece for me:) Met many new friends and got to learnt new skills. I'll never regret going:) Everyone there was really nice and enthu, though we had our mistakes like no sense of urgency, but we helped make the guides from overseas feel welcomed. We will be sure to try and pass on what we have learnt to the rest of the guides in ny. Basically, this will be one of my best memories and I will miss this camp. I managed to get a few contacts though, so we won't totally drift apart. I really feel privileged to be able to particitpate in the camp:)

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