Bonjour de Tours! I am all moved into my new residence here in Tours! However, before I begin documenting my new adventure, here is the post summarizing the rest of my summer that I wrote in Pearson Airport last Wednesday!
Hello from Pearson Airport (again)! In just
one hour my mother and I will be leaving the continent and flying across the
Atlantic to my home for the next 4 months – FRANCE! If you avert your eyes to
the top of this page, you can see that I have already changed the title of my
blog as for this semester; this blog will no longer be about my life at
Bishop’s but instead will detail my life at l’Université Francois Rabelais in
Tours, France. So buckle your seatbelts and follow me as I begin my next
exciting adventure! Allons-y!
The last time you heard from me I had just
returned from the most magical place on Earth, Disney World. It has been about
3 weeks since then and in typical Erica Zucker fashion, I did not take a
day of rest before I went up to Camp Wenonah for the last three weeks of my
summer. And what a great three weeks it was! Despite the car troubles on the
way up, we made it in good time and I immediately got myself settled into the
brand new tabin in the Leadership Village. I was a bit sad to find out that two
of my best friends at camp, Sara and Hannah were away in Algonquin Park on
POLARIS trips but I was greeted by a ton of other coworkers from last summer,
returning campers and of course, my little sister. I arrived on a great day too
as the next morning was the sleep-in Sunday brunch! Do I have good timing or
what? Unfortunately, there was no sleep-in for me and I stole my sister’s
sleep-in from her too as I used her as my victim to do my Bronze Cross
recertification in the morning. I am happy to report that I passed, though I
did have to switch my brain back to the Canadian standards as opposed to what I
was using in Disney World.
For the first week that I was up at Camp, I
was a floater, meaning I jumped in wherever and whenever help was needed. For
example, I was thrown into a parade, playing the role of Kim Possible. I lifeguarded, I made giant bubbles and later
in the week, I was made executive assistant to my coworker Oliver who was
planning the camp theme day. For this day, regular camp programming is stopped
and the whole day is centred around the theme, which in this year’s case was
WenonahCon aka a comic book convention. I helped the counsellors in training (WCITs) make costumes and signs and decorations and I helped Oliver make powder paint.
For anyone wondering, powder paint is what they use at the Run or Dye or Colour
Me Rad runs and it is corn starch, water and dye. First, we mixed the
ingredients. Next, we spread it out on baking sheets to dry. Then, we were
supposed to put it in the blender but of course, both camp blenders were broken so
Oliver and I had to grind it all by hand. It was a very, very long night.
 |
| Lord Somers Day Parade |
On Theme Day, I dressed up as Wonder Woman
and was in charge of running the Interactive Video Game station, which was a
game station at the beach. Different cabin groups rotated through a series of stations
through the morning and then there was a camp wide game in the afternoon, where
campers had to run around and get autographs of the different celebrities
attending WenonahCon. It was then my job to count all the collected autographs
and figure out the winning cabin. The oldest boys cabin was the winner and
overall, Theme Day was a huge success!
For my second week at Camp, I was a head
counsellor for Camp Kivita, which is a charity organization that brings up a
group of campers who are all post-organ transplant to Wenonah. I worked with
this group last year, counselling the youngest girls’ cabin and I was assigned
to the same age group again this year. I had 6 campers return from last year and
had 5 new ones, aged 7-10. In addition, I had two older Kivita volunteers, two
fantastic WCITs, Rachel and Maddy and a second staff, Laura. Wenonah also
brought up a former staff member, Dan to head the Kivita program, as it is
somewhat different from the regular camp program. Some of the programming has
to be altered to meet the medical needs of the campers but aside from a few
minor changes we run it like a traditional introductory week program. As
cabins, we rotated through a set of ten activities, had three cabin choices,
had several Kivita programs and participated in some all camp activities.
Unfortunately, two of my campers and one of my volunteers got sick and had to
leave camp and one of my campers left early to go to the One Direction concert but
all in all it was a great week. Lucky for me, my little girls LOVED Disney,
especially singing Disney songs, so I bonded with them over princesses,
castles, Frozen songs, etc. At the final campfire we sang Let it Go as a cabin
and it was one of my favourite moments of the whole summer.
For my third and final week at Wenonah, I
was the second staff in Hawthorn for the 4B program. Laura and I had a cabin of
10 girls, aged 11-13. It was my first time counselling teenagers so I said to
them on the first day that I was sorry in advance if I treated them like they
were younger than they were. It was very different not having to pour their
juice, walk them to the bathroom, remind them to wash their hands, etc. but of
course I still did all of that, even if they did not need it. What was neat
about the 4B intro program is that the campers are there for the Wenonah Games.
The games are our camp Olympics and everyone in camp is divided into three
teams, with families all being on the same one.
Lauren, Jamie and I are on Aki, the green team and I have to say, this
year’s games were probably my favourite to date. I participated in many events,
including the staff triathlon, staff ping pong, the Eco Challenge and the
Mickle Island Canoe Race. I ran events as well, including ping pong, tetherball
and the camp classic Greasy Watermelon. The best part of the games for me was
getting to do some events with my brother and sister. I watched them do the
camper triathlon, in which they crossed the finish line holding hands. I did the Eco Challenge with Lauren and we
learned that neither of us could strike a match. I got to paddle in a boat in
the canoe race with Jamie and we ended up coming second overall. In the end,
Aki ending up winning the August Games, which has only happened one other time
in my 13 years at Wenonah. I think I have to give some of our victory credit to
my mom, who sent Lauren, Jamie and me very impressive care packages, filled
with green merchandise and Gatorade energy chews. So thanks, mom, we could not
have done it without you!
The Games were a great way to end my
summer. However Camp does not end with the Games, so there were still more
memorable moments to follow. For those who do not know, the camp owner is the
husband of one of my mom’s housemates from university. Her 3 daughters (and
niece and nephew) attend the camp, as well as the daughters of two of my mom
and her other housemates. Together, all of us children call ourselves the
Queen’s babies or sometimes ”the cousins.” At the closing campfire on the last
night of camp, my brother, sister and I sang a song with the other Queen’s
babies, something we have been trying to organize for years and finally put
together this summer. Despite the lack of musical talent that I personally
bring to the table, I think that our performance went really well. I only wish that
all of our moms were there to share the moment with us.
Saturday I was on bus duty so I was up and
moving just as early as my campers in order to get all of my stuff on to the
bus to Vaughan Mills Mall. However, before the bus left, we had one more Camp
tradition to uphold. Each session of camp ends with a giant hug circle in which
everyone in camp hugs everyone in camp. One thing that everyone looks forward
to each year is watching Jeff give the very first hug because he always has a
special reason for choosing whom he does. This year, it was my brother, sister and
I who shared the first hug and I could not have asked for two better people to
share it with. It was a truly special moment to give them a group hug at the
circle because as I had said to Jeff the night before, one of the reasons I
love camp is because I get to spend time with my family. The three weeks I was
up at camp was the longest period of time I have spent with Lauren and Jamie
this year and I am so thankful for every moment I got to share with them.
Once the hug circle was over, myself along
with three other staff members and 60 or so campers boarded the bus and left
camp. We dropped the campers off at Vaughan Mills, dropped another 7 off at
Pearson airport and then drove back up to camp for the staff banquet. As usual,
the food was delicious and the night ended in tears after all the staff awards
were given out and the final slideshow of the summer was played. For the second
time that day, I boarded the bus for Vaughan Mills Mall and officially left
Camp Wenonah for another year.
Wednesday I was up bright and early to pack
and my mom and I left for the airport just after lunch. We parked, checked our
bags, safely made it through security and got ready to fly. We flew directly to Tours after we landed in Paris where we will stayed until Frida. We spent the weekend in Paris and now I am back in Tours, beginning my orientation week. Maintenent, c’est le temps pour
commencer à utiliser mon français, alors au revior et bon soirée! J’écrirai encore cette semaine!
Avec amour,
Erica xoxoxoxoxoxoxo
No comments:
Post a Comment