Sleepless nights and shower curtains...
Trip Start
Jun 15, 2010
1
3
24
Trip End
Jan 27, 2011
Hunter, New York
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
The next day I went on a walking tour of Harlem, Wall Street, over to Staten Island and then back to Manhattan at night. To see it all lit up was amazing, then we hit the blinding lights of Times Square. The next day I went up the Empire State Building with a few friends I made at the hostel and we headed to a Yankee's game that night. I was fantastic, completely overdone and so much fun.
The next day the bus took a small group of us to camp where we met up with the 30 or so people who had been training and setting up already. Then around 150 other staff turned up the next day and I have been meeting new people ever since. Our orientation week involved lots of training and heaps of fun. We had a dance off, a variety night and karaoke. Its an amazing environment and everyone seems happy to act crazy with no alcohol influence which is a bit of a new experience. But we have all learned to lose our inhibitions, because we need to make things fun, fun fun, for the campers.
I'm in a cabin with 9 other girls and we have anywhere between 10 and 12 campers at a time. Most of the ladies in our cabin are high functioning, able to look after their own personal care and get too activitines with just a bit of assistnace. They are all so excited to be at camp that it makes it easy to have fun with them. Thats not to say there aren't a lot of challenges here. Our day starts anywhere between 6 and 8am, denpending on how the campers sleep. We eat all of our meals with them and get an hour break a day before they (hopfully) go off to bed at around 9.30pm. Then its off tot he local pub/ wifi hotspot for a wind down. Safe to say I have not had 8 hours sleep for a while. But I'm loving every moment of it. The girls in my cabin are great. We have Aussies, English, Scottish and Ukrainian (spelling?) counsellors and everyone has been really supportive of each other. We are on our second group of campers (most are here for 2 weeks at time) and we have two more full sessions and a short 5 day session at the end.
I have definately had moments of wondering how long I'll be able to keep up the sleep deprevation and miss cooking fresh veggies and having a good long shower (not to mention going to a toilet with a door). But I would have to say it is all totally worth it....
Comments
wow you make me jealous all the fantastic things you are going to experience and you are so free to do as you please. jealous mum xxxx
Sounds amazing!!! Great to hear chicky!!!!!!! xo