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It's over But... Mamaaaa, C'est fini!!! Sauf que....

shoukakime — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:05:00 UTC

We had a wonderful time friday night. The rain did not stop and we had to cancel our visit to Village vacances Valcartier. We went to visit the Anglican Holy Trinity Cathedral the first built cathedral outside of the British island. Our attempt to have a tour of the city was ruined by the rain. We went back to the campus and started to plan our dance party.

At 8PM we started our dance and it was great. Group choregraphy, individual dancing, Step dancing, we had fun and did not stop before midnight. We went to bed and did not wake-up before 10 on Saturday.

Saturday was a day of planning for departure. We were asked to gather our belongings and clean rooms and premices. We filled a survey, we wrote on the T-shirts of friends to let them know how much we appreciated to be with them and we promised to do our best to be together next year. We mandated Rev Nathanael and Gisele our camp director, to do their best to book a place in NY so it can be fair for both groups.

Early Sunday we were up. And it was painfull to leave. We were lucky to have Reynold and Yvrose José (Parents of Ann Christie and Chris Darby) who came since Saturday night to help with transportation. We tooke the road to Montreal and by day we were able to see the road better. In Montreal we were expected. We had a quick lunch and we celebrate an English eucharist with St Ignatius. Rev Nathanael presided and preach. We had right after the French/Creole celebration presided by Rev Nathanael with Rev Casseus as the preacher. We were invited to dinner and we want to thank the members of La Nativité for being so generous toward us.

It was a very moving moment when we stood up to sing "Ce n'est qu'un au revoir" (It's just the time to say good bye") Please take the time to look at the pictures

See you NEXT YEAR

Another day of quality time

shoukakime — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 16:09:00 UTC

Since we are kinda nailed home because of that constant rain, we've enjoyed a very helpful presentation with The Rev Frantz Casseus about family and relationship. How do we manage to love respect obey our parents without loosing track of who we are. We've also discussed Obama answering a question of Rev Casseus about how do we feel about a black running for presidency of the most powerful country of the world. Then we went on to discuss friendship. For many of us friendship appeared not to be essential. It was obvious that because of bad experiences long term friendship was either a challenge or to be avoided. But Rev Casseus provided many recepes for a good friendship: Keep expectation moderate, learn to compromise etc...

Father Casseus did talk to several of us 1 on 1 and offered advice and support.

I am not sure if it was due to the weather being so mean. We had to manage some conflicts between campers. Staff met to sort out ways of reinforcing supervision and our usual recreation: movie and card and video game were allowed due to no possible outdoors activity.

Oh yes!! I forgot to mention: Andre audige was the dog of the bezig game they thought they were going to have a PRIEST as dog hihihi GOD did not let it happen.!!!

The Weather is nagging

shoukakime — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 10:46:00 UTC

Yesterday was a productive day. We had a first presentation with Rev Nathanael Saint-Pierre about safety. He spoke about safety at home but safety on the street and on the web. He defined for us this new concept of cyber bullying and its consequences in our lives. The way we act, the way we respond to threat and being alert to signs of violence in words and deeds are very important into building a safe environnement.

After lunch we attempted to go to Village vacance Valcartier. Unfortunately, because of the rain we had to cancel.

So far, we've received calls from several parents. We are all ok. No one is sick or had a major issues.

The 2nd presentation again with Rev Nathanael was about the place of God in our lives. Our place in the church and what church we want to inherit. For Ritchy Dubois this church is too Sad the songs are too slow and we need to give more room for english in ceremonies. "I don't speak French" he said, "and I don't want to. So coming to a church where nothing exist to make me feel welcome is not particularily appealing."

"Je crois que l'église épiscopale est idéale" Vanessa told, "La messe n'est pas aussi longue que chez les protestants ni aussi rushée qu'à l'église catholique (I believe that the Episcopal Church is ideal. Mass is not as long as in the protestant churches and not as rushed in roman catholic churches) Natoutchika suggest that a place is made NOW for the youth because they have to learn being responsible learn being in charge and feel home feel being part of decision. Many others, Marven, Felix, Victoria and Tatiana took the stand to speak out their mind about their vision of the church they want to inherit. Rev Saint-Pierre also explain the different part a prayer should have and that we are not forced to use the BCP for everything we do at church. On that matter we had evening prayer without the book and Felix made the prayer in English while Vanessa made it in French.

We had our movie time and we had LOL watching CHOMEKO a Haitian comedy movie. (I slept during the movie time)

What a tuesday

shoukakime — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 00:56:00 UTC

We woke up this morning after a better night of sleep. Moving some campers to different rooms worked out great. We had morning prayer this morning and waited for Hector Jean Philippe Attorney at Law to be with us.

He came around 11 and quickly after started his presentation. We've learned that we are not alone. All we do is affecting others. We've learned some basics: Respect is an important issue. Society cannot exist without rules (laws). We learned success is not all about money. We achieve success when we reach our mission in our community and country. We become a better person by helping others and we should always remember who we are.

After this presentation, we had lunch and we went to visit the bee museum. It was fun... we learned a lot about the bees. They do not just produce the nectar we all like. They allow agricuturer to augment their production by 4. We learned about the queen, the workers, the false bourdon. we've learned that there is no vote for the bee becoming the queen all is a matter of nutriments. We've learned how the male does not survive after mate with the queen. The queen can produced 2k eggs per day, bee live about 35 days, a queen can go as far as 5 years and that bees are friends to human being.

Adult were able to taste some product of the museum. Wine, and cider. Kids brought sirup, souvenirs etc. Tomorrow we will be talking about safety using a pc. at PM we will go to Village vacances. We hope the kids will have fun ntil the end.

Bless you

Nat+

Finally we are in St Ferreol-Les-Neiges

shoukakime — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 15:14:00 UTC

It took almost 12 hours for us to get there. Our journey started with eucharist at 9 AM in Good Samaritan, we left Bronx around noon. We made a few stops for fuel and other needs and we crossed the border around 7PM. Our van arrived in La Nativité at 7:50 (not to tell about being lost and found our way back) We had a generous supper offered by the members of La Nativité and we team up from there with the local youth and took the 40 east all the way through St Ferreol-Les-Neiges.

There, were waiting for us Karline, Adeline, Natoutchika and Kael. We were exhausted it was 22 minutes passed midnight. We had some quick instruction from the staff for safety issues and room allocations and went to bed.

Yes it was not bad for a first night. If we can get some people to lower their zzzzzz and some to finally stop walking back and forth to and from washrooms we'll survive.

See pictures and please post some comments.

-1 DODO

shoukakime — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 09:43:00 UTC

Yesterday night I drove Adeline to Bus station Port Authority in New York. Karline (my wife) and Adeline managed to meet in Montreal to shop for food. Don't we need food for camp? Please look at some picture I posted... When we got @ Port Authority for the 11PM trip to Montreal the line was loooong. Adeline admit I was right (wow!!! is that true or I am dreaming? a woman admit the priest is RIGHT?) buying the ticket online. She would have to be the nth of a loooooooong line if I didn't.

I spoke to her this morning. Beside the time she had to spend crossing the border, and being late so meeting with Karline waiting since 6:20 outside, all went well. She is safe Edric. Don't worry. I was stressed for nothing (I am most of the time). I am not in Mtl to get you picture of them shopping but hey!!! what's new? 2 women shopping I am sure they'll spend a GOOD time(read "goud" as the hatian official money ).

Let me take this opportunity to ask you PLEAAAAASE. Don't forget your document to cross the border. Bring original and BE ON TIME... departure is 11:00 AM

Day -6 of the summer camp

shoukakime — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 23:45:00 UTC

6 more dodos and we will be on our way to camp. Our Chapelain Rev Nathanael Saint-Pierre is all mixed up: so many last minute non planned surprises, list, food, passport, health insurance and transportation... he wants all to be ready he does not want any problem with crossing the border to Canada... Yes, that's where we are going this year.

With the price of gas we are lucky to go to camp this year.

We can't wait...