Dude, I'm in NYC

Madness

I remembered one thing!

One thing I meant to say.

On Sunday when the new campers were being dropped off, got chatting to the grandparents of one of my campers. They said they had been to New Zealand about 30 years ago and asked if I'd been over "that horrible hill road out of Queenstown" (the crown range) cos apparently when they went over it it wasn't paved haha.

Anyway, they then mentioned that they ventured into Fairlie and used a windup phone to call home. I loled so much when they said they went to Fairlie.  I said to them "My sheep won first prize in a show there once!"

Win.

Catch Up!! (written on Wednesday)

So, the Fourth of July was fun. We were meant to have a pretty normal day, but there was meant to be a thunder storm in the arvo, so we had a 2 and a half hour "Rest Hour" (we have rest hour every day, but usually its only 40 mins or so by the time you actually get back to your cabin!) So that was nice, we all got rested up for the social at Awosting that night. One of my mates from England wore her "I *heart* GB" top that day, saying GB was for Gary Barlow, the lolz. 

The social was fun. We went over to Awosting for dinner also! 

Office Manager Brian and Moi

Kiwi Peter and Myself

One of the memorable moments of the night was when I was hanging out with a group of counsellors down by the swings and one of guy Sam's kids came up to him and said that they had all danced with a girl except one of the kids. Apparently he had told them if they all danced with a girl, they could stay up a little later. Anyway, Tom and I decided that this was unfair so we took this kid up to the hall and found a girl for him to dance with, and he really got into if for about 3 minutes and then was over it. It was kinda cute though!

Alex, Tom, Me and Deidre

A glowing Katie and Maja

With Juila, the CIT from our cabin

Ellie and Chris and the bouncy slide

Katie and I 

Ollie, Noemi, Me, Tom, Michael and Sam

All in all it was a good night. No one seemed to over do the whole American-ness of the day which was cool. They did decorate camp up a bit to make it look a little festive though and that was nice, reminded me that something was actually happening!

Fell off my bike the other day, yes, I went biking! Sometimes we get allocated to help out the mountain biking counsellor while she leads and we bring up the rear. We didn't go on that long of a ride and I fell off while I was remembering how to ride/acquainting myself with the bike but it was still fun. The bloody spots looked like a snake bite and that's totally what I told the girls. It was funny seeing how many of them believed me haha.

My snake bite....

 The wildlife around camp is funky. There are some gorgeous dragonflies down on the waterfront, and I love watching them. The ants are scarily huge and some of the spiders look a little wacky. The chipmunks and squirrels however are the most exciting part. The chipmunks are a daily sighting, usually around the dining hall or a rubbish (trash) bin, and I'm beginning to get a little freaked out at where they turn up, hoping my room is safe from them! Have only seen a few squirrels here and there and their tails are out of control bushy! Makes my hair look tame haha. 

Chipmunk guarding the flagpole. 

Had another day off on Monday, we were meant to go shooting (LOL) but we turned up to this place in Massachusetts, which was about 2 hours worth of driving with the guys navigating, and it was closed. FAIL!! But we ended up heading to this awesome shopping mall and having a bit of fun there haha. I was very restrained. We went and saw Spiderman that evening, and I enjoyed it a hell of a lot more than Ted which we saw last week. Spiderman was AMAZING.

My bestest friend

The video cave

Epic candyfloss from Lake Compounce on Saturday.

Package from Mum arrived today, yay, I had better go and sort that out, take all my food over to the staff lounge so I don't break our cabin rules and have food in the cabin! *noms on Whitakkers Peppermint Chocolate*

I swear there was more stuff I wanted to say, but I've forgotten it now, I'll post it if it comes back to me.

GO THE HURRICANES!

Just quickly

We had a campfire tonight with the theme "Animal Fair". Our cabin got give sheep to dress up as (no surprises there! I was talking to the Aussie who organised it later on and she was all...yeah, we gave you a sheep on purpose).

Anyway, we dressed up our camper etc, and I told her her name was "Sonny Wool Williams" and pinned my ABs flag on the back of her and, even though they didn't understand, they all went down to the campfire singing "baahhhh rammmm eweeeee". Made my week.

At the camp fire, all the Kiwis and Aussies laughed at the Sonny Wool thing. I thought it was fun.

Also, wow, hes moving on quick isn't he? Annoys me a little.

And then I taught the kids that a group of sheep was called a flock (not a heard), a female is called a ewe (not a cow) and a male is called a ram (not a bull). Go Farmer Charlette!

Pictures to post tomorrow!!

Thoughts

Its all very well having Mondays off, but I really didn't think about it. Monday is the ONLY day of the week when Broadway shows aren't on. Goddamnit!

In other news, one camper asked me the other day if Rugby was played on Horseback.....

My cabin however, now know who the Hurricanes ask and regularly ask me if they have won another game. This week against the Chiefs should be a good one, might try stream it!

I have finally managed to order my Adidas shoes for my ankle so hopefully that should start feeling better soon.

Being the 4th of July today, camp was all very decked out in American stuff. We had a fun social tonight too, so yeah.

I dunno really.

People should send me letters.

Lets go to the beach, beach, lets go get away.

Had my first day off on Monday which was nice. There are 7 girls from here -Grace (Tennis, England), Maja (Arts and Crafts, Holland), Lila (Trailblazing, Hungary), Ellie (Canoeing, England), Meg (Water skiing, South Africa), Gabby (Kitchen, England) and myself. A pretty diverse group really! There are also 8 guys from Awosting who came with us yesterday. Kai (Waterfront, England), Craig (Drama, England), Tom (Dunno, England), Tom (Dunno, Wales), Peter (Photography, Poland), Chris (Journalism, England) Sam (Go Karts, England) and Alex (Arts and Crafts, England). We ended up meeting at a supermarket place and got supplies. I wanted a cricket bat and ball but we could only find a softball bat which was like four dollars so ended up with that.

It was like an hour and a half drive to the beach (Ocean beach as opposed to a Lake beach) but it was highly entertaining which was good. Lots of singing and talking and banter as to whether the boys actually knew where they were going or not. When we got to the beach, it took us a while to find parking but we eventually got there via suburbia which was actually kinda cool. There were a lot of nice places out there and it was fun to look at them all. Ended up at a really sweet part of the beach which had a mini kiosk place so we could get food. Paddled in the sea for a bit but basically just hung out on the sand. No one would play softball with me so I just attempted to bounce the ball on the bat which was entertaining.

After most of us getting a lot of sun and feeling severely sunburnt, we headed out to Fairfeild shops which was fun. There was a Victoria's Secret shop out there and it had a super duper sale. So that was fun. We wandered down the streets a bit and went into Banana Republic and found a Kiwi manager which was nice. She was able to help me out with clothing conversion sizes. Apparently I'd be a six over here. She took my email address (note to self - learn cell phone number) and said she would email me if she heard of anything going in the area should I stay on after camp which was cool. We nipped into Starbucks where I heard the sound of milk frothing at a coffee machine. Didn't realise how much I had missed that sound! It was amazing to finally be able to get a real coffee too!

We went out to a brewery for dinner and I totally rocked the fish and chips order (something I always refuse to order in a restaurant at home funnily enough) and the fish was soo good. Can't say much for the chips though. The drive home was interesting. The boys thought they knew where they were going, but who knows where we ended up on our way back.

Then it was decided that we would go to the movies and see Ted. I don't quite know what I watched. It was funny and all but seriously odd at the same time. Just weird.

And that was my day off. Slightly surreal to come back to a cabin and having to be quiet because of all the sleeping campers. Was nice to get away from camp for a bit though. Exhausted today! Enjoy pictures. Till next time xx

Gabby, Ellie and Meg in the car

Lila in the vromvrom

Pretty house being built

Beeeach!!

Monday crew in Water!

Kahu catches up on gossip

Kahu made a new friend!

Meg and Myself

Ellie and Alex

Gabby

A Tom-Tom Sandwich with a Meg filling!

Real coffee! Also managed to skype Dad for 3.5 minutes haha

Out of all NZ wines, Kim Crawford??

Cool Victoria's Secret Bag!

Sunburn, ouch!

Americans like to say "regular" a lot.

Yo yo yo dear readers. As its my night in and my campers go to bed at 9.30 I thought now was the perfect opportunity to write some stuff down!

Well, the campers have been here for 6 days now. Its been an interesting time. The campers in my cabin are pretty cool. They get a bit hyped sometimes but are pretty good about getting into bed which is nice. We had an incident earlier in the week where we we given some pretty strong evidence that a camper had their phone with them in the cabin, and so we were threatened with a "GI Party" which is where they take all your (campers only) stuff outside and you have to come and put it all back. We still haven't got the phone despite our biggest effort, but everyone is a little more vigilant now! It can be hard to get these girls to keep things tidy, but the promise of a pizza party at the end of the week for the tidiest cabin is a real bribe for these girls. Luckily I have a couple of draws that I can live out of so I'm able to keep myself reasonably tidy. We had a recycled fashion show tonight and that was fun, we managed to snag best formal wear in the intermediate cabins. Nawwwww. We have quite a few of our 11 campers who are only here for 2 weeks, so they leave next Saturday, so it will be interesting to see what happens with a new bunch, mixing with the people who are staying on.

I think I seem to be settling into camp life quite well. At the moment, in the mornings we have all the cabins going to each activity for 50 minutes to try everything out. Took me a while to get an idea of what to do (and in all honesty I think I scared them away with the amount of paperwork I'm having them do, but we only have one computer to edit on, so the more streamlined we make editing, the better!) but I eventually got there with a few cabins. I'm making them make a music video that tells a story.  I eventually figured out that they would watch a music video and if I pause it they will tell me whats happening in that story, hello Taylor Swift!You Belong With Me is an awesome story video and the perfect example for the girls. And of course, so is What Makes You Beautiful (well, not as much, but it gives some good basic camera angles and techniques) so thats fun. With no influence from me, one group is doing I Just Can't Wait to be King telling the Wills story (I did have to correct a few of their facts however) and another doing What Makes You Beautiful. Love it. I'm also editing the session video which the girls take home with them. Its a lot of fun to play with and I hope we can sort out privacy laws soon so I can show you guys!

Last night (Thursday) was the first social of the year with Awosting. We have one a week. It was a nice chance to get a little dressed up (just a summer dress was all that was required) and a little boogie. It was so funny to see the segregation on the dance floor - mind you it was so damn hot that hardly anyone was even inside for most of it! It was deffo a highlight so far! I had to leave a little early though cos it was my night off so we decided to go bowling. That went pretty horrendously haha, I only got like 61 or something, whoopsie! Not even one strike :(.

One team - Tom (Kitchen, From the 'Tron) Charlotte (Waterfront Director, From England) Maja, (Arts and Crafts, From Holland) and Gabby (Kitchen, From England)

My team! Ruslan (Kitchen, From Russia), ME! Catherine (Kitchen, From England) and Angie (Kitchen, From Mexico)

Group Shot!

My score. Horrendous.

Today was pretty damn hot. It was like 95deg Fahrenheit, which I think works out around 30degrees Celsius. Hot anyway. And the humidity on top of that was not desirable either. They cancelled the second elective today and had what they call a "Coney Island" which is where everyone has to go in the water and cool off. Me being me, literally just jumped in, then out and went straight back to the video camera lol. But everyone was having a good time and it really was nice to get out there for a little. Meant to get even hotter tomorrow, rats!

Looking forward to Monday though when its my day off! I think we are planning on meeting somewhere for morning coffee, getting supplies and then heading to a beach to chillax for the day. I'm keen to head out to the, mall for a bit too, but I have a feeling we wont be able to convince the guys to do the same.

Oh yeah, while I remember, we woke up to such a severe thunderstorm on Monday, the lighting sounded like it was just above us. Awosting got all their phone lines cut out and their computers all crashed, so we were actually quite lucky. Great first day for some of these campers!

Anyway, must nip off, books to read, videos to watch.

Feel free to write me letters and postcards, my campers keep getting heaps of mail and I have none :(. I can email you the address if you want it

Catch yas xx

Sunday now, not much more to report. Went out for a drink last night and ended up talking to a guy from Awosting who is from Bath about Stephen Donald and Anthony Perenise . Lolz. We also talked Cricket. Was quite nice. First day off tomorrow!

At the rodeo a few weeks ago

Bunch of us at the Rodeo
Meg, Katie, Yaz and Stef (at back), Ellie (Auburn hair), Ollie, Adam, Conrad and Charlotte

Yaz and myself at Rodeo

Our camp school bus