Jun 2006

So it's been a week since the girls arrived, and about that long of solid, terencial downpour rain.

The campers here all come from New York, Jersey, Flordia and Maryland for the most part, and from very well off families. The girls in my bunk are slowly becoming less snoby and more kid-ish as the week goes on, which is so nice.

My two co-counselors are awesome. Lauren is from England, and the butt of most jokes on the part of the kids, especially when it comes to words such as 'trainers' for shoes, and 'swimming costume' for swimsuit. They just think it is hilarious... My other counselor is from Wisconsin and is super nice, coaches softball, so she's going to be away for games alot... They are both wicked, and the three of us are working well together, which was and still is, such a relief.

Some of the camps in the area have been literally flooded in, one of the girls here has a brother in another camp and she said that they haven't received a food shipment since Monday. The amount of water that has fallen amazes me, and I'm from Vancouver. Some of us had Wednesday night off, so we drove to Scranton (about 40 min away) for dinner, and we drove past a road that was not only closed, but flooded to the tops of the electrical poles. It was like nothing I have ever seen. The Dunkin' Donuts and Arby's in Honesdale were in 3 1/2 feet of water, as well as the K-Mart. It's just out of this world. One of the counselors from Louisana said it looks worse than Katrina, and what we are going through is so bad it needs a name.

As for taking pictures, I have been hard at work since the girls arrived, I think I am averaging on about 100 pictures each day. It's alot of work, but I am liking it. Some girls are all over it, and love to have their pictures taken, while others duck out and then appear on the 'hit list' I get every morning from the media guys.

The girls have a trip to the brother camp next week in Mass. so hopefully I will be able to go, since they got here they have been trying on outfits and swapping clothes for the social they have with the boys camp. Oh, to be 12 again! We also only have one mirror and 2 outlets in the bunk, which has caused more that chaos, as you can imagine with 12 girls living together. Oh and two showers. It makes for a close knit group of kids thats for sure.

Well that's all for now, I hope that we make it through the next week as the rain is supposed to keep on falling until next Wednesday! Oh boy...

Love, Melanie

I am slowly learning more about this strange place in Pennsylvania - camp country - this area is called Wayne Country. The year-round population is about 10,000 and in the summer there are about 30,000 more, making it a busy place in the summer. There are about 30 camps in the area, girls, boys, co-ed, religious, sports, everything.

The weather is interesting, yesterday we had a thunder storm come in, it was about 95 F out, and within 20 min. was pouring with rain and thundering - apparently it's common to lose power with not much warning due to random storms.

The staff here are very cool, and the directors of the camp are both very lovely, caring people, who clearly care very much about their staff. The camp hires people from everywhere, and they hired 2 girls to do the night security from Israel, and they are the most hilarious people I have ever met. They have a very interesting background - as they both finished high school and then worked in the military for the mandatory 2 years, somthing that I didn't know about. Very interesting girls.

We took our first trip into Honesdale, or more like into the Wal-Mart... Which is not just a Wal-Mart, it's a Supercentre. It's bigger than Costco, it's so huge. We spent 2 hours there. The town is really cute, we passed a sports bar and I saw the game playing through the distant van window - Poor Edmonton. One of the guys here from Carolina didn't even seem to care his team won. He doesn't even like hockey! Imagine that!

We find out our cabin placements tonight - so I will know where and with what age I will be working with. I'm not too picky, which is a good thing as I don't have much of a choice. It will be fun no matter where I think. The girls come on Sat. which I am excited about - we have had one too many meetings and I am ready to get the ball rolling...

That's all for now, hope all's well, Melanie

Well -

The journey here was a long one, 2 countries, 4 states, in 2 days. I left the B.I. for Seattle with the maja on Thursday, in the a.m. expecting a day of paperwork at the border, but all I got was a 'why would you leave HERE for Pennsylvania?' from the boarder guard. We went to Salumi's restaurant in Seattle, a Italian deli that is owned and operated by the father of Ciao Italy! on the food network (I'm kind of obsessed...) anyways, it was fabulous, biggest sausages I've ever seen. Also had some fish thrown at me, 3 pounds to be exact, at the Pike Street Market, that I took to Arizona with me, for Drew and his fam.

Drew is good - Arizona was stupid hot. Some of India's friends were there en route to South America from Vancouver on their bikes, as in mountain bikes, very ambitious and cool people. I took an overnight flight to Newark, which sucked to say the least, but met L.Skeans in the Newark airport where we waited patiently for 6 hours to be picked up by the camp staff.

Once on the bus, all the Canadians that flew in found each other like magnets, and we, surprise surprise, are almost all from BC, and we all have friends in common, both in Squamish and Kelowna. Small World, as usual! Getting to know the 100+ staff over the last few days has been quite a challange, there are people from 30 states, 8 provinces, and 9 countries. There are a number of male staff as well that coach tennis, golf, do the heavy lifting... you know the usual. I think it will be good, a staff of all girls could get ugly.

I don't know what age of girls I will have are yet, but because I am doing the photography, I think I will have girls in the 8th grade or so, or 'upper seniors' as they are called here at camp. The camp is beautiful - and so huge. There are 25 sleeping cabins, 2 lakes, 2 pools, a pottery barn (not the store), an arts and crafts studio, a metal works studio, 2 dance studios, an aerobics studio, climbing walls, ropes courses, and endless tennis, basketball courts, and soccer fields. It's really quite amazing. The camera that I will be using is also amazing - brand new and digital, I've been playing with it all day...

We are going to Wal-Mart tomorrow night, woo hoo, it's what Honesdale (the town near by) is built around, mainly to supply this camp I think, as there is not much out here. The weather is hot, the cancelled one of the seminars to let us go swimming today. The owners are amazing, they treat their staff very well, making it a very enjoyable place to work, and I've only been here two days!

Well that is all for now, back to my assignments for school. I'll write more as the summer goes on...

Melanie