Coopers Beach - Day 3

Day 3 - Friday

Morning came, once again, far too soon. I stumbled blearily out of bed at six in the morning and moaned at the almighty pain in my back. Those beds are killers. I dressed and arrived only slightly late to the 6:30 leaders' meeting, where we discussed the events of the upcoming day, listened to a Bible reading, and attempted to look attentive.

That day we had some truly awesome activities lined up: the annual Tide Fight and an event known, oddly, as "Tabloids" despite its distinct lack of any possible connection to old fashioned gossip magazines.

But first we had a worship session in the morning, and though I sucked a bit less than I'd done the previous night, it was still filled with agonizingly spazmodic actions on my part. I smiled brightly and put the whole affair behind me.

Afterwards, the camp clothed themselves in their swimming togs and proceeded en masse down to the beach for the Tide Fight. The object of this game was for each team to build a spectacular fortress around their flag below the tideline, and the last flag to succumb to the incoming tide was the winner.

I'm generally pretty useless at any sort of physical activity. My muscles have atrophied from long hours doing nothing save read, drink tea and draw intricate planting plans. While everyone else in my team were getting down on hands and knees and weilding shovels with competitive frenzy, I tried my best to help out without collapsing in exhaustion. Mainly this involved compacting down the sand the others raised around the flag while dodging flying shovelfuls of aforementioned sand.
The hour allocated for sandcastle construction passed; we threw down our shovels and with whoops of delight leapt into the sea for a swim. The water was delightfully warm, and we had great fun splashing each other and shrieking when the occasional big wave swept over us.

After an hour or so of this, however, we grew tired of frolicking in the water and meandered back to shore. All of us were by now ravenously hungry, but for some reason no one seemed inclined to order the kids back up to the camp for lunch. It turned out we were waiting for the tide to come in and sweep away our fortresses, but because we'd built them just a little bit too high up it was taking much longer than expected. After muttering furiously with a few of the other leaders, I approached Head Leader Tony and Head Leader Dave and did my best to convince them that we should head back up for lunch.

I succeeded. We all cheered and feasted on American hot dogs. Or, in my case, a vegetarian filled roll.

After lunch came the "Tabloids". Essentially this involved each team spending fifteen minutes each at a variety of activities trying to earn points for their team. Activities included were making our way across the obstacle course, shooting at the rifle range, firing water balloons with a giant slingshot at team leaders (I enjoyed that one!), filling a bucket with water passed from person to person down a line, zooming down the flying fox as fast as possible, and seeing how many people could get down the waterslide and climb up again afterwards without collapsing in exhaustion. I sucked at the obstacle course (my poor wee muscles!!!), did fairly well at the rifle range (I actually managed to hit something - all that time I spent with Izak shooting his neighbour's chimney had served me well), had water ballons flung at me (most of which did not manage to hit me, for which I was quite disappointed), passed cups of water with willing cheerfulness, had a go on the flying fox, and point-blank refused to go down the waterslide. Five years of watching campers being mauled and maimed by this waterslide has caused me to never set buttocks upon it. I claimed it was tradition for me not to go down and cheered everyone else from the sidelines instead.

Our team kicked butt. We came first and second in pretty much everything. I was so proud.

That afternoon the leaders also led their teams in a small Bible study. We did this every day for the rest of camp. Most of my girls were extremely over-excited and shrieked and shouted with laughter all the way through, disturbing other nearby groups. We also tended to go off on some very strange tangents. It was when I caught myself giving a detailed description of the Greek myth of the Elysian Fields and how it compared to the philosophies of Plato that I realised things had gotten out of hand. Still, I tried my best, and managed to put an innovative spin on our study by leaving them with the idea that if you obey your leaders and be nice to each other God will be pleased. Now go and clean toilets without complaint. Ah, the Bible - another weapon in the arsenal of a kid's camp leader.

I used the reverse of this argument with some success later on. If you don't stop poking me with that stick, God will get angry and smite you. I felt a bit bad at misrepresenting God in that way - but it worked. The threat of a god who smites stick-pokers must not be underestimated.

Then followed the general camp routine. Dinner. Duties. Free time. I spent that evening learning some new songs and dance moves with Sara and Shannon. I had high hopes for the following morning. Perhaps I wouldn't suck as much. We were so carried away that we didn't realise that the kids' bedtime had arrived until someone looked at the clock and said, "Hey, it's after ten!"
"Aaaargh!" I shrieked, and ran as fast as I could out of the chapel.  I raced across the carpark and tore into the kitchen. "Are the kids getting ready for bed yet?" I demanded of the kitchen staff.
"Ah, yeah, they headed off to get ready about ten minutes ago," said one lady who looked slightly wary of the fevered light that was no doubt shining from my eyes.
"Noooooooo," I wailed, for I knew that ten minutes was long enough for the kids to get mostly ready. "I can't believe I'm missing it! This is my favourite part of camp! I get to be mean to children!" Quite certain now that the kitchen staff thought me totally mad, I ran full-tilt out of the kitchen and into the dorms. I surveyed my campers. They were in the last stages of getting ready for bed, but they were doing it in such a lackluster fashion that it brought tears of rage to my eyes.
"YOU HAVE FIVE MINUTES UNTIL THE LIGHTS GO OUT!" I bellowed, and watched in satisfaction as the kids began to scramble in fear. I was extra mean to make up for my previous absense. When the lights went out I took a zero-tolerance approach to talking, telling them to shush with such vehmance I'm surprised they did not quake with fear. Those braver souls who defied me even then with their whispered conversations suddenly found themselves sleeping away from their friends. I was mean. I was relentless. I have never enjoyed myself so much as I did then.

"Zara, you're so mean," said my Junior Junior Leader, Shelley, the next morning. "You're so nice and fun during the day and then you're all horrible at night. It's like you're a completely different person."
"Yes," I said in satisfaction. "You are absolutely correct."