Making Children Cry and Beating the Credit Crunch

This week I made a child cry. I'd like to point out though that this was through proportionate and necessary application of evil eyes and stern talking, and not because I'm a mean and horrible bastard. Much.

The term has started out fairly well. We've had a lot of indoor play (which involves them sitting in front of the telly watching Brum/Stuart Little/ 101/2 Dalmations) during the first week because of the ice, and this week we've had a lot of wet-play (same thing, but caused by the rain). This invariably annoys me because, despite being safer it means that the kids get stir-crazy, I get stir-crazy. All of that bottled energy ends up in the classroom and makes our lives more difficult.

I'll say this about playground politics, it involves an awful lot of micro-management. For example, a child may run up to you on the yard and say any number of things - usually it's a complaint, sometimes it's an annecdote. Sometimes they talk bollocks, somtimes they make you laugh. Half the time though, the message they tell you doesn't quite convey the depth of what they're trying to get across. Most of the time they come up to us and they may as well be saying:
"A hitherto unforessen turn of events has arisen, and I, lacking the faculties of age and wisdom to deal with such events, am left in a state of acute conundrum. I would greatly appreciate some assistance."

Sometimes you can help. Accidents, incidents of fighting and the like are often a relief because at least you can DO something about those. More often than not though you're left with very little to say to them. "Little Jonny said/did something that may or may not have been accidental/deliberate, but more importantly, acceptable." It seems harsh to send them away with the situation un-resolved, but it it occurred to me that these are the kinds of personality clashes and problems that they have to learn to solve. I can give them advice, but there's no way I'm going to call them into a debate - as interesting as it'd be, there just aren't enough hours in the day.

For whatever reason however, the kids have been absolutely loopy these past two weeks. At camp I could throw my weight about and threaten to throw them in the lake, now I'm beginning to think that more diplomatic methods of classroom management are better. The incident that incurred my wrath was during the loopiest of recent days. A dance workshop was going on all day in the adjacent hall and all we could hear was bass through the walls. Think nightclub. In a school. They were the last class of the day and the wait must have seemed interminable. However, the teacher wasn't feeling up to it and there had been several incidents where the entire class was in trouble. They were given a bollockin', as it were, and we carried on with our work in relative silence. I started doing some individual reading and was so engrossed that I didn't notice a posse of children missing until too late. They'd all been asking different people if they could go to the toilet. As a result, half the class was using the toilet as an excuse to watch the goings-on in the hall.

I told the children in my immediate area, when I'd figured out what was going on, that it was probably best if they come and ask me specifically and no-one else. To which, one little boy (normally a bit of a scamp, but not really naughty and certainly not cheeky), answered me back in a mocking rally of yeah-yeah-yeahs.

Pause. For a second I thought I'd misunderstood what he'd said.

"Are you making fun of me?" I said, with dawning horror.

Stunned silence. Apparently, I'd barked this bit with considerable venom.

"Are you making fun of me?" I repeated, louder.

Luckily, the teacher happened to have seen all of this and jumped to my rescue. Under her wagging finger and my intense stare of doom the poor boy crumpled into a mess of wobbly lips and soggy eyelashes. Bless.

After he'd apologised the afternoon wore on and at the end of the day the teacher had a word with his mother. This incident of answering back hadn't been isolated. Apparently, his home manner is one of cheekiness. In his own words "I forgot where I was". It's nice to know that he has enough respect for us normally that he doesn't do that kind of thing. It was also bizarre to watch the confusion play out on his face while he tried to figure out what had just happened.

Not exactly my proudest moment, I don't particularly like shouting and I don't like the idea of becoming a tyrannical disciplinarian. At the same time though I don't think they'll be pushing me that far again.

In other news I had an interview for a PGCE - I should know in a week and hopefully I'll be buying a laptop soon. Yay!

Camp 2

Camp 1

New Year's Resolutions

I've kind of put off blogging until the New Year, and now that the New Year is here I'm determined to sort out my priorities. So, I've set myself some targets. Firstly, to Blog more. Seems pretty straightforward, but for a month now I've been distracted, now with a new term starting on Monday (with an INSET day no less! My first INSET day as a member of staff! I don't know why it feels exciting or significant, maybe it's because it used to be a day off and now I get to see "what the teachers DO"!) I'm re-energised. I digress.

Secondly, in line with "more blogging", I want to blog a comic strip per week on ScribblePit, and slightly more infrequently perhaps, a Camp related one here. I've been reading a lot of comics recently and it's all making me want to draw more. There's no excuse, and I've wondered why I haven't got around to drawing out the comic I planned while I was in the states, I suppose at the time it was a mechanism for making me feel connected with the UK. It got left by the wayside when I got back though, I may have been a little bit distracted by unemployment. My friends have committed themselves in a very full-on way to their music, which is good for them but good for me too because it sets a kind of bench mark of effort. I'm tired of doing nothing now, I've had a bit of a production break and now I'm itching to make and do.

I'm slightly worried about my commitment to fulfilling all this, but I'm determined. 2009 feels like a good year, I'm quietly confident about it. I have a good job, I'm going back to the States in the summer and I have a cunning plan for keeping my job for the following academic year. Watch this space. As they say.

New Job P1

Yet again one of those things I can only talk about vaguelly. All I can say is that I'm working in an infants school, so no names and no specifics, which is a bit shit. I've been working there for a month now which is largely speaking why I haven't posted during that time. Naughty, naughty. Interestingly it was the Camp America experience that got me the job. So, what can I talk about without incriminating myself? Well, it's an Infants School and I'm working in the year two class as an 'learning support officer', which sounds far more trumped up than it is. I'm a classroom assistant, which basically means I'm a jack-of-all-trades. The school caters for main stream and a lot of SEN kids too. The class is quite diverse and the ability range is fairly broad.

A typical day consists of getting in at around quarter to nine and making a cup of coffee. The kids arrive at nine and mull around until the teacher does the register. Usually during this time I'm mulling around doing little tasks like getting things ready, preparing activities etc. At the moment we're up to our eyes in Christmas play rehearsals, so that chews up the morning until break time. Break time duty consists of standing on the yard and stamping out fires, not literally of course. Those pesky kids enjoy their metaphorical fires. After break we carry on with different activities/lessons. The teacher always has lessons planned yonks in advance so it's just a case of getting on with it. The different ability groups do variations on the same task. Lunch is at midday and consists of two sittings. In the afternoon we try and do group reading, finishing work or Busy Time, which includes practising writing/drawing etc. Then they all go home at half three.

More to follow.

The Bug

Got in touch with a few friends the other day, totally unrelated people, both of whom told me they were going to America next Summer to work at camps. One of them has been to the U.S. before and travelled extensively throughout, the other hasn't been. The added excitement factor of people I know being there while I am is awesome. The one who hasn't been to America before is dead keen on travelling to Alaska and along the West Coast, coincidentally the bit I'd like to visit the most. Plans are beginning to form in my mind. I'd love to see San Francisco. Alaska would be awesome too - this may need some careful planning...

Oh, and one of the English guys from camp is definitely going back next summer. An awesome summer 2009 is simmering away nicely in potential. In other news, the prospects of a job are looking better and better. Fingers crossed.

Contract Signed

I've committed myself to next summer. The contract is signed and sent. Now all I need to do is get a job. You know, to pay for the ticket to get there, etc. Sigh.

Ambition 2

Finally (for now), you mention that you saw your degree as a step closer to being published. How true is this? Have you always wanted to be published as your primary goal? Is that what you personally got out of education? Is this something you discussed at camp at all, either with the counsellors or the kids? In the case of your comics, for instance, to what extent did anyone mention their potential to be published?

Getting published has aways been the dream if not always the literal goal. It has always simmered at the back of my head, particularly now as the more I write the more it seems possible. When I was younger I wanted to be a comic artist and to a certain extent I still do. At camp, whenever I drew or did anything I got the response I always get which is "You should try and get those published," or similar.

Ambition

"I suppose you've seen a lot of ambitious kids, particularly in the second four. Has this influenced your understanding of ambition? Was it all great, or was there an unsavoury side to it? Do you think ambition to win a competition is similar / different to ambition to be published? Are ambitious kids more attracted to camp?"

Camp does attract the fairly ambitious, but it manifests itself in different ways. Self-motivation is the general vibe, particularly among the older kids who're involved with varsity/junior varsity fun and games. It doesn't really affect the younger kids so much, however they do spend a lot of time running around and doing things - it's only at night that they spend time playing DS or PSP (and even then the games tend to be sports related). When I saw the kids playing with their dads they spent a lot of time throwing/catching baseballs - their coordination and hand/eye coordination is very, very good. Mostly the kids are very able, quite bodily aware and competent, lending themselves to all manner of physical exercise.

In terms of ambition though, and I did have a chat with one of the counselors about this, it's very difficult to actually become a professional sports person in the US, particularly in the most glossy things like football. Having said that their ambitions are adjusted to what they know they can achieve - so most kids try out for sports that they like. The thing I found the most interesting was that there was a wider variety of sports to do/be interested in. Sports get a much wider degree of coverage in the US - Basketball is very aerobic and physically demanding; Football is tactical and physical in bursts; Soccer (or real football) is a bit of a damp squib as far as they're concerned, but they are very good at it because most of the skills they're good at in other sports are transferable; hockey, voleyball, tennis, swimming etc. are all variations. I don't think there's as much enthusiasm for all of the sports in the UK in the same way, or at least not that I've seen. In school it only seemed to be football and rugby that got the attention, but then again our sports department wasn't that big and therein lies the problem. TV and national leagues play a great part in the American attitude towards sport. Basically, there's plenty of support for sporting ambition in the US.

There were several kids there who were hard core all rounders who basically swept certain competitions (prompting the chant "Serrrrrrrr-weep! ". The attitudes of the kids was generally quite supportive to the extent that it draws a lot of overweight but well-adjusted kids who just enjoy being there. In some cases their attitudes were bad but overall it was very encouraging. In terms of The Week however it was as good as it could be considering it was a super intense competition that involved drafting everybody. Is it different from wanting to be published? Yes and no. It's a much more physical and personal ambition as compared to a mental, personality based ambition. None of the kids had actual ambitions of being actual sportsmen. At least I don't they do. They probably do.

Zeitgeist

"The credit crunch didn't touch you in camp, but what external influences were there? You mentioned in another entry that music was a big thing, but what else sneaked into camp? Computer games? Books? Knowledge of films? How sealed off are the counsellors? What about the kids?"

No. Well, basically I was blissfully cut off from the rest of the world. I was dimly aware of the credit crunch but it didn't literally affect me while I was there - how could it? I was in the middle of nowhere? Wasn't I? Well, of course I wasn't, silly me. I wasn't just in the middle of nowhere, I was in America. I remember thinking this at the time, that Americans (anyone really, but in this instance) can get complacent quite easily because the geography and scale of the place is so large. How does what happens on Wall Street with the "fat cats" really affect small town America? In the way all Americans get paid/pay for things, as it turns out. The psychology of fingers-in-ears, la la la - I can't hear you! logic applied quite heavily.

In terms of the zeitgeist of the kids and the counselors, well they basically brought the whole thing with them. Kids for the most part have fads and general interests, so even though the boys weren't into Miley Cyrus and High School Musical that kind of thing came with them in essence. It was strange hearing Coldpay and Bleeding Love being played ad nauseum because apart from being anachronistic, they seemed very British to me and very out of place. Computer games and that kind of thing played a big role in the general background noise - Mario Kart on the DS in particular; GTA IV. The biggest thing really was The Dark Knight. Obviously, Batman is cool, but this film was already legendary in statues before anyone had seen it. When it finally came out we were all clamouring to go and see it. Entire cabins geared up for Honour Cabin just so that they could go into town, plans were made in advance and many a conversation began with "Have you seen it yet?"

Everyone, what with it being a sports camp, was particularly in all the sporting events. The baseball was an ongoing interest, of course all the counselors have laptops and access to the wireless (lag, laggity, lag, lag, lag), so they were all keeping tabs on their teams. Towards the beginning there was the NBA final, which I think I've mentioned re: the drafting process. The big thing towards the end was the Olympics. All of these things flavoured the atmosphere.

Working

"Did anyone at camp build a career out of it? That is, how many people there worked in camp with no other means of supporting themselves? Is that possible? What happens to the camp when it isn't summer? Still operational? Do the employers spend all that time preparing for the following year?"

The only ones who come close to having made a career out of Camp are the Directors, particularly the older Directors. There are two sets, the Older Directors include the boss and his wife, the younger ones include the boss's daughter and her husband. The boss started at camp in the late fifties and has returned every summer bar one. In the eighties he and his wife took over as Directors. In addition to this though both had off-season jobs, as does everyone who works at Camp. The boss and his wife are now retired and spend more time, I'd imagine, planning long term things like new-builds, repairs etc., or liaising between staff, customers and the share-holders. It's not a full time job for anyone apart from them.

The young Directors handle all the high energy stuff during Camp's eight week duration. Both the boss and his younger male counterpart were/are teachers, so that's what they did/do during the off-season. Ultimately the boss will fully retire, I'd imagine, but I can only see that happening when he's physically incapable of doing the job anymore. He really loves Camp.

There is a caretaker who lives at the site all year around, his job is to look after the books for the logistical stuff - making sure everything's stocked up, for example. One of the things he does is go to bed at around seven in the evening and wake up at four in the morning to go and get fresh fruit and veg every day. The other domestic staff either live in the surrounding area, like the cleaners, or they travel up for the summer - the doctors and domestic nurses etc. The site itself closes down for the winter. The area actually gets a stupid amount of snowfall every winter, so the whole place changes dramatically in the off-season (it would be interesting to do a winter camp there, seeing as you could do ice skating on the lake and snow mobile fun and games - I doubt they'd ever want to actually do that though). Also, during the winter, that's when big things get done - they do a lot of subtle changes and upgrades each year and one big cosmetic one for the kids - for example, last year they added a new building and changed the basketball hoops for the kids. The undeniably adult staff (people who aren't like me, people with dependents/families/lives in the world beyond) who have worked there for years come from far and wide. Some come from Israel, most others come from out of state, all see camp as a part of their lives as opposed to jobs.

Books

"You mention refusing to feel guilty about buying books. Do you value books over, say, DVDs? Is this because you personally prefer them, or because books are cheaper, or because you feel books are inherently more valuable?"

I'll admit I was being a bit silly when I mentioned the whole "feeling guilty about buying books" but it is something I'm aware of, if whenever I'm in somewhere like Waterstones. There have been times when I've spent hours browsing for a new book, nothing has immediately inspired me so I've walked out happier not having bought anything. I go through periods of being very frivolous about spending and periods of extreme thriftiness. My mother once said, (in response to me saying something along the lines of: "Mam, we've got too many books,"), "You can never have too many books." I must admit I've taken that little saying to heart. In terms of DVDs and CDs I feel a bit more cheap. I love films and I love music, but not as much as I like books.

Without books at camp I'd probably have enjoyed it far less. There's a lot of down time which can get spent in a variety of ways. The American staff have their laptops - I don't have one ergo I need something to keep me going. I brought a small library of books with me, which on several occasions the international and American staff dipped into because there wasn't much of the way of books at camp. I'd anticipated not having access to a decent bookstore so I brought things that I'd intended to read for a while, for example the Ian Fleming tripe bill of From Russia with Love, Doctor No and Goldfinger; or things I knew I wouldn't be able to get with ease. I think I chunked through six or seven novels while I was out there, which is pretty good going really.

Summer Soundtrack

Shameless Summer reminiscences. There may be a quite a few of these as and when I remember them. They seemed a bit pointless to mention at the time but these particular songs have stayed with me (partly because the British music scene gets punctured by American Pop two months later). Effectively these songs have followed me home and I can't help but like them, largely due to their associations with the "socials" that the camp held with other camps. Seeing, what were effectively school discos from an outsider's perspective is weird and cool. Cool insofar as they're instantly nostalgic because they're EXACTLY the same abroad as they are at home. Kids are brilliant.

So, here are the shameless songs:

1) See you again, by Miley Cyrus, (the girls really liked this one).
2) I kissed a girl, by Katy Perry (the boys in particular went a bit bonkers for this one because of the "kissing girls and liking it factor", apart from the youngest ones who didn't get it and the younger ones from Texas in particular who didn't like the homosexual overtones - we tickled that out of them though - seriously, Camp is shamelessly and knowingly "camp" - they haven't actually heard of the phrase "camp" in its cultural Boy George kind of way - there's an irony there somewhere).
3) Pocketful of Sunshine, by Natasha Beddingfield (like I say, stupidly camp. Loved every second).
4) Disturbia, Rihanna.

Where am I again?

Those three words: credit, crunch and recession got me thinking, as I imagine they're getting everybody thinking, about money. Camp doesn't pay that well. I could have earned double what I made at Camp by working at home. Admittedly, I probably would have spent more that half of that on miscellaneous rubbish. "Oooh Look!" Says I, looking at all the pretty things on sale in HMV, "I've got twenty quid burning a hole in my pocket!". Of course, in a practical sense we have to still spend money on these kinds of things because it's what keeps an economy strong: healthy spending. Which is what I told myself when I was in uni, spending casually on shit I didn't really need, frittering away my student loan on lining the pockets of Virgin Megastore and Waterstones. (Small aside: I will never feel guilty about buying books. I refuse to. Come hell or high water I will get my literary fix. So there.).

So, at the moment I'm looking for a job, without a car, with a lot of debt and the job market stubbornly refuses to employ me! The bastards! I got a degree, and a diploma, I've done everything the government, society and my family/peers expected/wanted of me. And now, I'm either "over qualified" or a bit of a liability because I "may not stick around" (as if! Like I know what I want to do with my life in a practical and sensible capacity!), more than that though, half the time you need an additional qualification to do anything even remotely interesting.

So, like the proverbial Crazy Diamond I have "signed on" with the jolly-old Job Centre for the time being. This also got me thinking about living in little bubbles. Throughout the summer I paid little to no attention to the gathering storm that was to become the big three words. In fact, I had to go out of my way to hear anything because it was such a busy, all-encompassing experience. To be honest though, I wanted to shut the world out a little bit. While I was there I spoke to my parents... twice? I did keep a blog and stay in contact via email, but I have to admit to relishing the experience of severing all ties. After the Art Foundation finished everything was a bit hectic (I pulled down the exhibition two days before flying out(?)), because I knew I was going away I found myself not committing myself as much to the world around me. Now that I'm back though I'm absolutely engaged and getting about 75% of what I wanted to get done, done.

Which brings me to the conclusion that there are real world pressures and personal pressures. In an ideal world I'd be a published author/comic artist and that would be that. In an ideal world I'd be paid to do exactly what I'm good at, but for the time being I have to make do and do inbetweeny things like build up a portfolio. I had this image in my head the other day of me in a teaching capacity, wondering what I'd say about the subject of ambition. Society and acquired knowledge tells us that ambition isn't a good thing. Even JK Rowling puts ambition in the unlikeable Slytherin category, but in reality she needed a fair old whack of bloody-minded ambition to get a book published while she was living on the bread line. To me, ambition has never been a bad thing, there is, after all a difference between an ambitious person and a selfish person. While ambition is a symptom of selfishness, they aren't mutually dependent. I would say that a healthy amount of ambition is a good thing - it means that you will pursue the things that interest you - as far as I'm concerned, settling for second best isn't ideal for anybody. In many cases I'm quite lazy and I can see myself in a year's time applying for a PGCE because it'd be an easy "second best" option. The past summer has proved to me that I love working with kids, so it wouldn't be the end of the world if I became a teacher, but I'd feel like a bit of a hypocrite.

Ultimately the secondary education system lulls us into a false sense of security. Sheep-like I followed the path to university, where I was told I'd increase my chances of getting a good job afterwards and that everything would be greener on the other side. I'm not trying to belittle my degree, academia or anybody's academic ambitions, but I sometimes get the nagging sensation that I may not have gone to university had I not been steered towards it. This may sound contradictory, but I never had any ambitions of getting a degree, really, I just knew that it would probably help facilitate getting published.

Hmm Sweet Hmm

I've kind of needed a bit of space to be able to write this, seeing as having come home things have been a little strange. The programme actually warns you that the re-adjustment is often stranger than the adjustment in America. You aren't expecting to have to re-adjust in coming home. It's a bit of a touchy subject really insofar as I'm not sure of a) how big of a deal I'm making of things, and b) time will tell how well I settle back into the rhythm.

So far I've noticed that the patters of my life at home are totally different to what they were abroad. I write more. I mope more. I watch more TV. And I'm embarrassed how much later I seem to be waking up every day. The fact that I haven't got a job yet is another cause for concern.

Upon returning home, and on my first official UK drive, my car promptly kicked the bucket. I was on my way to re-unite with mates and it died. So, I'm without a car. Which is probably okay for some people but I feel restricted. I don't have wander lust by any stretch of the imagination, I'll go as far as to say that I found the touristy side of visiting America to be tiresome in the extreme. But not having the ability to go wherever I need to be with ease is a real pain in the arse. It was bad enough at camp, trying to negotiate lifts and plan things WELL in advance, but that was understandable - the most exciting thing to do in the middle of nowhere is go to the movies; at home I have friends who live miiiiilllllllleeeeeeeeesssssss away. And now I can't see them as easily and if I do go, I need to pay, which sucks, because I don't have any money.

So. Some news. I'm waiting to hear back from the Camp Director re: an invitiation for next summer (it's an official piece of mumbo jumbo the agency needs), but when that comes through I'll be able to sign up for next summer officially. Oh yes. I have every intention of returning. At the purely mercenary level it's two and a bit months of guaranteed work which doesn't come with the hang up of me spending it all on incidental crap. Also, I want to by a Macbook. But at the moment the lack of income is a serious issue, particularly considering there'll be a flight to pay for in May and rent to pay in the meantime. Things may get better. But three specific words are making me feel a bit five-pence-fifty-pence: Credit. Crunch. Recession.

Long term plans for the blog include filling in the gaps. Several people have mentioned wanting to know more so I'm inviting questions from my small but interested audience. Inquire away.

To sum up...

Things are better now. A point of the shagging was made and for the most part it has stopped. I've taken to exhausting myself during the days to make sure that I sleep. Sounds unhealthy? Well, there are only too more days left. Speaking of two days left, I feel compelled to do a bit of a Jerry Springer and sum things up.

Before I came here I had no real idea of what it was going to be like. America gets a lot of coverage, so I knew some things, but like having a vague idea of what softball is, I didn't know all the rules. I'm bringing a dvd of the camp home with me and I'm going to make a point of showing it to all who'll watch it. It's basically a soundbyte documentary of what happened this summer - every kid, cabin, sport and occasion is featured. I remember watching similar videos before coming and all left me feeling intimidated and a bit freaked out - after all it's a completely different culture - but now having lived it for three months I feel as if in some way it's my culture too.

Cut grass smells exactly the same here as it does anywhere else and by that, in a roundabout kind of way, I mean that it's not as weird or strange as it looks or sounds because things are
the ultimately same. Mint ice cream and strawberry ice cream taste different, but they're still ice cream. Once you get past the funny accents and the occasional baffled look before you repeat yourself, the people are all the same. It's why I want to come back next year, basically. I heard a London accent randomly the other day and it just felt weird.

In the next couple of days we'll be closing up shop and moving on to Chica-Chica-go-go (don't ask - these guys'll chant anything). A family have offered to let me stay and they are the most amazing people. Two of their kids were my campers so it's going to be cool to see them again. This second week of post-camp has been better because several of my campers' families have come up. I'm such a sap - I can't believed I missed them that much. Ah well.

All in all it's been a long and tiring summer and I've had an incredible time. It's been an interesting experience trying to carry on doing what I normally do but taking into consideration the spartan nature of living out of a rucksack. I've decided that I could live without most things, but I couldn't live without paper. My next post will likely be from a different computer.

I am seriously looking forward to coming home.

Flipside

I find it increasingly baffling how a summer that has been so amazing can change to the complete opposite almost over night. It has been seven days since the kids left and I find myself now counting down the remaining seven days to the day that I leave this place for Chicago. In principle not much has changed. The kids and American staff have gone, certainly, and a bunch of ex-camper families have come up for what's called Post-Camp. The soured heart of the problem is twofold, firstly I am now forced to occupy my spare and night time with people who's behaviour I find increasingly reprehensible. Secondly, the emphasis at Post-Camp is on working for tips, which can be fairly large so I'm told - the effect this has had on the staff is to turn those prone to brown nosing into overdrive.

With regards to the first point, problems have been simmering all summer. While the campers were here I had the Cabin as a retreat, but now I'm forced to live in the midst of the problem. To begin with things were quite affable, we got on well and there were no problems. Slowly, as these things happen, egos started to emerge and things began to unravel. On the one hand you have people like myself, quiet, unassuming, committed to doing the job and putting the campers first. On the other hand you have the staff who don't see this as a job but a vacation. Not only this, but for the most part they share some awful personal characteristics - they're all obnoxious, loud, vindictive, wholly selfish and completely un-interesting. This wouldn't be a problem if I could escape their poisonous company, but I can't because I'm forced to sleep in the same cabin as them. Oh, and another thing, they don't like sleeping, they like getting pissed every single night because they're boring and have no other way of sustaining their entertainment. Oh and another thing, they insist on invading everyone else's privacy by having sex - loudly, frequently and in the same room as the rest of us - until the early hours of the morning. By which I mean 5 AfriggingM. Not only that though, these aren't the same partners every night, these are different women (and I use that term loosely). Imagine my rage, my abhorrence, my absolute hatred of these people. Then imagine me having to listen to the pithy way in which they brush aside my concerns - "Ah well, anything can happen when twelve lads get together in a room!"

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK YYYYYYYYYYYYYOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And breathe.

The second point. The brown-nosing. After a long summer of being an authority figure, a mentor, a friend etc. (basically all the psychologically rewarding bits), I'm finding it hard to adjust to the job I came to America to escape - i.e. waitoring (or, picking up other people's shit because they're rich). Luckily, I'm being paid a healthy rate for these extra days and I don't have to "depend" on whatever these people are prepared to give me based on how much I suck up. If you don't like the service I provide, then you can go swivel. I'm not a bad waitor, I'd go as far as to say I'm a pretty good waitor, so the implication that there's something I'm not doing, I find slightly offensive. On top of all this I have far more free time than I had before, and far from making me happier, these periods are dragging the days out, swelling my least favourite of all human conditions: boredom. All this equals an extremely frustrated Jom.

Ultimately I have two choices, suffer in silence or snitch, and seeing as I have to spend most of my time in the company of these people even though they're making my life a misery, I'm not really inclined to do the latter. Suffice it to say the Director will be hearing my views on the subject and it will be affecting whatever contract he decides to draw up for next year. Fortunately there are three others who share my misery so I'm not suffering in silence. Eight weeks of blissful work and satisfaction far outweighs the irritating mire I find myself in, so my intention to return next year still stands. But by God, there are going to be conditions.

Are we tight?

So. Camp is kind of winding up and winding down. The massive all-week competition is rattling along steadily and my duties have been drastically reduced, which has basically left me in a small lurch. The free-time is nice but I find myself getting really stir-crazy - all I want to do is spend more time with the kids but they're always off doing competitiony stuff. I do get to see them at archery, which is cool but a little bit hectic.

So, mixed feelings. It's hard to get excited when you aren't on a team and everyone else is. It is an interesting lesson in American male psychology though. The little kids' moods have been reduced to overjoyed or uber-bummed out. I went on a little sojourn to the other cabins last night and hung out with a bunch of kids I normally only see in the day. They'd started a club called the Moobies - mostly composed of all the arty kids with wacky personalities - based on a conversation we'd had the previous day concerning Man Boobs, M-oobs or Moobies. I hope you find this as funny as we do. Anyway, it hadn't occurred to me that I could actually hang out with these kids in a non-responsible adult kind of way. One of the kids asked me "Are we tight?", as in to say "Are we cool/mates?" etc. He didn't really need to ask. Genuinely one of the most uplifting moments of the summer. It's gutting that this frighteningly obvious conclusion came to me five days before camp ends. Ah well, c'est la vie, there's always next summer.

The One One

Some people might call this place a sausage-fest. It's an all-male camp after all. You may be wondering why the majority of the people here abscond from any major female company for eight weeks (well, half of them are pre-pubescent and couldn't give a monkeys). Today I witnessed a camp tradition, the picking of the teams for the last eight days of camp. Twelve team coaches adopt the names of twelve American Colleges (universities for the condused/foreign) and Draft the entire camp. For those unfamiliar with Drafting it's worth looking up. Most major American sports teams don't "buy" their players, they get awarded their position in a draft by what position they end up in at the end of the season. So, the Celtics just won the Basketball jobbie a month ago - they got to pick, from the pool of players on the transfer list first.

In our case the position in the draft is awarded randomly. In the first pick they basically pick the twelve best athletes in camp. The team who get the first pick effectively pick the Best Athlete in Camp. Okay. Let me put this in perspective. Everyone at camp is an athlete. Most of the kids don't arrive until second four because they're off playing varsity baseball or whatever. For the second four there are hundreds of City X's richest young athletes. The award of being a first round pick is an incredible one. Bear in mind this isn't an "OMG I'm so much better than you " thing - maybe it's hard to explain that there isn't anything elitist or braggy about being a first round pick, it's more like a recognition of dedication. The other thing is, in preparation for the draft the camp undergoes a mass scouting binge. For the last two weeks everyone has been extensively researching everyone else. I don't jest. In fact, to everyone else around here it's deadly serious. My point is, everyone knows who the One One is going to be before he's picked, either that or they have an extremely good idea. There are no real surprises, ergo there are no tears.

Okay, back to my original point. Everyone I have ever met (back home), bar a small minority of very settled and comfortable individuals, who has had any kind of sporty inclinations has been an arsehole. I'm not saying tempers don't fray or that this place is some kind of sports paradise... but it's pretty good. And the great thing is I don't have to do any sports! It's basically the atmosphere and the company - devoid of cynicism this place actually works as a competitive and supportive community. The only kids who cry about losing here are in my cabin and they soon grow out of it.

Head Space

Yesterday we went to Walmart. Wow, not only does it sell everything (guns included), it also sells everything at ridiculously cheap prices. I'm not talking Tesco is two pence cheaper on bananas than Asda cheap, I'm talking a flat screen HD TV is thousands of dollars cheaper than anywhere else. Walmart isn't just beating the competition, it's undercutting the competition to the extent that there is no competition. Walmart has won. They even have leaflets dotted around the store aimed at people who don't have that much money - for example, you've got a five year old who goes through clothes at a rate of knots, "Do the math!" the headline screams - then it lists everything you need to buy for that child and how much you're saving. These aren't just empty boasts with pennies to save, they are literally offering a stupidly cheaper alternative.

Scarily, Walmart was in a large industrial estate on the outskirts of a larger town, much like the ones you see anywhere in the UK, but, whether by karma or intention, opposite Walmart on the highway was a trailer park, full of Walmart's target demographic. A brisk drive down the highway and everything that Walmart didn't sell (or did, they do, after all sell "everything") was sold here. We even passed a hospital which had more in common with a superstore than a place of medical emergency and rest. Sweeping out before it was an enormous car park and it occurred to me that everything here is for sale. Health care is a commodity. I even saw drive-thru ATMs. You might be forgiven for thinking that it was at this point that I lost my mind, sloppy grey-matter dribbling out of my ears like microwaved porridge. Fortunately, my sanity stayed intact. Just.

Everything is for sale. Someone mentioned tipping in a comment, but this is, again, a culture where everything is paid for, even service and courtesy, and this isn't in a grudging kind of way, it's just par for the course. They want to give you their money, there is not point in being chivalrous and refusing because they don't seem to get why you'd refuse. The preverbial you has offered a service, that service is then repayed in gratitude and a twenty dollar bill. It's just business, it's just the way the world works. In the UK people begrudge having to give up their cash. If you tip someone out of desire, more than courtesy, you are going out of your way to acknowledge extraordinary service, above and beyond that which is just expected. Money makes things work. Work makes money. It's simple... what other system works better...???

Cough. Sorry - drifted off into a world of capitalist bliss. And I'm back in the room! Okay. Head Space. I don't really talk about these things out loud, which is why I blog them instead. What I was originally going to write about was how, without regular and personal access to a PC, ideas are slopping around in my head blending into one another. I bought a notebook the other day with dividers built into it - now I can keep notes and keep things seperate! Isn't it amazing how paper is still the best way of keeping track of things? For thousands of years humankind has been writing things down and the concept is still going strong. Wonderful. I love paper.