The Simple Joys of Life!: Welcome to Tom Gray’s Camp! AKA Mosquito Bar!!!!

So this week has been a little different than the others. Monday started off to be a holiday with the fourth of July. So with work beginning on Tuesday, I feel that the week has been thrown off just a little bit. On Tuesday with three other interns we left to go to Council to meet with a man named Tom Gray for his camp that he was putting on for the kids. We were meeting in Council, AK because that is where the road ends and we proceeded to take a boat ride in the rain up river about 20 miles to finally arrive at the camp. We left Nome at around 2pm and arrived at the camp around 5:30pm with 6 staff, and 12 kids that were all excited to be there and ready for the fun activities. We unpacked and as a counselor had to designate beds to the girls for their sleeping arrangements. Once everyone was settled in, we all headed to the main cabin where dinner was almost ready. I wanted to get involved with some of the kids so I brought Uno to play and three other girls wanted to play with me. After playing a few rounds dinner was ready and we needed to begin setting up the table. With everyone helping out dinner was a smash. The hosts served chili and rolls for dinner and a rhubarb cake for dessert. By the middle of dinner the raining had stopped and after the kids helped pick up we needed to assign chores and groups before any free time was given. After the groups were given and names were made, a list of times and chores were given out to the groups and everyone had duties around the camp everyday so we would know if someone wasn’t doing a chore. After assignments the kids were given free time until lights out around 11pm. Many of the boys wanted to go canoeing and the girls wanted to go swimming and fishing. What the other interns and I didn’t know is that they called this place mosquito bar for reason, but we didn’t know it until the rain stopped. As soon as we stepped outside about 20 mosquitos attempted to bite us and many of them did succeed! We quickly learned that bug spray was not just a thing to maybe wear; it was something that we needed to shower ourselves in everyday! As many leaders have learned that if something instantly changes it is better and wiser to go with the change rather than fight it. In my case I was hoping to stay clean for the few days but I quickly learned to love the smell of citronella. As bedtime was approaching many of the kids were still really hyper and trying to calm them down was really hard to do but in a creative way I was able to explain to them that they needed to get some sleep because we were going to go seining tomorrow and it was going to take a lot of energy out of them.

In the morning all of the interns woke up so tired from a long night of scratching all the bites but still had to put on shining faces for the kids. Everyone started with their morning chores and breakfast was ready. After breakfast more cleaning took place as well as a guest speaker arrived at the camp to talk to the kids about tobacco cession. The talk was great and the kids enjoyed being a part in the skits that they had planned. After the guest talk, lunch was served and the group that was on duty for kitchen clean up helped clean really fast because we were to go seining after lunch. I had always known about fishing and net fishing but seining was a different kind of fishing all together. With two boats to get everyone out there and Tom delegating as a great leader everyone was ready to go. Traveling up river about 10 miles was our first attempt at seining. Tom explained how seining worked and how everyone as a group need to work together if we wanted to catch any fish. With all the kids on the riverbank and Tom and two kids on the boat carefully letting the net fall into the water it was time to run down the bank to bring the fish in. With everyone working as a team the net on both sides were brought in and everyone was pulling with all their might against the current of the river, we brought the net in and looked to see what our hard work had accomplished. With everyone’s help we caught about 10 salmon that were all over 15lbs. We kept all the females and threw back all the males. Everyone got back in the boat and we went farther up river. Trying about 3 more time finally we started to head back down river towards the camp with one more final time to try seining. This was the hardest time because there was no riverbank this time. Instead everyone was on the side of a small cliff. It was hard to not fall off the side of the cliff and still pull in the fish but in the end it was worth it because we looked down at what we caught and it was a King Salmon (the best kind of salmon to catch). All the kids were cheering and so excited because we knew that that is what we were having for dinner that night! As were took pictures and got back in the boat to head back to camp the joy and excitement and look of fulfillment of the kid’s faces was priceless. We sliced up the fish that we caught and the King Salmon was more than enough for all of us at dinner. With all the rest of the fish, the kids learned how to can preserve and keep it fresh by pressure cooking the fish. After dinner and chores all the kids were assigned times to watch the pressure cooker and make sure that everything was being sealed properly. While they weren’t on timing duty they were allowed to have free time for the remainder of the night. Many kids took turns on the canoe and using the fishing rods. We also had smores by the fire as a snack. Getting close to bed time many of the kids were already exhausted. This night instead of tossing from being itchy I remembered that I brought some anti-itch lotion with me and all the staff and interns were so grateful to finally get some sleep.

The next morning was my turn to cook breakfast that I had planned for a few weeks now. It was going to be an egg scramble with onions, red bell peppers, mushrooms, and black olives then put into a cake pan with cheese on top and baked in the oven for 10 min. On the side was and English muffin and a fresh fruit salad. The kids loved breakfast and we had planned to give a nutrition lesson about the importance of breakfast right after chores but before the next speaker. For the lesson we first talked about why it was important to eat breakfast every day and then did an exercise with running first without weights to see about the time and then again with our backpacks that were stuffed with weights to stimulate how hard it would be to carry that extra weight of not eating breakfast because your body needs the fuel for the day. Once the lesson was over the kids had some free time until the guest speaker arrived. Our guest speaker arriver to talk with the kids about cancer and how taking care of yourself can help you not get it or in our speakers case help you beat it. After the presentation, it was time for lunch and it was the time that the counselors had to switch so that the other four interns could learn about the camp. After lunch it was time to say goodbye to this camp and all the kids. Even thought it was really short time there I did learn a lot about leadership and even if you’re not in control of the camp there are kids or people below you that are still watching you and your leadership shines though in every situation.