Making Friends, Making Memories

Corny, eh? What-evah!

I've made friends, biotch!

Yes, I realize that this is a big "Duh, Mei, you big doubting dork" moment, but there were a couple of hours there where I did, indeed, doubt. Open heart and open mind Ofelia vs. doubting Daisy: 1 - 0. I sincerely hope that Ofelia wins by a landslide!

Yesterday after those Doubting Daisy hours and after a horrible dinner, I did some of the NY Times crossword puzzles in a little puzzle calendar that I got for Xmas this past year. (Miss you and your fabulous brain, Joely-Moely-Guacamole!) I only do the Monday and Tuesday ones because those are the easiest, but whatever - it makes me feel smart and I like it! Haha. I was doing some puzzles lying out on the big wagon bed in the sun when Sunny (new friend number 1) came up with a book and a bean bag chair and asked if she could join me. I agreed readily, eager to get the friend-making process underway. It was great fun! She was reading Amy Tan's Saving Fish from Drowning which I just finished over the Xmas break, and we just talked about various and sundry small light things. It was great. It started to look stormy and so we decided to move inside, but en route we were invited to go out canoeing/kayaking/paddling around on the lake with Amy and Sam and a whole posse of others. It was really great! Katie and Sam were in a kayak, Amy and Lisa were in a canoe (Lisa had never paddled before and so there was a lot of lilydipping going on - definition of lilydipping: A lily dipper is one who looks from the outside like they are paddling like everyone else; however, from inside of the team, they are known for just going through the motions of real work - but in this case it was because of a lack of familiarity with canoeing), and Barbara, Sunny, and I were in a canoe (Barbara up front, Sunny in the middle confusing things, and me in the back trying to keep up with the switching of Barbara and Sunny and struggling to hear Barbara's requests of directions). It was so much fun! It was absolutely gorgeous, with a breeze (that later became a wind as we straggled back to shore), a beautiful sunset through the big scary tornado-esque clouds, and the fabulous company. I had such a great time I laughed the whole time! Barbara, Sunny, Katie, Sam, and I got back to shore, but Amy and Lisa were still paddling around way out in the middle of the lake. We thought they just wanted to hang out way out there for a little longer. Little did we know that they were actually stuck because of the wind!

When they finally made it in, Amy was so frustrated she was "really fucked off!" which she prefers to "really pissed off" because it has just that extra much of oomph to it. As they were struggling in, Charlotte arrived with two new additions, Emily and Josh who had just flown in from England. They had flown to New York, spent the night in "a hostel," and then flown here. Two solid days of traveling with very little sleep and they were both wiped out. But they went out in a canoe with Charlotte anyway and had a great time. Sunny and I went up to grab a snack from the dining hall (bagel and jam), and then just hung out doing crosswords on the wagon and then chatting in my cabin when the clouds became too menacing. The lighting was absolutely incredible though! The sky was the gorgeous deep pink color, while the lighting on the trees behind us was the eerie copper red, deep tang (Kate Campbell reference, please check out her music!) orange color. It was amazing!!!!

Emily eventually made her way back to the cabin and we all sat around and talked, learning stuff about our different cultures, customs, and schooling. It was so much fun! I really had a great time! Emily said that her favorite parts of England are the Lake District because of the mountains, lakes, and just all out beauty, and Yorkshire where her aunt lives because of its "quintessential English village look." At the end of the chat night, Emily and I were both falling asleep while Sunny was just as peppy as ever (she had been here a lot longer than either Emily or myself). It was "damned amusing!" (Vicar of Dibley reference)

Amy, Sam, and Katie stopped by on their way out for a smoke and it was quite hilarious. I greeted Amy with the standard greeting, "Yo what's poppin'?" Her response was to look at me like I was crazy and laugh at me like I knew exactly that what I had said was ridiculous. She is correct on both counts. Thanks, Justin Cervantes Morehouse and Wheezy! Let me ask you something, dear reader. What would you think an individual would be purchasing if they were to say: "I'm going out to buy myself some togs"? Tee hee hee. Here's a teaser! Personally I thought they meant just big wading boots or some such. We also had a great little discussion on nomenclature. For example in New Zealand, diapers for children are called "nappies," while the same for adults are called "mollies." In the U.S. we call diapers for children, well, diapers, or we go for the good ol' brand name "Pampers" or some such. For adults, we always default to the brand name "Depends." Lovely conversation though - very amusing!

This morning I got up about 8am CST for a little morning exercise. Note to self: must get up earlier (well, I will have to get up earlier) because the sun is ridiculously warm already at 8am. RIDICULOUS! But it was a nice mile and a half or so walk/jog (about 90% walk, 10% painful jog - I'm bound to get better though, right? Right?!). So now I'm sitting outside in my favorite spot beneath the Friendship Lodge looking out at the lake and enjoying the cool breeze. It's fabulous!

Here are things I miss from home:

• Humming birds - instead they have tons of dragon flies
  
• Bird calls - of course there are different birds and other such up here, but it surprises me how much it startles me to hear completely different bird calls and see different kinds of birds!)
• Reddy - my dog - I will certainly go mad up here wifout a puffy/fur fix at some point!
• Walking in the woods wif Reddy
• Vicar of Dibley viewings with mother (no, I don't quite miss the "watery cow" dinner sounds ... yet ...)
  

Not so bad, considering that earlier I had missed almost everything. Haha! One thing I will say, though, is that I get MUCH better internet reception here than I ever did from the stolen wireless at home! I wonder why ... Haha.

Oh! I talked to Michael (love you!) yesterday who promised fabulous omelets upon return to Emory. I in turn promised yummy french toast, though I suspect that I will also be making sweet potato pancakes ... yum ... Tubbies (my my, Z, are we getting frisky), we are going to make FABULOUS din-dins when we get back!!!!!! I'm getting a rumbly stomach already - this is not a good sign - breakfast is still a good hour away! (10:30am CST.) Haha!

Training starts tomorrow. Yikes! I will certainly keep you posted!

Love to you all!

~ Mei

Arrival!

Disclaimer: CAUTION: THE FOLLOWING IS ANOTHER RIDICULOUSLY LONG ENTRY. PLEASE DO NOT BE DISCOURAGED - FEEL FREE TO SKIM.

New-Camp Blues?

I'm here! In fabulous Annandale, MN. It is absolutely gorgeous up here - beautiful weather, sunshine, upper seventies in the degrees department, breeze, beautiful lake, and green grass. Heaven much? Charlotte, one of three program managers, picked me up at the airport right on time. My bag even got there And yet I feel slightly obligated to express what I can only term my "new camp blues." I had these "blues" as a camper, and now as a counselor I'm displaying the same main symptom: paralyzing shyness. I don't know anyone, and I'm not that great around all-female groups. The camp staff is decidedly female-dominated, and I'm not entirely comfortable. I am certainly looking forward to working with the campers this coming week and for the rest of the summer! Sure, I can go and put myself out on a limb, but it takes me a while to warm up to people. Yes, I am most likely just making excuses for being unfriendly and extremely nervous, but hopefully I can snap out of this stage of hesitation in order to go out and actually make new counselor friends. I know I said I would come here with an open heart and an open mind, but I'm finding it a bit difficult to come out of the industrial-strength shell in which I've hunkered down.

The flight from Knoxville to Chicago was relatively uneventful. They crammed us into a tiny airplane, but luckily I had the window seat. It was fabulous. The clouds and mist, fog, and sunrise were absolutely breath-taking. Almost worth getting up at 5am ... almost ... Unfortunately for the woman seated beside me, she was in quite a foul mood, huffing, chugging her vente Starbucks, sipping tomato juice (eesh - just heat it up and eat it like tomato soup), and glaring at the seat in front of her. I'm not sure what got her goat, but she needed to just take a chill pill. I spent the flight doing more thank you notes from birthday presents/cards. Great flight - not too much turbulence!

Amusingly enough, the entire trip up here seemed to be bent upon testing my patience and my ability to just let things slide. It was so refreshing, though, to be able to just say "Hey, it's okay. Take your time!" to see the look on the person's face: astonishment, pity, confusion, etc. There was nothing I could do about the plane being late, and I was in no hurry to get anywhere to see anyone. It was quite relaxing - much like my drive home from Atlanta after finals (or was it during Spring Break?) when I saw all the rainbows. But I digress - here are some of the moments when I just laughed softly to myself and sat back:

• When we first got to Tyson-McGhee airport, we saw an extremely long line for check-in, but it turned out to be Delta. Thank goodness. So we stepped over to the American Airlines counter. And what do you know! There was a whole gang of Asians (Japanese in this case) who didn't understand the concept of waiting turns (they all rushed the counter), what to do, or where to go. It was quite amusing, actually.
• Luggage weighed in at a solid 49.5 pounds. Whew.
• Security line was ridiculously long, but thankfully I didn't wait any longer to get into line. After about five minutes in line, there was a line backed up past the end of the fancy-shmancy Great Smoky Mountain stream fountain thingy.
  
• Security had to re-scan my bag because of something in it, but luckily they didn't ask me to unpack anything.
• After it was re-scanned, a bag belonging to the man behind me was scanned, re-scanned, scans consulted, re-consulted, scanned once again, and discussed further. Of course my backpack had to be right in front of his, completely inaccessible. And so though my bag was no longer in question, I still had to wait. I just took a deep breath and waited, sighing inside and rolling my eyes everytime a "new superior" sidled over to take a look.
• When coming into the O'Hare airport, we had pulled up to our terminal, but were blocked from pulling up to the actual gate by a line of air craft who were waiting to get the all's-clear sign to taxi out onto the runway. We were within 50 yards of the gate - so close, and yet so far ... The weather was gloomy, rainy, and gross, so I'm guessing the back-up was due to the weather. (I'm a genius, I know. Everyone start clapping.)
• It took forever for people to get off of the plane. I'm not sure why they don't have us exit the same way that they have us board: according to zones. The huffy Starbucks-toting woman grumbled and grouched and griped, but no one would let her in despite her jerky motions (I smiled a little inside).
• Once we were all boarded on the plane headed from O'Hare to Minneapolis, there was a fabulously long wait to for the plane to leave. It took forever! Not sure why. Maybe luggage loading issues?
• On this flight I was on the aisle, but luckily it was a much larger plane, and the center seat was open with a sulky girl listening to screaming metal bands in the window seat. She wasn't very friendly and was down-right surly most of the time. I guess I just have good luck with plane buddies? Haha.
  

Classic Mei moment: I forgot that Chicago was in CST, and so hadn't changed my watch. I rushed to the terminal and was getting peeved that they hadn't started seating people, when i realized that I had an additional hour. Phooey! I could have gotten food! And I totally should have. I was starving, digesting my insides, and getting nauseous by the time I got to the carousel to pick up my luggage. And then another hour and a half until we got to camp, followed by a small tour, getting settled, and finally food. Crappy food at that. It's really quite unfortunate. But hey, it's food. Hopefully if it stays this bad I'll lose some weight. Hah! The delicious fare of the day was: sloppy joes, awkward north-style slaw (no flavor), chips, brownie, under-cooked pasta salad with olives. The only redeeming qualities were the wheat bun and the fresh fruit (yay for bananas!). I most definitely miss home with Red, the kitchen/cooking, and the friends and family! Love y'all!

Here's an interesting (true, as far as I can tell) story, called "The Man-with-Nothing." Allow me to introduce you to the Man-with-Nothing. He plops down in the seat right next to me (there were plenty of of other empty seats at the terminal) and begins this fabulous story of how he became the Man-with-Nothing. Calling up whoever, he tells such a fascinating story. "I have nothing. Literally nothing except for what was in my pockets last night." He had gotten apparently 5 hours of sleep in the past 48 hours, but it sounds like it was sleep deprivation of choice. Hard nights of partying? Me thinks yes. He and his "buddies" (well, ex-buddies after this incident) had not quite enjoyed an "anti-climatic night." They had gone out to a bar last night and were sitting around wondering what to do next when another buddy called to say that he was having a party over at his house. They all went. Apparently the first group of buddies passed out somewhere and then left the Man-with-Nothing with, well, practically nothing. Interestingly enough, they even had all but one of his credit cards. So this morning he took a "$75 cab" to the airport where he bought a ticket and was making his way ... to wherever ... where they were supposed to "launch some boats" (because they "had to"). Man-with-nothing looked to be in his late twenties, early thirties. Pretty amusing stuff. After the phone convo, he sulkily played games on his iPhone, occasionally picking his phone up as if trying to call his buddies - no answers, apparently.

Chiggers: Northern-style. Instead of being those tiny red dots that drop from Spanish moss (or in the case of our front porch swarm everywhere) in order to feast upon your flesh leaving tiny red bumps that last forever and itch like hell as in the Southern-style chigger, these Northern-chiggers seem to be of a different breed. They live, for all intents and purposes, in the water, specifically the thousands of lakes up here, and burrow beneath the skin to feast, casing horrendous itching and burning sensations for a week or more. Fabulous. They sounds absolutely horrendous, don't they? Good thing camp is situated on a lake ...

For Nalas: Wildlife Spottings. So far, here are the varied species of "Wildlife!" that I have spotted here at camp so far:

• beautiful little blue dragon flies
• one squirrel
• one chipmunk
• various and sundry small brown birds
• one crow, and a great blue heron (that is out on the dock as I type this)

Alright, brave, committed, and slightly insane readers (only insane if you read every word of this tome), that is all for now. More to come as I type furiously trying to avoid making eye contact and friends. Just kidding ... I hope ...

Love!

~ Mei