Just in Case You Were Starting to Miss the Camp Dance...

I know them

Okay, weird: I was at the website for Bill's Bookstore yesterday and on the homepage there's this picture of these four kids from Leon. Weird.

So yeah, that's Jim, Emily, Craig, and Brandon. I definitely know them. I don't know how they got to do that, especially since Brandon goes to the US Air Force Acadamy and Emily goes to UF. What the heck? At least the other two go to FSU. It just for real made me laugh. I mean, a lot of times I go to websites and see the obviously posed pictures and I wonder "Who are those people?" So, when I went to order books, I was not expecting to be able to answer that question. It makes me wonder, how many of people in the billions of other staged pictures I've seen in publications from FSU and stuff like that don't actually go there? Funny stuff, I tell ya what.

Alberto and the First Day

I got my car back!!! You have no idea how happy I am about that. After not driving since November, (we were trying to save money, so we went from 3 cars to 2) it needed some work, but my dad fixed it up today and I can use it tomorrow! I am so excited. I love my Alberto (although now I feel like his name needs to be Artyom or something...wonder why). I drove it to the auto parts store tonight to get some new wiper blades and I was scared that I had forgotten how to drive stick or something, but I got in and started driving and it was like I never left. Yep, I love my little '89 Honda Accord.

Okay so I realize that's not my car, but give me a break, I can't use my camera. My car looks exactly like that though, except it's got a lei hanging from the rearview mirror instead of a paper that says "SALE."
So, today was my first day of classes at FSU. It really didn't seem much different than high school, because all but one of my classes are really small. But, I like all my professors so far. It was pretty funny because it turns out that me and one of my best friends from high school, Amanda, are in the same FIG, so we had all of our classes together today. It was actually pretty nice to know someone already. I have one class tomorrow, but first I have an interview at Canopy Oaks. I'm interviewing to work in the extended day program (after-school). Please pray that I will get the job, cause I really need a job and this is like my dream job at the moment, so please pray for me.

Surprise

I don't know if I've talked much about this, but that picture that I took of Janelle and Nicole dancing in the sunset, you know, this one:



Well, my mom really liked it and she told me I should enter it in some photo contests, so I did. I like the picture and all, but my mom was the one who was really gung-ho about the whole thing, so when I heard back from two of the places, she like flipped out. Apparently my photo was published in two different books of amateur photography. One of the companies made you buy the book for like $65 in order to advance to the next level of the competition, but the other company sent me a letter that said I was a semi-finalist. So, you know, I was pretty excited, but my mom was extatic. So I've had to sign a couple of things saying it's my original work and all and the picture has been copyrighted in my name and I had it licsensed so if the company sold a product off their website with my photo on, I would get royalty payments. I had just been getting paperwork from this place, but then today, they sent me this manilla envelope and I could feel something inside. I opened it and there was this silver coin that said "Winner" and had the contest name and stuff on it. So I opened the letter with it and found out that I won first prize. Now, this is not grand prize, it's first prize. So like, there is one grand prize winner that wins money, then there are 40 first prize winners like me who get the coin and 80 second prize winners and I don't know what they get. So I was soooo surprised. I really didn't expect to make it to the semi-finals, let alone have my photo be one of 40 chosen out of thousands to win first prize. Kinda weird. I called my mom and she freaked out. It was pretty funny. So yeah, I was pretty happy. I kinda wish I would have gotten in on some of that money, but it's still just cool that I won. In a couple of weeks my photo will be on their website, but right now they just have last year's winners.
Well, I'm off to Ruth's for a Mary Kay party!

Happy Ukrainian Independence Day!



I know that it hasn't been August 24 in Ukraine since 4:59 this afternoon, but it's still August 24 here for another 45 minutes, so it's still Ukrainian Independence Day here. (That reminds me of that shirt that says "It's happy hour somewhere*.") So, I'm sitting here sipping my tea and thinking about Ukraine. My dad said that I am obsessed with Ukraine and Radooga. While that pretty much hits the nail on the head, there is nothing wrong with celebrating holidays from other countries. I mean, no one has a problem celebrating Cinco de Mayo, ya know? I guess Radooga has just impacted me in such a way, that I can't help but loving it and the country of Ukraine and all its people. If you've never been on a foreign mission trip before, you probably haven't experienced this. I know that Janelle had a really hard time leaving China and Ian said that he wanted to go back to Guatemala for like months after he came back. I'm just glad that I have friends that will share with me in obsession over Ukraine and that whenever I miss people or just Radooga in general, I know that they are feeling the same way. I pray that I will be able to go back next summer as an All Summer Staff and I can't wait.
I got an email from Joe from South Carolina that went with us to Radooga. It made me happy to hear from him. I for real need to download ICQ so that I can talk to people from Ukraine. Okay, well, I should get to bed soon. I'm helping decorate for the Godby football team meal tomorrow. I feel like I am betraying my alma mater of Leon, but I am secure enough in my loyalty to be a part of this. Oh, I almost forgot, my new cell phone came in today. I am so excited. My old one has been so messed up for so long, that I have really been needing this. Once it decided to stop making or receiving calls, my dad agreed that it was time for a new phone. Anyway, it's here, so that's happy.

*Jenna Myrick and her affiliates in no way endorse drinking alcoholic beverages or observing happy hour. Okay, just wanted to put that out there.

So Much for a Quiet Night at Home

Well, I was going to relax and just take it easy tonight, maybe even go to bed early. I even told Daniel I didn't want to go see a movie tonight because I've been doing a lot and I just wanted to stay home. This was, until Calyn asked me to go to Campus Crusades with her. I thought "Sure, why not? I want to get involved. This is a good reason to go out tonight." So, off we went to the Student Services Building, first floor, room 203 at 8:00 pm. Or so we thought. When we got to the SSB, we found that all the entrances were locked. We were at the SSB, and it was just a few minutes before 8, but no one was there. So we started thinking, maybe it doesn't start till next week. I suggested that we head to the Student Union to check out what was going on there. So after taking the long route (I'm sure) to the union, we found that there wasn't too much happening. Calyn said we should call Daniel to see what he was doing so our driving across town to campus could at least be worth something. I told her how I had told him I was staying home tonight and then decided to call him anyway.
Daniel: "Hey, Calyn."
Me: "Actually, this is Jenna. Guess where I am."
Daniel: "The movies."
Me: "No. Close."
Daniel: "At Calyn's house."
Me: "No, I'm on campus."
Daniel: laughing
Me (to Calyn): He's laughing at me.
So, I told him the story and he invited us to his dorm. So, we went and hung out in Daniel's dorm room until 10:45. We had lots of fun. Daniel's room is really nice and his roommate, Henry, is fun. And now, here I am, just getting home at 11:30 (me and Calyn talked for a bit at her house). So, as I said: so much for a quiet night at home. Oh well.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot. I got to talk to Roma tonight on ICQ! Only for like 2 minutes at Calyn's, but it made my night. I love that kid!

Pumped!

So, I finished orientation at 12:15 today. Yes! It's over and now I feel more confident about being a student at FSU. I got my schedule and I'm excited about the classes that I got. Not necissarily the classes themselves, like the work, but I got good times and a good schedule. I don't ever have a class before 10:10 in the morning. My classes start at 10:10 and go to 3:20 on Monday (with an hour and 20 minutes break for lunch), go from 2:00 to 3:15 on Tuesday and Thursday, go from 10:10 to 2:15 on Wednesday (again with a lunch break), and go from 12:20 to 2:15 on Friday. I think that's a pretty good schedule, if I do say so myself. I'm in this thing called a Freshman Interest Group that groups me with other freshmen in my major and picks some of my classes for me to give me a great schedule with like 15 min between each class. I added one more class to that FIG (the Tues/Thurs one) and there we go. After orientation today, I met up with Daniel and we went and picked up my football ticket coupons and then went to CiCi's for lunch. So, it's been a good day so far. Now I have the rest of the evening (besides running Brandon over to his piano lessons at 5) to do whatever. I'm going to try to organize some things in my room and then get to bed at a decent hour so I can start getting back on a more regular schedule. So, paka for now!

11 Hours of Orientation

So...freakin...tired.
On a good note, some of the program was cancelled, so we got let out at 7:30 instead of 9. Well, to bed for me. I have more orientation starting bright and early at 7 am tomorrow. Groan...

Bittersweet

Carli and Trisha, I love you guys soooo much!
Listen (you have to say it like Jake), Carli and Trisha got to come to Tallahassee yesterday and today and we had so much fun! Carli got in around 4 on Saturday, so Calyn and I took her to Wakulla Springs and she jumped off the high dive. I'm so proud, Carli! Around 7 we left and picked up Trisha and went to Applebee's for dinner. We shared pictures and stories and laughed like crazy. As if we weren't already loud enough by ourselves, we called Jake and Skeef and put them on speaker phone and talked to them for a while. The whole restaurant probably thought we were crazy. Carli said "We're being the loud Americans again, but we're in America, so it's okay."
Then we went to Calyn's house and looked at a TON of pictures that were amazing (especially the ones from Jake and Josh). We reminisced about camp and, again, laughed a lot. We called Jake again and did an interview with him for Calyn's blog and it was hilarious. We even got to call Lori and talk to her. I miss you Lori! We finally went to sleep about 3ish and we had to get up at 7:15 so we could go talk to Sunday school classes about raising money for Lori at 8:15. Carli had to leave in the morning, :-( but Trisha came with us to church and got to meet everyone and go around to classes with us. We left after we were done talking to the 11:00 classes and went to Calyn's for lunch. We got to talk to Tanya and Zhenya (the twins) on ICQ for a little while and then after lunch we took a 3 hour nap because we were all so tired. Trisha came with us to youth, but she had to leave halfway through, so we went up on the hill and did the camp dance before she left. It's so weird, because I feel like I've known Trisha for as long as anyone else from Radooga, I forget I just met her. But as we said, we know each other now and that's all that matters.
"Why are Trisha and Carli so kick butt? Is it because they are such awesome people? Yeah, you know it." Oh my gosh, I love you guys!
So, the only problem is now they are both gone and I am sad because talking about everybody and everything from Radooga just makes me miss it that much more. At the time we were talking and laughing, it was great and it made me feel better, but now, not so much. So yeah, I'm listening to the camp dance song right now (Cbobodniy Palyot!) and I'm about to cry. Not really, but I am really sad.
Well, I should go to bed, because I have FSU orientation tomorrow (12 hours at FSU) and Tuesday (another 5 or 6 hours) and I have to get up pretty early.
I miss Ukraine, I miss Radooga, and I miss Carlitchka and Trishka!

That's Heavy!

Okay, I don't have time to post because Me and Calyn are about to watch Back to the Future. However, you can, and should, read about my feelings for the day on Calyn's blog. I am so excited that Trisha and Carli are coming. Yay!!!

Since I Still Haven't Written About it: Camp!

Okay, I know what you're going to say. "It's about time!" But I really want to write about Student Life Camp and I really have been meaning to, but I haven't yet. But now I am...
Just a little background information: I had been feeling pretty discouraged about our youth group. I mean, it seemed as if most people didn't care about the relationship part of being a Christian and that our group, in general, was going downhill. I came to camp not expecting for much to change, because I thought that everyone was so far gone that they wouldn't care. Our youth group lacked leadership and we weren't growing. I think you can see why I was discouraged.
Camp started and I was worried that our family group wasn't going to get along. We had an interesting mix of people, but Calyn and I were determined to make it work. As the week went on, our family group started to mesh. Recreation really helped us to bond. We became the Funky Chickens and had an awesome cheer. We even won family group of the day. Around me, I saw people began to change, and God was working in me too. Us leaders felt so burdened for the people around us that we began to meet when we had a chance to pray for them. During the last two church group times, I couldn't help but to cry when different people shared what God was doing in their lives. I had doubted God's power to work in the lives of the people in our youth group. We had been learning about how big (haha, hugeous) God is and how He's made these amazing things that are like 31 billion lightyears away and yet I was doubting that he could speak to the hearts of the people around me. What was I thinking? So many people made decisions and shared about changes they needed to make in their lives. God showed me that I need to worship him with all that I am, because he's worthy of it (and we all know he sooooo is).
So now, I'm pretty pumped about how God is working in our youth group. I'm looking forward to the year ahead and I'm excited about what's going to take place. Todd took the youth leaders for next year (that's me and that's weird) and some youth that have shown leadership potential to Laguna last week and we spent time planning out the year. We decided to make some changes in the way we were running things, and we planned some awesome outreach opportunities. I am so excited to see what God's gonna do in our youth group this year. It was awesome to see students and leaders so on fire for God. Please pray for our youth group that these changes could be a step, well more like a leap, in the right direction and not just a "camp experience." Also pray for the coming year and for everyone who made a change in their lifestyle, that they would have the strength to keep it.
I'm so glad that I got to and get to be a part of the amazing things happening in the Northwoods Youth Ministry. This was the best Student Life Camp that I have ever been to. I must say that for not coming to camp with very high expectations, I sure left being blown away by all that was happening. This summer has been full of amazing experiences and I hope that there are more to come.

"Jenna is..."

Okay, so I was going to do a serious post about camp and people leaving and senior night and stuff (yes, yes, I know, I still haven't done that) but it's late and I'm tired. So instead, I got this idea off of Lauren's blog. You type your name and the word "is" in quotations (ex: "Jenna is") into a Google search and you see what comes up. I found out some very interesting things about myself...

• "Jenna is 'a great player'" (Why, thank you!)
• "Jenna is some perfect interpersonal guru" (I wouldn't say perfect, but...)
• "Jenna is a girl that is so beautiful every other girl envies her" (Hey, I didn't make this up.)
• "Jenna is even dumber than her father" (That's not very nice, they shouldn't talk about my dad that way.)
• "Jenna is in the elevator" (Not at the moment.)
• "Jenna is unwanted" (Sad for me!)
• "Jenna is married to Greg" (See! And all you people thought I was going to marry Daniel.)

Well, that was fun. There were a ton more but some of them weren't very funny and some were just, well, bad. But yeah, that was fun, so you should try it. I bet you'll learn some very interesting things about yourself too.

Caramel Apple Pops

Oh, the joys of being a college student. Yes! I can say that now. It's so awesome that I don't have to go to school tomorrow. Calyn is spending the night and tomorrow we are going to Wakulla Springs with Nicole and her sister. Woo-hoo! Since Calyn's interview was so much fun last night, we're going to do another one.

*Cool music playing. Da da duh... This is: Lifestyles of the Rich and Emotional. I'm your host, Jenna Myrick, and we are joined tonight by our guest, Lil' Moo-Moo, the semi-famous rapper (after Lil' Bray-Bray and Lil' Tay-Tay, of course). Let's begin.*

Jenna: So, Calyn, what did you end up doing with all that leftover food from yesterday?
Calyn: Well, my neighbors and I have a food war going on, cause we do, and they keep bringing us food and we keep giving them food. They own a Jenny Craig franchise and they just bought a new Corvette, so apparently people are getting skinny. So, I took them over some borsch. Oh, and while I was walking back I almost ran into this giant banana spider web. With two giant banana spiders on it, like somthing off of "Arachniphobia." I almost died. Seriously. Are banana spiders poisonous?
Jenna: I don't know.
Calyn: They look like they'd be poisonous. They should really teach you that kinda stuff in school. Cause like, who needs to know about the Prussian wars? I'd rather know if I'm gonna die if I got bit by a banana spider.
Jenna: Yeah, that seems a little more practical to me. You know they do teach you some of that stuff in school. Like that rhyme for coral snakes.
Calyn: And king snakes. Yeah, but I never remember it.
Jenna: That's a problem. I think it's "Red touches black, friend of Jack. Red touches yellow, deadly fellow." Yeah, that sounds about right.
Calyn: Wait, but if red touches black, doesn't it touch yellow too? There's only three colors! Cause if red touches black, then black must touch yellow, and yellow must touch red. It's like hyperbola theorum, or something. You know, if A=B, and B=C, then A=C.
Jenna: Yea, I know what you're talking about, but I don't think that's what it's called.
Calyn: Well, I haven't had a math class in like, 2 years, and I don't plan on taking one ever again, so I've forgotten it.
Jenna: See, that's what I'm talking about, right there. That's why college rocks.
Calyn: Okay, let me get this strait. Red touches Jack, get back, get back! Red touches yellow, friendly fellow. Wait, no. See, this is why I wouldn't bet my life on this stupid rhyme. They really need to teach us stuff in school like this. Like, how to start a fire (more importantly, how to put out a fire), how to tell which way's north like, cause of the stars and stuff. You know, like when you'd read about the Underground railroad and the slaves would tell which way was north cause of where the ivy grew on the trees and stuff.
Jenna: I think it's moss, Calyn.
Calyn: Whatever. See, that's why I need to learn it.
Jenna: Well, why don't you just join Girl Scouts or something?
Calyn: Cause all they do is sell cookies.
Jenna: Okay, then join Boy Scouts.
Calyn: Oh, sure, I can just cut my hair. But what do I do about these?
Jenna: You can just put duct tape around your chest.
Calyn: Like in Mulan?
Jenna: Actually, I was thinking like in "Now and Then."
Calyn: You mean, "Now and Later?"
Jenna: No, that movie, "Now and Then." You know, it's got that girl in it. The one with the funky face from that movie.
Calyn: Oh, yeah. That clears it up. The one wth the "funky face".
Jenna: Casper! She's the girl from Casper!
Calyn: Christina Ricci?
Jenna: Yeah, that's it.
Calyn: Didn't it have Ellen DeGeneres in it?
Jenna: No, it had Rosie O'Donnell in it.
Calyn: I knew it was a talk-show host.
Jenna: Yeah, the other lesbian talk-show host.
Calyn: Oh yes.
Jenna: I don't think they'll let her on Sesame Street anymore.
Calyn: No, I think they'll really invite her on now. Sesame Street's messed up. They have all sorts of bad people on. Little kids don't know. They don't watch the news. They watch Sesame Street. I watched Sesame Street all the time. "'C' is for 'cookie', is good enough for me..." I love that one.
Jenna: "'L' is for 'Lesbian', it's good enough for me..."
Calyn: It's definitely good enough for Rosie.
Jenna: And Ellen.
Calyn: But not together.
Jenna: You know, Rosie O'Donnell has a blog. I found it.
Calyn: That's great, Goose. When I watched Sesame Street, I was really afraid of the Nip Nips.
Jenna: The what?
Calyn: The nip nips. The aliens that came in the spaceship. They said nip, nip, nip, nip, nip...
Jenna: Is that where your hatred of E.T. came from?
Calyn: Yeah, it's on my profile.
Jenna: Do you wanna talk about it?
Calyn: Yes, Oleg Jr.
Jenna: Tell me about your childhood.
Calyn: Well, the nip nips aren't the only thing I was scared of. I was really scared of "Land Before Time" when Little Foot's mom gets half eaten by the T-Rex. I used to always hide in my mom's closet during that part.
Jenna: Tell me how that makes you feel.
Calyn: uh, pretty scared. Keagan is scared of "Land Before Time" too ("too", not "to" or "two". Just wanted to get that strait, Taco Bell...) but only because my mom would put on Jurassic Park and tell him it was Land Before Time. He's scared of the German Coffee commercial too. But his mom is the one that sent that to us. So she approved.
Jenna: Very interesting. Hey, want a carmel apple pop? I have chocolate covered coffee beans too. The dark chocolate ones are the best.
Calyn: Heck yes. Oh my gosh. These are to die for. We did a musical of that. But it was "2 die 4."
Jenna: Cause it was like, on a license plate. Like a play on words or something. Or numbers. Whatever. Okay, we're too engrossed in our snacking to type anymore. I'll have to hear about your childhood later.
Calyn: Oleg would have listened about my childhood.
Jenna: You can still tell me, it just won't be on record.
Calyn: What could I possibly have to say to you that I don't want to say in front of 5 milion people on the internet?
Jenna: How we're gonna get you into the Boy Scouts.
Calyn: The end.

This has been "Lifestyles of the Rich and Genderly Confused. For a transcript, please visit our website at www.jenshka.blogspot.com. Goodnight everyone. Copyright XXMCCLQRS12&*

My Eyes...

So, as you can see, I've been pretty busy lately and haven't made time for blogging. I want to tell you about camp and the leadership retreat and our Ukrainian food night, but I just went with Calyn to a house with 27 cats and 6 dogs and my allergies are acting up and I can feel my eyes swelling more and more each minute. So, I should probably go to sleep or something. I don't know, but this allergy medicine better kick in soon or I'm not going to be able to see at all. I will post tomorrow. Really. I promise. Or you can punch me.

Hey, by the way, did you know if you take the first "e" off of the word "eyes" it makes the word "yes"? It does, you should try it. Try it! Okay.

Pictures From Radooga

Here are some pictures from Radooga. I don't know how much these will mean to the people who weren't there, but I hope they will give you a little look at what it was like.


Ahhh...Paris, the city of love


The Notre Dame cathedral


The Eiffel Tower


Calyn, Diane, Tamara, Nicole, and Lori at our favorite hangout place, the steps of building one.


A very interesting meal with our staple substitute, peanut butter. Nekita made me try one of those nasty fish things and, unlike Diane, I did not find them appetizing.


The girls in my English class: Dasha, Tanya, Anya, and Yulya


Nicole and I's English class on the day we took a trip to "America" and played frisbee.
Sasha, Me, Dasha, Anya (student), Kostya, Nicole, Yulya, Tanya, Anya (translator), Artyom, and Yura


Elusha and Calyn


Kelly, Tamara, Tiffany, and Diane


JenniGray, Shelby, and Lauren


Veronica and Calyn


Roma and Joe feelin' the love


Tamara, Hillary, (Katya's teddy bear held by Nekita,) Nicole, and Me


Diane and Tamara dancing to the "reggae" song. If you knew the word "reggae," you knew half of the song.


Tamara and I in our super-awesome glowstick glasses. Mine started leaking and so there was orange glowy stuff all over my cheek.


Sergey with his awesome spikey hair

There are a ton more pictures where these came from. Check out my link to my Radooga album in the sidebar. That album doesn't even have all of my pictures because I can't get the ones off of my camera's internal memory, but they are mostly all there. Also check out Diane, Todd, and Calyn's blogs (in my "check these blogs out" section) for more pictures and stories about Radooga.

I'm Back!

Wow, guys, I am really sorry. It's been almost a month since I blogged last and that's pitiful. I was planning on blogging before I left for Radooga to do the whole "I'm going out of the country so don't expect me to blog" thing, but our flight got changed and my hour of time got cut to like 15 minutes and I didn't have time to blog. So then I felt really bad and I knew everyone was going to get mad at me, but I thought "oh well, I'll blog when I get back." Well, I got back from Radooga and had 3 days before Student Life Camp. But those 3 days ended up being really busy and I again failed to blog. We got back from camp yesterday and I am finally able to catch you up on everything.
Let's start with Radooga. I have one word: Awesome! I mean, I had heard Calyn and Lori talk about things that happened and how great Radooga was, but I didn't really know until I went for myself. As you now know, our flights got messed up before we left and we had to change some flights. We met the team from South Carolina that we were working with that week at the Cincinnati airport. I wasn't sure how well we were going to mesh with them, because it seemed like they all had their friends and were fine. But anyways, when we got to Paris the next morning we missed our flight and found out we were going to have to stay the night in Paris. I figured "hey, if we're gonna get stuck somewhere, Paris is probably the best place to do it." They airline paid for our hotel and meals, so that was awesome. We went and saw the Eiffel Tower and the Notre Dame cathedral and ate at this sorta cute but sorta sketchy French cafe. Oh yeah, and we met this guy who was going to Ukraine to meet some chick he met over the internet and he missed his flight too so he walked around with us. He was definitely sketchy. Hey Duane, if you're out there, I hope you found your wife, man.
We finally made it to Ukraine and we got to the Kiev airport. We walked out of customs and I was soooo happy to see Calyn and Lori waiting for us. We rode to the camp they caught us up on what was going on at Radooga. Since we were a day late, we didn't get to start our week with a day in the city like normal. But we did have orientation the first 2 days we were there. We learned about the history of Ukraine (sort of), shared testimonies, learned some Russian (Privyet chuvaki!), and visited English classes. We started to get to know the team from SC better. Nicole and I played ultimate frisbee with them and they were impressed at how good we were and I think that started to break down barriers and open up conversations. I found out that they were really cool and I got to know most of them quite well over the 2 weeks in Ukraine. The housing and stuff isn't bad. Except for the occasional cold shower and not being able to flush your toilet paper, I would actually consider it good. The food on the other hand, not so much. Every meal you had a meat and a starch and either a slice of cucumber or a wedge of tomato. The food was sometimes okay, but when it was, it would be like chicken and rice...for breakfast, kind of weird, don't ya think? But hey, it's camp food. Real Ukrainian food is actually good. Anyways, when the kids finally got there, we welcomed them as their busses pulled in and then they went to English testing to be placed into a class. Normally, there are around 100 pre-beginners, but this time, there were only 13. In a way, that was good because it meant that most people knew at least some English, but I was supposed to be teaching a pre-beginner class with Nicole and we ended up teaching a beginner class. This meant that they knew quite a bit more than we thought that they were going to. But, English class went well the whole week. We taught them new words, played games, and sang the "Baby Shark" song, which they loved. At the end of the week they made up words to it and sang it to us.
Throughout the week there was celebration in the morning (after breakfast), then English class, lunch, then the kids went to their church group time and we got ready for recreation, then we had rec, dinner, then evening program and, last but not least, Party Zone. Party Zone was like Late Nite at Student Life, except it was way better. We did the camp dance during Party Zone, and it was one of my favorite parts of the day. Before celebration, evening program, and Party Zone, we made "Two lines!" and gave the kids high fives and danced around while they came in. At first they were kind of freaked out by it, but by the end of camp we were giving them hugs and they just loved it.
On repentance night, Paul, the speaker, gave an altar call for kids to accept Christ and about 100 Ukrainian students gave their lives to Christ. It was so awesome to see God work in such a big way. That was probably the best part of the whole week.
During camp, I lived with 3 other Americans, a translator, and 4 Ukrainians. I got to know the girls in my room pretty well. They were all so sweet. I know for a fact that at least one accepted Christ. I'm pretty sure 2 others did too. The other girl was really scared about going to anything. She would just stay in the room the whole day except for English class and meals. But, by the end of the week she was going to everything and, I'm not sure whether she became a Christian or not, but she at least was starting to open up.
Everyone was so awesome that I don't have room or time to tell you about it all. This is already so long, so I'll try to give you the short version. All of the translators were awesome. Katya was in my room and she was so cool. She fell in love with my vanilla body spray, so I left the rest of it with her when I left. Nekita was so much fun. He always kept us laughing with his craziness. Anya was so incredibly sweet. She was the translator for our English class and I don't know what I would have done without her. The all-summer staff was really cool too. Carli did rec and she was so awesome. I love Carli. I got to spend some time with her on the last night we were there and we had some good times talking and falling asleep to Zoolander. Amberly and Cliff did worship. Amberly lead the singing and Cliff played drums. Amberly is so sweet and I loved watching her when she lead worship because she was so energetic. Cliff was fun. He made fun of people a lot, and I was no exception, but I did manage to have a serious conversation with him and I figured out that he's a pretty cool guy. Justin lead drama. We decided that he shouldn't be in charge of teaching us Ukrainian history, but he was also a cool guy and he was good at drama. The all-summer staff on team B were cool too, but I wasn't able to get to know them that well. I did, however, get to know the tech/camera people who were from Ukraine, Roma, Andrey, Sergey. On the last night we were there we stayed up all night long so we could hang out and talk. We told jokes and figured out that they don't translate very well, but they were still hilarious because of Roma's facial expressions. The time flew by and we had to leave for the airport before we knew it. Getting home was not nearly as difficult and I slept on and off pretty much the whole way, so it went by pretty fast. When we got back it was like 6 something so we went to Village Inn to get some real breakfast food for dinner.
I have so much more to tell, but if you spend any amount of time with me, I'm sure you'll hear (or already have heard) stories. I'll have to tell ya'll about camp later because I'm tired and this is really long. I'll also put some pictures of Radooga up later. But for now, paka!