Hey there readers! Pixels are here again to blog about our day! We woke up early and we were very exhausted because we arrived Camp Taloali at about 11:00 p.m. the night before after our long day of celebration for the Fourth of July. We were busy shopping at Newport, playing at the beach and watching fireworks. We had fun, but now we had to return to our regular schedule. It was not easy!
In the morning, we had Camp Council. We voted our YLC ‘09 Banquet chairpersons, Juan Dillard and Subrina Morales! Then, we were able to make our own motions. We made two motions, we sure learned a lot about how to properly state and discuss our proposals! We are excited to learn more valuable information that we will be able to bring back to our schools and communities!
Our next activity was Outdoor Living Skills and we learned how to make a shelter without using trees for support. First, we had to learn how to make a Bowline, Clove Hitch, and Taut. These are three kinds of knots that are very useful because they won’t slip or come undone. Bowline is the most complicated knot comparing to others, whereas the other two are simpler to tie. Then, after we learned how to make the three different knots, we had to make a shelter using these knots to keep it in place. We used a blue tarp and strings. We got big rocks and some large sticks to hold the tarp in place , everyone was successful at making the shelter. Now we know what to do if we are lost in wilderness with strings and a tarp!
During our famous Evening Program (EP), each of the four teams, Callus, Firefly, Evermore and Pixels had to carve their own watermelon to represent their group. Team Gizmo, also known as our wonderful staff, joined too! We had only a hour to finish it, then we chose one or two representatives from each group to explain why they picked their design and what it meant. The judges who decided winner of this activity were Travis Clevenger, Jennifer Yost Ortiz, Martin Dale-Hench, and Jonathan Kessel. The scores were so close, the judges declared that Callus won for the best watermelon carving!
It was fun, campers enjoyed each groups’ watermelons carving, some of them to ate be delicious watery watermelons and after that, they played around running and a lot of laughers.
Last night, we had two wonderful fireside speakers. Cesar Ayala, one of our YLC staff, talked about three words that define his life: Deaf, Latino, and Gay. He is the baby of a strong Latino family; his family immigrated to California from Mexico just before he was born. An audiologist mistook him as deaf so he was placed in California School for the Deaf, Riverside and grew up there. He got exposed to the Deaf community by accident! During his senior year, he had another audiogram. It confirmed that he could hear but he felt that his identity was with the Deaf community, so he decided to attend Gallaudet University. He also talked about how many of his experiences, including YLC, helped him through his obstacles and fears. The advice he gave all of us was very inspiring and to be supportive of others in whatever they may be going through! The next guest speaker was another YLC staff, Samantha Kreiger, she talked about her experiences with bullying. She was bullied by her best friend her childhood friends. They were jealous of her academic successes. It was very hard to believe that a person like Samantha could get bullied but that proves that anyone could get bullied by anyone. It is important for everyone to stay true to yourselves and speak up when you feel bullied by the others.
What an exhausting day we had! Bit by bit we are learning how to be leaders. With every OLS class we take, we learn valuable skills that can be applied to real life situations. We learn how to be skilled media editors on the Daily Drum, DVD yearbook, Vlog and Blog. We have fun with things like watermelon carving contests, which are still beneficial because we ultimately have to learn how to sell ourselves as well as our works of art. We passed our two first bills, and though they will need to be approved by the camp director, we feel empowered that we came to a decision together! And we wrapped up our day with two inspiring speakers whom we see on a day to day basis, but now know just a little bit more!
Dathan Brown and Sophia Stone concentrating on their knots!
Jay Werner practicing the bowline on Esther Fass' arm.
Dakota Johndrow looks confident in his knot-tying skills.
Johnny Bonilla showing Mike Hesser how to do a clove hitch.
Team Callus working on their watermelon.
Valerie Farr discussing what her team should do with their sculpture.
Team Evermore carving out the insides of their watermelon.
Joshua Ralstin, you are supposed to be carving your watermelon not eating it!
Juan Dillard did an awesome job carving up the rind!
Hilary Stone putting her artistic skills to work!
All done? Your watermelon looks great, Tiffany Hill!
As Subrina Morales is showing, there is always time and room for laughter during our Evening Programs!
Gizmo staff: Samantha Krieger, Vivienne Schroeder and Joshua Beckman working hard to make a beautiful entry!
Sergio Carrillo stating his team's motto "Small light, big *impact*!"
