ENGLISH CAMP AFTER-PARTY 2011

Two weeks after the North Bohemia English Camp, we had an English Camp after-party at Zakopane Pes, the Christian Youth Center in Liberec. (A local church has a ministry center which is like a mini-Dream Center that houses various Christian ministries to the community.) It was in the 90's and one of the hottest days of the summer. So what else than to have a WATER theme.

For the first game, we divided into 4 teams. Each person filled their mouth with water from the small pool, ran around the large yard and then spit the water into their team's bottle. First team to fill their bottle won.

Next a full fledged war with water balloons. It's every man for himself!

The water balloon fight quickly escalated - everyone knows that balloons don't hold much! What else can I grab? .. buckets, bottles, orange cones, the hose ...

After everyone is as wet as can be, what else can we do? How about an improvised Slip-n-Slide? No, a BIGGER ONE!!!!

What better way to end the party than with Pepsi (or Kofola) floats!

N BOHEMIA ENGLISH CAMP Aug 6-13, 2011

This year's English Camp included many new and younger teens, many of whom had little knowledge about Jesus. It was a fantastic outreach. These teens grew up in a post-communist society and they were much freer to hear and ask questions about Christianity than groups in the past. The evening meetings were followed by small discussion groups and the Holy Spirit often changed the planned topic to go into depth to answer their questions. I often heard leaders say, "I didn't plan to say that, but ...", throughout the week (even Ken and I).

There were 40 Czech teens, 10 American teens, and 12 leaders. Everyone seemed to have a great time. Each day had a theme with a different leader/team responsible for the day. It worked out well, no one felt overwhelmed. Being an English Camp, we had English for a few hours everyday which Linda planned and prepared ahead of time. We divided almost evenly into 4 groups, each at a different level of ability.

Following are some photos of our time together.

Each day had a theme. One day was Houston Day where the teens climbed into a space capsule. One day was Hollywood Day where the teens made a movie. Another day was New Mexico Day. During the evening meetings we sang a camp song. This night it was led by a "famous" rock star, Kigi.

The teens were divided into 4 English groups with Aretta, Ken, Linda and Stephan as teachers. We have pictures of 3 of the 4 groups. Unfortunately I did not get a picture of Stephan's beginner's group.

The teens had fun hanging out. On the last night we had a campfire. It was the first time for many to roast marshmallows and eat "ewy sticky sweet smores."

Ben, do you have what is takes to be a leader? (How much pain can you endure?)

Aretta and Johanka. Notice one hand has US flags and the other has Czech flags. English Camp was truly a unifying experince.