Saturday, July 23, 2016

Polska Part 4 - The Middle

As English Camp progressed throughout the week, it brought challenges.

The second full day in particular was hard. Logistically, we had started to figure out a lot of the bugs, but in doing so, there had been some tension among the leadership of the American and Polish teams. But we met together for prayer even before walking over for the morning meeting. When we got there, it was amazing how the Spirit filled our meeting room, independently laid the same verse on the leaders' hearts, and opened the channels of communication and understanding. One of the most amazing aspects of this trip was just seeing the immediacy of our need for prayer and staying connected to the Holy Spirit. The camp absolutely would not have worked without it. 

The day itself went smooth enough. We started with another round of English lessons, still trying to find the balance between staying true to the curriculum, but having the beginning students feel challenged and have a chance to use their English. 

Then came lunch. It was pasta. It claimed to be gluten-free. It lied.

So, I had to miss the second day of bubble balls and the team leader tournament because I was throwing up in the bathroom. It actually turned out okay though because I got most of it out of my system so the reaction wasn't as bad. 

It wasn't really the stomach pain that bothered me so much; I'm used to it, it's just something I have to deal with. More than anything, it discouraged me. The self-doubt kept creeping in, "You're broken. You're not fit for this kind of work. You're just making it harder on everyone else. You're more a burden than a help. This is why you don't travel." Meanwhile, everyone was so kind, making sure I was okay, going out and buying me tea to settle my stomach, promising to make me special food the rest of the week just to make sure it didn't happen again - and all I could feel was guilt for having them go out of their way for me, even though they were more than happy to do it. Sometimes I don't understand why I feel things the way I do. But all I can say now is that my Polish family showed me so much love and grace and I am inexpressibly thankful for it. 

I felt okay enough to lead the camp dance, and luckily I didn't have any other responsibilities for the evening program that night. After that, we had a special concert put on by Exit, another program run by JosiahVenture. The show was excellent and the kids seemed to have a lot of fun with it. I tried to power through the stomach evils, and maybe did a little too much dancing and bouncing around, but I was going to feel sick anyway, and I'm glad I had that opportunity to bond with a few of the kids.





When all the campers left, our team stayed and ate dinner. They were all talking and laughing, but I just felt drained. All I wanted was to be by myself somewhere, not have to eat anything, and get some emotion off my chest, but of course there was no way to do that. The walk back to the hotel was good though, and I was holding on to the prospect of a little break in the routine the following day. 

We spent the better part of Wednesday at a horse ranch about a 30-minute drive from the church. There was horseback riding, (very dirty) bareback pony racing, kayaking, running obstacle courses (which I ended up doing barefoot because there is ZERO tread left on my old tennis shoes), roasting kiełbasa (Polish sausage) and s'mores over a bonfire, and playing all kinds of outdoor games I'm terrible at! It was fantastic. No, really, don't read that last statement with any sarcasm LOOK AT THESE PICTURES IT WAS SO FREAKING GREAT. And exactly what I needed :) It was wonderful to just let loose, be out in nature, and connect in smaller groups with some of the kids. Zosia and Justyna were my red team team, and though we maybe weren't the best at the games that involved flying projectiles, we made up for it in team spirit, and it was absolutely wonderful getting to know their lovely, silly, brilliant personalities. I also got to spend some time with Leszek and Wojtek from my beginner class talking about Star Wars and Lord of the Rings!







Ironically enough, I had no problems with allergies that day, but Tracie's hay fever really acted up, and Grace found out she's allergic to ponies...good thing I always carry benadryl!

When we got back, all we had to do were the evening program and the theme night. The evening program went the smoothest it ever had, the worship was really tight and powerful, and Łukasz' testimony was very poignant and relatable for me and probably a lot of the kids there, too. Sammie, Skylar, and Kate also did a fantastic job with the evening talk, speaking about the birth and life of Jesus, with Sky and Kate stepping in and performing the roles of Mary, the Angel, and all the other characters. 


The theme night was Hipster and it was ridiculous and wonderful. There were hipster outfits, fake mustaches, hipster dancing, yarn beards made by committee, and shaving cream/cheeto hairdos. This was definitely a youth camp. By the end of the day, I was completely physically exhausted and everything hurt, but my heart was rejuvenated.  






The next day was back to business, and the start was again a little rough because of miscommunication and misunderstanding within the team. There were hurt feelings on both sides. On the walk over I prayed hard over the situation, and throughout the day, I really tried to be intentional about making everyone feel heard and included. It was a challenge, but we got through it by God's grace.

The first night of camp, the evening program was supposed to be followed by a theme night - baseball night - but that was one of the logistical bugs we needed to work out. The evening program took longer than we thought, so baseball night didn't happen. But Alva had poured so much work into the preparation for it, so we decided to replace afternoon sports on Thursday with baseball. We all learned the rules of the game and got to play against the other color teams. All the Poles sang their national anthem before we began, and they all stood just a little bit taller. You never really see Americans singing our national anthem with quite that level of pride. It was neat to see. Then, I sang the American national anthem to a backing track whose key was way up in the stratosphere, so that was embarrassing. Oh well. The game was fun! And everyone else ate peanuts and cracker jacks. Since we were outside, I did pretty okay allergy-wise. We also played steal-the-hat-off-Adam, which must have been pretty terrifying for him... 




Over the meals and snacks, I really felt like I was starting to form deeper connections with some of the girls and we had great talks about religion, hypocrisy in the church, what it means for God to be relational and not just conceptual, and share some of our personal experience and thoughts on life in general. These kids amazed me more and more every day.

Again, the evening program went great. We did both worship songs in Polish and I even learned a new one on the fly. I love music.

We had another insane theme night - Hawaiian. We had the same kinds of silly dancing, games, and costumes and everyone had a blast.


We stayed after all the kids had left and watched the football match, but Poland lost to Portugal and it was heartbreaking.  



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