Camp

Now for all those who have been wondering why my blog has been dead for the past week, I've been out for church camp and then kept busy with the HICT Open Day. Anyhow I'm back now and I'll try giving all of you a glimpse into my past week.

Camp started on Sunday after the Holy Qurbana service. For those who are wondering what camp this is, its the 37th Annual Orthodox Youth Camp (AOYC). The theme of the camp this year was "Come Follow Me". I wasn't particularly exhilarated to attend the camp, but I attended it nonetheless because I knew she was coming and so also many of my other friends from Singapore. Zubin, Sherry and I left for the camp site slightly earlier than everyone else to prepare for the registration and stuffs.

The registration and all went well, I had to take the kids to the dorm after which we had a tea break then we had briefing and then refreshed ourselves. Evening prayers soon followed with dinner right after that. It was then that she came along with the others from Singapore. I had just finished dinner and saw her suddenly and was so shocked I just smiled at her and waved hi. I went in for the ice-breaker session, and once the Singaporeans came in I started my game. The game went well which was followed by night prayers, supper and then off to bed. That night, we made sure the kids slept whereas the slightly older ones we let them stay up n talk as long as they don't disturb the other kids and me and my gang (Ben, Zubin, Ashley) stayed up until 2am catching up with each other's stories.

We woke up the next day at 5.30 am. It was freaking cold, I was shivering what more it was raining. And oh yeah I was sleeping on the couch because the air cond was leaking onto a bed so there was no place so I slept on the couch with Kevin and David.


It was pretty much sessions and all nothing major I guess. We (the older bunch) heard from the younger bunch about a hypnotist who gave them a session and in the end where they managed to lift their friends into the air, somehow it sounded impossible to us, but the next day we were in for a huge shock.

We were freaking excited at the thought of being hypnotized or whatever she was about to do to us. She started off with giving us a brief description of hypnotism, and some of us asked questions that were bugging our heads. Then at last the time came, she told us to get into a group of 5, me, Zubin, Ben, Ashley and Dinesh got in a group. She then told us to keep the biggest guy on the chair so naturally our group put Ben on the chair. We were then told the process :


1) we will use 2 fingers each, 2 people will hold under the armpit and 2 more under the knees to lift the person up

2)she will say somethings that we must totally concentrate on and totally believe in

3)We lift the person up

She first told us to picture ourselves as tiny little mouses, scrawling on the floor, with small hands and a small body, helpless, looking around for cheese. Then she asks us to lift our friend, and true enough we couldn't even get the legs to budge even an inch above the ground. Next, she told us that she is going to make us lift our friend.

We were all pumped with excitement, so she tells us to close our eyes, and she makes us picture ourselves as Superman, that we can carry buildings and fly, that our legs were pumping with muscles, that our chests were pushed out with our hands also feeling so strong. And then she says, "Now on the count of three, you're going to lift your friend up. 1...2...3..." and the next thing you know, we open our eyes and with no effort at all, we lift our friend right up to the air, and not like a few inches above ground but like 5 feet above the ground.

Once we set him down, we were dumbfounded, we couldn't believe what just happened. Anyhow she asks us to be seated again and she explains more about hypnotism and all and then she said she'll let us have one more activity. "Now close your eyes, concentrate on your eyes, you're letting all your troubles drift away, you're in a state of relaxation, you are totally relaxed. Now try to open your eyes, you can't, because you don't want to leave this state. Focus on your right hand, its getting heavy, as if there is a book, a big book on your hand. Its sinking into your leg (And sure enough you feel as if your right hand is sinking into your leg, you try to lift it but it wont budge it just sinks more) Now you're left hand is getting lighter, it feels almost weightless, it feels as if you have 2 helium balloons tied to your hand, at any time if you feel as if you need to change your sitting position to make you feel more relaxed make sure you do so. (As she is saying this, you can actually feel that your left hand is moving up, and I personally tried to lift my right hand as well but it wouldn't budge, I tried to make my left hand heavy but no, it just continued floating in the air) Now you shall start counting until you forget the numbers that you were saying (Straight away my head raced, 1..2..3..4..5..6..7..8..9.. I counted so fast that I realized my left hand was going down again, I relaxed my mind and continued counting but slower this time and sure enough I lost count) Now you shall open your eyes and leave this relaxed state, open your eyes" When we opened our eyes, we saw that some of our hands were in the air, some way up high, some just slightly above. With that, she told us how we can do whatever we want if we put our minds to it, that is how strong we are, that all we need to do is believe in ourselves, and she handed her name cards to us and told us that we can contact her at any time if we needed any sort of help.

Now even though all this happened right in front of our eyes, we needed to be certain that all that had just happened wasn't merely some kind of hoax. I jokingly told my friends that the only way to be certain was to lift my 120kg cousin. I hope he doesn't mind me saying this. So we kinda practised it on... wait not me but the others were practising it with their friends. We approached David and he freaked out, he didn't want us to carry him, but we did. Suddenly, my cousin bro, Sherry came in. That was it, me, Zubin, Ben and Ashley went to him and told him we were about to lift him up. He was a good sport he sat on the chair as we prepared with our self hypnotizing.
Everyone was surrounding us, everyone wanted to see whether at last, does this hypnotizing thing really work. We got ourselves in the mood, and at last when I knew I was ready, I asked them "Ok shall we do it?" and they said yes. 1...2...3...and *$!@ing shit my cousin was in the air, supported by four people who were lifting him up with 2 fingers each. That was the final straw, this shit works, trust me and I still do practice it sometimes at night lifting my bed.
Besides that they day was pretty ok, they had confession that night which I did not go for because I really wanted to talk to her and abolish the tradition of talking only on the last night. Sadly my dreams were dashed, the Singaporeans had planned a dance for Campers Night, however one of their dancers, had a small accident and sprained his leg if I'm not mistaken, so I told my friend I'll dance for that guy, and so I had to train the whole night all the moves, every single step and therefore couldn't talk to her that night. I know I screwed up, I know I pissed her off, but I had to do it.
The next day, went as usual, Campers Night went ok I guess besides the fact that I screwed up the PA system and was in deep shit. That night, I made sure I had some time with her, I didn't want to leave camp thinking that I didn't spend enough time with her. Just to make things short, it never was enough, my mind was on many other things as well. Before I was talking to her, we had a boys time out. Not the typical boys time out but a real different one. I'm sure Ben, Zubin and Ashley know what I mean.
Well all in all, camp wasnt as great as it usually was, the PA system was fixed by the way which really eased the pain out of me. I find that there a lot of things that should be taken into account and be changed if it could. I have to make some kind of change, or things might only get worse.