Youth camp and Independance Day

Youth Camp
Last Thursday afternoon, Olivia and I set out for Youth Camp. It is the only camp the Mennonite Churches offer all summer, and anyone from the ages of 12-25 may attend. We arrived in time for supper (which in this case means before 8:00) on Thursday, and stayed until Sunday mid-afternoon. There were 27 campers-12 girls and 15 boys. All the girls slept in one big (air-conditioned) room-including cooks and counselors. The same was true for the boys, except they had a different room from the girls. One of my favorite parts of Camp was Friday afternoon when we did games and swimming. In games, we started with an interesting version of football where there were 4 teams all playing at once in a tiny little area that didn't even have grass-it was just concrete! It was kind of strange also because I am not used to calling it football-I'm used to saying soccer instead! About halfway through it started pouring down rain, but we kept on playing just like nothing was happening! It was actually very fun to play in the rain! Then we played a game they called elephant trunk that I think was supposed to get us a little bit wet to cool us off, but we were all already soaking! Then lastly, we played cricket which was very interesting, because Olivia and I had never ever played cricket and had no idea how to! We told this to the people in charge and asked them if we should just watch for this reason, and they told us that we could watch the first 2 teams play and then when our 2 teams played, we could play with them then. We enjoyed playing, but both agreed that watching was still more fun. It was funny to watch when they hit the ball because there seemed to be no out-of-bounds, even if they hit it backwards, and it was really funny to watch the two people run back and forth between the two different spots! After all that, we went swimming, but it seemed to have almost no point because everybody was drenched anyways! But it had cleared off by that point and so the pool was very enjoyable anyways.
~Roxy

I thought one of the most interesting parts of Youth Camp was Saturday night. I had heard there was going to be a banquet then but I had no idea it was going to be a big fancy thing. Roxy and I hadn't brought any nice clothes because no one told us to, and we're used to going to Camp Mennoscah where they say specifically not to bring nice clothes because there will be no dress occassions. So, what happened was that the guys were supposed to ask the girls to go with them to the banquet. Everyone dressed up, except Roxy and I. Roxy did my hair so it looked pretty, though. And hers too. So, we all went out and met the guys under a little gazebo type area. When our guy came, they would escort us into the place where we had our meals. Everyone was there taking pictures and there was music in the background. After the meal, there was a slide show of pictures first from last year and then ones from this year at youth camp. Then we went for dessert. The funny part was that Roxy and I both got asked in the pool. After Roxy got asked, she said okay, but then had to go ask someone what his name was. I knew my date a little better than she knew hers. For one thing, his sister who was 7, really wanted me to go with him and had been making that clear to me over the course of the day. Plus I had gone to his youth group earlier. Some of the other highlights of the camp were: getting to meet other youth here, learning some new songs, and the talent show we had on the last day where I got the part of the gunman.
~Olivia

Happy Independance Day! That's what today is in Trinidad. So everyone has the day off. Tonight we are planning to go to the capital city and watch the fireworks. We made brownies today so we would have snacks to take. Luckily someone left a cookbook here. Richard and I spent part of the time at the youth camp. Richard was asked to preach there on Sunday morning. Part of the time we were at home. We've been trying to prepare for the clesses we will be teaching. Our understanding is that classes begin at the college on Wednesday. So far no word on what days or times we will be teaching. We'll call again tomorrow.
~Barb

Thanks to everyone who has been praying for us. We are very happy to say that our prayers for our house in Kansas to be rented have been answered! A family will be moving in this week. We also have our own high speed Internet access in our apartment now. We've had to make a few calls to get everyone set up right, but as of this afternoon, it seems to be functioning as it should.
The other prayer issues mentioned in our last post continue to be concerns. We had been told that the water line would be repaired by the end of last week, but it hasn't. Since today is a holiday, we hope to have it fixed in the next day or two.
School for the girls also continues to be a major concern. Classes start tomorrow, but they still haven't been accepted by the Ministry of Education to attend a government supported school. We are looking at some private school options as well right now. We hadn't budgeted for those costs, but with our house rented we would hopefully have finances available to cover such costs. We pray that we might hear from the Education Ministry soon and be able to make good choices for the girls.
~Richard