camp and birthday fun!

Today is day 21 of 30 and we are both loving every day and becoming sadder as the realisation hits us that we will soon be leaving this incredible adventure.

Camp began last week and in that time we've took kids to a forest hiking and to a water park. Cheska is enjoying camp in general and is pleased she hasn't got too much preparation to do for her art classes, and particularly musical class (dance and singing) which are going well. Cheska chose 3 girls from the younger group to take out (which is called Bible Buddies) and not only had a great time taking them to the park and to buy slurpees but was amazed at how appreciative they were. Jo is taking out sets of 3 street leaders each day (as she is on different camps) and is building up good relationships with the teenagers- which is ace to spend some positive time together as she sometimes feels its more telling them what to do in her role. Jo had one particularly good mentoring relationship last week on her first day with one guy who had blatantly got loads of potential but was unconfident and to top it off, he had four 10 year old boys join his class that were intent on causing trouble. By supporting and encouraging him as well as being tough on those boys, Jo watched a mini miracle as the street leader grew in to a confident and capable leader in just one day, smiling and having fun with the boys in his group.

Thursday 3rd was a very special day, Jo woke up and went upstairs to a 'Happy Birthday banner' with a bag, balloon and card to match by Cheska with a little help from some other interns. The kids at Cheska's camp sang happy birthday and presented her with a cup cake and then a big chocolate cake with candles after tea with the 'house-mate family'. The next evening we all went to Mount Cyprus to check out the beautiful view and then to Ambleside Park to play Ultimate Frisbee, hang out watching the sea and jam/worship. On the Saturday we went to Stanley park to ride tandem bikes but it rained so we just walked round a bit instead, then went to the aquarium to see the baby baloo but it was too expensive so we ended up just coming home and watching P.S. I love you with special hot chocolates and home made popcorn.

2 more retreat photos

Root beer, marshmellows, speed boats and canoes.

We have had quite an intense but exciting week this week. Starting from monday to wednesday we had training for the interns and street leaders. It was really ace to get to know everyone and to become more familiar with what the camp was going to be like. We're both really excited about how we are going to be used and challenged in the next 3 weeks and to meet all the children we will be working with. So after our intense training and reading policy after policy we went on a retreat for 2days to a place called 'Sunshine coast'...It was aaaaaaaaaaaamazing!! The house was like the size of buckingham palace with a lake and amazing views. We speed boated, canoed, kayaked, swam in a private pool and chilled in the hot tub...maaaaaaan it was so cool! We did a servant profile while we were there to look at our spiritual gifting...we were both really surprised with what came up for us. We also did cross cultural training and intentional community living training. This was interesting to look at what each intern in the house had to offer and what our strengths and weaknesses are. Jo took a walk up a mountain with other interns which had signs with scriptures on. We shared rooms with different interns to get to know new people and to build up new friendships. Some of the team roasted marshmellows by the camp fire and watched the stars. We felt really blessed to be in such a beautiful place and to be around such ace people. It has ben 33 degrees for the past few days which cheska has absoloutly loved...we chilled at a place called trout like on saturday where cheska got a little burn't and we watched a film called 'juno' on saturday night which was interesting. Sunday we went to the churches we will be based at while we are on camp which was good. Cheska's church is a christian reformed church so its very traditional with hymns (very different to living hope) and jo is going to different churches as she is floating around different camps while we are here. We are going for BBQ this afternoon (sunday) At one of the team leaders house which will be great. Everythings going really well and we are both going to be real sad to leave.

The Urban Promise House

Arrived at Urban Promise house after a 45 minute bus journey from the west side to the east side of town to a good welcome!Jo had friends from last time very happy to see her and Cheska was made to feel welcome too. After the hellos many of the staff had meetings so we were shown to our room (see pic)and shortly after Jackie (a 16 yr old team leader) took us out for pizza for lunch.

After we unpacked our clothes, updated our diaries, had some 'God time' and a quick nap (3 days in and we're still not completely over jet lag!) By 6pm the house manager called us up for a Filipino dinner.We then all watched a foreign movie with English subtitles about a completely paralyzed stroke victim who managed to write a book through blinking to a note taker- eyeopening indeed!

Today we finally slept through to a normal time (6am for Jo and 8am for Cheska). We went to the mall (which is enormous) to buy phone cards and watched the film Love Guru with Mike Myers which is hilarious!

Photos of the B&B

The B & B (Bed in the Basement)

So today is day 3 of our mission in Vancouver Canada and we feel like the adventure is just beginning!

We arrived after an 11 hour flight from London Gatwick which seemed to take forever! Once at the airport we located our suitcases quickly, caught a taxi and arrived at the B&B (Bed in a Basement but without the breakfast!) We arrived at 9pm and as it was 6am in England we were definitely ready for sleep but woke up again throughout the night and by 4am we couldn't sleep anymore so Cheska finally agreed with Jo to go for a walk to watch the sunrise over the mountains! We walked for a while and our eyes lit up when we spotted a Starbucks- so after a long 10 minutes waiting for them to open we enjoyed hot chocolate and breakfast. After we went to Safeway and brought Pancakes, Waffles and strawberries to enjoy a 'traditional Canadian Breakfast", but for lunch!! We were pretty jet lagged for the next two days so enjoyed the apartment, sleep and a trip 'Downtown Vancouver' to briefly check out the shops, a Chinese for tea and a long walk home due to getting off the bus at 1st Avenue when we were staying on 31st Avenue! (As if you hadn't guessed that was Jo's fault!)

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Testing testing...1 2...heres a practice blog for you mate...we're all signed up and stuff now. Hope this works.
Much love.
Jo and cheska.