I realise that it has been a few days since my last post, but they have been full of stuff...
Friday
We had a day off on Friday, which was great. I got up so that I wouldn't miss breakfast and once up I decided not to waste he day but to do something. That something ended up being cycling down to Newport and helping set up for Catalyst, which - if you remember - is the Praise Night equivalent on IOW. It was great fun and included climbing up ladders to hang up massive banners, setting up all the tech stuff, playing loads of music, chatting with friends, going to the local Christian bookstore and getting lots of books and CDs to sell in the evening, and generally having a good time.
Then I cycled back, on both cycle rides I passed police who were entrenched on a bridge overlooking some marshes. I later looked on the local news to find out why there were news reporters and police there and it turns out they were searching for a body of a teenager who disappeared in 1996 (I was FOUR!!). I'm very glad I later found out that he'd actually disappeared on the waterfront not on the cycle path, it did worry me just a LITTLE that I'd been cycling on the cyclepath in the dark on my own that someone had (I thought) been "disappeared" on. I don't know if they found anything or not.
In the afternoon I went down to town, bought some new shoes, a plain lunch of pita read and water (which was genuinely sooo good), and some stationary I'd been needing for a while. Taking it slowly it took an hour or so, then I came back and chilled out in the computer room until dinner, and then it was time to go catch my lift back to Newport and Catalyst
At Catalyst there was a group from BMS there who'd come back from a project (I believe in India) and they were pretty much leading it. So that was good fun.
Saturday
Saturday was back to work experience. I was with a group from Surrey (near Guildford, ie near home) and we did a session out just beyond Cowes Harbour with the Doublehanders (Visions if you remember my mention of them from when I was dinghy sailing) the Cats (ie multihulls/Catamarans) and Picos (again think back to when I was dinghy sailing). Once more I was in a safety boat in the morning, this time driving, and I was with the Vision session (we took out three). I just followed them around and made sure if they needed any help they had it. I also had to facilitate swapping kids so that they all had a go on them. It was great fun and just that morning of powerboating increased (I felt) my confidence and ability in it. We went to the beach for lunch and the kids played around. The tide went out EXTREMELY fast, however, and we ended up making a rather hurried rush back to the boats to save them from becoming beached. Even then we had to leave one boat on the mud and come back for it later on when the tide came in. In the afternoon I was on one of the visions with three kids, three boys who were forever asking if we could capsize and then forever worrying about what to do should we capsize. (I didn't capsize, even if it was the first time I'd sailed in almost two months) It was a great day overall and I had loads of fun. (a recurring statement, surprisingly enough.)
Sunday
I was with the same group of kids on Sunday as I was on Saturday. the were leaving at 2.30 though and so we only had a morning session. This time the visions stayed on land and we took more picos out. One of the "Cats" was also left behind. I was on a safety boat with the large pico session. this ended up involving helping them rig (by yelling instructions at them; you have to yell to be heard, it's really not because I got angry), doing a little bit of coaching to improve their sailing, watching out for that stray pico that would end up ridiculously far away from the main group, keeping an eye on any picos that might stray too close to the wall, towing picos away form the wall when they did get too close, helping picos get upwind (much more difficult than it sounds when your kids have done none of the theory and know relatively nothing about sailing) - having said that I spoke to one of the more experienced instructors today and they gave a solution which was so simple and easy I wondered how stupid I must have been not to think of it... drive in front of them and get them to follow you, then you don't need to explain in child's language about the no go zone or a close hauled sailing position, and having more fun.
In the afternoon, once they'd gone, we finished tidying up all the picos, then were tidying the site for an hour/hour and a half. Then we were let off early WOOO!! at the cost of owing our Chief Instructor a favour... ominous indeed. lol
In the evening some of the youth from various churches I know had a worship evening/gig on in Shanklin so I grabbed dinner extremely quickly and then caught a bus... no one had warned me how bad the buses are here... I expected to be half an hour late... which is reasonable... the bus journey ended up taking one and a half hours. I set of at 6-ish. The event started at 6.30. I got there at 8. (don't do the maths i know it doesn't add up and that's because this is a summarised version with rounded numbers.) I caught the last song... I was not happy with the buses AT ALL. At least there was free cake to be had aplenty :D :D And I met some new friends, who were friends of Simon and Hannah. And ended up going home with Simon (local youthworker) and them and chatting for a while then going with Simon to take them to the ferry back to the mainland. It was great meeting them and definitely made up for catching only the last song of the event. And on the upside they have another event this Saturday in Ryde, so I'll go along to that :D
Monday
Today was half and half. New groups were arriving so for the morning we were doing pretty much nothing. We checked their rooms to make sure they were clean and ready for them, we got their lunches ready, we sorted out what we'd do with them in the afternoon. Then things began to pick up when we went to get them. They are from Surrey again, and near Redhill again, which is really cool. We did some wet games with them (getting them to chuck cups of water at each other whilst blindfolded, fill up a pole covered in holes by plugging the holes with their fingers, play games whilst standing under the showers, which could be turned on if they weren't going fast enough or did something wrong), which was amazingly fun, just having a splash around and a laugh and then did a pontoon jump, which was also great fun. At one point there was even a small waterfight with the hoses, which was immense also.
Then in the evening I volunteered to help with their evening session as well. We walked up to a nearby park and did some relay races in groups. Then all the girls wanted to play rounders and all the guys wanted to play.. no prizes for guessing... football. So the other two instructors took football and I was left to run the rounders... thank goodness I listened in school and didn't skive P.E. :D :D :D After a while rounders degenerated into a prolonged toilet break (girls... eh? :P) and then into a rather fun game of Frisbee. It was great fun and we were all laughing loads. Then a nice walk back and I came into the computer room (where I am now) to write this.
It's been long, yep, but I've had a lot to cover. So, hope you like the up date. It's been great fun so far as I thought it would be. I have one more day work experience and then five days of theoretical navigation study. So yea.. going to be an interesting week. This group is amazing though and I hope I'm with them again tomorrow.
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