Undignified

I still haven't finished the post about Hairspray, but since I've left it so long, might as well leave it even longer.
From the afternoon of 1st June till the afternoon of 3rd June, I've been at the OMPH Church 2012 Form 3 Pre-Confirmation Camp.

At first, I thought it was going to be a normal camp, like those leadership and motivational camps that people make me go to where we "share" our experiences. I really hate sharing my experiences at those camps because I don't know those people and I don't really want to know those people. And before the camp, I was like "I don't want to go, Daddy/Mummy", "What if they bully me?", etc. My mom told me: "Good!" But my dad told me: "Just keep an open mind."

So for once in my life, I decided to try, really try at camp. And I don't regret it one bit. :)

So I arrived at camp, which was at La Salle Center, which is deep inside the jungle known as St. Michael's Institution, which is full of monkeys also known as the students of SMI. As the number of people at camp increased, the level of my hyperness increased. And I was jumping here and there, being really really high (i.e. really energetic, not high as in high on drugs).

The camp started off with me being unable to find my dorm and lugging my luggage up and down the stairs. Eventually, I just placed myself in Room 13 with Amber (my girlfriend), with the teachers' permission, of course. Our first activity at camp was an icebreaker where we take the first letter of our first name and come up with an adjective with that letter to combine with our name to form a nickname (I hope that last sentence made sense). For example, I was "Radiant Rachel".

To make this post short, I shall leave out the constant breaks and the six meals we had a day. Breakfast, Morning Tea, Lunch, Afternoon Tea, Dinner and Supper. Which was held in a canteen and all the girls sat at the same table. Always. And any guys who wanted to sit with us had to have a girls' name.

The next thing we did was a Praise & Worship session, led by the Prodigal Apostles (Jason, Aaron, Stephanie, Jasper and Terence) which was basically a sing-along session. At first, I was skeptical, but since I already knew the song, I decided to sing and do the actions with the others. The song was called "Undignified".

And then the head facilitator Mervin came to begin his talk. My first thought was: Great, he's probably gonna give us those long and boring talks about how much he loves God, how much Jesus has touched him, blah blah blah, I'm gonna fall asleep in five minutes.

I was wrong.

Yes, he did talk for a long time about how much he loves God, how much Jesus has touched him, etc. But I never felt bored, not once. The way he talked to us, he didn't exactly preach, he told us his experiences in a hilarious way that kept us in stitches throughout all his sessions. But every time he became serious to tell us how much God loves us, I felt touched by his words.

That night, we watched a movie called "Facing The Giants". This is the movie which has that famous "Death Crawl" scene. Though it was the scene where he had nowhere else to go and went to seek God that touched me the most. The message? God will always be there for you. Seek and you shall find.

 

The next day. 2nd June.

In the morning, we sang the "Undignified" song again to wake ourselves up. "LALALALALALA HEY!"

After that, we had various talks about such topics as Who Is God To Me, Who Am I, The Challenges Teenagers Face, Boy-Girl Relationships and Parent-Child Relationships.

Aaron (a.k.a. Noraa) told us his story, which is actually the only one that I remember.

Late afternoon, after the Parent-Child Relationship talk, we were told to write a love letter to our parents. Tell them what we were happy and grateful for, what made us sad and frustrated, and what we struggle to say to them. I had no idea how much I wanted to tell my parents and I only wrote two lines for my father when I started crying. I'm pretty sure everyone heard me.

At night. The inner healing session.

We peeked into the conference room before we went upstairs to freshen up. And we saw a table, with lit candles, and a small cross. And we were scared, we knew we were probably gonna cry a lot that night.

And so everyone entered the room. It was so quiet, you could definitely hear a pin drop. There was an air of foreboding. Mervin was like: "This is the first time all of you are sitting down without making a sound, I'm getting scared."

So, with all of us (girls) armed with tissues, the inner healing session began.

Mervin started us off with two videos. These two videos. At first, I wanted to use this as the ultimate test of my control over my emotions, but then again, I really wanted to find out what Jesus would show me. And it's all because of the first video, which I can really relate to. The message is: Jesus will always be there for you.
 

At that point, I already felt like crying. So when the inner healing part actually began, with Mervin going: "Close your eyes. Now imagine Jesus taking your hand." I started crying. At first, silent tears. Then the boogers came, so I wasted 75% of my tissues on my nose.

"Give them all, give them all, give them all to Jesus. Your shattered dreams, your wounded hearts, your broken toys. Give them all, give them all, give them all to Jesus. And He will turn your sorrow into joy."

When I was done, I listened to everyone else. I could hear the girls sniffing. But surprisingly (or not), it was the guys who were sobbing their hearts out. My theory: As girls, we tend to cry more often. So crying is just crying. Since we normally let it out when we need to. But guys don't cry much, so when they have to, it all comes out. Listening to everyone, I just wanted to give everyone a hug. I looked at Amber, and we both went out quietly.

We waited outside for everyone to come out. And we gave each person a hug (except for a couple of guys, but I think they were shy so never mind). I think everyone appreciated that. Guys and girls. The guys especially. ;)

After a half hour or so of hugging and apologizing and forgiving, we went upstairs. Since none of us could sleep, we ended up in the hallway, sitting in a circle, playing Truth or Dare after forcing the beautiful and talented Natasha to sing Adele's Rumour Has It for us. (You rock, girl!) I had to chicken dance, which was ok. I won't go into the details of what happened during the game because what happens at camp, stays at camp. We were allowed to sleep at 12. Which of course we didn't. In the end, sleeping after 1, because of someone and someone. ;D

And on the last day. Which was today. (3rd June)

We spent the first hour in the morning doing Praise & Worship again. Followed by question time! The proud expressions of the facilitators when they saw us mingling. *smile* After that, we received our manila cards, hung them around our necks, and went around writing on everyone's cards, and getting our cards written on by everyone. I made it a point to write on everyone's card. Some people were very long-winded on mine, which in the end, I didn't mind. To everyone who wrote on my card, thank you and you're all very sweet and nice. :)

After that, we did testimonies (singular form: testimony). Some people would come up and share their experiences at camp. Normally, I don't do that. But normally, I don't participate so wholeheartedly during camps either. So after three certain people made everyone really emotional (which attracted a lot of hugging), some people were crying, some people were on the verge of tears, and I went up. Not because I had to, but because I wanted to. (Then again, I've known some of these people for more than half my life so. . .)

I cried, sharing stuff with them. I looked at some people and saw that they were crying too, so I stopped looking at everyone because if not, I would never finish. Thank you to all the people who came out to give me a hug after I finished, I love you all. <3

After lunch, we had the parents' session. Which made everyone cry again. Then mass. Then lots of goodbye hugs.

After so many inspirational videos, songs, talks, etc, the camp ended. On a happy note. I think we've all gotten closer after this. And that is very good.

The people who lived in darkness have seen a great light; on those who live in the land of the shadow of death, a light has shone.
~ Matthew 4:16