Hi there everyone, sorry we haven't written any updates lately....I guess we have just been having too much fun! Nearly three weeks ago, we had....
NEW MEMBERS WEEK
I have the honor of telling you all about New Members week, and what it is. The new members who came here are people who are on a two year course to becoming official members of the Iona community. So, every summer they have as many new members as possible come on out to Camas to do some maintenance work, build relationships, tidy these old buildings up, and have a regular good ole' time! The reason the Iona Community does this with their new members is because George Macleod had a firm belief that building relationships and working along side people in a common task who you might not normally interact with is vital to building one's character and faith, so naturally the Iona Community continues this tradition by making their new members our slaves for a week.
So naturally, we put these guys to work!!! So here's a list of everything these guys did: Some of the ladies spent HOURS making mountains of new pillows and cushions for our common room, a group of people repainted the common room and kitchen, a load of rubbish was gotten rid of which was laboriously driven to two hours to the tip (Garbage Center) in Tobermory (only, it did take the men quite a bit of time to get back, there is rumor of a fish and chip stop...) Anyway, there was loads of track maintenance, tons more of repainting, the chapel of the nets was totally cleaned out, all the windows were washed (inside and out), lots of help cooking, a massive amount of Pete cutting, a fire pit was rebuilt, lots of work was done in the garden, and lots of wheelbarrow runs for food and fire wood. Then we sent everyone away....
Not Really! We had tons of fun too. We went ab sailing, hill walking, kayaking, and the best bit was on the last day when all of our slaves made us dinner. Oh my goodness, it was amazing, and they even served ''sea biscuits'' at the end of the meal. ( It was shortbread shaped into sea creatures) They did a lovely reflection for us, and then my favorite part of the evening was when they decided to entertain us with 'Camas has got Talent'. There were loads of performances from singing, to skits, to accordion playing, to lots of jokes (I cannot say whether or no they were good-sorry Mark), and the final act of the evening was my personal favorite, and that was when my dear friend Rosiadh from the Isle of Skye busted out her bagpipes and played us all a few reels to the roaring applause of a happily knackered team. And then we bid them a very fond farewell... Thanks for all your help team!
Oh, yeah, before I forget-Whales-There were Killer Whales in our bay that week. Cool, ay?
Now, it is time to transition to the smaller, but not less important community members...
COMMUNITY KIDS WEEK
So, after all of our amazing Community Members left us in ship shape order, they sent their kids on over while they had a retreat week on Iona. Now, these guys were AWESOME! And so much fun! We did all sorts of fun things with these guys...We did the typical ab sailing, kayaking, raft building, hill walking, etc. But these guys also went WILD camping on the Camas lawn, and then we played man hunt (which is a glorified way to play hide and go seek, actually it is the best way to play hide and go seek). We also took a trip to Market Bay which was like non other I have ever been on!
First, I cannot forget to mention, we had a visiting staff member that week by the name of a Mr. Adam Smalls, and I partly blame him for this, but while at the beach, for the first time in Camas history since I have been here, we had a massive wrestling match, and it was guys vs. gals! And let me say this...boy was it close. Some of the kids had Tom by the legs and wouldn't let him go! We had a big rope circle around us and the deal was you had to push all the opposing team out of the circle, and it was best two out of three. And I think, if I am right, that the girls ended up winning! But we all expected that anyway,right? We also had a huge jelly fish war on the beach; seeing as there were hundreds of dead jellies just waiting there for us, we thought what better thing could be done than to throw jelly fishes at everyone! It was great!
We really like those Community Kids and we look forward to having them back for more fun next year!
That's all for now folks!
Peace out, from that crazy American
Cally
