Here we are. The summer has ended and the other 20 or so college aged interns that spent their summer on the Reservation have gone home to start/ get back to the next stage of their lives. This officially begins the next part of my internship. Having now experienced two summers I'm both worried and joyfully optimistic about what the next unknown challenges I'll face in the winter, fall, and spring months. But I'll refrain from going into that very much as I have little information or knowledge about what that may hold. Instead I wish to tell you some about my summer. Mainly focusing on two distinct jobs that I got the pleasure to have. If your looking for a good laugh at my expense from the summer read the last half of my post.
First, I got the absolute honor of leading one of the "kids clubs" that we run at the local parks. This year we had four different kids clubs spread out among two different reservations, one of these is Adam's view park. This park holds a special place in my heart as it is where I went to kids club my very first time on the Rez. Now two years later I was put in the position of leading this outreach. This would consist of me assigning volunteers and interns to different sites at the park such as blowing bubbles with kids or manning the ever popular kick ball station. I additionally held the responsibility of making sure that kids club was safe and secured from any threats. There were many other little ins and outs of this job but my favorite was telling the bible story to the children.
Children would volunteer to be in the story, acting out Sunday school classics like Zaccheus and parting of the red sea. Although many people in the United States culture have had these stories told to them since they were toddlers. Many of these kids hadn't or had only heard about it through prior kid's club stories. So for them to see their family members and friends getting up there and reenacted bible stories, it made it all the more personal for them. Although this sounds (and often times was) adorable, it also provided a unique challenge of telling a story while controlling multiple hyperactive and low attention span kids. In one instance, in the story of Paul and Silas being held in prison. The prison guard used his prop spear as an assault rifle to fire upon the two actors, this was obviously not within the biblical cannon. Nevertheless, this job was one of the greatest privilege I've ever received.
The second job I had was being a leader of the older boys in "Daycamp", which is a VBS like program that we run on the church property. My boys consisted of 3rd to 5th graders that would come learn memory verses, hear biblical stories, craft, do science experiments, and do tons of other fun activities. But this story is not about those excellent days. No, the story I'm going to tell you is about one of the greatest failures and challenges I had as a daycamp leader. On the second day, we received the activity of making a group name, coloring our team flag, and making a chant. This task sounded simple enough. I lined the boys up and started asking for suggestions. Two choices arose, Green Gorillas or Green Goblins. Easy enough, I asked for a show of hands for who wanted which name. Six hands rose for Gorillas and Seven hands rose for Goblins. We had a clear and definite winner, democracy ruled. What I had failed to realize was that one of the "Gorillas" had already written GOR on our flag. They looked at me for guidance on what the next step should be as Goblins is certainly not spelled with an R. I said to simply write around it or cover it with something and moved on to a nearby picnic table where the six gorillas had now gathered and were angrily looking to stage a coup to take power from me. As I approached the ring leader declared "This sucks! Green Goblins is a stupid name and it sucks! There's not even a chant for it. It sucks and Daycamp sucks!!!" I sternly warned him that such talk wasn't allowed at Daycamp and if he didn't want to come back he didn't have to. Goblins had one fair and square, now it was time to write our names across the flag and decorate it. The six gorillas got up one by one and dejectedly went to the flag to write their name...so I thought. Once everyone was seated I felt a light tug on my shirt and looked to find one of the Goblins, upset, whispering something to me. "They wrote sucks on our flag". Apparently some hoodlum had vandalized our flag. Writing sucks underneath every single name and on the main title. The flag now proudly displaying the title of "Green Gorblins Sucks". "Who wrote this?".
Six hands quickly raise as six green gorillas stared me down defiantly. The rebellion had begun. Now I had seven upset kids on one side and six angry children on the other. Both sides yelling at the other. It was at this point that our director cheerily approached me and asked what our new name was. I told her that now was certainly not the time for such questions and I had an issue to deal with. She then offered me a chance at redemption. A new flag. An untainted, clean slate, that most certainly wouldn't suck. I pulled the boys down and asked them to talk to one another and express why they disliked the other side. The word "sucks" once again rained down like water in Seattle. I now offered them a new chance. Neither goblins nor gorillas would be accepted as names. We had to find a brand new name. For what seemed like hours there was silence till finally one child said "what about Gorgyles?". "What?" I asked deeply confused. "you know gorgyles, those things with wings that stand on old buildings?". "Are you trying to say gargoyles?" YEAH! was the common scream, but the ringleader of the gorillas would have nothing of it. "that name sucks too!" he yelled vehemently. More options came, original home run ideas like the Green bananas, or the green apples, or maybe the green pies? One of the kids was very hungry. Finally one child offered the name of Green Giants. There was a hush over the crowd while they drank in the very thought of such a name. Multiple eyes twinkled with support for this new name. But my eyes were fixed upon the ringleader, what would his thoughts be. His eyes covered underneath his pink and black baseball cap, hiding his emotions until he spoke with infinite 9 year old wisdom "I guess that name doesn't suck". At that moment I felt as though I'd just run a marathon and finished first place. "who votes for green giants then?". Thirteen gleeful little giants raise their hands in support. "Alright well what about our chant?!". After a moment of discussion we came up with "Fee-fi-fo-fum, we're the green giants and here we come". Our challenge had been met just as the director called for all the groups to show off their chants. In the concluding contest we were declared the chant champions. We had gone from Gorblins to might Green Giants.
