It’s time to wrap up the camp posts. I have to keep checking the calendar to convince myself that it has only been one week (tomorrow) since the end of the camp. What a week it has been. I’m so confused by what day it is and what is going on. So, the final weekend of the camp, I left late Friday afternoon and came back mid-day on Sunday so I could sneak in a quick visit to a friend in a nearby town. We had planned to climb Ista, but the conditions were not in our favor. I think that worked out for the best though, because I was feeling super-guilty about missing even just the one day of the camp. I would have completely missed Day 7 if we had climbed the mountain.

Day 6’s theme was Goals. The second psychologist came back and the girls made collages with their short-, medium-, and long-term goals. Speaking with the other organizers and looking at the collages after the fact, there were a few trends. The most interesting and bothersome trend was that the girls had a lot of things in the medium-term goals area, coming before their long-term career goals. This provided a good opportunity to discuss how maybe the career and thus income should come before the goals of auto and home ownership. The girls also developed a plan and elected officers for the Mariposas club they have to start once back home. The club is a requirement for all participants, and one they key sustainability elements of the program. The girls stay involved, and they can bring in others that didn’t get to attend the camp this year. The 2 main camp organizers will be the club mentors.

Day 7 including outings to the botanical garden and various sites of interest around Cholula, and then a celebratory barbecue. I didn’t get back in time to go on the outings, but that worked out perfectly for me to help set-up the barbecue. Burgers were cooked. Cheese slices and pickle slices were policed. Burgers were eaten, and then the evening activities began. We did a number of egg-carry races were the girls had to balance an egg in a spoon being held in their mouth. The egg races were slightly more popular than the three-legged race, but neither compared to the limbo and the mummy-wrap. Also mixed in were superlative awards where every girl won a certificate and a prize for being the best at something, as voted by the other girls. Wonderful cupcakes were eaten, and the organizer graciously made extra so that we could eat one or two additional cupcakes where the girls weren’t looking. The mummy wrap was highly successful with even some of the occasionally less-engaged girls thoroughly active and laughing. At that point all we had left for prizes were toothbrushes and toothpaste, but you can’t underestimate the value of good dental hygiene. We didn’t even finish that late, so we all got to get a full night’s sleep before the graduation ceremony on the final day.

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I’m not sure what comes next for me exactly, but I am having interesting thoughts about going back for next year’s camp. I would love to stay involved and do this again. We shall see.