timeimmortal

This is the second entry in a series in which I am transcribing my diary from the 21st World Scouts Jamboree into something “a little more readable and a little more descriptive…and, of course, a lot less ‘pen and paper’.”

Previous entries: July 24th

Breakfast

I awoke at about 6:00 AM, which would usually be an ungodly hour for me, but which proved to be not nearly so bad on this particular morning — I suspect the early bed-time the previous evening played a role there, as did the deep sleep that the jet lag induced in me. The Thermarest I bought myself just prior to departing Canada was shown to be worth every penny after only one night, as I woke up with hardly any sore spots. That’s not something I can usually claim to have done.

The line for breakfast was mercifully short, and I was fairly impressed with the food offerings. If one wanted, there were various cereals and yogurts available for a “cold breakfast”…but there were also hot buffets open offering rashers of bacon, sausages, eggs, hashbrowns, and stewed tomatoes. This last thing is not an innovation I was familiar with, and it proved to be a very tasty addition to the meal, vastly superior to ketchup (ew!).

The Site

I wandered around the site for a bit after the meal — my volunteer training didn’t begin until 9:00 AM, so I had a good ninety minutes in which to wander. Or so I thought — I wound up getting waylaid by a young lady who, in her lilting British accent, was asking passers-by to come and help unload a truck full of tents.

The plan for the U.K. Scouting contingent, it seems, was identical to the Canadian plan (or perhaps it is us who had the plan identical to theirs?): rather than have the kids haul in tents from offsite, large quantites of tents (all of them exactly the same colour and model) were shippped in to a “warehouse” (another large marquee tent, basically) at which they would be picked up by the Scouts upon arrival. This approach had several net benefits, not the least of which was the uniformity of the tent appearance. This might sound like a trivial consideration, but it made a huge difference in the campground…it was an impressive sight to see, for example, a solid mass of yellow tents (the colour of the Canadian tents) all in one area. And something like that can’t really be missed under most lighting conditions, which was another useful feature.

At any rate, I was feeling affable that morning, so I pitched in and helped unload about half of the 419 tents on a very large truck that had pulled in behind the “warehouse” (waretent?). I left only when it was very nearly 9:00, and (fortunately!) the Day Visitor area (which is where I was to report to for my training) was not that far away.

Faith and Beliefs

Training went well, overall. A huge mass of volunteers assembled around what we came to know as the Day Visitor Stage, and we were quickly divided up into those volunteers who had offered to work with Faith and Beliefs, and those who had offered to work with the Day Visitors…and, apparently, those who were cool either way. Being in the first group, I then wandered off to a second stage, where I met two gentlemen, both named Tom. One of them was a volunteer, and the other was the co-ordinator for the Ba’hai display.

After a few ice-breakers, and a bit of an explanation of the goals and expectations of the Faith and Beliefs area from the “big boss” coordinator, Johnathan (a Catholic priest), the volunteers went to work helping set up the various displays. In particular, I helped a couple members from the Muslim contingent carry a rather heavy box from the adult sub-camp over to the Muslim display tent at the Faith and Beliefs area (that took a good ninety minutes right there),

and then spent most of the rest of the day helping the Jewish group set up their display and the marquee tent they would be using as a makeshift synagogue.

Toward the end of the day, I wandered over to the Catholic display, hosted by the ICCS (International Catholic Conference of Scouting) — this was instantly distinguishable by its large, black tents, one of which had even been formed into the shape of a cathedral.

I learned a few things from them about scheduling (Mass would be held daily, for example, along with Taize Prayer later in the evenings). There was even a rumour floating around that the Mass on August 1st* would be presided over by the Cardinal of England.

I walked back to the adult sub-camp after the day’s work was done and took a few photos of the tents, and of people playing volleyball. The weather had been a little bit wet during the day, and there was mud everywhere, so we were quite overjoyed to see that in high-traffic areas (notably: the bar) the grounds staff were spreading wood chips to try and keep the mud in check.

I can’t remember who we were waiting for in the bar prior to dinner, but the delay meant that we wound up standing in a very long line-up for food that evening. Not that this troubled us all that much, and certainly I didn’t waste the opportunity to take more pictures. It was again quite amazing to the entire Rover Crew just how distinctive our red berets were — Colin, I believe, noted that he felt rather like he was one of the Canadian Olympic team at Nagano, with their equally distinctive Roots headwear.

We felt a bit like rock stars, and once again refused to entertain all offers to trade hats.

Late Evening

There was a smaller stage set up in the adult sub-camp, and it featured nightly shows of varying sort. The show for the evening of the 25th turned out to be a DJ, who spun various tunes until “quiet time” at 11:00 PM. Most of the music played was of a decidedly Western flavour, equal parts North American and European artists. And the last song of the evening was the…er…mediocre tune entitled “Jambo”, which was ostensibly the Jamboree song. There must be a factory somewhere that churns out banal pop ballads of this sort.

As the evening rolled on and I took several more photos, I began to reflect that my camera batteries were extremely unlikely to last the full length of the Jamboree, and I rather hoped that one of the other Rovers was working at an event with power outlets nearby. I wasn’t the only one with this concern, either. The discussion at the bar that evening actually stayed on the topic of electronics for a bit longer, as we had discovered that Internet access was “pay as you go”, which didn’t sit well with us as we had all brought a fairly limited quantity of pounds sterling with us. We threw around the idea of chipping in to a fund with which Robin could buy wireless Internet access for his laptop computer, a plan which came to bear fruit a day or two later.

And wouldn’t you know it? I spilled beer on the diary. I took that as a signal to head to bed. As I headed off back to the tents, though, I caught sight of what became my first real laugh at the English nanny state: a mobile CCTV unit had been parked near the Internet tent to monitor the goings on that evening. This was just too funny, I thought — you really don’t see stuff like that in Canada — and easily worth a picture. I wonder if the two officers in the van thought it weird for me to be snapping a photo of their vehicle. If they did, though, they didn’t confront me about it.

* the Reader may be wondering what the meaning of August 1st was: this was the day that had been designated as “Sunrise Day”, the day which would mark the centenary of Scouting.

~ by Kenneth on September 5, 2007.