Home Is Where The Roast Is

When days off are so few and far between, deciding what one is going to do with their precious free-time requires consideration. Usually, a big group of us would spend the day (and night) touring around the two-hour radius beyond Elmer, New Jersey.

 But this week, all I wanted to do was feel like a non-counsellor. So I returned to the world I once loved – a place of shopping and quality coffee and real food – and was invited ‘home’ with fellow counsellor, Kate.


Kate lives in Delran, a suburb which lies between two suburbs in New Jersey – Camden and Moorestown. If we were in Sydney, this would be like comparing Silverwater with Potts Point. Camden is an industrial wasteland with a crime-rate going through the roof, while Moorestown boasts acreage, architecture and country clubs. Yet they exist side by side.

Having not been in the vicinity of a shopping complex in weeks and not having physically shopped in months, getting my first hit of spending in the USA left my travel savings considerably depleted. I'd forgotten the sheer bliss that comes with purchasing new clothes and having something to wear that you haven't been kicking around in for the last  4 weeks.

I'd also forgotten the sheer bliss of being in a home, with a bathroom and bedrooms and a kitchen which produces real food. We were treated to a fully-blown roast dinner with carrots and beans and gravy and mash, all topped off with one hearty slice of peanut butter pie.

And served alongside the food were plenty of licks from Kate's dog, Kira - a golden ball of lovin' who had just as much right at the dinner table as the humans.

And so we returned to camp full of food, licked to death and recharged with all the goodness of home.

Ciao for now. xo

Camp Quality

Hello from the sticks!

I am quite seriously in the middle of nowhere, writing this blog in the heat of about 30 degrees, and it’s only 8am in the morning. I knew eastern America could get hot in the summer, but I never thought it would be quite this hot. However, the fantastic thing about the New Jersey sun is that while it’s hot and uncomfortable, it doesn’t have the cancerous infused UV sting of the Australia sun. And for albinos like myself, this is great. For the first time, I can stand out in the heat all day and actually TAN, WITHOUT BURNING. (And don’t worry Mum, I’m still putting on sunscreen.)

So I’ve waved goodbye to New York and civilisation and have arrived at Appel Farm Creative Arts Camp – my home for the next 9 weeks. The best part of the 2 hour journey here was being picked up in a big yellow Magic School Bus-looking school bus. My fellow Aussie – Nelly-pops – and I could not have been more pleased.

Appel Farm is quite literally in the middle of nowhere. There is not a Walmart, Denny’s or petrol station in sight, which is quite a change from the hustle and bustle of New York. The camp is quite spread out across the grounds, with each bunk house representing a different age group of campers. Yours truly has landed in Hill – ages 16 – 17.

Now, while this was the age group I originally requested to be with, I’m still trying to decide if I have just dug my own grave. I am reassured by my fellow counselors that they are a great set of girls who will keep me well entertained, but being right next to the boys cabin and with all that pubescent energy pulsing through their little veins, are also advised they can be quite a handful.

Should make for some interesting times.

The following week is Orientation and is pretty much an information dump on how to counsel and plan classes before the campers arrive on Saturday. As the only instructor for Creative Writing and Journalism, I arrived here knowing that I would have my work cut out for me. Now I’ve also been told that the Journalism program in particular is in need of great improvement. While this leaves me with the creative vision of doing whatever I please, I can’t help but feel the weight of expectation that I am meant to be the person to turn it all around.

But even without the kids here, camp is exactly what you would expect. I’m sleeping on a mattress about as thin as a slice of bread, there are bugs everywhere, Americans everywhere and last night we ate Smores around the campfire. But the kicker was when on the walk back to our cabin last night, the trees were full of fireflies, twinkling like a handful of tossed glitter.


You can't buy that in Australia.

Ciao for now. xo