The Summer Camps (19/08/12 - 13/09/12)

With the exception of Aglae none of us had done a camp in Chabrouh, and despite talking about at the preparation camp none of us truly knew what to expect.  In 48 hours we went from Dusseldorf to Beirut Airport, met Michel who looks after us in Lebanon, then on to the apartment in Naccache (pronounced Na-ash), then visiting Naccache on foot, then to Chabrouh and meeting a group of Germans which most of us did not know, to setting up the house and then meeting the guests from Deir el Salib which we would look after!  I have to say that already knowing from the preparation camp the liturgy of the Hours and all the songs, especially for the non-German speakers, helped a lot in the first few days.

7 of the 8 CARAVAN members at Chabrouh had a guest for the first camp, and despite some of us had rarely looked after the disabled before we all became friends with our guests.  For all three camps we did pretty much the same set of activities, if in a different order.  These included a day at the beach, the fancy dinner (tin foil galore J), the Olympic Games, a fashion show for the first two camps, shaving sessions with the boys, a walk in the direction of the Dam, one big mass and ‘Yalla Pepsi’ time where we went to a nearby tavern for soft drinks.  Every day we would start at 7am with Morning Prayer on the terrace, after which we would go get our guests and start that day’s activities.

It was quite interesting to compare the three different camps that we had, and how different the guests were.  The first camp only had boys from Deir el Salib, the second camp had girls from Deir el Qamar and Antellias and the third camp had boys from Antellias and Deir el Salib.  The first camp had a huge range in the mental and physical capabilities of the guests, which meant that different volunteers had completely different experiences of the camp – some volunteers ran around all day, whereas others stayed pretty much in the same place.  Of course this was the case in all the camps, and it was always interesting to see.  With the second camp the girls as a group were much livelier, and many of them loved dancing, which gave the whole camp a party feel from beginning to end.  We also stopped jumping from getting our asses pinched by one of the boys at lunch, and instead jumped when we had a raspberry blown in our ears by one of the girls!  They managed to leave everyone exhausted by the end, but it was so much fun!  With the third camp many of the guests were older, and several spoke some English or French, so far more of us had conversations with our guests rather than just trying to demonstrate activities that we could do.  Overall each of the camps had a very different feel to it, but they were all great fun and very rewarding, and all of us missed our guests very much as soon as they were gone.

Seeing how happy we could make them with just 6 days was however very inspiring, as it made all of us realise how much joy we could bring them throughout the year with our visits.  This impression was reinforced when we visited Deir el Salib two days after the first camp, and saw how different some of the guests were in their home, and how overjoyed most of them were that we had come to visit them.

When there were no guests we had a great programme of activities, thank you Masul!  In between the first two camps we went to Byblos, where some of us visited the ruins, including a really nice castle, and all of us had an amazing lunch!  We also visited downtown Beirut, where we were shown around by Windy, one of our Lebanese friends, and walked up to the cross on the mountain next to the centre in Chabrouh, where we had a mass. 

After the girls’ camp we visited the Holy Valley, which is stunning, and slept overnight in a monastery.  After the third camp we went to the Jeitta Grottos, which I would heartily recommend to anyone who has not yet been, as well as a lovely dinner in a tavern and a great night at Pier 7.

We all had a great time at the camps, made many new Lebanese friends there which we are now seeing again in Beirut, and we all look forward to going to Chabrouh again for the Christmas camp.

by Maxime