Newbies

I have just finished the third set of orientation that I will encounter at Urban Promise. I have just started my second year Internship and I must admit that I have had mixed feelings.

On the positive side, I have been given  an incredible opportunity to learn. I have taken on the role of managing one of the Intern houses. and I am also taking on more of a role at the After School Program which I am really excited about.

The negative aspect of his has come out of loss. Firstly, losing a group of people who I looked to as family and secondly being awoken to the harsh reality of living in an area such as Camden. My first year internship was rudely interrupted by US Visa people. This resulted in me spending 3 months in the UK, and this resulted in me not always feeling as if i was part of the House community. But this all changed in the summer when I went to Trenton, and spent alot of my time with my team of 5 others. This led to our team being incredibly close. When it came for them to one by one leave, it felt as if I was slowly losing limbs. It was really painful and the next weeks was really hard.

And now I am faced with the knowledge that to get close to a group of people will inevitably come with the end result (for most part anyway) of pain over the breaking of ties. This is a choice which is impossible to make without any clear answer - do I close myself and become a Hermit (maybe abit extreme) or make friends with people whom you know that in 9 months will part paths? It is a choice that makes my head hurt. I am currently listening to the Soundtrack of the Movie Where the Wild Things Are and I was reminded of a quote from Judith (one of the Wild Things) saying "Happiness is not always the best way to be happy".  This made sense to me in some weird way. If the things that hurt, usually hurt because in one way they made us so happy. I think that the things that make us happy are worth it even if they are going to eventually have the potential to make us unhappy, and by running away in order to avoid pain, we also run the risk of avoiding the things that make us happy permanently.

But also weighing on my already overloaded brain is the fact that life is fleeting. A friend who I met in the summer in Trenton, died nearly two weeks ago, at the age of 24. And it struck me that life is fragile, and we never know what is going to happen. One of my favourite films is a film called The Crow. During the filming of the movie, the main actor, Brandon Lee was unfortunatly killed, but what was striking was that the day before he was giving an interview where he talked about how we seem to have a mentality of immortality, that we think that we are going to live for ever, saying

" ...you tend to take a great deal for granted, because you feel like you're going to live forever. It's only if you lose a friend, or maybe have a near-death experience, (that) many events and people in your life suddenly attain real significance"

It has been an eye opening last couple of weeks, and I hope now that I don't take things for granted and if your reading I urge you not to either.

My Summer...

Leese B

I thought that I would share my friends new single.

If a picture paints a thousand words... (Take 2)

A few images from Camp Truth in Trenton

An interesting week...

We have finished the first week at Camp Truth in Trenton, NJ and to put it diplomatically, it was interesting. I put a lot of it down to new camp syndrome, with new kids, directors, interns, streetleaders resulting in a week with some very stressful moments.

We also had some good moments. On the whole, teaching rec has been fun and enjoyable, and the Kids love it. We also had a trip to the New Jersey State Museum.

I have faith that in the next week we will continue to get stronger as a camp

Trenton, Day 2

We are in our second day in Trenton, working for Camp Truth in its Inaugural year. We are settled in our house and have had a chance to survey the Church (more like the Cathedral) that we are working in.

The class I will be teaching is Rec and I will be teaching it in a Gym which is in a converted Crypt under the main Cathedral hall.

The feel about the camp is one of excitement. We have some newbie interns and streetleaders, but also some old School camp kids who have grown up and are in the Leadership positions, which gives the camp a really good feel.

The one downside is that out house is so far from the camp we are working at. This is bad for two reasons. One, it means that we are not going to be interacting with the children that we are working with all the time, which is the case for many of the other camps. Secondly, it means that we are a hour bus journey from camp, and because we have a 7.30am start it means a very early bus journey.

I am really enjoying getting to know the team that I am working with. We have 3 from California, one from Belize (a little country below Mexico, in the Caribbean) and one from Camden. We are looking like we are going to be a really good team.

Thats all from me for the moment but I probably update you with some pictures sometime.

The Greatest terror a child can have is that he is not loved, and rejection is the hell he fears

I've been thinking about why I do what I do.

My thoughts continued to return to this quote. It is from a book called East of Eden by John Stienbeck:

"The Greatest terror a child can have is that he is not loved, and rejection is the hell he fears. I think everyone in the world to a large or small extent has felt rejection. And with rejection comes anger, and with anger some kind of crime in revenge for the rejection, and with the crime, guilt - and there is the story of mankind. I think that if rejection could be amputated, the human would not be what he is. Maybe there would be fewer crazy people. I am sure in myself there would not be many jails. It is all there - the start, the beginning. One child, refused the love he craves, kicks the cat and hides his secret guilt; and another steals so that money will make him loved; and a third conquers the world - and always the guilt and revenge and more guilt."


There are so many people in this city that have felt the harsh sting of rejection. Some of the stories that I have recently heard are so heart wrenching that I wonder if I can ever have any influence. I really feel that I have been called here to stand by those who have been rejected, those who are still being rejected  today and to help stem the cycle of rejection, anger and guilt.