Speckled Green

And so here I am, back from my band camp with the school. We went to Crusaders Recreation Centre in Galston. It was quite good this year.
After school, a few of us started sorting out and moving the gear from the TLC Band Room to the bus bay (with Eka being the boss and Fiona being the ‘sub-boss’), and after about an hour, we got it done…. Instead of the mayhem last year with the luggage, this year people were slowly let in to get their luggage out, removing that giant-crowd-of-people-in-the-door problem (and reducing the noise!).
And if that took ages, packing it into the bus was just as long, and we started that soon after we were taking the stuff down there… (I now remember how heavy timps can be…). Finally, we all got on the buses, the music gear in one, luggage in the other, and we were off (albeit 20 minutes late….). Upon arrival, it was time to unpack all the lovingly *cough cough* stuff. After we had all the stuff in the hall and were settled down, the 3rd bus of people turned up (their bus had accidentally gone to vision valley lol).
Then it was off to dinner. I reckon the food there was some of the best camp food I’ve ever had (I’m not too sure if I’ll be looking forward to yr 9 camp food…). Next: rehearsals. Instead of sectionals this year we had guest conductors. So while junior band played in the hall on the stage, senior band had to trudge off with half the percussion to a room near our cabins for our first session with Mark. What fun we had with mosquitoes while there (there were heaps of them…).
After a tiresome session, we went off to endure Mark’s games & trivia night… The trivia wasn’t that bad, but the game he had was ‘So you think you can dance’… Lets say some of us (a.k.a. alot of the guys) weren’t too enthusiastic about it, but is was fun to watch. Supper before bed (if you don’t know this, Sean eats A LOT) where we stuffed the last food we would get before we sleep. I was bunked with Axel, Nick, David (yr 10) (and later once Mr. Drummond found him our room) Josh (from yr 7). Nick, Josh and I went off to sleep while Axel and David played cards (is it worth loosing sleep over??).
Next morning, I wake up at 6, lay there till 7 while the others wake up, go back to sleep, wake up, go back to sleep, etc. thinking its still really early. I go have shower, come back out, and THEY’RE STILL SLEEPING?! Even after the yr 8 all around us are making heaps of noise… heavy sleepers, till you mention how long till breakfast lol!
Today, tutorials with Renee, a session with the guest conductor (Mrs Debbie Deats, she’s an adjudicator at Yamaha festival, conductor for Hornsby Girls High), Mark, a lot of food (remember what I said about Sean? Nick’s just like him), free time with games (football, basket ball) or chess or table tennis or playing Mario Kart DS (yr 8s, they were noobs.) and then dinner. For meals this year, I sat with the yr 10s and Sean, and the things they talked about were funny. The second night, some yr 8 girls stole our spot at the end of the table, so we had to sit a little further up. While we were talking about stuff, Nick found it funny to juice the runner beans, and soon another girl was helping him. By the end of dinner, they had heaps of beans piled on their plates, with half a cup of juice there, and they were discussing who should drink it (a terrible thought).
Then Mark had us back in the hall for a few more trivia questions (His 4 favourite Rock bands was a question, Queen was one of them) and ‘who am I’s (with one really hard one). A quick game of sock battling (don’t ask me about it) where I conveniently really needed to go to the toilet, and so actually ended up missing when my group was on (it sounded like fun). My team, despite having random people, still ended up last. At least we did better than Nick’s record score of 3 for the impersonation of Mark task (there were some really funny ones, with Sean’s ‘Horrible Joke!!!’ one being superb! Ask him about it).
Movie this year was Police Academy. Not a movie for the minors. Still REALLY funny!!! Makes me want to see the rest of the Police Academy movies…. probably not when my mum or brother is around though.
Supper that night, I was there till we got kicked out by the kitchen staff who had to clean up, with Sean, Alesha, Mr Drummond, some other yr 8 and the teacher from the Support unit who was with us, just eating and talking. Sean and I kept on talking about the poor starving children in Africa, and how we must eat the food before it’s wasted or it’ll be a crime towards the children in Africa!! Mr. Drummond recapped to us about his experiences with possums crawling around his cabin all night, on which we all joked about getting him a toy possum. But then to bed (at 11:50…) and good old sleep (with Axel and David still playing cards). Something I noticed, because all the yr 8s around us were REALLY noisy, we seemed really quite, so Mark or Mr. Drummond never checked on us to tell us lights out. So we normally had the light on the longest while we talked.
KK, next day, wake up early, again, get changed, ask some yr 8 what the time was to check that my watch was correct, and then tell the others the time…. They got up late. Breakfast, Mark decided to sit with us and grace us with his bad jokes, comments, and overall talk. After finishing breakfast early, packed my bag early, and then read a book. Tutorial with Renee again (Eiger, one of our songs, stuck in head…) then morning tea spent pouring out milk for people and stuffing face with cake.
After that, we had to take our luggage and instruments to the hall and vacate the cabins, and I spent 10 minutes of my life cleaning up after messy yr 8s (learn to clean up will you??) and packing up stuff from tutorials. Then Koran decided to teach me how to play Speed. We were still playing when tutorials/rehearsals started, and the brass were using the cabin we were in as a tutorial area, and Mark happened to be talking there. So Koran, being the tactical games expert there, watched the coast till it was safe to run. We were seen, by the students that is, Mark didn’t even notice us (lol, and I thought I ran rather loudly… or maybe he did….). Anyways, we went off to our session, and our Guest conductor today was Steve (can’t remember his full name, and as I was late, I never got to learn it). He’s the top guy with the state music stuff, and helps organise the School Spec. stuff. He was good, funny (at least he doesn’t tell lame jokes, which is better than Mark). Then we had lunch, and our long awaited concert.
Junior band played, and everyone that was only in senior band sat behind the parents in the seats (except for Koran, Nirosh and I!!), then it was our turn. After the “thank you”s/gift giving, we played, and despite all being tired, I think we played really really well (at least better than the beginning of camp, which shows we didn’t wast our time). Then it was off to home, where my brother wanted to be after coming to hear my concert right after his band camp.
Now I just want to quickly note how confused I’ve been this year, when I remember that if I look at the calendar Mother’s day is really the 2nd Sunday in May (I always thought is was the first… has it changed???). Also, good luck to my friends and the Yr 10s in our half yearlies. This is the first time we’ve had our half yearlies bunched up into such a small time span (1 month, with essays as well), because we have that new National testing for yr 7 & 9 to do at the same time, and then camp right after our exams (Duke of Ed will be interesting…). At least I’ll learn how it’s like for yr 10, 11 and 12 exams… Phew, llooooonngg blog today.