Day 24 (Monday 17 March 2014) by Kara

We had been told the day before that we had to wake up for 5 A.M. boot camp. Ben and I were talking and thinking maybe it was a joke.  At 5 in the morning we heard whistles and made the decision that it was not a joke.  We opened our tent only to see that it was still dark outside.  Not knowing what to expect we gathered around all the other students.  They had us form lines.  We weren't exactly sure what they were saying because they were speaking Karen. We then were given orders to turn right and left and march.  Before we knew it we were jogging in lines as a unit.  We were wondering when we joined the military in Thailand.  We ran down the road outside the camp for a while.  A couple more whistles and some Karen talk and we turned around and jogged back to the camp.  At the camp we did some stretches.

It was still dark when we finished the stretches so we took a short nap until breakfast.  For breakfast we had jok.  It’s a rice porridge.  After breakfast, we cleaned the dishes in the river. Ok, Wijit and Tan did it while we watched. Next on the agenda was cleaning the base camp and wetting down the dirt so when we moved around it didn't get dusty.  While we were doing this we saw a huge colorful bird fly by.  It was a peacock! We spent the better part of half an hour following it around trying to get pictures.

We then started our activity for the day.  On Monday we (Payap Christian Zone) were responsible for the activities. We had 6 groups that talked about different countries and traveling.  The students rotated to different stations to learn about the different countries.  This activity is important because many of these refugee students will move to other countries in the future.  We had representation from China, Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia and Australia.  Each station had fun activities.   We also had a flight delay station that taught about passports and currency exchange. The students visited two countries before lunch and four after.

After stations it was time to cool off.   The boys did cannonballs into the lake from the platform. The water was nice and refreshing.  Some of the students built a raft out of bamboo and we had fun paddling on it.

Next it was time for dinner.  Geng’s mom was so sweet to make us dinner at her village and bring it to us.  We ate on the beautiful deck overlooking the river.  We had a fun time eating and learning how to do the Thai chicken dance.

We then headed up to the pavilion to watch a documentary about refugees in Uganda.  After the movie we were hungry again so it was Mama (instant noodles) time. We sat in the tent of some of the refugee students and ate Mama noodle and talked until it was curfew and we had to go to our tents and mentally prepare ourselves for another 5 A.M. wake up call.