Summer Camp Beginnings

By: Elyse Waksman 

ENP Volunteer
Onward Israel Boston

Student at Clark University

During my first two weeks at ENP, I’ve worked with the other interns to plan a summer camp program for Ethiopian-Israeli youth. Camp started on Monday, and from the start we could tell that it wouldn’t go as planned.

            We began by asking each camper to introduce herself, but most of the campers were too shy to participate and would barely even mumble their names. This initial shyness disappeared for the most part by the end of the first day as we encouraged the girls to come out of their shells and participate, but there are still several other challenges we have to face.

My Hebrew knowledge coming into this was slim to none, which is about the same as most of the girls’ English knowledge. This makes communication extremely difficult, and subsequently being in charge of the girls becomes a challenge because I can hardly understand or respond to their questions. But after two days of working at the camp, I’ve spent a lot of time sitting with some of the girls and teaching them some English while they teach me Hebrew.

Another challenge was how disorganized everything felt. We had planned activities on an exact schedule, but keeping the girls paying attention (or even in the same room) was not as easy as we had hoped. But in the end it’s actually good that the schedule changes along the way, because some of the moments when we connect most to the girls are during free time when we’re just talking and laughing. I’m sure that we will continue to face these challenges and others over the next few weeks, but I can already tell that it’s worth it.