okay so last summer I went to this "leadership" camp that was in the a forest in the middle of nowhere (in California, no less, it was like 98 F every day) and i was on my period (which was the worst thing ever since there were no bathrooms, only porta-potties and tp-strewn bushes, and we didnt even sleep in tents). The showers spewed green water, and there was a family of drowned rats in the pool, which we were forced to "dip" in every morning right after we woke up at 5:30. Every day, we would hike uphill for 5-7 hours and then write essays in the burning sun for the next 3 and then stand for 2 hours straight while we did flag-lowering ceremonies and camp songs. And half the nights, they "surprised" us by getting us to take a 5 mile hike at 11:30pm so that they could get to a special clearing and do some dumb skit that was a mash-up of, like, star wars and greek mythology. Which was also 2 hours long. Se we'd sleep at 2 a.m (and wake up at 5). We had to sleep side by side in sleeping bags with nothing but spider-infested trees over our heads and potato bugs and giant ants to keep us company. We always had to wear our "uniforms" (heavy t-shirt, long khaki pants, bandana, beret, rope around waist) which was especially hell because it was too hot to even be bikini weather. The one pair of sweaty khaki pants I had to wear for a week will haunt me for life. And, because California was (and still is) in a drought, there was dust everywhere that got everywhere. As in, when I took a shower when I finally got home, it took me three shampoos and two body scrubs to get all of it out. Oh, and there were a few rattlesnakes too. I had the pleasure of getting the mustard on my sandwich spread by the same knife that had been used to decapitate one of them. And one of the highlights of the whole thing was leaving the ziploc of sandwich meats on the table for 2 minutes and coming back to find that a hoard of yellow jackets had made themselves at home in it.
It was probably the worst week of my life. Don't get me wrong, I love the outdoors and roughing it, but this was just too much. The only thing that kept me going after I was ready to give up on day 2 were the really nice people in my group (and the cafeteria lady who snuck my group a gallon of ice water, bless her heart). And honestly, it would have been 50x better if I wasn't spewing blood and convulsing from cramps the whole time.
It was probably the worst week of my life. Don't get me wrong, I love the outdoors and roughing it, but this was just too much. The only thing that kept me going after I was ready to give up on day 2 were the really nice people in my group (and the cafeteria lady who snuck my group a gallon of ice water, bless her heart). And honestly, it would have been 50x better if I wasn't spewing blood and convulsing from cramps the whole time.
