Category: Junior Camp East

Naomi W.

Tribe of Benjamin

Age 11

Archery

Fun archery, fun archery, fun archery. Before I tell you about my first-time doing archery at camp, let me just tell you this- I LOVE ARCHERY! The singing of the string, the excitement as I hit the bullseye, the drawing back of the bow. I just love it! But now let me tell you the first time I did archery at camp.

As I walked down the grassy slope to where the archery range was, I held my breath in anticipation. Seizing the bow and grasping the arrow, filled with quiver I ran my finger on the length of the bow searching for imperfections. Loosening the quiver, I drew the shaft to string. Drawing back the bow, arms quivering, string pulled tight, all concentration focused on the target. Beads of perspiration trickled down my brow, clouding my present conception. Realizing my breath, I liberated the dart. Hearing the singing bolt whistle past my ear slicing its opponent in two. Crowd cheering, I was lifted onto the shoulders of my fellow campers. As we paraded through the streets, throngs followed, awaiting the talk of the arrow. Hence this gazette concludes.

Eliran K.

Tribe of Reuben

Age 8

Movie Night

At camp we do a lot of fun things. One of these things is called movie night. We went in to the cabin to put on pajamas for movie night. We watched the movie “Raya the last Dragon”. We also got snacks. The snacks were sour patches, chips, and Oreo cookies. The movie started, we were eating the snacks with Mason and Band-aid. When we were done eating and watching the movie, we went to brush our teeth and we went to go to bed. Also, we woke up and had a new day.

Ilana S.

Tribe of Benjamin

Age 11

FOB

Every day at camp we have FOB. Junior camp has FOB but teen camp does not. They have TAWG time, which is short for Time Alone With God. I love to spend FOB everyday reading, writing, sleeping, the list goes on and on. But there are 2 rules: 1, you have to stay in your bed, and 2, stay quiet so that others can sleep or do the things that they would like to do. FOB stands for Flat on Bunk. FOB is also a great time to write letters and that is really fun. It is a great time of day for me to reset and it helps make camp fun!

Hannah R.

Tribe of Benjamin

Age 12

Dessert

Dessert is delicious, yummy, breathtaking, and stupendous! I love the camp desserts, and food! My favorite is either the ice cream, or the cookies. All the desserts I remember are cookies, ice cream, pudding, ice pops, s’mores, brownies, gummies, hard candy, watermelon, cheesecake, mousse cake, chocolate cake, scones, pastries, and banana bread. Last, but not least, Rice Krispy treats. If you are kosher, they tell you if it is kosher or not. All the treats are amazing! I have never met a Camp Gilgal treat I haven’t liked. The only thing is you have to have vegetables and eat your meal first! PS, you are only allowed to have one dessert so that everyone can have one!

Illyana C.

Tribe of Benjamin

Age 12

Camp Gilgal

Cabins

Archery

Mission Impossible

Pool

Games

Isaiah 40:1-8

Laughing

Geese

All camp activities

Lively

Naomi W.

Tribe of Benjamin

Age 11

Mission Impossible

As I walked down to the bathroom to brush my teeth, I felt in my bones that something was going to happen! While in the middle of brushing my teeth I saw, to my bewilderment and surprise, Emanuela running toward me and screaming! Once soaking all this in, trying to figure out if something bad happened, I heard music; loud, boisterous music that rung in my ears. At the same time, I see people running out of cabins yelling “Mission impossible, Mission impossible!!!” In the confusion I ran outside with my toothbrush still in my mouth where I fell upon fellow campers telling me to get some black clothes on and go to the mishkan! I dash up the cabin steps giddy with excitement! Throwing on some adidas pants and sweatshirt, I ran as fast as I could to the mishkan. When I get there, I hear Mission Impossible music. Once all the cabins are ready and at their station, Hiccup shouts “on your mark, get set, go!” we’re off! My cabin darted to the bathroom where the first clue is hidden! We figured out the clue! We’re off again! Sweat trickles down my back. This goes on for an hour, darting here and there, focused alone on the clues, jumping over logs and hiding behind bushes. At last, we find all the clues. We come in 2nd place, hooray! This is my recollection of Mission Impossible!

Emanuela K.

Tribe of Benjamin

Age 11

Movie Night

Hi, Camp Gilgal is awesome. But, do you know what makes it so awesome? I do, and it is… Movie Night!!! Now, if you are wondering what Movie Night is I’ll tell you.Movie Night is when we get in our PJs and we bring our sleeping bags and to the mishkan. They set up mats on the floor for us to put our sleeping bags on and then we get ready for everything to start. When all of the tribes are settled down in the mishkan we begin the movie and they don’t tell you what it is until it starts. During the movie we get to eat a bunch of snacks. Movie night is usually on a Friday in the first week of Camp Gilgal and it is extra fun and special. Once the movie is finished, we throw out our trash from the candy. After that we take our sleeping bag and go back to our cabin for bed.

Mason C.

Tribe of Reuben

Age 10

Mission Impossible

Mission Impossible started like this.  The Mission Impossible theme song played and we all ran into the Mishkan where Hiccup told us the rules.  You have to collect all the clues, and the first tribe to find them all wins! Also, if you get spotted by a spotter with their flashlight, you have to go back to your cabin before you can continue.

These were some of my favorite Mission Impossible clues.  One time, we had to find a clue near our cabin, and Tchotchkie almost spotted us.  But he didn’t because I hid behind a dresser and waited.  Another time, we ran to the volleyball net and I slipped in the mud, but kept going.  For the last clue, we had to run all the way up to Sunset and back down.  I got really sweaty and had way too much fun.

My tribe ended up winning, and it felt amazing.  Everybody got popsicles as a prize, but we also got anything we wanted from the camp store.  I got a lot of really cool rubber duckies.  Thank you for reading this, and I hope you go to Camp Gilgal next year. 

Ilana S.

Tribe of Benjamin

Age 11

Swamp Cows (a fictional explanation of a camp phenomenon)

As I lay flat on my bunk during (FOB) I heard a noise outside that I didn’t know how to identify. One of the rules of FOB is that you need to be quiet so I couldn’t ask any of my cabin-mates if they were hearing what I was hearing and if they knew what it was. As I focused on the sound I decided that I had to investigate and I became singularly focused on finding the answer to my quest. But before I can investigate, I have to wait 36 seconds for FOB to end.

I grab a flashlight, and a notebook and off I go and invite my cabin along with me! We start to go down the trail with that leads to the dining hall and take 13 steps and then hear a “cricket, cricket” sound.  I thought “Is that the noise?” I take my notebook out and write “A cricket-cricket noise.” I put my notebook away and off I go yet again. I take 29 steps and I see something bright, black, red and very small. I decide to pause and listen, but hear nothing. But I still take out my notebook and write “Black and red, small.” I put my notebook back I my pocket, and again, off I go. Then I walk 29 steps before I decide to listen and wait. I saw and heard something! It was big and oh my it’s a person! It is Red Sox and Beardo and Peachfuzz! I say hi to them and decide that they couldn’t be the source of the noise, then I walk 32 steps to a pond. I see and hear something else. Like a “honk.” It’s a- I don’t know so I take out my notebook and write “Honk noise, sorta brown, black, and white color with beak.” We all ran back to the cabin as fast as we could, right as it started to rain (again). I look at my notebook. It reads; “Cricket-cricket noise, black, red and small, honk noise, sorta brown, black, and white color with beak.” My cabin looked at our observations but decided that we didn’t have any new answers.

 The next day, I go to breakfast and asked Verde if he knew anything about the weird noises at camp. He said there was a legend of the swamp cows. At night, they call to lure you into the water of Camp Gilgal to swim. But I think they are bullfrogs croaking and I like legends so legends can be changed and stretched which make everything more fun!

Naomi W.

Tribe of Benjamin

Age 11

Worship Team

The worship team is a wonderful group of people who leads the songs for tabernacle. The songs are beautiful, angelic, and divine. The choir of people are Schnitzel, Maya, Levi, some volunteers, and myself, Naomi. We sing 2 songs every day. Schnitzel plays the piano, harmonica, ukelele, or drone. When we sing, he is very talented (oooh, ahhh; that’s something we say at camp!). My favorite song in tabernacle is “By the Waters of Babylon.” The worship team also leads the Shema, Veyahavta, and Amidah. Now, I will list all the songs we sing: By the Waters of Babylon, Bless the Lord O My Soul, I’ll Fly Away, But For You Who Fear My Name, Home, Hallelujah, 10 000 Reasons. Singing in the worship team makes me feel happy and closer to the Lord. I love worship and really like getting to use my love of music with an ability to praise God. Thank you!

Emanuela K.

Tribe of Benjamin

Age 11

Campfire

Hello, I am a camper at Camp Gilgal. Camp Gilgal is awesome. One of my favorite things to do at Camp Gilgal is to go to campfire. If you are wondering what campfire is I can tell you. Campfire is when we go up on a small mountain and praise God. There is a cute fire at campfire. There are also benches made of wood. At campfire we also sing songs, read, talk and praise God. This year at campfire Hiccup read from a Bible storybook and then we talk about the story. We talk about exile and how the people of Israel get exiled from their home. We also talked about how Adam and Eve got exiled from the garden of Eden. Campfire always happens late in the evening before devotions and lights out. We didn’t have that many fires this year because of lots of rain but we had lots of campfire style gatherings. Sometimes we eat s’mores at campfire. I also like looking up at the stars at campfire. Campfire is awesome. I love it.

Lilly M.

Tribe of Benjamin

Age 12

Tribe Flags

At Camp Gilgal, a main part of camp is our camp flags! First, we decide our tribe names after the 12 sons of Jacob. Asher, Zebulon, Naphtali, Benjamin, Judah, Gad, Manasseh, Ephraim, Dan, Issachar, Reuben, and Levi. My cabin picked Benjamin. Then, you pick a color. My tribe and another tribe wanted the same color and then had to come up with a speech about why we should get it, and my tribe got most voted for! We had orange. Then you can start on your flag!

All the kids work together and bond over deciding what to make their flag look like, centered around their symbol. Each tribe has a symbol, ours is a wolf. Then the squeeze painting begins! We squeeze pain out of bottles onto our flag and everyone writes their names. My tribe wrote out names in plants with the wolf howling at the moon. Ta-da! You’ve got a flag.

Your flag gets put on a pole and you bring it to breakfast and dinner. Show some cabin spirit! It represents your team after all. But be careful, if you’re careless with your flag and forget it lying around somewhere, someone can steal it (temporarily). To get it back, the whole tribe has to do a challenge that the flag stealing cabin made up. All in all, I think tribe flags are a special and very fun part of camp!