World Scout Jamboree Team
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Take me out to the ball game!
4th August 2019
Take me out to the ball game!
Today we got up early and walked across to the university dining hall. We then got ready and walked across campus to get on a school bus to Baltimore. Once in Baltimore we walked to the stadium and received a free Baltimore orioles baseball hat and took to our seats. There was 4000 scouts in the stadium creating an amazing atmosphere. We had great seats as we weren't too high but could still see everything. For lunch uk contingent had arranged it and we got a soda, water, hot dog, crisps and souvenir cup. UK contingent even handed out foam hands for us all. With our lunch it felt like we were living the true American cultures at a baseball game. At their home stadium, the Baltimore orioles were victorious against the Toronto blue jays. Once we left we headed back to Maryland university to dump our stuff and catch a bus to the train station, where we headed to pentagon city for some quick shopping in Macy's then headed to the matchbox restaurant for our dinner. Where I had a spicy meatball and pork pizza with a strawberry lemonade and chips. Everyone had eaten the most amount of food since we arrived in the US. it was also one of our unit members birthday so was very special for her to celebrate it with us at a nice restaurant.
Welcome to D.C!
3rd August 2019
Welcome to D.C!
We woke up and headed down for breakfast with the rest of the uk units sharing dorms with us. Then we headed down to catch a bus then a subway in to Washington DC. Once in Washington DC we arrived at the archives station and walked to the United States capitol. We had a unit picture outside the capitol and saw an american football team also getting a team picture. We then headed down to the Washington memorial and also had a unit picture. We decided to head down to the White House however the view isn't that clear as there was a barrier a distance away from the fence and supposedly some renovations occurring. Our unit then split into groups of our choice so my group headed down to the Lincoln memorial and recreated the captain America scene around the national mall whilst also visiting the Vietnam veterans memorial. We headed back to a station and headed to pentagon city to look at some shops and get some lunch. And spent our afternoon shopping. Once we had headed back to the uni we had dinner and got ready for the uk contingent party. I bought a cheap American flag tie die t shirt for the party earlier. We walked to the party which was on campus but still a trek as the campus was huge. They had stuff from USA, Mexico and Canada and was known as a tri national party. You could have a photo shoot, caricature, hold some animals, play carnival stalls games, practise baseball etc. There was even a replica capitol building, Washington monument and Lincoln memorial. As the party continue more music began to be played till nearly everyone was sweating and dancing. We also received a free ground sheet with the tea bear one to sit on or take back and our leaders collected our #uk24wsjbingo badges that we completed in New York and Washington DC.
2nd August 2019
I�m on my way!
Today was departure day and we were meant to get up at 5am however no one got up on time. We had to quickly pack up our sleeping stuff into our holdall then to pack down all our tents and shelters. We made our way up the hill to our coach and loaded it up. Once on the coach I ended up falling asleep for the entirety of the journey till we were in Washington. We arrived at Maryland university and were allocated our rooms and had quick showers. We then split off into groups and walked around the huge campus. I went to the uni's football stadium, baseball stadium and athletic stadium along with the food shops and stores on campus. The Americans campus' are huge and have so many things to do. We then headed to the university dinning area which was like an American dinner.
Time to say goodbye!
1st August 2019
Time to say goodbye!
Today was our last day at the jamboree. I woke up and my aim was to trade my daybag for an American one. So this meant I walked all over subcamp C4 and c3 and c2 and then finally c1. I stopped at the other Kent unit; the bohemian raspberries in c1 for a while then on the way back to camp I found an American troop and managed to get the swap and some badges and hat as well. At 1 o'clock my whole unit had to make their way back to camp so we can put down the unit kit and also our personal kit however this took a while. Afterwards we started to prepare and made our way down to the summit stadium for the closing ceremony. It started off with an American marching band and a speech from the Secretary General of the world scout organisation. There was also a reflection of our jamboree experience then the co hosts handed the jamboree over to the next hosts, Korea - as the 25th world scout jamboree is in South Korea in 2023. This lead to our entertainment for the night which started off with a performance from Pentatonix who are an a Capella group singing lots of covers and medleys. Afterwards there was a dance performance from Light Balance who were contestants on America's got talent and performed dances synchronised to lights on their costume. Finally we had a very long, impressive fireworks, lasers and fire display which lasted about 15 mins long. And the medway 5 even managed to get a photo together for the first time since we left for America over a week ago.
Mountain Bike Madness
31st July 2019
Ooops! Said Harvey......
Yesterday we went mountain biking which was filled with many great tracks that varied in difficulty. I got more and more confident as the day went on to find out that I had pushed my self to far and managed to skid on my head for about 2m while digging up the track.
Bright lights bigger city!
31st July 2019
Bright lights bigger city!
Today I woke up and went with some of my unit for a backstage tour of the jamboree main stage where we learnt about the equipment and financial requirement for the performances they deliver. I then headed off to the sustainability treehouse and made an engraved metal tag and learnt about recycling. Then I went to the global development village and took part in an activity by WAGGS about inequality and sustainable lifestyle where living conditions would change and the family would have to continue to produce bracelets to sell. I also made a bee house with the Irish scouts and earned a badge for scouts against killer robots. Afterwards I went to the faith and beliefs zone and was introduced to the Punajbi alphabet, wrote my name in Hebrew on a bookmark, learnt about the history of the hijab. I then headed out to trade once I was back at camp and traded neckers, uniforms, t shirts and badges. The trading there was crazy and is huge with the Americans. For dinner about 15 of our unit went and had dinner with some Oman scouts. We started off by playing some games for us to bond and even tried on some traditional Oman clothing. For dinner was wraps, rice, noodles, prawn dish in sauce with fruit on the side. We then stood around and sang Oman songs and english songs then the rain and lightning began but we continued our singing and had a great night with lots of laughter even though we didn’t speak Arabic.
