ParentSpace Blog

We’re very excited to announce that we will be posting a video on ParentSpace every day for parents. The video will follow the theme of the day in camp.

To view the videos:

• Go to CampSimcha.org
• Click the login button in the top right corner
• Type in your username and password
• Then scroll over “Parents” on the top bar and click “ParentSpace”

From this page you can access a special blog just for parents, the daily schedule, and daily pictures and videos.

• To get to the videos, click on the link for photos and videos and then click on Videos: Camp Simcha Boys

Oy vey, what is happening with this generation?!? When I was a kid, my mommy taught me that fruits were my friends. All ailments, from flat tires to stubbed toes, were blamed on my lack of my fruits. But sometime recently, the fruit ninja came along, and fruits became the mortal enemy that you practiced your kung-fu on.

Well today Camp Simcha went bananas (b-a-n-a-n-a-s) as we sharpened our swords and unleashed all that pent up energy from eleven months away from camp. After a morning fire-drill, to preclude any fried bananas in camp, we hurried to our morning activity. Joseph headed to the newly built fencing workshop under Matt’s place. It was there that he practiced his ninja skills. He perfected his sword fighting, swung his ninja chucks, and broke wood boards with his bare hands. Meanwhile, Ori Michael headed out to the pottery shop where he painstakingly created a beautiful fruit bowl. After all, all those fruits that Joseph will be choppin’ up has to go somewhere.

Towards the end of lunch, we all gathered in the middle of the dining room where we heard a rockin’ concert from our own personal band: The Tikunei. The campers danced, climbed on staff members’ shoulders, and screamed in a Tikunei Twelve rendition of uproar. Over lunch, we had a group of visitors from Wall Street. After observing just a few moments of our lunch upROAR, they were thoroughly convinced that they are supporting the best possible cause. Many of them opted to join in on the fun, and sing and dance with our awesome campers. They seemed to be having just a bit more fun than they’ve had in a while (After all, SimchaWorld is just a bit more exciting than CubicleWorld).

From lunch, we headed back to our ninjous activities. We had watermelon eating, seed spitting, and lemon squeezing contests in which our campers all dominated our staff, of course! And when the rain started, we just raised the intensity level. After all, “Life is not about waiting for the storm to pass; It’s about dancing in the rain.”

And to cap off the day, we had Eugene the magician come down and teach us the dark magic behind ninjing. Oh what a first day!

One spirit, one team, one win

That’s the attitude Camp Simcha takes towards everything, and it was on full display today.

With our costumes on, our faces painted, and our overflowing energy, we all headed out to the main gate to greet our campers. It was there that we found a life sized Candyland board and candy band-stand courtesy of our in house design team. With our amazing camp band pumping us up, we stamped, screamed, danced, and ushered in the greatest season in camp history. With Tikunim rushing through our blood, and upROARity pouring through our sweat, we went through one final drill: mastering the new camp song, niggun, and dance.

It was then that we began welcoming our amazing campers Camp Simcha Style. One by one, every camper was greeted and given his own personal introduction. He was then rushed through a human tunnel, put on staff member’s shoulders, and danced around the entrance area. The elation of coming back home after a year on vacation showed through on every campers face. After that, the campers were taken for a check at the infirmary before coming back outside to meet new and old friends.

The energy was endless, and we welcomed campers well into the evening. Just when we thought we were done for the day, a bus filled with the Israeli Division showed up and the party started again. This time though, we used a blend of American and Israeli songs and everyone was quite pleased.

After the buses disembarked, the campers had a few moments to catch their breaths before heading to the dining room for a scrumptious dinner. From supper, the camp rushed to the gym for our special night activity. It was there that Cirqutacular, a professional gymnast and stunt team, greeted us. They dazzled us with their three-part performance consisting of aerobatics, contortionism, and a balancing act. Steve’s wicked contortions culminated in him passing his ENTIRE BODY through an unstrung tennis racket, earning him shouts of delight from the standing-room-only audience. And when they said the show would be Tikunei, the crowd went wild.

After a great start, however, it was time to get a good night sleep before tomorrow’s amazing program.

The staff members of Camp Simcha are eagerly awaiting the arrival of the greatest campers on Earth! They have spent the last 24 hours getting oriented (lots and lots of speeches), disoriented (Mud sliding and mud dodgeball), and straight up psyched. The energy is palpable.

The Greatest Show on Earth is now ready to begin! Rain or shine, the show will go on. The staff is all dressed up in the wackiest costumes. Operation Red Nose is in full effect, and not a face has gone unpainted. The place is in TOTAL uproar. And Dembi’s Got a Feeling’…

CSB2012: Where Amazing Happens

Dear Humans in the non-Simcha world,

We know you were jealous of Epic ‘11. You followed us on Facebook. You read the blog. You continually watched the videos we posted on YouTube. You drooled over the fun we were having day in and day out. Under your breath you could be heard humming “I’ve got a Feelin”, “Tonight Tonight…”, or “Rollin in Camp Simcha.” In the privacy of your car you would treat yourself to a mini-upROAR. You tried capturing just a small piece of the Epicness we were having in our world.

But let me let you in on a little secret… Epic ‘11 is SOOOOOOOOOO last year.

To my fellow Simchonians, welcome to a whole new dimension. A world that has yet to be discovered by humans. A twilight zone between reality and dreamland. A summer for the record books.  A continuous picture perfect moment. A high that puts Graceland to shame. An experience that will stay for you for a lifetime. A rollercoaster ride that will leave you breathless at every turn.

Welcome to TIKUN’EY TWELVE.

You will not be disappointed.

Now, in case you haven’t heard, let me fill you in on the theme and word of the summer.

The word of the summer is…wait for it… TIKUNIM! Last year’s word, Epic, may have sounded epic but had little depth.  In contrast, this year’s word holds a message that can be carried for life. It traces its roots to the Hebrew word Tikun, which loosely means “to heal, repair and transform.” It can be applied to everything from our world to ourselves. The lesson of the summer is to take everything that’s thrown at us and use it to better and perfect ourselves…and of course have an amazing time doing it. And don’t you worry, our summer will go wayyyyy beyond uber and epic. They just haven’t yet invented a synonym that encapsulates CSB 2012 🙂

Now on to the theme. This year’s theme is Game On.

The NY Times recently had an article about games. The article explained that Game-studies scholars (there are such things) like to point out that games tend to reflect the societies in which they are created and played. Monopoly, for instance, makes perfect sense as a product of the 1930s — it allowed anyone, in the middle of the Depression, to play at being a tycoon. Risk, released in the 1950s, is a stunningly literal expression of cold-war realpolitik. Tetris was invented exactly when and where you would expect — in a Soviet computer lab in 1984 — and its game play reflects this origin. The enemy in Tetris is not some identifiable villain (Donkey Kong, Mike Tyson, Carmen Sandiego) but a faceless, ceaseless, reasonless force that threatens constantly to overwhelm you, a churning production of blocks against which your only defense is a repetitive, meaningless sorting. It is bureaucracy in pure form, busywork with no aim or end, impossible to avoid or escape.

Do to the aforementioned soliloquy, Game On is a perfect theme for Tikun’ey Twelve. In contrast to last year’s theme, Great Escapes, which seemed to emphasize escaping the moment, this year’s theme (and word) are about living in the moment: To take everything that’s thrown at us and use it to perfect ourselves; To become better people and have an amazing time doing it.

As Michael Jordan once said, “I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.”

Camp Simcha, get your game face on.

CSB Tikun’ey Twelve: It’s Game Time

Over 200 CSB2012 staff  arrived in on our beautiful, luxurious, and comfortable camp grounds today for CSB2012 orientation. After a delicious lunch and some general bonding time, meeting new and greeting old, we went to the Social Hall to hear orientation speeches from Dembi, Rabbi K, Rochel Katz (our Head Nurse), and Shaindy Lowenthal, our program director. We were inspired, informed, interested, uplifted, and UPROARed. Following the orientation speeches, we followed Sergeant Dembi for “Staff Boot-Camp” during which we received a tour of the camp grounds, and were introduced to the staff hotel, dining room, bunkhouses, lake, etc. We sang, chanted, and denounced  slacking.

We were all psyched to see what came next. Dembi led us to the baseball field where with the help of some water hoses we created a massive mud slide. We spent the rest of the afternoon breaking ourselves in for an amazing summer.

Following a tasty dinner, served by our Head Chef Ruevin, we heard a speech by Rabbi Simcha Scholar, Chai Lifeline’s Executive Vice President. He inspired us to work together as one heart, and one soul, to make this summer amazing for our campers. We also heard from Dr. Wexler, who filled us in on what these children go through the rest if the year. To once again get us in the right mind set, we were shown a part of last year’s video. The lights were then turned off, the disco lights turned on, and we stamped and danced until we were utterly zonked.

It took a while to get fully recovered from the intensity of the mudsliding and dancing, but once we managed to recover ourselves, we all split in our respective divisions and had our first meeting get the down-low on this years theme “Game On’, and plot and plan the most amazing Camp Simcha boys session ever!!!!

A day full of glorious uproaring and TIKUNification, orientation has come to an end.

CSB2012: Let the games begin

Meet Matti from Camp Simcha Special.

The last night in camp featured a beautiful banquet, complete with meat carving stations and candy galore! Ten campers graduated from Camp Simcha Special and the banquet was also their graduation ceremony. They were presented with their diploma on the stage, wearing their caps and gowns. It was the twelfth year of CSS, so there was a huge birthday cake to celebrate. After dinner, we headed to the Social Hall. We said our thank-yous to everyone who made this summer happen and made it what it was; we couldn’t have done without each and every person in camp! Then we watched the newest CSS video from this session. Well, it wasn’t over there. Everyone went out onto the lawn and we watched a slide-show of pictures, including camper-counselor photos. Then, there was an amazing display of fireworks! At the end we looked at the sky and realized that tomorrow night when we look up, we’ll be seeing the same stars as the ones we see tonight! keep that in mind everyone! Have a great rest of the summer and can’t wait to see you next year!

Everyone was thrilled when we realized Avram Fried was here for the last Camp Simcha Special concert of 2012! We sang and danced together, taking full advantage of our last day in camp. Everyone had a great time!

Nearing the wood-shop, the sound of saws cutting through wood can be heard. Inside, campers are making wooden works-of-art. This year, the projects are doll-houses, kitchen decorations, and ring-holders, all created from wood! They nail the wooden pieces together and then stain, paint, and shine them. Campers wear special eye-gear and hand-gear to protect themselves from dust as they cut and sand the wood. Wood-working is hard work, but it’s rewarding and our campers are strong!