Gemma Bishop ’19 and Jordan Manning ’19 share the groups first day in La Plant, getting to know the local community and making new friends.
Gemma and Jordan here, reporting live from La Plant, South Dakota! The highlight of our day was definitely meeting some of the children. They were cool and cute!
We started off the day bright and early with tea and pancakes, then the rest of the day was filled with orientation activities and preparation for our first day of camp tomorrow. Some people made dinner for tonight, others dug a ditch, some destroyed a wall, and the last group planned our day for tomorrow.
After a fun evening of getting to know the kids and eating sweet potato enchiladas, we were assigned a few little chores. Jordan cleaned a Latrine during chores and “cried”. Gemma “got to mop a floor and had good squad bonding”.
Yesterday, we had a long day of travel. Over the course of the van ride, playing ukuleles and sharing candy, we were surprised at the expanse of the land. Trees dotted the landscape, with rolling hills, grassy plains, and many bison and cows.
When we first met the townspeople, there was an awkwardness in the air, kind of like a blind date. Soon, however, we all got together and started playing games like four square (or as our Florida friends call it, boxball) and basketball, which here is called rezball. (Res-ball) One kid went up to each one of us and held up the “A-OK” sign, which elicited a response just like it would at Deerfield.
We all bonded really well with the other school group here from Florida (Palmer Trinity School) they are all really cool and it is interesting talking about our different high school experiences of Deerfield vs Miami.
We are all excited to host the first official day of camp tomorrow and begin to make meaningful relationships with some native children from the area.
