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Dear Parents,
I hope this final note of the summer finds you and your son doing well. As you can imagine these last few days in camp were a flurry of activity with Shabbos, Tisha B’Av as well as all the closing activities in camp. I am sure your son has shared with you some of what went on in camp but here is a glimpse of all that occurred at the end of an amazing summer.
Although Shabbos was actually the Ninth of Av the fast was moved until Sunday, since Shabbos takes precedence. This meant that we would have our usual spirited Shabbos with amazing singing and dancing during the davening, meal and oneg. The oneg was run by our counselors with Rabbi Kimche and featured some great food and even better inspiration. Shabbos day was full of that same ruach at davening and the meal. As Shalosh Seudos approached we had an exciting shiur about how to keep the inspiration going post camp and then headed out for our last meal before the fast. Following the meal we ebbed for one last time with singing and some great stories from Rabbi Fried.
We headed to the Bais Medrash for maariv and Eicha. Before we read Eicha I tried to set the tone for all of Tisha BA’v and then our advisors lead the reading of Eicha with a explanatory preface before each perek.
For Tisha B’Av we spent the morning with advisors explaining 9 kinos as well as some singing between kinos. This lasted from 10:00am until 1:15. In the afternoon we showed some meaningful videos, davened mincha, and went outside for a short kumzits as the sun set. In the middle of the kumzits we were joined by Camp Ohr Haner, another camp on campus run for boys from Central America. It was beautiful to have both camps come together, almost 200 people outside ending the fast with achdus.
Monday morning we had some great learning groups and headed out to the playoffs. After the playoffs and supper we went to Four Seasons indoor sports facility. The boys had a great time swimming, playing sports and relaxing.
Tuesday was the last day of learning groups and many of the NCSYers who won prizes went to collect them at local restaurants and stores in the early afternoon. Everyone then went out to watch the finals championship games, the Toilet Bowl and Kiddush Kup. Following the games we celebrated some great sports with a steak barbecue. The evening came to an end with some final speeches, a video, evaluations, t-shirt presentation and an inspirational “open mike” kumzits.
This was truly an amazing summer. It was filled with some wonderful trips, intense and fun sports, some great learning and of course the inspiration and growth that NCSY specializes in. I wanted to thank all the members of my staff for making this happen as well as thank you for sharing your son with us for this month.
As we always tell the boys, Camp Sports never really ends because you are always part of our family and we will try and stay in touch. For our NCSYrers and you, their parents, if we can ever be of help do not hesitate to let us know. Hopefully your son will join us or another NCSY summer program next summer.
Until then, keep flying high and have a great Shabbos,
Rabbi Green |
