Summer 2012

We kicked off the Playoffs and the Toilet Bowl Playoffs on Monday.  Up until the last day of the season, all 10 teams had a chance of making the playoffs. The teams were all evenly matched as the playoffs began. Everybody had a great time as we finished off the day with Team 7 set to play Team 9 for the Championship and Team 10 to play Team 6 for the Toilet Bowl. We took a night trip to 4 Seasons once again, and everybody had  a blast playing ultimate, soccer, football, basketball and swimming.

On Tuesday we had our Championship and Toilet Bowl games at Northwest Park. Some played ultimate or soccer, some came to cheer on their friends, but everyone came and had a great time. In the end, Rabbi Fried’s team won the Championship and Shmuley Saklad’s team won the toilet bowl. We had and end of the year BBQ at the park and everybody had a great time. After the BBQ, Camp Sports set a new world record as we took 2 busses, 5 vans, and 4 cars to 7 different 7Elevens throughout Baltimore and every camper got a Slurpee. 100 Slurpees in less than a half hour, new world record.

We returned to camp the end of the year banquet and video. Many campers recieved learning awards for their extraordinary efforts throughought the month and every camper recieved a brand new 2012 NCSY Camp Sports camp T-Shirt.  It has been an awesome summer and everybody is very sad to go home.

Shabbos began with a bang Friday night as David Block, who was visiting, davened Kaballas Shabbos and gave the speech before Maariv. After the Friday night meal, which included lots of good shtik, the Fried family hosted an Oneg filled with singing, Divrei Torah, and great snacks. After that Oneg, there was a surprise Oneg in the dorms led by Meir Preis which included even more delicious food, including deli roll and potato kugel, and there was singing late into the night.

After an inspiring davening and another fun shtik filled Shabbos day meal, we had much needed Shabbos afternoon rest. We davened Mincha and then Rabbi Fried and Rabbi Green gave important speeches about the importance of learning. We then headed to the Dining Room for shaleshudes and pre-fast meal time. We ate and ate in order to be ready for the fast of Tisha B’Av, which actually fell on Shabbos this year, but because of the importance of Shabbos was pushed off until Saturday night/Sunday. The fast began while it was still Shabbos and it was an incredibly serious atmoshphere for our final ebbing and the saddest day in the Jewish calendar, Tisha B’Av. We talked about the meaning of Shabbos and Tisha B’Av while singing inspiring songs to get us in the right mindset.

We then went to the Shul, removed our leather shoes, sat on the floor as we davened Maariv and read Megillat Eichah. Rabbi Green spoke about what the destruction of the Beis HaMikdash has to do with us and we tried to feel the pain and suffering which has been with our ancestors for generations. After we finished Kinnos and Maariv, Rabbi Cooper gave a shiur pointing out the curses in the Torah and showing us the terrible things that G-d told us would happen when we stray from Him.

The next morning, we began the Tisha B’Av service at 9AM. Rabbi Green, Rabbi Cooper, Rabbi Fried, Rabbi Wex, Rabbi Paretzky, Rabbi Wiener, Rabbi Yaemans, Meir Preis, Dovid Kimche, and David Block gave inspiring insights into the particular Kinnos which we said and there was much to be gained by all. The afternoon was reserved for taking it easy and not doing too much strenuous activity on this hot, fast day. At 6PM we watched some inspiring videos to get a better understanding of what the day of Tisha B’Av is all about and we heard an inspiring story on the power of starting something and doing small pieces of it daily. After the fast ended at 9:07, we heard Havdalah and headed to the Dining Room to eat for the first time all day. The camp got everyone Dunkin Donuts as well, and the light were turned on in the basketball courts and sports fields for some late night balling. It was a draining, inspiring weekend, and we look forward to an exciting, fun final week of camp.

On Thursday we took our annual trip to Washington D.C. Because it was two days before Tisha B’Av, we all went to the National Holocaust Museum in order to try to get into the right mindset. It was very meaningful to take a visual tour of the horrific destruction of European Jewry, only a few days before the saddest day on the Jewish calendar. From there we were free to go with an advisor and explore any part of the United States’ Capital that we wished, including the White House, Washington Monument, Lincoln Memorial, and the Smithsonian Museums on the D.C. Mall. We all met up at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum at  5:30 and then we headed back to camp.

When we returned, we had our final Mishmar of the summer with an amazing nearly 100% attendance to the optional event. The Beis Medrash was filled with campers teaming with advisors for an exciting, fun filled, learning experience. Many prizes were raffled off for our final Mishmar and Asaf Gadasi won our grand prize, an electric motor bike. We capped off the fun filled day with a late night Kugel snack to close out our final Mishmar.

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We started the week off on Sunday and Monday with four more league games as the regular season nears the end. Every team still has a shot at the playoffs and are all within a few games of each other. The Chai Lifeline free throw and frisbee competition came to a close this week and we were able to raise $700+. David Spero won the free throw competition and David Kornbluth and Eric Sturm tied in the frisbee competition as they were able to throw the frisbee through a camp van an impressive 4/10. The 3 on 3 basketball tournament also finished up this week with the team of Daniel Jager, Yehuda Rosenberg,and Moshe Ostriker champions.

On Tuesday we took a trip to Baltimore’s Inner Harbor for an exciting scavenger hunt throughout the city of Baltimore. At 5:30 we met on top of Federal Hill where Yoni Okin made a Siyum on Mishnayos Seder Nezikin and Benjy Weil made a Siyum on Mishnayos Seder Moed. Because we are in the 9 Days of Mourning leading up to Tisha B’Av, we are forbidden to eat meat, but because of these incredible accomplishments of finishing a portion of Torah, we are permitted to eat meat and the camp treated us to a delicious BBQ. After the BBQ we made our way to Camden Yards for the Baltimore Orioles- Tampa Bay Rays baseball game. In a very well pitched game, the Orioles lost 3-1. When we got back to Camp, everyone brought in their items, pictures, and videos they acquired throughout the scavenger hunt and later in the week there will be a vote on the winners of the hunt.

Dear NCSY Camp Sports Parents,

I hope you are doing well. Here at camp we are pretty exhausted from another great week and I would love to share some high lights with you.

Last Shabbos was the first that we had together with the whole camp and it was a spiritual Shabbos and a bonding experience for all the campers. It was filled with dancing, an oneg, great meals and an opportunity for everyone to catch up on some sleep. As Shabbos was ending we all came together to sing and hear words of encouragement about helping each other out in all we do. Not only does this help the other person but it helps you as well. After Havdala we went bowling and had pizza. After that late night, wake up was an hour later on Sunday.

During the week we had intense sports, but I am very proud of all the NCSYers for keeping their cool on some very hot days. Each team plays hard, but as I told them at the beginning of the summer, if you take out the ties, for all the games, it  is guaranteed that one team will lose. We made sure to remind them often to drink and to wear sunscreen.

On Monday we went on a trip to a 3 level laser tag, as well as batting cages and bumper cars with a basketball net. Once we had finished with laser tag, we left Hanover PA (home of UTZ and Snyders chips and pretzels) and headed to York PA, to watch the York Revolution minor league baseball team take on the team from Bridgeport. Before the game,  40 NCSYers got to play wiffle ball on the outfield grass, and had a blast doing that. I hope we did not do anything to the field when we played, because by the third inning the Revolution were losing 7-0, and lost the game 13-3. Even though the home team lost, everyone had fun and enjoyed a very scrumptious mid game barbecue.

On Wednesday most of the NCSYers went on a 3 mile water tubing trip near Gunpowder Falls in Monkton, Maryland. It was a very hot day and everyone enjoyed the cool water and hanging out with their friends. A smaller group of NCSYers went biking on the path next to the water but went almost 30 miles instead of the  three miles that the tubers trail took them. The bikers made it all the way to New Freedom, Pennsylvania and stopped off at a Rutters convenience store to refuel for the trip back. What was amazing, is that a thunder storm hit the NCSYers while they were biking but did not get the tubers, it missed them by a mere 5 miles.  Both groups came back very wet.

On Wednesday night we had a special class that dealt with the transmission of Oral Law in Judaism. It culminated with a reading of a list of rabbis and who taught them and who they taught from Moshe until today. This was a very graphic showing of how the oral law has been transmitted all the way down to us.  This afforded us an opportunity to discuss the death of Rav Elyashiv, one of the leading rabbis of our generation, and how that loss makes a difference to us as he was a link in that chain.

On Thursday after a great day of sports we had a fundraiser for Chai Lifeline and raised over $5oo with a free throw shooting and Frisbee skills contest. A big thanks to our advisors Eli Weinstein and Eric Sturm for organizing these fundraisers. Chai Lifeline is a wonderful organization that helps children with illnesses and their families. The NCSYers went all out to give what they could for this worthy organization.

At Thursday Mishmar  we served kugel after a great night or extra learning and our weekly raffle. This week’s raffle featured a lot of food, York Revolution apparel, a device that turns anything into a speaker and much more. After the raffle we served kugel to help kick off a program that Rabbi Wexler introduced before mishmar. We called it the “No Google, just Koogle” campaign, to have as many members of the Camp Sports family, campers and all staff turn off their cell phones Friday at Shacharis and to keep them off until bowling after shabbos. They will be able to get their phones back from 5-6 to call you before Shabbos. Many NCSYers took up the challenge and I hope they can learn many lessons from this experience. You can find the videos we showed to introduce the concept in these two places. The first features many alumni as dancers in this video, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvwpNkJd82w

This second video is about turning of the phone for the day for a program called “day to disconnect” that was organized last year. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XiSIGPIi7s. I hope you enjoy them

On Friday we had Zaq Harrison come into camp to discuss the 40^th anniversary of the Munich Olympics killing. He spoke to all the NCSYers  and ran a program with NCSYers breaking up into groups with the advisors to facilitate discussions on wat we can learn from this tragedy.

I look forward to another great shabbos  here in camp and I will fill you in next Friday, about all that happens this coming week.

Thank you for trusting us with your son,

Rabbi Jon Green

This past Shabbos was an extremely fun Shabbos. We had many Camp Sports alumni visit including Ari Kahn, Jeremy Lavitt, and Jason Weinblatt. During Friday night dinner, Ohr HaNer, the camp from Central America also living on campus for the month, joined us for some fun Shtick. After dinner, we had a legendary Oneg led by Ari Kahn. Lunch the next day was also memorable, as many funny things happened including Rabbi Green’s weekly birthday cake giveout. A relaxing free time followed, and after Mincha Rabbi Green gave a shiur about boy and girl relationships. After Shaleshudes, the third Shabbos meal, we had an inspirational “ebbing” filled with singing and words of  inspiration as Shabbos ebbed away. After Shabbos was over, we we went bowling and returned to camp to a pizza dinner as we look forward to another great week.

– Adam Jampel

Today was the last day before the nine days. We played leagues on another 100 degree day, and made sure to do our laundry. Of the campers who have been showing up to davening on time, a few lucky winners were chosen to go to Rabbi Cooper’s friend’s pool for a final pre-nine days pool party. Between Mincha and Maariv, we kicked off our annual free throw shooting contest for charity, and this year we introduced a new frisbee throwing competition. It was $5 to enter the frisbee contest and $10 to enter the free throw shooting contest with all proceeds going to Chai Lifeline. Rabbi Wexler gave a short night shiur/video explaining the value of disconnecting from our  cell phones in order to have more meaningful lives, and tomorrow morning many of us are going to turn in our cell phones for a day. We had another exciting thursday night Mishmar, with many prizes, and I won a kosherlamp (even though I already have one.) Afterward, we had a tasty kugel buffet as we get ready to head into Shabbos.

-Shaun Regenbaum

On Tuesday we played another exciting day of leagues. It was extremely hot and everyone fatigued very quickly. We went swimming between mincha and maariv and afterwards Rabbi Cooper gave an interesting interactive night shiur.

Today, because of the heat, the camp decided to take us tubing/biking. Only 7 campers were brave enough to choose the 32 mile bike trail and the rain made for a memorable experience. The rest of the camp went on a relaxing and refreshing tubing trip to help us recharge for more leagues.