I just have time for a quick update, but thought you'd like to see the pictures and hear the stories from yesterday. One more week to go!
Yesterday was by far my favorite day of camp so far. We all ~ as in all 210 students and 40+ teachers ~ loaded up onto buses and headed downtown to Nan Hu Park. Our first event was the ultimate Fire and Ice Olympics Relay Race. Unfortunately, the Fire team pulled ahead during the first leg and was ahead the whole time. But, the Ice team made a valiant effort to stick pretty close by. My favorite event was the human pyramid ~ the students had absolutely no idea how to do it so I was quite entertained watching the attempt to master the event.
After the race we split up all over the park for picnics with our classes. My students went shopping for the food so it was quite traditional Chinese picnic food. I was quite surprised as I opened up the boxes only to discover chicken feet, dried fish, goose eggs, and other such delicacies. 
Fortunately, they brought four watermelons and lots of cookies so I survived on those. My team ~ the Skaters ~ had a great time talking, laughing, and playing games together.
After the game time, our head volunteer suggested everyone walking over to the lake and going boating. I was so excited because I have been wanting to go boating on the lake for the past two years but never had the opportunity. So, off we all go, trudging through the forest over to the lake. Once we got to the lake and split up into our different boats, we were off. The weather was absolutely gorgeous ~ mid-70's with abundant sunshine. First, we rowed all the way across the lake and under the bridge to a small section of the lake that was much quieter and secluded. Half of our team was over there so we took advantage of the opportunity to learn a new, team cheer to introduce to the camp on Monday. On the 
way back, Austin (another teacher in my class) showed one of the boys in my boat how to splash water with the oars. Well, that started a huge water fight between the two boats that lasted across the whole lake. And, I happened to be on the receiving end of a lot of the excitement and water! It was a lot of fun though!!
After drying off and finishing up the watermelon we split up to come back to school. We made it just in time to hook up with about ten other teachers and head to dinner. That was a huge blessing since we were all starving after our Chinese picnic lunch! It was a wonderful day and I had many opportunities to talk to students and build some relationships with them.
~Lisa