Wrapping up and leaving

There are times you have to pack up and leave. Either you go gladly, in other cases reluctantly. I've just handed over the responsability for the district's training scheme to Thomas, who I'm sure will do a marvelous job of it.
I do so reluctantly, but just because I'm a bit egotistical. I've enjoyed the position of Training Officer, and the perks that come with the job: You get to meet lovely, intelligent and interested people, you get the opportunaty to great training, and you get to be a part of people's development. But really, for the last year or so I haven't done a great job. Definately not as great as I wanted to, anyway. So I decided that it was time to go.
You sometimes see that in groups: People that are stuck in positions that they really don't have time, energy or even the passion for anymore, but for various reasons they just don't move on. The most common, I think, is that they think that if they go everything will fall apart. However much we want to believe this, it is very rarely true. If you are only a leader because noone else is available, you will be leader because noone else is available for a very long time. Because you are available. If you go, another sollution will have to be found. It might not be the same as it was before, but there will be a sollution.
Sometimes a staying on is very irresponsable, as it may keep the group from moving forward. If you haven't got the time or energy to do anything but maintaining status quo, you won't move anything forward, and eventually the momentum is gone and instead there is the definate risk of the carrige starting to slowly roll backwards, and most likely by then you will notice that the scouts will jump.
Then there is, like in my case, those who stay on to enjoy the perks. How ever innocent this may seem, you have to step back and evaluate: Do I deserve them? I found I didn't anymore.
The work on the book is coming up to not the final stretch, but the final feet of the finish line. And now I get nervous. I know that I am proud of my work, of my baby. But how will others see it? What will they think about the fact that there is a complete lack of advanced knots or first aid skills, but advanced group process theory and life skills? There will be lots of people crying: This is not scouting! But I feel comforted in the FACT (as I in this work has reread Scouting for Boys and a few of the earlier program materials aimed at the scout, not the leader) that we follow a straight tradition of a century in providing young people with the necessary skills of becoming healthy, happy and responsable adults.

Productive meeting

The project group met last night to repport back about how far we've got for the Scout Forum in August. Our Scout Council Sectretary General and Federation Chairman were both present and it felt great to be able to ask all the questions we've been dying to have answers for.
All five of the Swedish scout organisations have accepted the invitation for the event, which means that the likely number of participants has risen from the first estamated 300 to perhaps more than 800!
The space for tent pitching is limmited which is a problem, but of course we'll solve that some how. The camp fire will be awesome and will be heard all the way into the centre of town, and hopefully we'll get some curious visitors.

Scouting is my life

At least according to my husband, who is a very patient man.
Scouting can easily take over your life, if you'd let it. Of course, most of us are scouts around the clock in spirit, but most of us do have "day jobs" too, and spend a varying amount of our spare time with scouting activities. A few have the privilege to have scouting as a career.
The last couple of years I have had to limit my involvment somewhat, both for my own sake, and most of all, for my family. I would have wanted to go to all of the congresses, meetings and would have loved to take on a number of various things that have passed in the ether, but I have had to realise that with a 45 hour/week job, three children, a dog and a husband you just have to accept that the day only have 25 hours.
Things seem to land on all the inconvenient dates this year: A course I wanted to attend collides with my own birthday (which other people seem to find important), our centinary camp finishes on my youngest son's birthday, and now I've been invited to a summing-up celebration of the new scout material the weekend my oldest turns 18.
My husband always say, that there will be plenty of time for involvement when the kids have flown the nest, and I earn better money for less work, and I know he's right. Thing is, I believe scouting is an organisation for the young, that I'm already on the old side. Don't get me wrong now people, I know there are some readers that are even older than me: Older people definately have a place, and the experience and knowledge kept in the organisation is vital for it's existens, but, by right, all the "fun" should be the privilege of the young.
Perhaps I could bring my son to the book celebrations?

Scouting at Halloween

As you might remember a while ago I wrote about the difficulty in letting scouts be independent. This weekend the Falcons of Falkenberg finally hosted the Halloween party they had planned for weeks. The setting was pretty horror film: A group of happy youngsters arriving at a small cottage in the middle of nowhere for a party, decorating the place with jack-o-lanterns, skulls and ghosts; dressing up as zombies, squirting fake blood every where; A car that seemed to have given up the ghost on parking; A little jet black cat showing up from nowhere, miauing desperately, trying to crash the party...

I left the scouts to their own devices, worrying about the state of the car: If I were to be the responsible adult with a car, ICE, I thought it might be an idea to have a functioning one. There seemed to be a hose leaking in the cooling system, and Marie was going to arrive at six anyway, to keep me company over night.

The little black cat showed up out of nowhere when I was sitting outside on the stoop, having lunch. I had bought some ready made Swedish dolmas in gravy that I had heated in the microwave oven. The cat almost threw herself into the gravy, crying with hunger! It's so sad, how some people get a kitten for the summer holiday, and then, when the season is over, they leave their summer house, and the cat, and go home.

The cat was skin and bones. It wasn't bothered about the dog, but the dog was very vary about the cat, not wanting to leave it when I left the house to set up camp. All afternoon the dog ran back and forth between the house and the camp site. I think he was worried about the cat. I made a few phonecalls, but noone was interested in taking it, and there isn't a rescue center anywhere near, so I'm afraid we finally had to make the decision to just leave it.

Anyway, the guests arrived at 6, and was met down by the road by a couple of zombies with lanterns who guided their way to the cottage. Marie and I withdrew to the hilltop, and had a very pleasant evening, grilling gourmet sausages and dunking Italian chocolate rusks in mascarpone. We had a good natter in front the fire, and crawled into our sleeping bags at about 10, gazing at the starry skies in the moonlight. The dog curled up by our feet, and our breath rose like smoke in the cold evening.

I'm not a very well equipped scout leader. Whilst Marie has all the gear to get up Mount Everest, I have been stingy, making do with budget stuff. But I've rarely suffered. You just have to be a little bit inventive. My first sleeping bag from the 1980's, and a budget bag, designed to manage freezing point, some wolly socks and a sleeping bag liner did me just fine in -4. I had also a good mat, and a warm dog. I woke up at 8, not realizing I was sleeping outdoors!

We had a lovely breakfast, cooked on the Trangia: Scrambled eggs, bacon, mushrooms and a tomato relish. We pottered about for a couple of hours, before we went down to the house to see if the scout had woken up and started clearing up yet. They had and they were. They had had a wonderful time, even though they didn't get the film projector to work. They had finished all the food (except the veg, and a bag of potato crisps). Marie and I made sure that they locked up everything and then we all went back to civilization: The mothers relaxed and invigourated, and the kids very happy and pleased that their project had come together as they had hoped.

It helps being a scout

This Easter school break saw beautiful weather, and as a teacher I'm off work during school holidays. But my husband is in the middle of a career change, and is doing his last work placement period before graduating as a qualified nurse, so there wasn't time to go off on a family holiday...

School breaks can easily make me crazy. Or, rather, having the kids 'round the house all the time, having to nag them to get off the computer, get off the TV, get off the sofa, get off the Wii, etc. All their friends seemed to be off in Thailand, or the Alps or in all sorts of exotic places.

Not very far from Falkenberg is part of the North Sea Trail, a system of foot paths connecting all the countries around the North Sea. I managed to get the kids interested in hiking with me for two days.

We took the bus from Falkenberg at lunch time, 20 minutes eastwards to a small village called Vessigebro, were we got off the bus and had ice cream in the sun before setting off through the village, past the church and onto the path, leading along the ridge above the river Ätran. The view was magnificent!

We paused for a rest, a drink and a piece of fruit or a little sweet every so often, as we all felt slightly uncomfortable in our backpacks and our feet grew tired. 5 km was just the right distance to hike with a 10-year-old, a 12-year-old and a 40+ mum, early in the season. The dog carried his own food and drink, and got slightly tired too.

At 4 pm we reached our camp site, Skattagård, and had plenty of time to rest, pitch the tent, enjoy the surrounding forest and cook before dark. We saw lots of tracks from deer, elks, birds and wild boar. Just after dinner we had a visit from a couple of the nearby farmers/landowners, who told us that they were going to hunt for wild boar during the night, so if we heard anything we shouldn't be alarmed. And could we please keep in the tent and the dog too (as if we'd be out in the dark with lots of wild boar about!)

After having read a couple of chapters in a Famouse Five book, we turned in for the night just after dark (at about 9.30 pm). We were very tired. Mike, whose ten, fell a sleep almost instantly. The dog first wanted to stay in the for-tent, but the night grew very chilly very quickly, and there was an array of mysterious sounds from the forest outside the tent, and he very soon wanted to snuggle down in between us three in the already crowded tent.

Cassandra and I lay listening to the night sounds. It was exciting and a bit scary. We wished that we had learnt the various bird's song, and got slightly worried when we heard a consistant rustling noise, just outside the tent. Could it be a wild boar? I thought I heard a slight snuffling noise too.

Suddenly, a shot rang out in the night! The dog flew up, and tried to open the tent flap, but landed his paws in Mike's face, but he barely woke up at all. The forest got all quiet, and we hardly drew breath as we were listening to the sound of a hound a little way off. Then it got all quiet. The dog finally lay down again. And the forest started breathing, and sounding. Far away a deer barked. A fox yelped quite close, and owls and other birds called out. I have never heard such music!

It got very cold during the night. I later learnt that a few kilometers away, it got down to -4, and we woke up a couple of times and snuggled closer together. Mike woke up at 6 am and wanted breakfast, but got pursuaded to go back to sleep.

When the sun got up, the warmth returned quickly. We cooked a luxurious breakfast on the Trangia, before setting off for the 6 km walk to the bus stop in Abild. The path took us through a nature reserve, on little country lanes, past farms and fields, and on the last leg, on the road.

Before catching one of the few buses back to Falkenberg that run out there, we had a nice lunch outside the mideveal church. With a lovely couple of day's hiking, aching feet and shoulders and a nice, fresh tan, we returned home just in time for an afternoon ice cream. I couldn't help thinking how lucky I am to be a scout, which makes it so much easier to get out on little expeditions like this....

Back at Gilwell Lodge, Sweden

Gilwell Lodge, Sweden

Our second Gilwell weekend started already on Thursday, when we started our 5 hour drive towards Flen and Sparreholm, slightly tired after a days work, but full of anticipation and singing along with sixties hits and ABBA-songs on the car stereo. We arrived in the dark, to find the lodge warm and welcoming, already full of life. We helped make the bread for the Friday breakfast, before we went to bed.

The rest of the participants arrived on the Friday morning, while some of us had our mentor talks. Just before lunch we gathered around the flag pole and broke flag and started the weekend with a lovely, hearty gulash soup out in the crisp winter air. When everybody had settled in, we learnt more about the FIRO-theory and discussed where we were in the group process, how to use the theory productively in our scout groups and coping strategies.

Non violent communication

Before dinner we were given half an hour's solitary reflection. I took a lantern and took a walk in the nearby woods. I lost the path in the dark, but as I never lost my barings I still enjoyed the walk, though it got slightly adventurous, climbing over rocks and sliding down the hillside to the bigger path along the lakeside. I saw fresh roedeer hooves' marks in the snow, and the lights from Rockelstad castle across the bay. It was beautiful!

After dinner we met our mentors for evaluation of the between time and the tasks we had been set. Then we spent the rest of the evening, socialising and using our hands, making leather covers for our books among other things. The cooks had made us carrot cake for evening tea, and there was a happy little log fire crackling in the big fire place in the hall.

After starting off outside with more group dynamics and practical discussions we had another quiet half hour to ourselves to reflect, this time in daylight. I walked along the waterfront and found the little beach, where the jetty usually is in the summer. The ice lay still underneath the thin snow cover, and I sat down on a rock a little bit out on the lake, looking across the bay at the castle, that now was clearly visable, with it's farmhouses, barns, boathouses and lawns sloping down towards the lake. It was crisp and still, and for some reason I started thinking about the Mumin trolls...

Lunch was organised as a competition: In our groups we were given some sausage, an onion, and a few other bits and pieces. On a table were then layed out a collection of vegetables, spices, pasta and other condiments. Our task was to cook a two course meal on our Trangias, for ten people, and to present a helping to the jury for evaluation. When I saw the beetroots and the fresh lemons I had an idea for the starter, that I communicated to my group. Marie, a chemist at one largest pharmaceutical companies in the world volonteered to make the starter, and as "sixer" I took the task of co-ordinate the cooking. Two minutes before time we delivered a THREE course lunch for evaluation: A starter consisting of grated beetroot, sauteed in balsamic vinager, served on a lettuce leaf with a dollop of greek yoghurt with lemon rind, a main course that we named sausage cassarole and pepper symphony, a colourful dish with reds, yellows and orange colours, creamy and mild, as one of us can't handle hot spices very well. As a desert, we served fried apple rings with cinamon and sugar, with marengue crumbs. And we WON! Then we had a thought provocing walk, discussing symbols and ceremonies, how to use them and how to make them meaningful and inclusive. We had some time to prepare the theme for the evening: Spirituality. We had a wonderful group discussion about our definition of spirituality, faith, or lack of the same. Together we found that to us LOVE and respect is the essence of spirituality.

We had another lovely three course meal, a filled chicken breast as main course, cooked by our excellent kitchen crew, before we went outside to try and visualize our views for the others. We found a lovely clearing close the lodge, and put lanterns out in a heart shape. Then we got some soft reindeer hides and sleeping mats and laid them out on the ground. We lay down to try our installation. Softly, we talked about the wonders of nature, listening to the ice on the lake singing, watching the stars in the deep, black sky above us. Nobody really wanted to go inside, even though it was almost -5.

The cooks had made us semla for evening snack, and we went to bed, filled with inner piece and sweet weat bun and cream.

There are very few situations where you can find 40 adults playing tag in the snow, laughing and having fun, tumbling around like children, having fun. The youngest on the course is 24 and the oldest member of the Gilwell team is in his 70ies, and we all gave our heart and soul in the game!
The Sunday program was to be about children with special needs and how to meet those needs in scouting. Although all of us agreed that scouting should be open for everyone, there was a collective sense of frustration as we don't have the resources to care for everyone, and many had experienced loosing members due to one or two very difficult children. We never found a good answer to how to deal with these situations, but the discussion took us forward nevertheless.

After a light lunch we travelled back, filled with energy and thoughts, already looking forward to the third and last weekend in May.

Sweaty work - but someone has to do it...

...or perhaps not. But it was great fun, albeit slightly warm and a little bit tough on the old legs.

Akelas Marie and Lotta decided to do a 5km fun run in our uniforms, to show off a little bit. We walked to the start as a warm-up and waited in glorious sunshine together with the other 90 people who had signed up for the 5km run and the almost 1000 people who were going to run 10km in the summer heat.

In the picture you can see Lotta in the new, green, uniform, that is the same for the whole Swedish Scout Federation, and Marie in the beautiful, old, blue uniform, specific for the SSF, the Swedish Guide and Scout Association.

Our strategy was to keep in the back of the field and at a most modest pace, just to finish the race, and we let the hotspurs and the serious runners fight for space across the old tollbridge. It proved a good plan, as when we passed the commentator's tower in the centre of town we got everyone's attention, and our names and the groups name was mentioned loudly and clearly over the sound system, and everybody cheered us on.

We had to break our pace and start walking for a little while after a long uphill slope, but then we spotted some handsome young fire fighters, who were watching the race at the roadside, and found the strength to start jogging again. But after another uphill bit, in relentless sunshine, we felt a bit drained and walked for a little while again. Just when we felt the most tired we were cheered on by some people sitting on their stoops, and their warm smiles and waves did the trick and carried us up to the water stop.

In the shade of the trees down by the river we spotted the 10km runners across the water comming up for their last kilometer, led by police escort. They looked almost as warm as we felt, but they were running a whole lot faster. (They did all have a lot longer legs too, I think!) Marie's husband met us by the white water rapids and cykled behind us, as we plodded on along the river path into town and the dreaded Brewer's slope, a short but steep, cobbled street up from the river path, where the 10km runners merged with the trickle of the remaining 5km runners. There were quite a lot of people watching by Brewer's slope and they cheered everyone equally, which was well needed, as the hill is well known for breaking amateur runners' spirits.

With renewed strength we took on the last uphill slope, not as steep as the one before, but double in lenght. The crowd cheered us on as we got close to the home strech. At the top of the hill waited Lotta's husband and Marie's daughter, whose enthusiasm gave that last little boost of energy that, together with the commentator's and the crowd's support made us able to give that little bit extra past the finishing line.

The picture was taken just after the finish, just after we had caught our breath again. As you can see we were very pleased with our effort. Later in the evening we learnt that our times were just about 35 minutes, which is great considering that we are NOT adement runners and that we walked, however briskly, about 1 of the 5 km! The fact that we were among the 10 last to finish is not relevant, as we did our best, and we had fun doing it. (We laught and joked most of the way)

We also had a very encouraging message from our group leader, who congratulated us on finishing the race, and giving the scouts good publicity. This was just a test run, and we hope that we next year can encourage more scouts of all ages to join in.

One Piece of Rubbish Aday

Someone nudged my memory today, and I had an idea. . .

Sweden is a relatively clean country. We have the highest numbers in the world of recycling, especially drink cans and PET bottles, as we get a small amount of money for every can or PET bottle we hand in at the shop. (This is paid for by an addition to the price of the drink in the first place) Nevertheless you see an awful lot of rubbish along the roads and on the ground in the town centres. Even in the middle of the woods! Some people seem to think that dropping rubbish on the ground is what you should do, even if there are bins around.

In 2005 the organisation Håll Sverige rent! (Keep Sweden Clean!) started a campain called One piece of rubbish aday (In Swedish of course) The campain, in all its simplicity, aims to raise people's awareness about the damgers of those little bits of rubbish that we drop on the ground and to get people to pick up their own rubbish, by urging people to pich up one piece of rubbish aday and put it in the nearest bin! If everyone did that, hey presto! We'd have a MUCH nicer environment!

Someone has now taken this idea onto Facebook, and someone else mentioned this in their blogg, which jolted my memory. And I thought, why not spead this via the Cub Scout groups around the world too!

So this autumn you'll hear more about what rubbish we have in Falkenberg, Sweden, and what we do with it!

Happy scouting!

Picture by: Alfred N

Waiting...

In waiting for the photos from Wednesday's St George/World Book Day celebrations, perhaps you'd like to hear the Swedish National Scout Anthem. Ehem... At least for now... Appearently, noone ever accually made the decision in the 1920s, and the lyrics are, by most people, considered to be slightly dated and also slightly unfashionably nationalistic. Personally, I find that it would be better if we sang verses 2 and 3, that unfortunately are never sung (except in the 1990s punk version, virtually impossible to find on the net, I'm afraid) about our love for the outdoors and how we should strive to be good to others, instead of pledging our honour to serve king and country. Some of the words are almost archaic and most scouts struggle to understand them, even reasonably well educated adults. Anyway, the Scout song is now under scrutiny, to either be scrapped and replaced by something more modern, or at least given the official status that it inofficially has.
Here is also a technoversion. There are also other scout hits, like the 2007 Jingijamborii song you could download from this site or just watch some films promoting and documenting the centenary camp in Scania, Sweden. Or listen to the anonymous rap from the Swedish Scout Association's homepage. (They've buried it well on one of the course pages!)
If your country, or group, has got a scout song that I can link to, it'd be great fun to hear from you!