Reports from Peacemakers Camp 2003

The King, Gandhi and Truth groups started their week at camp this year with the same curriculum, but at the end of the week, each group had designed and named a unique village. Both King and Truth actually built villages, King using paper maché and Truth clay, while Gandhi made a flag to represent their village.

Each group used the book If the World Were a Village (David J. Smith, Kids Can Press) to start discussion about composition of the world’s population, languages spoken, and resource distribution and use. (See the sidebar to learn how many people live in what areas of the world if we reduce population proportionately from six billion plus to 100.) All campers also visited the Calvin Center’s Global Village for a tour of a Haitian village that has been reproduced on the campus.

Hein Vingerling, who has lived and worked in Haiti for many years, introduced Peacemakers to Haitian life, starting with a cinderblock kitchen separate from the house. Hein explained how a fire is tended so that there are always coals to use under the grates that cover cutouts in a concrete counter. Pots and pans sit on the grates to cook food. He pointed out the goat, a great hit with campers, that is a source of milk and cheese; he led us through a very small, cinderblock house and a small shower stall fed by a 50-gallon drum of water; we witnessed bargaining for acceptable prices in the outdoor market where we ate sample slices of 4- inch-long Caribbean bananas. Then we toured a garden and the pond where villagers fish for talapia. The last stop on the tour was the brick-making shed where each group of Peacemakers made a brick and signed it.

In the remaining two days of camp, our three groups designed their own villages the way they thought they should be.