61st Mindanao Visayas Baptist Youth Fellowship

Monday -April 2, 2012, the 61st Mindanao Visayas Baptist Youth Fellowship officially started.

Dawn was just breaking the night's darkened skies when I woke up. It was quite a long ride to Mt. Carmel. We took the Marbel-Tacurong-Davao del Sur route instead of the usual Marbel-Gensan-Davao route because it would've taken us longer daw. It was my first time (since I could remember) taking that route so I tried not to fall asleep but I guess a one-day break from the Evaluation Camp was not enough so I fell asleep halfway through the ride.

We had a stop over in a municipality called Tulunan. One of my friends threw his trash outside and was scolded for it by a vendor. It was my first time seeing someone that actually cares and abides by the rule of 'Basura mo, Sagot mo'. I salute the woman!

My first day at the camp was quite tiring and needed a lot of patience because the registration took so long. It took more than 3 hours I guess? I was also quite scared that I might get assigned in a different room than the church that I went with. It was my first time attending MVBYF so I was quite cautious in not making a fool out of myself. Oh yeah! Did I mention that I was the only one from our church that attended the camp? I guess not :)

One of the striking thing that left a big impression on me during the camp was the mass. It had a different feel than the mass that I usually attend every Sunday. I felt my tears well up. The feeling that everyone was participative and enthusiastic in praising and worshiping Jesus was just too overwhelming! Everyone was singing and clapping their hands in sync as if they had practiced it.

After the morning service

The rest of the days were filled with either lectures or performance practices.

It was on the 4th day when the extreme games started. The games were really extreme (in my case) because I almost never do those games. For fun's sake, I joined most of the games except the ones that makes you wet -I didn't want to go roaming around in a wet get-up. I had to crawl, do the limbo, do the jumping jack 175 times, sing off-tune and walk on mud! The fun was worth it though!

The 'Power Slide' was the highlight of the extreme games. A lot of old campers were looking forward to it. The staffs 'staff toys' put up this long tarpaulin and plastic of some-sort together in a slopping part of Mt Carmel. The objective of the game was to get as many players as the group can up the slide. Easy right? Yeah sure -if they didn't rub conditioner on your foot and oil on the slide!

Thank God I decided to skip the power slide because Aunt Flo was visiting! I was scared out of my wits every time a player fails to reach the top! I felt like they would get something fractured!!!



THE LAST NIGHT WAS THE BEST

This year's theme was 'Masquerade'.
I thought that it was gonna be a casual event! It turned out to be prom-like! We even had to do a march with our partners!

We had a short mass before we ate. Everybody was emotional (except for a few people. Like ME). They were all tearing up! There was this teammate of mine who was seating a few seats behind me... He was so affected by the pastor's message that he was having a hard time breathing while crying! I was like, 'Is something wrong with me because it seems like I'm the only one who seemed to be unaffected?'

Keren, Kuya Bootx (Cool mask!) and Joseph


DAMA DE NOCHE WON! MY TEAM! MY TEAM WON!
Everyone was saying that it was unexpected that we won but I rooted for Dama de Noche (under my breath) till the end.

Kuya Rikkiboi's hair slash wig was cool! It reminds me of Kakashi!
PS. Kuya Rikkiboi looks like my tito :P

This staff's costume was too cool so I asked him for a picture!
My friends were laughing at me after they took this. They said I looked like a puppy when I asked this kuya for a picture because I was tugging on his sleeves!

After the mass and the announcement of winners, everybody was bustling around taking pictures of their crushes and asking for phone numbers/emails.

Me, Jinkai and Joseph decided to go out of the tabernacle and hangout. Me and Jinkai thought that Joseph had a guitar so we went him. Turns out he didn't. The three guys on the left were kind enough to let us borrow their guitar for awhile so yeah.



Later that night (more like later that morning), I hanged out with Yan-yan who was giving free hugs to guys and sharing the 'Abundance of Grace'. Yan-yan's probably one of the persons I'll really miss in camp! I don't really like gays that much because they tend to bully me but Yan-yan's okay.


Necklace from Joseph and Transformers keychain from Kuya Bootx

I looked for something to give them back but I couldn't find anything. I tried giving Joseph a spare kitkat bar but he didn't accept it. I think he doesn't like sweets. Lah.


"You don't need to join a lot of church activities or do a lot of good things to be saved. You will be saved as long as you accept the Lord"