Cadet Camp

Catitlin suffered through a week away at cadet camp, for her sins.

It was cold. It was wet. They got to sleep in swags (those that were prepared) or sleeping bags (those that weren't) under a small piece of canvas. No bathrooms, only portaloos. Lots of boring drills like marching.

She hated it!

Michael, Margaret, Jemima and I went up to the paddock that the cadets called home for a week, on the Wednesday night for the Mass. It was dark by 6pm and very very cold. They didn't fire up the generator for the spotlights, because they'd make too much noise. So instead of watching the cadets march in, we got to listen to them march in, just dark shapes rustling. The priest said the Mass by torchlight. He got to the Eucharist when somebody's mobile phone went off. In his not-so-quiet voice Michael intoned, "Christ has died, Christ is ringing, Christ will ring again". Caused some giggles over our side of the paddock.

We'd brought up a foot long sub from Subway for Caitlin, which she inhaled. I'd also brought her a block of chocolate, a bribe to keep her at the camp for the rest of the week.

Caitlin told us how one girl (a Coleraine local) had been a b#@ch the whole time. During drills, she was behind Caitlin and kept kicking her in the heel and thought she was funny. After Caitlin had turned around and told her to stop it, the young bint swung her foot back and delivered a healthy kick to the back of Caitlin's calf. When Caitlin told me this, I cornered the girl with her parents and asked her about it. She claimed it was just an accident and stormed off in a huff. (Caitlin was told later in the week that she was going to be bashed up for dobbing on the girl, luckily for the girls concerned, this never happened!) The girl continued to be a trouble maker for the rest of the camp - believing it was her mission in life to make the camp "fun" (for her cliche, at the expense of the rest)!

She survived, without washing, for a whole week and arrived home very tired and determined never to go to cadet camp again. I'm very proud of her for persisting with it, despite having to deal with a bully the whole time!