It was 6:30 am when we awoke, still smelling of firewood and saltwater from last night's beautiful campfire at Middle Cove Beach, where friendships were strengthened, fish caught, cooked and eaten, a myriad of photos taken, many songs sung, and much fun had! After workouts, showers and breakfasts, we proceeded to the lecture hall to find today's lectures as educational and wide-ranging as ever – the first concerned concept generation, a theme not only fascinating but vitally important to our house-project process. We came away inspired, minds and notebooks full of techniques with which to better focus our house discussions. The second unexpectedly concerned linguistics, particularly the English spoken in Newfoundland – this was the first language-related lecture as of yet! The presentation was interesting, and the speaker, knowledgeable and engaging. It was a great morning all around!
After lunch we went to our respective seminars, including anatomy, held at Memorial University Medical School, where we explored the human body, examining cadavers and seeing the effects biological processes we all knew, as well as many we did not, first-hand. During our afternoon rec time it was raining – today was the first day we truly experienced the well-known foggy, rainy Newfoundland weather after a surprisingly hot and sunny week. Inside, we did a core and arms workout and after dinner, it was time for some team-building activities! We had a hypothetical wilderness survival challenge and ended the evening with the creative challenge of performing a puppet show reflective of the dangers of capitalism, which really drove home the way so many concepts – storylines, in this case – can stem from a single idea when it is left to interpretation.
We're off to bed early tonight to get a good rest before tomorrow's field trips, on which we will learn more and bond more still. It is hard to believe that we have been here for less than a week and that this is only the beginning – that the energy and warmth that has abounded from day one will only spread and grow in the weeks to come!
Cristina Leone, Shad Valley Memorial 2012
