Brian and Libby's Blog

Cha-cha-cha FIESTA!

I think that there is a new, very secretive Masters program being offered throughout the United States entitled "Communication Strategies: Injecting small impressionable children with your propaganda" (or something of the sort). I say this because I have spent the greater part of this week at Northway's Vacation Bible School, more affectionately known as Fiesta. Now, I don't consider myself particularly young or impressionable but every night after Fiesta, I find myself lying awake at night with visions of dancing bunny rabbits in colorful ponchos in my head, to the tune of such Fiesta classics as "Never be the same" (click on the "Never be the same" music sample...you can be injected too).

My role has been to sing/dance the music at the opening and closing rally each night. Those of you who have ever attended any kind of Bible camp know that these rallies are largely characterized by people on stage continously prompting you to yell and scream as loud as you can, just because that is more fun than not yelling and screaming. Well, I am that person. I have been told that my performance thus far is reminiscent of mouseketeer Annette Funicello. I don't really know who that is, but I do know that if you tell that to someone who does know her, they will say something along the lines of "I hate young people." I was hoping someone would point out the obvious parallel between me and Fergie when she was on Kids, Inc. This observation has not yet come to fruition. But all of that is besides the point.

Anyway, because of my particular vantagepoint each night, that is, being on stage and looking out at the crowd as opposed to the opposite, I have been pondering some ironies during my 2.5 hours break each night. These kids are young (entering Kindergarten through entering 6th grade) and this week we taught them about 6 songs...choreographed songs...with lots of words. I was extremely concerned that in the short time span of 3 nights they would not be able to grasp the songs or the motions, and that by the conclusion of Fiesta they would just be getting the hang of it. Au contraire.

This brings me back to my suspicions about the the "Communication Strategies" program. Simply put, the people who write these songs are geniuses...or utterly evil (I haven't decided which yet). These kids know EVERY word and EVERY action to EVERY song we sing. They know them better than I do. By the beginning of the second night all 200 people in the crowd were completely Fiesta-fied. Last night, as I looked out at the kaleidescope of sombreros and colored beads I found myself very appreciative that whoever authored these songs decided to use their power for good, not evil.

All joking aside, FIESTA has been a huge success, and we still have one more night. Many thanks to the volunteers (over 100 of them) who have spent the better part of their free time this week as crew coaches, activity coaches, camera persons, clean up crew, registrants, decoraters, etc so that 200 kids could learn that God loves them. We could not have done this without you.

posted by Libby @ 8:39 AM