The bus ride wasn't half bad; as I got off, I was excited to find out which dorm I'd have and hoped I would get paired with one of my school friends. Turns out, I was paired with another girl. None of my previous friends were put in my team either. After unpacking, we were sent to go meet our groups and pump up with team spirit. As soon as I sat down, I started talking to the friendly girl next to me, Greer. From that moment on, I knew camp was gonna be more than I expected. After some pre-camp talk, we were sent to go start group activities. The very first activity brought us so close, literally! There were about 17 of us on one piece of tarp, and we were not aloud to touch the ground. At the end of the first night, I had already met so many new people, but still stayed close to my Campbell friends. The next morning, I started seeing how much of a clique my friends were being. They talked to others, but it was as if they were glued to each other. I realized that I didn't want to be a part of that. Don't take me wrong, I love each one of them. But I came to RYLA wanting to meet new people, and that's what I was determined to do. The more I kept my distance, the more people I met, the more friends I made. I still gave them a bit of time, but not as much as they gave each other. Usually I know I would've wanted to stay with them, for the sake of "not missing out on any of the fun they were having." But I was having just as much fun, or maybe more. I knew I would be seeing them on a regular basis, but the students at RYLA were from all over Georgia, so it was a one time opportunity. It was interesting meeting new people, they were all different in their own ways. Some were very outgoing, and others were a bit quieter. Some were very religious, others didn't care. As time went by, I learned so much not only about myself, but also the others around me. I saw that it was fun being friends with people completely opposite than you too, it just sometimes took more effort to understand them.
It was interesting, because I realized that sometimes I didn't notice people, but they would take the time to come to me, already taking note of my name and character. People are observant, and there's always opportunities to make friends around you. You just have to take advantage of it. Many people make the excuse of "I'll never see them again, so what's the point?". The thing is, it doesn't have to be that way. You can just as well keep in touch and make plans to hang out. All it takes is "Hey my name's Sehar, what's yours?". Friendship is such an interesting concept. It's ridiculous how close I felt to the people around me after only four days. I felt like I'd known them for years; I felt like we were family. The time and activities together had slowly formed a bond between us that I didn't even realize was forming. Regardless of how different we all were, regardless of how far we lived from each other, regardless of our past experiences, we all grew a lot together during that short period of time. My Team, The Black Squad, won basically all the activities, not because we were the strongest nor because we were the smartest. It was because of something else. We knew each other, our strengths, weaknesses, and silently were there for each other. Failure just brought us back up, and kept us determined to come up with better ideas to succeed. The activities kept us always helping each other, always supporting each other, until words weren't necessary anymore to describe what we had. We had trust.
Before ending this post, I'd like to give a special shout out to Greer McCosh, Virginia Murrah, and Emma Baker, because RYLA wouldn't have been anything near how great it was without you guys. Thanks so much :)
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