One of the first books I read in English as a kid, maybe 1 year after I started learning English, was a booklet with a title like, How to Have a Great Time at Summer Camp. I donât remember the exact title and I know I only picked it up because the other books in English in my schoolâs library looked way beyond my level, stuff like Austen and Dickens. The summer camp booklet didnât look too interesting but it was small with simple sentences. I ended up being fascinated with it because it was the most American thing I had ever seen and it felt impossibly exotic
all the kids had cool American names like Jill and Mike. One of them at one point talked about the âchipmunksâ in the woods near the camp, a mysterious word that didnât exist in my tiny English dictionary, and for some reason I pictured them as scrawny wolves. I had read Little House on the Prairie so I knew wolves were a major concern for Americans
camp âcounsellorsâ were often mentioned, and my pocket English dictionary only defined that word as âpsychologueâ. I thought it was weird how American summer camps had dozens of psychologists roaming the premises, one for every 5 to 10 kids. That felt like a lot of psychologists
I had no idea that the word âpetâ could mean âfavouriteâ. When the booklet said one kid might become âthe camp counsellorâs petâ, my dictionary helpfully led me to believe it meant that a psychologist would pick one unfortunate kid to be his domestic animal for the summer. Slightly disturbing. I moved on
the kids slept in âbunksâ and my stupid dictionary only defined this word as âcoucheâ. Which is not wrong, but we would probably say couchette instead, or better yet lits superposĂ©s, and couche is also our word for diaper so you can see why I continued being deeply intrigued by every new detail I learnt in this booklet. American kids are excited about camp because they get to sleep in diapers
I had never encountered the word âbaseballâ before but managed to guess it was some kind of sport, but when the booklet mentioned the âbaseball diamondâ (in the context of a kid saying the baseball diamond was big) I of course assumed it was an actual diamond that you could win if you won a game of baseball at camp. For some reason I had a debate with a classmate over the plausibility of this. I say for some reason because I didnât really question the wolves or the psychologists with their human pets. A diamond though? Doubt. I just remember that we were queueing up for lunch and I was like âWhat do you think?â and my friend said hesitantly, âMaybe if itâs a small diamond?â and I insisted âNo! The book says itâs big!â
among the basic items the book said every kid should bring to camp were âbatteriesâ. I didnât bother looking up that word in my dictionary seeing as itâs the same in French. I didnât know it was a false friend, and I was impressed to learn that most American kids own a drum set and bring it to camp as an essential item
on the same page, in the list of things every kid should put in their suitcase for summer camp, another item was âcomic booksâ. I wasnât sure what those were since in French we call them BD, but basing myself on the word âcomicâ I assumed they were books of jokes and puns. I loved learning that in the US all kids bring humour anthologies to summer camp, presumably because they worry about running out of funny things to say. I thought American kids sounded nervous and sweet. But also really cool, because of all the drums
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