My daughter arrived back from France yesterday. Falling off the coach looking sleepy but happy, into my rain soaked, but relieved arms. They all arrived back safely and she hasn’t stopped talking about her adventure. If it was anything like the school journey I experienced at about the same age, the memories will stay with her forever. She didn’t have time to miss us. She was far too busy building rafts, kayaking, cave exploring, zip-wiring and doing all sorts of other team-building activities. She did however admit to missing her phone.
When I was 11 and living in Hong Kong, our school trip was to Wu Kwai Sha, in the New Territories. We stayed in some sort of compound (army?), sleeping four to a house and sharing a hole in the floor Chinese loo. I don’t remember many details, it was more the overall feeling of freedom that I can still recall, that and experiencing my first French kiss, the sliminess of which appalled me. I remember arriving and each of us being given a bag of raw meat. This was to be our food for the week, which we had to cook each night on a bonfire. I did a lot of growing up that week, learning new skills and beginning for the first time, to see my teachers as being vaguely human.
She’s extremely lucky to have been able to go on such a trip – a lot of teachers would not even contemplate taking nearly 60 children abroad these days. It’s such a shame that these formative, life changing experiences are diminishing owing to all the health and safety issues teachers have to deal with these days. A big thank you to the teachers for being brave enough to take the responsibility.
