Innoworks

On June 27th, I went to a meeting at Colina for the Innoworks camp. I had just been at Atlantis, so i hopped into the car, drove over the bridge and went to this meeting. They introduced us to our director, Peter Blair, our sponsors, and our mentors. Then we had some food and went home. Well, most of us went home, I went to Atlantis. Haha. On Monday, June 30th, I went to Colina and got on the bus with some people i would soon get to know and love. (Yeah right, it was only 5 days). The bus took us to St. Andrews School. Mr. Robert Wade, the principal of St. Andrews School was opening his school to the Innoworks camp so we could use their amazing labs. On the first day I met my teammates, T. Crystal Fountain, Talbot Mckinney, Alonzo Austin, and Tyvonia Adderley. My team captain was Danielle Turnquest. We had a lot of fun. My teammates were really cool. Crystal was a bit annoying, Talbot was funny (We called him Tally) Alonzo was nice, and Tyvonia was really shy. Danielle was the best. Each day we went to a different area of science. Body Expeditions (Biology), Extreme Biomes (Technology), Flight and Fury (Flight) and Extraterrestrial Excursions. In extraterrestrial we launched rockets and made robots.
Check out the video in the sidebar I found of a LEGO MINDSTORM robot solving a rubix cube. It is a bit slow but it's worth it. We built a LEGO MINDSTORM robot but it was nowhere near as high-tech as this. The second one is better!
Then on Saturday we had our open house. We showed all our parents what we did and had some fun shooting rockets into the sky. I got soaked with vinegar.
At the award ceremony I recieved Most Valuable Player on my team and my team won first prize out of the twelve teams in the camp!
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Performance pressure is a very real thing!

As you may already know I play the piano.

This year I changed piano teachers. I now study under Jai Kim. She is a great pianist and musician. She has a club called the Ars Nova Musical Outreach Program. This club has about 20 or so members including me. We have to study every day for at least an hour. This may seem like a lot but there are teenagers out there practicing 8 hours a day! A brilliant British pianist I know, Benjamin Grosvenor, practices for 8 hours. We had a piano concert on June 7th. It was great. I played Bach's Invention #1 in F major, Rhapsody by Margaret Wigham, and A Chopsticks Theme and Variations Duet. The duet I played with my teacher, Mrs. Kim. I will try to get a video of the performance and post it.

Oh dear!

I can hardly believe I haven't posted anything on my blog in over half a year! I apologize profusely to all (if any) of my adoring fans who have bit their nails clean off waiting for me to post.

Ok, that sounds big-headed but it was a joke, I swear!

Well, I've been quite busy the last seven months. It started with the math competition actually.



1,400 students from all over the Bahamas in grades 4-12 came to COB (College of the Bahamas) and took a written math test about 6 pages long. Then 30 of those 1,400 moved on to the finals. 10 kids from each grade group, 4-6, 7-9, and 10-12. I was a finalist in the 7-9 group. At our finals, we sat at desks in front of a screen that displayed our questions. I got 8 questions right out of 10 so i won. I got a nice HP Pavillion Desktop that i am posting from right now.



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DAIRY QUEEN IS GONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

For some reason, Dairy Queen has been taken away from us in the Bahamas. The one at the plaza on Cable Beach was shut down as well as the one at Harbor Bay. I'm not sure about the one at Town Center Mall but I think it's down too.

Let us all remember Dairy Queen and ... Oh look at that. My mouth is watering.

It is a sad day for Nassau, Bahamas and it's citizens. Especially Jason Williams

My Summer Travels 3

Chapter 3: Fitting in.

Alright, I'm gonna overlap a bit. Last time I told you I helped Joe Eisele get a few of his errands done but that was the next day, Sunday. On Saturday, after I got to Interlochen, my dad and I got my stuff and met some of the teachers I thought I would have. Turns out I would never take that class but anyway. Then my dad left (boo hoo). We headed over to the cafeteria and ate dinner. By the way the cafeterias are really nice. After that we played some ping pong and I learned tether-ball then went home and went to bed. Not a bad day, eh?

Next day, I helped Joe get ready for Interlochen, you know, taking care of forms and getting his uniform. Then we went together to do our auditions. This was about 3:00. Then, it was time for the opening ceremony at Kresge. Kresge is the big performance hall on the main campus where a lot of big performances take place such as Bob Dylan, Guster, and Collage.

This thing was huge! We walked in with our IBL sign which stands for Intermediate Boys Lakeside. There were about a hundred or so Intermediate boys and three hundred Intermediate s. There were High School kids too and in the middle were the juniors. Behind us were the students and then family, friends, and guests. When everyone was settled there were about three thousand people crammed into the place and then it started.

So first the president came onstage and welcomed everyone and there were some small introductions and (oh wait, president of Interlochen. not the united states.) a dance number too. Then, my favorite part. The president told us he was going to call out certain things such as boys, piano, theatre and if these things have anything to do with you, you stand up and cheer. So he said boys, s, women, men, piano, organ, guitar, violin, viola, intermediate boys, intermediate s, high school s, high school boys etc. I stood up for the ones I belonged to like boys, piano, intermediate boys, and new people. Then he said he was going to call out the countries and when you hear your country, you should stand up and show some patriotism. Amazingly, the Bahamas was first so I stood up and cheered but I was the only one. Everything was quiet for a second, then I started cheering again and the crowd went wild.

Ooooh, I've always wanted to say that.

So yeah, that was cool. After that when I met anyone it was

"Hey, you're that Bahamian kid!"

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My Summer Travels 2

Chapter 2: Getting ready and the trip (to Interlochen) [duh]

When I told my teacher I made it, she put me in the newspaper. I was pretty excited until I saw the picture that she put in. I looked like I wanted to kill someone. Just joking, Mrs. Fawkes. It was probably the best one anyway. So, anyway my trip was publicized and you wouldn't believe how many people saw it. I was at my friend Heather's 13 birthday party and this guy who used to go to my school, Ondre Cargill, congratulated me. I hadn't seen him in like a year. Thanks Ondre, by the way.

(Oh yeah, I don't know what kind of mood I was in when I posted that vegetables thing.)

Moving on, a few weeks later, I got a bunch of forms to sign. Wow, those were tedious. There were, cabin life forms, uniform forms, (he he that rhymes, sorta) health forms (that one was big) travel forms, instrument rental forms, and lots more. Anyway, so I filled in all those forms and sent them off.

Then it was quiet for a little while. We got ready for summer at school and finished up everything. I packed everything, unpacked everything, repacked everything, lost some stuff, then found them again. All in all, i was ready when it was time to go.

It's June 22 2007, It's the last day of school and we're having a little party in grade 7. Mrs. Foote is moving so she is giving out some of her stuff. Then we had the prize giving and I got quite a few certificates and a nice literary award trophy. Then that afternoon at 4:00, my dad and I headed to the airport. We said goodbye and flew to Chicago and stayed the night. We then drove for SIX hours to Traverse City which was the hardest drive of my life but I was so excited when I got there because, well you know i was there!

The first thing I did was I headed to my division, Intermediate Boys. I registered at the headquarters then headed to my cabin, Cabin 9 ironically. Baha'i joke. Anyway, I met about three of my cabin mates, Alex Rosenberg, he slept above me, Tony Macht, and Ethan Campbell. I think some of the other guys were there but I don't remember.

Once I got settled and unpacked, my dad and I drove to the main campus to get my uniform and look around. We went to Melody Freeze which is the ice cream place there. We saw Kresge Stadium which was huge! It was where a lot of the performances were held.

Later, we headed back to the division and I headed back to my cabin. We had dinner and then a kid joined us. His name was Joseph Eisele. He was a bit late so the next day I helped him register and everything.

The next day, We hung out and got to know each other. Some of us headed to main campus to check out the rest of campus. That night, we had the opening ceremony.

he he Cliffhanger.

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Oh, by the way, I'm gonna make my posts shorter from now on so I can post more frequently

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My Summer Travels

Chapter 1: Applying for Interlochen

I guess it started about a year ago when the 2007 Interlochen application forms became available. I decided to apply since I was too late for 2006. Interochen Arts Camp is a place for young aspiring artists. And, when I say artists I mean any kind of art. There's what you normally think of when you hear art, visual arts like painting, sculpting, or drawing. Then, there's music, photography, creative writing, drama. And even foreign languages! The place is full of talented kids who'll blow you away!

So I applied for an Intermediate Boys Session A Piano major 2007 slot. But first I had to record two of my best piano pieces of contrasting style. I played "Rhumba Toccatta" and "O Danny Boy" Ask me to play them some time. But beware, I'm a bit rusty. So I practiced until my hands fell off and my mom had to put salt on it and sew them back on. Around January, I was ready so I took my music, myself, and my anxiety to a recording studio to record my pieces. This was because we tried to record it with a tape recorder but it was very staticky. Finally, I sent the CD with my two works of art to the school in February.

I'll tell you it was about eight weeks before I heard anything from Interlochen. Then one day, I asked my dad if we could stop at the post office and see if we had received an news from Interlochen for about the seventy-eighth time. We went and indeed there was a letter in the box with the now all-to-familiar Interlochen logo. As we were driving away I opened. Right on the roundabout I read "Dear Mr.Wayne Bernard Farquharson, We are pleased to tell you that you have been accepted to Interlochen Arts Camp. We are able to contribute $500 to your fee."

I am embarrassed to say that I screamed like a little girl. I think the whole of Indigo must have heard. I express sincere apologies to the Illing family who own Indigo if I broke any china.

That concludes this segment of My Summer Travels. Join me next time when I warn you of the tediousness of filling out camp forms. There are just too many.

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