Joys of Jewish summer camp

KELLEY KORBIN

The first time my eldest son returned home from camp, I couldn't believe it when I opened up his duffel bag. That smell. They say that more than any other sense, smell has the power to evoke memory. Well, that rank, moldy stench that emanated from his bag brought it all back to me – so much so that I didn't even mind doing the six loads of stinky laundry because it gave me an opportunity to wallow in precious memories of my own camp summers.

As you pack your kid off to camp, consider for a moment just what you are giving your child by sending him or her to a Jewish summer camp.

When I was a kid, I always suspected that my parents were overjoyed at seeing my brother and I take off on the ferry to Camp Miriam because it offered them four, or sometimes six, weeks of peace and quiet during those heavenly summer months. But I never really considered what they gave up to send us off to camp. Of course there's the money, and anyone who's paid tuition and made a few trips to the drugstore and Canadian Tire in preparation for camp knows that it doesn't come cheap – even if you deduct your savings from not having to feed or entertain your kids for half the summer.

But these short-term costs are only the beginning. Once your child is immersed in the Jewish summer camp cultural experience, they will beg you to let them return every summer. When they reach 15 or 16, you'll probably be asked to shell out even more so your child can participate in their camp's Israeli summer experience. Every Jewish camp I've ever heard of has at least one summer program that will take your child far, far away by plane to a distant and sometimes dangerous place. This costs even more money than regular camp and, I'm told, causes you a lot of sleepless nights. Say goodbye to that summer serenity.

However, with high school graduation, all good things must come to an end, and most kids who have been raised on a steady diet of summer camp can't wait to become a counsellor. Now it's payback time: your kid will earn some money to help pay for university, right? Think again.

There is no doubt about it – we may have made it out of Egypt, but Jewish summer camps are the last bastion of the Israelite slave labor economy. Your child can expect to earn about $1/hour for his or her contribution to the social and religious upbringing of our culture's next generation. Not that this will dissuade your kid from wanting to work at camp. In fact, most kids I know would work there for nothing if their parents would let them.

But the ultimate cost of sending your kids to camp isn't monetary at all: it's the cost of missing out on those precious few frolicking summers with your family.

This is where all my friends who never went to camp look at my husband and I like we're awful parents and declare disdainfully, "I can't believe you send your kids away for half the summer – I could never do that, I'd miss them too much." And the truth is, we can't believe we do it either. Oh sure, the first few days of quiet adult activities are great, but after a while, those summer weeks of parental freedom aren't all they're cracked up to be and we find ourselves acting like lovesick teenagers, counting the days until we can meet our kids at the bus.

All things considered, the emotional and monetary costs of sending kids to camp are pretty high for the parents. Is it worth it? To answer that question, you have to look at what the benefits are to the kids.

I would posit that kids learn more at Jewish summer camps than they do in any other facet of their life – more than school, music lessons or sports activities. Camp is where you learn about life. You learn about freedom, friendship, idealism and Judaism.

I met one of my very best friends on my first day at camp, as an eight-year-old. I didn't let the fact that she wanted nothing to do with me deter me from following her around relentlessly that day. By the end of it, she gave in and we subsequently shared 10 wild and glorious summers together. Through camp, we created memories and a bond that even living 2,000 miles apart for the last 20 years hasn't been able to shake.

Summer camps afford kids their first sense of true freedom – freedom from teacher and parents and the realities of their incredibly busy day-to-day lives. Camp is an oasis in time, where kids can break free from the shackles of their tidy homes and indulge in experiments of idealism and community and a little healthy squalor.

Of course, camp offers a lot of fun too – not to mention first crushes and a few first kisses. But there is something a lot deeper than that with a Jewish camp. Camp gave me the feeling that by being Jewish, I was part of something of which I could be proud. Judaism became more than just the requisite Hebrew school lessons and family holiday celebrations. I learned about Zionism and social justice and debate, and those qualities became an integral part of my adult Jewish identity.

When I consider what camp gave me, I realize that, while the costs are high, sending my kids to Jewish summer camp is a gift I wouldn't want to deny them, no matter how much dirty laundry they bring home.

Kelley Korbin is a Vancouver freelance writer who thanks her parents for allowing her to spend her childhood summers at Camp Miriam.

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