The City, Shopping, the Little Sea…
July 11 (Day 5 at the camp)
By Misha Franchuk

This day started very well for me: I woke up very early today — earlier than everyone else, at about 6:36 in the morning. Then I spent half an hour lying in bed, not wanting to disturb the others.

After that, everyone got up, and we all went to the shower together. Somehow it happened that I brushed my teeth and went down to exercises last — the whole group was already assembled, and we cheerfully (Elena’s version) / at a snail’s pace (I wasn’t really feeling it) headed to morning exercises.

For breakfast, they served: boiled eggs, scrambled eggs, cheese and sausage, frankfurters, milk porridge, tea, fruit drink, water, fruit, and pastries — but we ate: cereal with milk, muffins, and a chocolate croissant. Breakfast was ordinary, but everything was so tasty! After breakfast, my comrades and I went to the sea. I didn’t swim today — only dipped my feet. I didn’t swim because I’m already tired of spending three hours at the sea and tanning until I’m black. I think I already have a nice, even tan. Ivan, as you know, was a little under the weather, so he didn’t go swimming either, and we just chatted about the food we were going to buy at the store after lunch — we made a sort of shopping list.

After coming out of the sea following a long swim, at Sofia’s suggestion, we played cards. Usually, I plan out a strategy and win, but this time, after three games, I didn’t win a single one. About half an hour of walking along the shore concluded the beach part of the day.

By the way, Turkey was celebrating Kurban Bayram — the third day of a nationwide holiday, and today there were families with children on the beach, lots of locals. We returned just in time for lunch. I’ll keep it short: I liked everything! Elena was the only one who ate the cabbage soup and vegetable salad (“Is this even food?!”), while we had pasta with a cutlet, a muffin, watermelon, apricots, and apples — a completely different story!

Then we were all sent to English class in our groups. The foreign teacher explained how to address people correctly in English — so we studied for an hour and a half and then went for afternoon snack. The snack was also tasty: buckwheat with chicken and a burger, fruit, tea, and mannik (semolina cake). After the snack, the younger squads went to a show, while we went to the game room. At first, I thought it would be boring, but I was the first to volunteer to play Twister — and it turned out to be a lot of fun.

Oh, and the girls also had a cool photo shoot! Yes! Before dinner, we also went to the store. Ivan plotted the route on his navigator, and we found the place without any problems. Near the store, there was a little kitten — the girls wanted to take him with them, either to the camp or to Surgut — I didn’t quite understand, because I had already rushed off TO SHOP!

Back in the room, we of course accidentally didn’t follow Elena’s advice and sampled a little bit of the delights we’d brought from the local supermarket — and then we were called to dinner. I won’t go into details, but dinner was also good: nobody ate the healthy food, everyone ate the tasty stuff.

Elena suggested we spend the next hour outdoors, and I suggested playing UNO. In the end, we played for a very long time (an hour) and joked about all sorts of things. Girls from other groups joined us again — probably because there are a lot of us, we sit in a circle, chat cheerfully, and don’t swear — or maybe they just had nothing else to do. One of them was named Sofia (the usual name), and the other was Bayan. We still had some free time, which we spent in our room.

After that — please note: only we do this — we had our daily reflection session. We evaluated the day, shared our feelings, and gave each other compliments. For example, Maxim complimented me for being very calm today. And now, here I am, thinking about what a great guy I am, lying on my bed and writing the diary entry for today. Thank you for your attention.

We’re waiting for our parents to write to us. Today, Sofia was upset that there wasn’t much reaction to her day, and Max didn’t recognise his own mother’s comment.