Scout story
As incredible as it may seem, I was in the boy-scouts for six years, and during those six years, my friends in the scouts and I have been through many adventures, and this one is one of my favourite.
The summer camp which I had been part of every year had started like all the others, with the 35 scouts from Paris leaving in a packed bus while singing loudly until the driver, as every year, stopped the bus on the side of the highway and, while our scout supervisors watched with eyes that seemed to say “here we go again”, the driver went to the back of the bus and screamed:
-“ If you don’t immediately stop your barbaric singing, this bus is going right back to Paris and too bad for the summer camp.”
Once he had said this, we would be quiet for a little while, and we would start singing 5 kilometres later, as every year.
After about 500 kilometres and 6 long hours in the uncomfortable bus, we arrived in the field which had been lent to us for the two weeks we were going to spend. As usual, our supervisors had chosen a field in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of France with one faucet 500 metres away for all our water. But as every year, we were all happy to be in the “wild”, from a Parisian point of view at least.
As soon as we got off the bus, we set off to setting up the tents, making a fire pit, and of course a very elaborate washroom which consisted of a hole in the ground. As always, we had been divided into groups of 5 or 6 per tent called a patrouille (translate patrol). Each patrouille was then assigned to a certain task for the camp life, for instance getting wood, preparing food or washing the dishes, and we rotated every day. It was also with our patrouille that we were always teamed up during the games we played every day, and thus a patrouille was sort of like a house in a school.
One thing which was, at least for the kids my age and I, different that year was that we had just left the louveteaux and become scouts. At this point, a little clarification is probably needed for those who are not familiar with the scouting world. Since the scouts are a very large organization composed of children from 8 to 21, and even later if you consider the supervisors, the scouts are divided in four sections, depending on age. From 8 to 12 years old are the louveteaux (wolf cubs), then the scouts from 12 to 15, the pionniers (pioneers) from 15 to 18, and the compagnons (companions) from 18 to 21. The idea is that the older you are, the more independent and autonomous you are and in fact, in the compagnons, there no longer are any supervisors as you are your own supervisor.
Thus my friends and I had were 12 and had just become scouts; and were proud to be part of the older group, where we knew we would be treated more like grown-ups. One day, our supervisors gathered us all after the Sunday mass (let us not forget that the scouts are also a catholic organisation, although no one of a different religion has ever been forbidden to join.) and told us that on the next day we would go on our exploration. The older boys who already knew what the exploration was chuckled and started telling each other stories of previous explorations but the younger ones, me included, started excitingly whispering to each other that the day had finally come and that the veil of mystery which enveloped the exploration would be lifted at last, for we had heard so much of the exploration. The supervisors slowly told us that the next day, each patrouille would be given 50 euros and a map with an itinerary to follow. We were supposed to use paths and roads to go to a house, but usually a basement owner by people who had previously agreed to lend part of their house to 6 young scouts for a night. We were supposed to buy food ourselves with the money, and walk back to the camp on the following day, and all this in an environment completely unknown to us, hence the name exploration. As we went back to our tents that night, none of us was able to fall asleep right away for we were all trying to imagine what would happen the next day and we were all making up scenarios in our heads as to what might happen.
The next day, around 9 am, one supervisor came to wake my tent up and told us it was time to go. My tent and patrouille was composed of two boys my age whom I also knew from school, Hadrien and Bruno, two boys two years older, Matthieu and Henri, and Cyprien, who was the oldest and thus the head of the patrouille. We quickly went around the camp fire, ate and breakfast and waited for our supervisor to tell us what to do. Our supervisor gave us a map and showed us where we were going to spend the night and how to get there. Unfortunately, that year the exploration had been rushed and quickly organised by our supervisors and all they had found for us was a house in construction with no roof that had been lent to us by the city hall of the village in which the house was. Nonetheless, we were all so overcome by our happiness of being granted so much freedom that the idea of sleeping à la belle étoile did not least bother us. We could hardly restrain ourselves from jumping with joy, especially when we were given the bill of 50 euros, which was of course a huge amount of money for boys our age. Thus, after saying good bye and taking with us two baguettes, cheese and ham for the trip, we left the camp and entered the wild world alone, three boys of 12, two boys of 14 and one of 15.
My patrouille had been bravely walking for five hours, and, conscious of all the liberty we had, we had enjoyed every minute of it. We had stopped in a supermarket earlier to buy as much junk food as possible for our dinner and breakfast, because yes, it is possible to buy food for 5 people with 50 euros, for 2 days. As we were walking on a very small road in the countryside, we took a quick break next to a house in construction by the road. The house was empty and there was a large truck next to it. As we were about to start walking again, I felt the need to annoy Cyprien, as I always did, by snatching his hat and running away with it. I obtained the effect I was looking for when he immediately stood up to chase me. As I was running away from Cyprien, I turned my head around to see how far he was, and ran head first into the back corner of the stationary truck I have mentioned earlier which, of course, was as sharp as a knife. The shock I had just received had thrown me on the ground and at first, my friends started laughing which I cannot condemn for the scene must have been quite funny. I started laughing a bit while touching my head with my hand but I stopped laughing when I realized that my hand was covered in blood. It is usually in such moments that one realizes how soft the human skull really is, and as funny as my running into the truck might have been, the story became slightly less funny when Cyprien told me that I have a cut 5 centimetres long on my head. Without losing his calm, he told me to lay down while he called our supervisors. The problem was that we only had one cellphone which had of course no money, and we could not call a regular number. My friends then called the firemen because their number is free of charges, and started telling them what had happened. The other problem was that we did not know precisely where we were because the road on which we were was in the middle of nowhere, and as my friends were trying to tell the firemen our location, the phone shut down. That is when we realized that the phone was out of battery. Thus here we were, 6 young boys in the country, one of them with a huge cut in the skull and unsure wether the fireman knew where we were or not. After fifteen minutes, we heard the sirens of the ambulance in the distance, but it did not come near us, instead we heard it driving around us without being able to find us. Luckily, at this point, a local farmer went by in his car and stopped when he saw us by the side of the road. In his peasant accent, he asked us what was wrong and we told him of our misfortune. Since he happened to know the fireman who was on duty when we called, he pulled out a cell phone which seemed to us like quite a contrast for a man who looked so rural, and he called his friend, saying that he had found “them” as though he was talking about an object the entire world had been looking for.
The man decided to stay with us until the ambulance arrived and while we were all waiting, two old ladies and then another peasant came by, and as they all knew each other, they started talking about the “pauvres garcons” who were so unlucky. Before I knew it, about half the rural community was around me and talking about what was best to do, and the scene became rather unusual:
-“Back in my days, being in the scouts was not so dangerous” said an elderly lady.
_”Yes but they are good boys nonetheless Madame Joubert, one can see it right away.” Answered another
-“And by the way, how is your elder son, the one who was himself in the scouts?” said a third one, who had just appeared out of nowhere.
-“Oh well he told me he is doing very well in his engineering school, he is the nicest boy.”
Et caetera…
Although having many people around was rather soothing at first, the constant blabbering of the old ladies and the peasants soon became annoying and I was quite happy when the ambulance finally arrived and took me away. Thus I left my friends and rode towards the hospital of the obscure town of Brive-la-Gaillarde, which I had never heard of before in my life. Once in the hospital, I patiently waited for my turn in the waiting room while everyone was watching the rather unusual sight of a 12 years old boy in a scouts uniform and with dried blood all over his face. After an hour, a doctor told me to come in his room and made me sit. He was huge and had hands that would have best suited a butcher than a doctor, and he too talked with a peasant accent. Seeing my cut, he pulled out a huge stapler and started stapling the two sides of my cut together. Now I do not know much about medicine, but it seems to me like he should maybe have cleaned my cut from the dried blood and shaved my hair before stapling my head, but I am a polite person and decided to let him do his work. As he started absently stapling my head, he starting talking to his nurse as though I was not here:
-“Ah those scouts! – Tchak! one staple- They’re so irresponsible! –Tchak! Two staples- To leave young boys –Tchak! Three staples- alone in the wild! –Tchak! Four staples- How irresponsible! –Tchack! Five staples- Never will you see my children with them –Tchak! Six staples- Never! –Tchak”
After seven staples, my head was on fire and had there been one more, the tear that I was restraining to the corner of my eye would have most likely dripped down my cheek. Once the good doctor had finished his job, I must that I looked much worse that before, sort of like a scout version of Frankeinstein. As I left the doctor’s room, a new problem arose: it was now around midnight, I was in an unknown town with no cell phone and I did not know my supervisors’ cell phone number. Therefore, I asked to use the hospital’s phone and called the only number I knew by heart, my father’s. So at midnight, my father received a call from his 12 years old son saying that he was in a hospital in Brive-la-Gaillarde, that I would explain everything later but that I needed my supervisors’ phone number. My father’s reaction was simple:
-”Is this a joke?”
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| La patrouille |
My father has many qualities, but one cannot say that my father is very organized. He was aware of the fact that I was in a scouts camp but he did not have my supervisors’ phone number. Therefore I told him to call my grandparents, because my mother had just gone to Vancouver and was not taking care of me that summer, and once he had the number he could call the hospital back and give me the number. I do not know how my grandparents reacted when he called them because before he called back, my supervisors had come to get me themselves after my patrouille had called them with one of the old ladies’ phone and informed them of the situation. They had ended up sleeping at the old ladies’ house who apparently offered them very comfortable beds and good food when they heard that my friends didn’t have time to reach the house where they had to go before nightfall. In the end, my misfortune was good for them because the place in which they stayed was much better than a house in construction. As for me, I went back to the camp that night with my supervisors and waited the next day for all my friends to come back and tell them of my adventure.
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