Dorm Retreat

By Emilia Park

Last Friday, the dorms went on a two-day trip to Ipoh. Because it was only a short getaway, no one was anticipating the trip. My roommates and I put off packing as much as possible until late the night before we left.

On the following day, we drove for about three hours and arrived at Adeline's Villa before lunch. We checked in, and as soon as we heard we were going rafting and caving, we changed our clothes and loaded into the back of two trucks. Five rafting guides were waiting for us when we arrived at the rafting location, and we broke into teams of 4-5 people. The rafting route had breaks between the large and small rapids to swim and take short rests. 

Since we had four to five people on each raft, we started to compete. We splashed water on each other's faces and pushed each other off the boat to win small competitions we created. Everyone was so into it that there seemed to be conflicts even between team members. Haylee Douglas (11) from Ziemer Dorm bragged, "As we were about to flip, Joycelyn hung onto half of the raft and looked at me with pleading eyes, so I pushed her off. It was yummy!" indicating that even her best friend was not an exception in the competition.

Meanwhile, only five people went caving. Sharon Kang (11) from Jackson Dorm, one of the cave explorers, said, "The cave was so cool. We had to crawl the whole time, so we got all dusty, but it was worth it." It seemed like the caving participants also had fun exploring.

After returning from an exciting afternoon schedule, we returned to the resort and had a short devotion time. We talked about identity and spent time looking back, reflecting on ourselves, and getting to know others better. Later we grilled marshmallows around a bonfire and gathered at a small cafe to play games and chat. Due to the long day, we all went straight to bed at 11 that first night.

The next day the final activity took place at a nearby waterfall. Since it was the last event of the dorm retreat, everyone enjoyed a cold waterfall shower and even participated in an impromptu karaoke session. The trip, which started without many expectations, turned out to be so perfect that not even a single hour was wasted. Though brief, it was a precious time for the dorm students to escape from the reality of daily school life and feel free and refreshed in a new place.