Young Friends:
FGConnections Winter 2006

My Experience at the Gathering

by Anna Lindo

This year in July, my family went to the FGC Annual Gathering of Friends. FGC stands for Friends General Conference, and it’s a lot of fun. I didn’t know anyone there except my parents (of course), but in two days, I had made friends. The children go to Junior Gatherings, while parents and other adults go to workshops. I went to the U-Stewardship (U’s group) Gathering. We did all sorts of things on stewardship and a little show on how to get people to look closer, because a staff person noticed people were not looking carefully. There are different groups, like U- Community and U- World Peace. U stands for kids going into 4th and 5th grade. There are others too, like K group and A group, although I don’t know what grades they are.

While I was at my gathering, my parents went to a workshop called “Experiencing the Light” with Chris Ravndal. It was a meditation workshop. There are other workshops, too. They enjoyed it, and found it a “centering transformative experience.”

Meals were a big deal. You could get as much as you wanted. You had a meal card. You’d swipe it, get a tray, and set off to find some food and a table. The restaurants- Brazilian, Chinese, Italian, vegetarian, vegetables and sandwiches, and desserts (the best cakes!) and more than I can remember. Plus juice, milk, cereal, and soft-serve ice cream machines. For breakfast, they have things like omelets, different style eggs, bacon, sausages, and one time ham. I also discovered biscuits and sausage gravy. Yummy! And every half hour, someone would raise a hand for silence. Then, the only sound would be from the kitchen. Also, the students staying for part of the summer would be completely baffled. (“What’re they doing that for?” or “What about us, are we supposed to be quiet too?”) They obviously didn’t get it. Oh, well. And on Wednesday, for those who wanted to experience what it was like for extremely poor people who had nothing to look forward to but rice and beans for meals, we had a meal of just that, only for some it was a peanut butter sandwich.

You would sleep in a dorm, with many people. And most of the people from my group were on the same floor, same building. I ran into them at the showers often.

There were also activities for the afternoon all around the campus. You didn’t spend all of your time in groups or workshops! For example, shape singing (extremely hard and frustrating) and others, including singing from the books we use at meeting. Then there were capture the flag, Frisbee games, family worship and about a million other things. You weren’t expected to do anything. You could do something else, like my family took my best friend (from FGC) to go tubing and hiking.

There were also things just about everyone would attend. Trout Fishing in America came. Trout Fishing in America is two men who looooooooooove singing and make up the weirdest and funniest songs about just about everything. And also, there was the weaving of the blessed tapestry. Everybody gathered for this. The kids used sticks and yarn to weave the sticks, and on that morning, the sticks were arranged and everybody joined. Some adults took yarn and wove their lives into ours. Now, I have several yarn balls from the tapestry, ‘cause they had to take it down obviously.

Those were the most important things at the Gathering, and it’s so much fun. I mean, it’s sad because you have only a week and what’re the chances you’ll make a friend from the other side of the country? FGC is all around the world. If you go again, sometimes you see your old friends, and you can always make more. And you can write, call, and e-mail. I hope I’m going next year in Tacoma, Washington!

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From FGConnections. Friends General Conference, 1216 Arch Street 2B, Philadelphia, PA 19107. Connections Home and Back Issues.