Day 4: 26 Jul
At 5am this morning I woke up to the sound and the wind of a helicopter close outside. I quickly dismissed it as just a rescue chopper coming too close or something like that as I was very tired and immediately went back to sleep.
In the morning we learned that they were using infrared scanners to look for a missing person, and that our dining fly had sailed all the way to the Italian troop next door and one of our leaders tents broke. Plenty of excitement far too early in the morning!
In other news, today was culture day, which is pretty exciting. Us Aussies were all making vegemite sandwiches and fairy bread, and all the other countries were doing different cultural activities. We tried some Brazilian food, did some origami with the Japanese and took part in the Swedish midsummer dances.
I also managed to trade some really cool things today- if you didn’t know, trading is MASSIVE here. Everyone loves trading badges, pins, shirts, souvenirs and anything else that they can get their hands on in exchange for something cool from another country, region or event. Today I managed to get one of the revered Scottish kilts, which come at a very high price- for me, it was a long sleeve Australian contingent shirt and towel. I got the MacLaren kilt, and I learned that it’s the most popular one for scouting- there’s a long and complicated story about it that I don’t quite remember.
Another thing that I scored was one of the Mexican shirts, which are really colourful and cool, and it only cost me two of those tiny little koalas that you can buy in any tourist stores in Australia.
The rest of the day was spent trading, experiencing cultures, and resting my feet,  which have begun to blister from all the walking I’m doing.
Tonight I went to the Unity Show, which was an awesome celebration of culture and all of our differences.
Unfortunately, my group left before the broadway Disney show that was immediately afterwards , which was disappointing but at least we got to bed early!