From July 5th to July 14th the Shri Sundar Gopal Mandir in association with the National Children Cultural Foundation Inc. hosted the annual Hindu youth summer camp at the Shri Sundar Gopal Mandir located at 97-53 104 Street Ozone Park, NY 11416. The camp was directed under the leadership of Pandit Rooplall Phagu, Pandit Narayan Latchana (Baya), Pandit Mahanand Sharma and Pandit Devanand Das, with the help of Katherine Lall, Sharas Shankar, Devi Latchana, Ishwar Das, Matthew Mohan, Priyanka Phagoo, Natasha Ram, Movina Seepersaud and other volunteers. The summer camp of 2017 was very successful.

A typical day at the summer camp consists of the doors opening at 8 am for parents to drop off their children. From 8 am to 9 am breakfast is served along with registration. At 9 am the eventful days began with yoga and prayers. Throughout the day, the children learned gaytries, prayers, ramayan chaupai, dohas, kirtans, kabirdas quotations and knowledge related to hinduism, gods and goddesses. In addition, the campers had lots of fun with creative learning such as group activities, making their own songs, making skits with morals, playing jeopardy, and dancing.

The campers learned that in Hinduism god is one but comes in different forms. For each form of god, teachers explained what they look like and how we benefit by praying to them. The children were taught gaytries and prayers for all the deities during the morning learning session. Also within the morning session, they learned kabirdas quotations and ramayan. Chaupais and dohas were extracted from bal kaand of the Ramayan where Lord Ram speaks to shabri about the 9 forms of devotion, Kabirdas quotations taught them morals about life.

The children enjoyed many different games and events. Games such as manoranjan, lion and sheep ,and aum competitions. But whether or not they got to play these games was based on their behavior. If the campers misbehaved they had to face consequences such as chanting, facing Hanumanji to see if he will tell them a secret and exercises. On Thursday, July 13th we had a field trip to the Divya Dham Temple. On the trip the campers got to learn about and see the 51 form of Durga Ma, the campers got to opportunity to pray to Durga Ma in her three forms. They also got to see 1,008 Shiva Lingams along with many other beautiful deities. A special thanks go out to Babloe Shankar, Pandit Rooplall Phagu, Pandit Narayan Latchana (Baya) and Lin Seenarine our volunteer drivers, for taking everyone to experience such an amazing temple. The campers really enjoyed it.

An important part of the camp was the food. Each day the campers received breakfast, lunch and a snack that was specially prepared for them. Meals such as chow mein, macaroni pie etc. As a special treat , he campers received two days of pizza. Their favorite snack was ice cream. We would like to thank Bal Mamoo and others for all their hard work in the kitchen each and every day.

Thank you to the parents for sending their children to our camp to learn about our wonderful culture and religion. Most importantly, thank you to the Shri Sundar Gopal Mandir for hosting the camp, and to Pandit Narayan Latchana (Baya), Pandit Mahanand Sharma and Pandit Devanand Das for devoting their time and efforts into teaching the youths. We hope to continue to spread Sanathan Dharm for many years to come thank you to everyone for your continuous support.