The search for the budda cookie

The inclusive camp in reutersbrunn has a long tradition. Since 1992, the habberge district youth association (KJR) has been organizing a vacation camp here in cooperation with the habberge lifesupport association, where young people and children with and without disabilities have a lot of fun together. Only this year everything was different. Due to the pandemic and the strict rules of conduct, this year there was a "tent camp to go", so to speak.

Frank kupfer-mauder, the current managing director of the KJR, reports that in february the camp was already almost fully booked. But then everything changed. Corona destroyed all plans. A long time had to be waited, until one had certainty, in which framework at all meetings can take place.

A tent camp would have been theoretically possible in august, said kupfer-mauer, but under the conditions the idea of the camp would not have been justified any more. "With the demanded single tents, mobile cakes and further restrictions the inclusive idea would have been lost", according to the managing director.

Small groups

Now they wanted to set up something completely different, as reported by copper-mauders successor eva pfeil, who has already been in her induction phase at the KJR for some time. The district was asked about the number of people interested and finally the decision was made to run a decentralized seven-day vacation program with day care only in habfurt, knetzgau, zeil and hofheim. A total of 35 children between the ages of eight and 14 took part in small groups.

"At the beginning, we didn’t know exactly where we would be able to hold the vacation program in the towns", the organizers, however, later found out that they were welcomed with open arms. Clubs were found in the vicinity of all four towns who offered their land for the program.

For habfurt it was the tennis department of the FC habfurt, in knetzgau the MSC knetzgau participated, in the district of krum the FSV victoria krum was accommodating and for hofheim the TSV lendershausen participated.#

"Who stole the golden budda cookie??"

As is usually the case with the camp, the vacation program had a special theme, which this time was "detectives" read. "Who stole the golden budda cookie??", was the task of the children to determine this. The two volunteer leaders caroline petersen (KJR) and nina brech (lebenshilfe), together with their team, had come up with an original crime story.

From "francesco’s reutersbrunn cookie factory the golden budda-cookie was stolen, whereby "budda" was the name of the game on the one hand a reference to the religious figure and on the other hand the french pronunciation of the word "butter" clarified. Each of the four groups was shown daily clues and videos in which the two detectives coro (caroline petersen) and nana (nina brech) amusingly shared their investigative work with the children. In the beginning, factory owner francesco himself was suspected of having faked the theft in order to collect the 40 million euro insurance sum. On the last day of the vacation program, however, the tide was to turn. The resourceful detectives determined that detective nana was responsible for the disappearance of the golden budda cookie. Her motive was that she finally wanted to solve a big case again.

Ten supervisors and six jumpers ensured that the vacation program participants were never bored. With a rotating program, there was plenty to experience in all four locations. In a workshop, the young detectives were able to make everything they needed for their investigative work. Crime scene markers, fingerprint powder, deciphering discs or a book with a secret hiding place were created in a short time.

In a game show, a detective instructor told about his work and had funny games like searching for objects or taking fingerprints in store. During a photo rally, the participants had to "secure evidence" photos of certain things were taken with an instant camera, and during a hike in the forest, small houses were built out of moss and bark, roughly the size of a sand castle. On the penultimate day, the program, which usually took place from 8 a.M. To 2 p.M., did not begin until late afternoon, since the finale was a campfire with a barbecue of stick bread.

Naturally a hygiene concept was compiled and kept, on distance and/or mask respected. The children quickly internalized the rules, which they already knew from school, the supervisors report. Nevertheless, the fun for the participants was huge. This is also confirmed by observations that some children who took part in the vacation program during the day continued it privately at home at night in the garden of their parents’ house as a tent camp and spent the night there.