Scouting and imagination

[The Blancmange]

I listened yesterday to an interview with Terry Gilliam (Monty Python, etc.) on NPR's Fresh Air. A question came up to the effect of what influenced the creativity and imagination that is evident in all of his work. One of the things he cited was his time spent camping with Boy Scouts as a teen, particularly telling stories around the campfire.

 

I also remember, I was a bit older, 12, 13, as a Boy Scout, being up in the forests above - in the mountains above Los Angeles and at nighttime around a campfire and stories being told. And it's - to me, the real magic is just wonderful because suddenly you're transported from your own world into other worlds if you let yourself go. And that's the key to letting go, trusting the storyteller, relax.

Only a brief discussion of scouting, but from someone whom you might not expect, and an influence that we don't always associtate with scouting.

http://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=121751887

[Eamonn]

Not trying to hijack the thread, but...

 

A very longtime back, I took the Campfire Leaders course which at the time was offered and ran at Gilwell Park.

A great course and a lot of fun.

If there was one not so great thing about it. I couldn't help thinking that while it worked great for organizing "Big Camp Fires" )At the time I was a Service Team Member at Walton Firs National Camp Site in Cobham, Surrey and one weekend a month led the campfire there.) It maybe went a little too far in over-organizing camp fires which didn't offer the Scouts to do their own thing or use their imagination.

We adults are at times so busy wanting things to be so right and look so good we tend to get in the way of the kids.

Kinda all boils down to this youth led stuff.

Ea.