Story & photo:Paul & Kirsty Whelan
After a year of fundraising in the community local Scouts, Paul and Kirsty, from St. Catherine’s scout group on Holtwood Road were able to take up their places at the World Scouting Jamboree in Japan.
The 23rd World Scout Jamboree was a ten-day event hosted in Kiara-harma, Japan which encouraged scouts from around 150 countries to discover new cultural ideas and develop an understanding for the diversity of our world.
We had to do a lot of fundraising before we went. We did lots of bag packs, raffles and clothes weigh-ins. We received particular help from our old school St Catherine’s and The Mangla saved us cans every week for us to weigh in.
We learned lots from the Jamboree but, most importantly, that the similarities between us and the people we met far outweighed our differences. Most scouts were fluent in English, which allowed us to share information about our cultures.
We visited Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park a few days before the 70th anniversary of the dropping of the A- bomb. The entire unit folded hundreds of origami peace cranes which we laid at the memorial near the A-bomb dome.
The temperature was difficult to adjust to, especially during the heat wave we had when at one point, the campsite reached 51°C.
After the Jamboree, we spent a few days with different Japanese scouting families.
Now that the experience is over, it is very sad that we can no longer see the friends that we met from all over the world. We are proud to have acted as young diplomats for peace and unity and we are proud to have represented our country, Sheffield, Pitsmoor and Scouting as a whole.
We have acted as young diplomats for peace and unity in a time of political turmoil in some areas of the globe. We are proud to have visited Japan, a rich and beautiful nation, worthy of our love and respect.