From the CEO
August 2009: Canada Vacation Part III
Pancakes
posted 10/2009
In the summer months leading up to our vacation in Canada, conversations among our residents speak to fishing, swimming, travel, and pancakes. Why pancakes? Six years ago, we began holding a pancake breakfast at a maple syrup farm in northern Ontario Province. The pancake breakfast was an enormous success and became an instant Bonnie Brae tradition.
To understand the significance of the pancake breakfast it is helpful to know more about the geography, menu, and timing of the breakfast. To our residents Canada is the "far north," a foreign country, or just plain "out in the woods." Our Canadian sites are all located directly on a lake and often at the end of a long dirt road. Now the pancake house is 45 minutes north of our furthest site, located in the midst of 700 acres of maple trees, and at the very end of a dirt road leading from a wider dirt road. So, to our guys, many of whom have been raised in the inner-city, the pancake house is in the wilderness, at the very edge of the known world.
The pancake house itself is a 10,000 square foot log building. There are usually a few farm animals surrounding the building who quickly disappear when we arrive in our cloud of dust. There is also a small playground with a zip line that attracts our guys both before and after the breakfast. The breakfast menu, and breakfast is the only meal served throughout the day, is quite simple: pancakes and sausage. Consequently there are no printed menus. One simply says 3 and 2, meaning three pancakes and two sausages. This lack of printed menus and lack of choices always causes amazement among both our residents and our staff. Inevitably someone will attempt to order eggs or bacon. The answer is always the same: pancakes and sausage only!
What adds to the attractiveness of the breakfast is its timing. We deliberately chose the last full day of our Canadian vacation for the breakfast so as to see staff and residents from the different sites reunite prior to the return home. Due to the large geographic range of our sites most of our guys do not see each other during the week. Consequently at the pancake breakfast there are many joyful reunions and a strong sense of community. After breakfast the cottages scatter, each returning to their own site to begin the sad task of packing and loading the vans for the return trip.
The one week Canada vacation is the high point of the year for our boys and for our program. We could not stage such an enormous adventure without the support of our loyal donors. In this very challenging year we were truly amazed and deeply grateful to receive 50 % more donations for the vacation than the prior year. Thank you for making this vacation a reality!