Book Project 1: Room

“Don’t Disturb Old Nick” Survival Camp Experience

What we’re offering here is a once in a lifetime opportunity. We want to give people a chance to create their very own Room experience. “Don’t Disturb Old Nick” experience will take place at Camp Joy for one night. We want people to be able to feel how Ma and Jack felt while trapped in the Room. At camp, people will be assigned a cabin, then they will be locked in the cabin for 12 hours and they will need to figure out a way to get out of these cabins that were set up just like Room was in the book. Without “disturbing Old Nick”, they may use anything in the Room to help them. But at midnight, “Old Nick” always comes in to feed the participants, but if you are caught trying to escape you may be punished (Note: The counselors are not allowed to touch you and you will not be harmed in anyway during this experience, they’re just allowed to scare you). This camp is offering you a taste of what Ma and Jack went through while living in this room. Come experience it today and you may just have a different point of view on everything.

                In Room, Ma was kidnapped by a man, named Old Nick. She was locked inside a shed that “Old Nick” built just for her. She gave birth to Jack while inside the shed, so Jack has never been outside of the shed or Room. All Ma ever wanted to do was escape. She tried multiple times but always got caught. With this camp experience, people can actually rein-act the ways Ma tried to escape. In the book, Ma said, “And another time I made a hole” (pg.95). Could you be brave enough to try to dig your way out like Ma had tried? The cabins are stocked with materials that Ma would have had in the book; forks, knives, plates, bowls, furniture such as her bed and chair, and even the rug that Jack loved in the book. The rug that actually helped Jack and Ma escape Room, in the book their plan included, “…I’m going to show him the rug all rolled up with you inside” (pg. 124). In the end Jack pretended to be dead and Old Nick had to carry his body outside, and then Jack had to run away to get help. The people in the cabins may not be able to do exactly that but they will have to creative just like Ma. With such little materials, Ma had to be inventive on how to get them out of that Room. If you had 12 hours to figure it out before getting caught, what would you do?

                This camp experience is ideal for people that are not afraid. Room is a book that makes people face the fact that life is not just a walk in the park. Bad things happen all around us. The “Don’t Disturb Old Nick” experience is not meant to scare people, it will be provided to help people open their eyes. This fan experience can give everyone a chance to feel empathy. In Room, Ma even felt it, “…Your experiences have given you, enormous empathy with the suffering children of the world. Yes?” (pg. 236), with this fan experience I want everyone to be able to feel that. It can help readers connect to Ma and Jack.

                This camp experience can help more readers be able to relate and actually understand the amount of pain that Ma went through. In the book you feel bad for Ma and Jack, and you just want to cry because you can’t even imagine what they went through. But now with this camp experience, I think more readers can be better connected with the book because they will know what Ma did to try to, not only survive, but escape. When people hear about this experience they might even want to read the book so they know more about the story. If people could experience the kind of hardship that Ma had to, I believe more people will empathize for people around the world and won’t take life for granted as much anymore. Who wouldn’t want to be locked up in a small, crowded cabin… actually nobody would, but the reality is people are. Come experience this with us, and it may just change your life.

Examples of the Cabins the people would stay in: