Hilo

Honolulu

89th Floor of Taipei 101

Taipei 101

Wu Lai

Taiwan National Palace Museum

China

Can’t believe that it is actually April. I remember getting on this trip and thinking that April will feel like years from now, but it really flew by. China was unforgettable. The first day we got into Hong Kong at around 10 in the morning. it was a little later then what we expected because the seas were really rough the prior few days. Once we got in, I could tell what my professors were talking about when they said that the smog would limit visibility. I could see the other side of the harbor, but down farther was so clouded in smog. I’d say I could see about two miles or so before it became completely white.

I decided to tag along with Mike, Paige, and Jess. We took the star ferry across the harbor to the main island of Hong Kong. The first thing I noticed was the amount of luxury cars. Every other car seemed to be a Mercedes, Lexus, or BMW. There were also a good amount of Porsches and I saw three Bentleys and two Ferraris. The four of us ended up going to this restaurant where a lot of SASers went to because they heard from people who had been and said it was great. The servers would walk around with trays of all kinds of interesting stuff and you just waved them down if you saw something you wanted. It was relatively cheap for the kind of atmosphere they had.

After lunch, we decided to try and find this huge escalator to go up, but when we got there, it was just a series of escalators. Mike and I thought it was cool, but not something to spend forty fives on. Once we got to the top, Paige insisted on going to the zoo and tea museum. We got a little turned around and found the botanical gardens, which was also a bit of a snooze. We cut through those and then into the zoo. At this point, Mike and I were bored. I mean we were in Hong Kong and Paige wanted to spend time looking at lemurs and orangutans. After that, we thought the museum would be a little cooler, but we were wrong. The museum was a bunch of different kinds of tea and different cups of historic value. Good thing the museum was in Hong Kong park, which was a nice place to wait while Jess and Paige went through the tea museum.

After we split up with them, Mike and I got a taxi to the shopping district so Mike could get a bigger backpack for his independent travel. After getting that, we decided to head back to the ship for dinner. We waited until 8 to see the light show that the buildings of Hong Kong performed every night. It wasn’t anything spectacular, but it was neat to see. Because it was earth hour, at 8:30 all of the lights of the buildings turned off which I thought was something cool to see. After watching the skyline, Mike and I met up with Steph and Katie and we decided to walk a few blocks away to check out the night life, until we discovered how expensive everything was. We got back to the ship at around 2:30 after Mike and I decided to sit and watch the skyline by the harbor. The next day, we left for Beijing. The Hong Kong airport wasn’t anything special. They had American stores and American food. Our flight was at 1:55 and I ended up sleeping the whole way, which was about 3 hours. Once we exited out of the terminal, we didn’t find a person waiting for us. Turns out the university completely forgot about our trip so we spent the next 3 and a half hours in the airport. It was surprising how everyone was as patient as we were.

Finally at around quarter to nine, a guide that ISE had booked picked us up from the airport. We were taken to the Jade Palace hotel where we stayed the night. I ended up going down the street with Lee and Russ in order to find some food since we didn’t have too much to eat at the airport. We found a place that was very Chinese. Never before did I have trouble with a language barrier but here, it was almost impossible. I tried to make a hand gesture for drinking while saying coke, and the waitress started cracking up hysterically. So much so, that she had to turn away and a second waitress had to take my order. This didn’t really give me a good feeling about mandarin. The next day, we were picked up by the same tour guide that brought us to the hotel and she told us that we were going to the Great Wall. It was about an hour ride outside of Beijing. I slept a little on the way and once we got there, it was kind of cool and deserted. The hike itself was a lot harder than I anticipated. The stairs were very uneven too. One would be a baby step while the next would be almost waist high. There were a surprising amount of older people climbing the wall too, it was a workout. Once we got to the top of the section, the view was breathtaking. Of course I took pictures, but it doesn’t do the scene real justice. The walk down was a lot easier.

Once we got back on the bus, we went to lunch/jade jewelry dealer. I think they anticipated on us buying things, but not many of us did. After lunch, we went to the Summer Palace. The palace was built on a pear-shaped lake which was huge. There weren’t too many interesting things to look at, but the general setting was very peaceful. After the summer palace, we went out to dinner. That night, we were informed that we would be moving to the university guesthouse. The guesthouse actually turned out to be cooler than the hotel. Oh, the one thing I found in common about all Chinese beds, is that they are ROCK hard. I jumped on my bed at the guesthouse hoping that it would be softer than the one at the Jade Palace, but I was wrong.

But anyway, the next day we went to the Forbidden City, which was cool. It did become repetitive though. We kept passing through sections that looked the same as the previous. Even the professor leading the trip made a comment about the similarity that each section had. It was also very crowded. The guide said they could have up to 50,000 people a day. Once we made our way through, we went across the street to Tiananmen Square. This also wasn’t so eventful. I kind of thought of it like going to Washington D.C. At first, everything you see is cool to look at and take in. As time goes on, it gets boring. After you leave, you realize what you just saw is something amazing that someone, somewhere in the world won’t ever see. So I tried to appreciate the moment as much as I could while it lasted.

After we left Tiananmen Square, we got lunch and then went to the Temple of Heaven. It was kind of embarrassing to see the other SAS kids doing handstands and making a big commotion while some Chinese people were on their knees praying. The temple itself was beautifully colored with reds, greens, and blues. It was pretty cool to be able to see where the emperor of China would once go to pray. After the temple, we went to a Chinese acrobatics show. T his show was great, but no one was allowed to take pictures or video. Some of the acts included men jumping through hopes that were near ten feet high, a guy juggling ten or eleven balls, women with extreme flexibility, and men flipping between two poles. T he whole show reminded me of Cirque De Solei. After the show, we were taken back to the guesthouse. Lee, Russ, and I decided to wander out around the university to try and find something interesting. I ended up trying this amazing skewer of some kind of meat, but it was great. A fter that, we all headed to bed.

The next day, we went to the Zoo to see the pandas. The panda actually looked like a man in a bear suit, but it was awesome to see. The rest of the zoo consisted of some nocturnal creatures, a fat lioness, and some elephants. After South Africa, I think I was a bit spoiled with the creatures. When we left the zoo, we got to see the Olympic Village. The Bird’s Nest was pretty cool see. I never realized how close it was in proximity to the Water Cube. Both were cool to see. After spending about half an hour there, we headed to the airport for our flight. That night, Lee, Russ and I decided to walk around Shanghai for awhile before we all headed to sleep. It was a long couple of days.

The following day, I met up with Mike, Kyle, and Erica. Mike and Kyle had just come back from their independent travel to Beijing. They had seen the same things I had, for about a third of the price. We all decided to check out the Shanghai World Financial Center. Once we got to the foot of the building, we realized it was around $25 American to go to the top, so we all decided to try to go to the top of the Pearl Tower but when we got there, we found that it was the same price. The one thing I noticed about walking around Shanghai during the day was the amount that people spit. Even on the Great Wall, people would hawk lugies left and right like people didn’t care. I mean it was gross, but people there believe that it is a healthy habit and completely acceptable. Another observation I had was how short everyone was, but I kind of expected that. We all ended up having dinner at this awesome place a few block away from the ship. It was about $2.50 American for a hefty portion of some real Chinese food, and the menu was English too! After we ate, we decided to hit a bar that was on the same block. There, the bar owner took a picture of the four of us and put it on the wall of his bar along with other Americans. It was pretty awesome to be immortalized on the wall of a bar in Shanghai.

The next morning, I met up with Kyle and Mike and we went to the market. The process of getting there took about two hours though. We ended up walking in a different direction from the subway stop and took the wrong train. In the ended, we gave up and got into a taxi. The market itself was huge and confusing. If you wanted something, it could be bought here. There were people selling all kinds of things, more so then in Vietnam. There were place I thought were stores that turned out to be malls. I think I counted three Dairy Queens and Two Starbucks just within the vicinity of the market. After the market, the three of us went onto the boardwalk and sat for about half an hour before we left to get back on the ship. The whole experience of China was great, I wish we could have stayed longer.

The Forbidden City

The Great Wall of China

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Hong Kong Park

Hong Kong

Vietnam

Can't believe that its March 24th already. Vietnam went by so quickly. The seas are really rocky right now. I just came from dinner and we had one good wave that caused drinks to hit the floor and people to drop their plates. But yeah, Vietnam was great.

The first day, I ended up being able to get on the city orientation tour with Kyle, Mike and Katie. As soon as we got off, there was a group of about 15 women dressed in traditional Vietnamese clothing holding a banner welcoming SAS to Ho Chi Min City. We all boarded the bus and our first stop was a Buddhist temple. On the way, I noticed that there was an abundance of scooters on the road. No real motorcycles, but for every car, there had to be at least 8 or 9 scooters on the road. The traffic was crazy here too. People would cut other people off left and right, but others didn’t seem to get pissed at this. Being in a bus was great though, no one tried to cut us off and we basically got to go whenever we wanted to.

The Buddhist temple was nothing special compared to the one in Singapore. I saw similar statues and people burning incense as an offering. After the temple, we had lunch at a very nice restaurant. Here, a coke cost 49000 dong, which is only about 2.50 American. I think the exact rate was 20,856 dong to the dollar, something ridiculous. We ended up eating some chicken soup, fish, rice, and shrimp. The food was very well prepared.

After lunch, we went to see a water puppet show across town. The stage was a pond of water at the foot of a building. In the building were people that would control the puppets. There were dragons, humans, geese, and what looked like a turtle, all of which did tricks on top of the water. For the finale, a dragon puppet spit fire from his mouth, which was pretty cool. The whole show only lasted around 10 minutes. After that, the people controlling the puppets came out from the back and bowed while we applauded.

After the show, we were taken to the former president’s palace, which was now the reunification palace. We were shown the various rooms where important representatives would meet as well as the bomb the shelter. After that, we were taken to Notre Dame church where we saw a service being held. It wasn’t really anything special, or anything I didn’t see before.

That night, Mike, Kyle and I decided we wanted to grab some Vietnamese food so we looked on wikitravel for a good place and we all decided to go to Allez Boo. As soon as we left the harbor, we were being bothered by people to get motorcycle rides. We ended up getting a taxi because we weren’t sure how safe the bikes would be. Once we pulled up to Allez Boo, the meter read 940, so we paid the driver 940000 dong. As soon as we all stepped out, the driver sped away and we realized that we almost paid 50 dollars for a taxi ride that less than 5 minutes long. We were pissed for the next few hours because it didn’t register with any of us how much we actually paid because the currency system was so inflated compared to the states.

At Allez Boo, I ended up getting steamed rice with crab meat, absolutely great. We all had a few drinks along with dinner and the total bill came to around $56, which was wasn’t exactly the kind of deal we had hoped to get. After Allez Boo, we walked for a few blocks and stumbled onto a place where the food was much cheaper. Here, the same dish was a fifth of the price compared to Allez Boo. We decided to sit down and have some french fries and garlic bread before we headed back to ship.

The next morning, Kyle and I got up early in order to get to the bus station for an early bus to My Tho, a city about 2 hours south of Saigon. The taxi ended taking us to a market, but still close to another bus station. We were sure that we paid him only $5 this time too. Once there we bought tickets from the station for 30000 dong each and got on our bus. We had to get off in order to transfer at another bus station. A few stops later, the whole bus seemed to tell us to get off for My Tho, like everyone knew where we wanted to go. I guess being American had its advantages some times. Once off, we were ushered onto a minibus where the man quickly demanded 500000 from both of us. This time, I knew that it was way too much, but Kyle said the he saw the man in front of us pay the same amount. I still didn’t think that $25 for a 2 hour ride was anywhere near reasonable, but Kyle had paid, so I did the same. The man walked right off the bus. After we discussed it, we tried to get our money when we realized that we made a big mistake. When Kyle stpped off the bus in order to make it clear to the man what we wanted, the driver started to pull away, so he had no choice but to get back on. Again, we got ripped off for around $20. These people were out to take advantage of any white person, and from then on, Kyle and I made sure not to do anything before we established a price.

Once we arrived in My Tho, we took separate bikes to a hotel in the middle of a small village. Here, we met Nikko, a man 36 years old who had moved from Finland to Vietnam around 10 months ago. He spoke English but it wasn’t the best. The price of the room at the hotel, which was $8, also included a free bike rental. So for the next four hours, Kyle and I biked around the village, going back into neighborhoods and seeing the Mekong Delta. At around 4, we decided to head back to the hotel, but we were a little lost. Luckily, Kyle had brought the business card of the hotel. We asked about ten people before we finally arrived back at the hotel.

After a nap, we wandered to the main part of the hotel and had elephant ear fish for dinner, which was a native fish to Mekong Delta. We stayed and talked with Nikko, the hotel owner, a lonely student about our age from Japan, and a younger couple from the UK that was staying at the hotel too. It was about 10 before we headed to bed. We woke up at around 9, said goodbye to everyone at the hotel, and got motorbikes back to the bus station. Our plan was to travel a further two hours south to Vihn Long, but because we got ripped off neither of us felt like dishing out more money to have the same thing potentially happen again. Once we got back to the ship, we got changed, ate, and then went to the war museum.

The war was refered to as the American War to the Vietnamese. After leaving the museum, I felt like a dick for what we did to these people. The pictures and accounts both Americans and Vietnamese people made me feel so terrible for America’s actions. After leaving, Kyle and I walked around and decided to eat on the ship and then go out to the night market. Mike had left for Cambodia earlier that day and wasn’t going to return until after on ship time, so it was just me and Kyle for the rest of the time. The night market was amazing. If you wanted something, they had it. Ffake DVDs, shirts, dress shirts, tailors, shoes, food, fake watches, backpacks, everything. I ended up getting a north face backpack for Abby for $6.25. Kyle told me that they normally go for around $100 back home, so I thought I made out pretty well. There were plenty of other deals like that, but because the bus back to the ship ended at 10:30, we left early.

The next day, Kyle and I spent all day wandering around the city. We weren’t really looking for anything specific, but just walking to take in the atmosphere. That night we hit the night market and had a good time bargaining with people, but we didn’t buy too many things. After getting back at 10:30, I decided to go out to a club called Lush. The club wasn’t anything out of the ordinary, but I refused to buy a beer for 75000 dong when I knew I could get one a block down on the street for 10000. We left at about midnight and went to Apocalypse Now, which was another night club. I was with Janie and her friend and we decided to walk because it wasn’t too far away. On the way, Janie almost had her back purse stolen right off her shoulder by a man on a scooter. The scooter had driven up onto the sidewalk and the next thing I knew, I heard Janie hit the ground. At first I thought she had been hit, but she was just holding onto her purse when the man had grabbed onto it. It turns out she got drgged for about 5 feet before the guy on the scooter let go. Thankfully, she only had a few scrapes and she didn’t lose anything. It was something that they warned us about, but something that I never expected to happen. Apparently, there were three or four other similar events that happened that night as well.

The next morning, Kyle and I decided to head to this local place spend the rest of our dong. We heard about it from one of the younger doctors on the UVA medical staff that had joined us in India. When we got there, the place was full of Vietnamese and everyone stared at us as we walked in. Before we sat down for a minute, the waiter brought as a bowl of moist peanuts and a 2-liter jug of beer. After a while, locals started coming up to us and trying to talk with us. They were all very friendly and just wanted to practice their English. A little later on, people started singing and dancing around the place, probably because they were drunk. at around 3, Kyle and I headed to the market where we tried to spend the rest of our dong that we didn’t spend earlier. I tried to get a fake rolex for 100000 dong, but no one would go that low, so I settled for a T-shirt instead. We got back on the bus at around 5:15 and got back on the ship at 5:30. Vietnam was a great time.

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Singapore

Singapore was awesome. Not so much a culture shock as India was, but its very modern. It kind of reminded me of a cleaner, less crowded New York. The skyline was beautiful, hopefully we get to see it lite up on the way out.

Today I had an FDP with Kyle. We first went to a mosque where we had to take off our shoes. The guide who was going to be with us until 1:00 seemed kind of cool. He talked really fast and laughed for only short periods of time. After the mosque we went to a church, and then a roman catholic church. I got plenty of pictures on the way. Brittany was with us on the trip too, she kept changing her lenses every few minutes.

After the two Christian sites, we went to a Buddhist temple. This was probably the coolest religious site that we hit on the tour. It got me really psyched for China. The temple itself had many statues to different Gods. I also saw a statue of Guan Yu, who I thought only existed in the dynasty warriors video game. Apparently, the whole game is based on the three kingdoms era of China. After the Buddhist temple, we went to a Hindu temple. I was kind of half paying attention to what the guide was saying because we had just come from India.

When Kyle and I got back, we met up with Carolyn, who had gone to the zoo. Carolyn said that that was one of the two things I should do, but I didn’t get to. Mike said that the zoo was pretty amazing and that the animals weren’t in cages at all. He brought this girl Cassie back from the tour and she wanted to hang around with us. After Kyle got done with talking to his bank about withdrawing money, we all left for the MRT, or subway. The subway was extremely clean, probably because there were fines imposed if someone littered, ate, or carried flammable items in the subway. We took the purple line until we hit Chinatown. There, we got to eat at some awesome place. And of course, we ate with chopsticks. Kyle and I split barbecued pork, and prawns and crab meat over rice. Mike and Cassie split some chicken and some vegetarian dish because Cassie is vegetarian.

Halfway through the meal, it started to pour rain, which wouldn’t help because it already felt like it was 100% humidity. After the rain let up, the four of us went to orchard street which was where all the high end stores were. I saw two rolex stores within 5 minutes of each other. I also had the best ice ream sandwich that I had ever had. If fact it was so good, I had two. The man took a brick of ice cream, and sandwiched it between two real wafers, none of that pre packaged stuff. After I tried to find a shirt that said Singapore on it and failed, we all went to the marina bay front. It took us forever to find a crosswalk. We were all too afraid that we would get a fine for jaywalking so we walked back and forth along the street until we finally found one. There, Kyle and I split off from Mike and Cassie because they wanted to go to the skypark but Kyle and I wanted to get some local food and try a Singapore Sling.

Kyle and I got a kia taxi cab to where we had been before where we got our drinks, which were really good. I wasn’t sure how strong it was, but I couldn’t taste the alcohol. It reminded me of a coke with cherry grenadine, but it had kind of a fruit kick and with less carbonation. After leaving the bar, we walked around and tried to find a place to eat. In the process of doing that, we were harassed by two prostitutes our age. They saw us coming, stood up and started calling us baby and honey and then touched us as we walked by. It was really strange, they looked like they were younger than us. We found a place to eat. I got a roasted chicken cutlet, amazing yet again, and we split an order of dumplings. The whole meal came out to be 15 singapore dollars, which was a pretty good deal for the amount of food that we got.

We then took the MRT back to the ship. Im currently sitting on the back of the 6th deck looking at pier and forklifts driving back and forth. T here is a huge ship called the Super Star Virgo that’s ported next to us. It kind of reminds me of Freedom of the Seas. Singapore overall was a great time. I expected a less modern and less clean city, but it was by far a first class place.

Singapore skyline

"Just try to blend India"

India was definitely my favorite country so far. The highlight was the Taj, but I still saw some pretty awesome places and got to interact with a bunch of people.

The first day in India was enlightening. As soon as "The Voice" came over the speaker and said that we docked, I already knew it. The odor of sulfur and eggs seemed to find its way through the ventilation system and into my cabin. Wasn’t exactly the first thing I expected from India. After waking up, I went up to the observation deck to get a better look. Once I walked outside, the smell was pretty strong. We were in an industrial port, the gate was about half a mile away, and we were not allowed to walk to it. Right off of the ship there was a dock filled with around 300 Ford cars, looking like they had just arrived, whether it was from a manufacturing plant in India or the US, I wasn’t sure. I decided to go back to sleep after passing face-to-face immigration.

At about 12, I went to the fifth deck to get food. They had closed off the sixth and seventh deck due to the potential problem with bugs and pollution. I also noticed that they covered the fifth deck floor with wrap and stairs with cardboard in order to prevent people from tracking in dirt. After I got food with Mike and Ashley, I had an FDP with my international business professor. Once we all got on the bus from the gangway, we had to go through the gate. Here, we had to stop the bus and an officer had to come on and check our passports. After that, we drove a little over an hour to a place outside of Chennai where we got to see a local village. We were taken inside the school, the place where they sewed clothes, and the medical clinic. Luckily, they were all the same building, each just separated by a wall.

We spent about twenty minutes interacting with the kids. Ashley was having a ball but Mike and I weren’t the biggest fans of small children. After going through that, we got see where the town had its dump and how they used their waste to fertilize plants. It was about dinner time when we left the village. We got back to the ship around 6. I ate with Mike, Kyle, and Jess and since they hadn’t booked anything for China, they were looking to find an internet café in order to make some plans together. So I decided to tag along with them just for something to do.

We got to ride in a rickshaw on the way to the internet café. Oh, I forgot to mention the lack of sanity that people have while behind the wheel. Street signs and traffic lights, yeah people ignore them flat out. If theres a possible way for someone to pass you, they will, not to mention the constant honking every three seconds, no exaggeration. I think people in India believe to signal that they're passing, they honk. But then again, I guess they need to since they ignore the marks on the road. The whole driving experience was maximized by driving in a small contraption with 3 wheels and absolutely no protection. It was a thrill, in the bad kind of way.

After getting back from the internet café, I debated until 1 in the morning whether I should sleep before my trip to Agra left at 4. I decided to take a nap and then sleep on the plane. Because airport security was very tight, we were not allowed to carry on liquids so for the 44 of us, there was a small bag that we had to squeeze all of our liquids into. Once they figured out that we couldn’t manage, we realized we needed to have second bag to check. I took a risk bringing on my camera battery, cell phone battery, and laptop battery. ISE suggested that all external batteries be checked, but I thought that was BS so I kept my stuff and I made through security fine.

We flew into New Delhi and once we got there, we hopped right on a tour bus to go and see where Gandhi was cremated. That was another thing I noticed. Gandhi seemed to be everywhere. He was on every form of paper currency and I must have seen four or five statues of him. The place where he was cremated was surrounded by gardens and there was a flame burning near what looked like a marble table. We had to take off our shoes in order to walk around the interior of the gardens. After seeing that, we got to eat lunch at a place that had the best vanilla ice cream I have ever had. Luckily, that’s where we were getting our boxed lunch for the train to Agra. After getting lunch we got to go site seeing around New Delhi.

There really wasn’t anything too interesting to see until two days later when we would get a whole tour of the city. At 5:00, we headed for the train station and once we got through security, we were notified that our train was delayed two and a half hours, so the guide decided that taking the bus on a 5 hour drive would be quicker, so that’s what we did. I slept for most of the ride but along the way there were multiple weddings. You could tell they were weddings because they were huge parties with what looked like Christmas lights, blasting music, and people dancing. Apparently March is a popular month for people to get married. Once we got to the hotel, I tried to get the internet working but it cost money. The hotel was five stars by Indian standards and pretty good by my standards. I ended up watching Robocop 3 until around two and fell asleep right after.

We got a 5:45 wakeup call in order to be at the Taj Mahal for sunrise. The hotel was luckily only about a mile away. We arrived at the east gate at around 6:15, just as the sun was coming up. Once I walked in, I was in awe. It looked exactly like every picture that I had seen of it, almost like I was standing in front a backdrop. Immediately people around me started taking pictures, as did I. I think I must have taken 100 pictures of the same thing. After we walked around and got plenty of pictures, we had to take off our shoes in order to go inside to see Sha Jahan and his wife’s tomb. The outside far surpassed the inside, but the inside was still pretty amazing.

We headed back to the hotel at around 8:30 and got breakfast which was surprisingly good. They had pancakes, eggs, bacon, french toast, and a chef that would make any omelet that you wanted. After breakfast, we got to go on the tour of the city. We got to see Agra Fort and a palace made of red sandstone. I had a kid about my age guide me around and tell me about everything. I was with him for about ten minutes and at the end, he asked me for a tip. I said I didn’t have anything, so he asked me for my watch, but I said no.

Everywhere I went, people seemed to think I was rich because I was white. We headed back to the Taj at about 5:00 in order to catch it at sunset. It was much more crowded then the morning. It was kind of depressing to leave one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, but then I remembered that I’d be seeing the Great Wall in a few weeks, so I felt better about that. After the Taj, we headed to the train station for our express train back to New Delhi. Once there, we checked into our hotel and I finally broke down and bought two hours of internet, which I spent skyping.

The next day, we got to wake up at 8:30 which was so much better than the morning before. Breakfast again was great. The hotel was very Americanized, just like the last. We got taken on a whole tour of the city. During the tour, we visited two temples. One of which, we had to cover our heads with a turban or scarf like cloth and take off our shoes and socks in order to enter. The shrine inside was gold and there were three men singing and playing drums while people were kneeling down and kissing the floor. It was pretty cool to see. the second shrine was very similar to the first, but this time, I got a lea of flowers and a red dot on my forehead between my eyes. I could break off a flower and lay it in front of the statue of the god that I wanted to make an offering to, so I did. I wasn’t sure which god meant what, but I didn’t have any flowers when we left the temple.

We then went to a bazaar in order to shop. We had two hours to buy things, but my friend Lee and I decided to go to a local bar to get some drinks and try to figure out the game of cricket. It was kind of strange because the sign said that we needed to be 25 to drink, but we weren’t carded or even looked at twice. In fact, the man who looked like a security guard sitting outside opened the door for us to let us in. Lee and I ended up splitting a pitcher of beer and my first ever pitcher of mojitos. We left for the airport at around 6 for our 9:15 flight. The New Delhi airport was very nice, and they had a Subway! I went straight for it and realized that there was a vegetarian line and a non vegetarian line, quite interesting. It was quite what I expected, but it was still nice to have something that reminded me of home. We ended up getting back to the ship at around 1:00 in the morning and I was so nice to finally see my bed.

The next day was kind of a relaxed day. I slept in until 11 and met up with Erica and Nate for lunch and we went to a hookah bar/ internet café. This was my first hookah bar I had ever been to. I wasn’t really a fan of it, but the wifi was free so I didn’t complain. We spent most of the afternoon there and I just took the rest of the night easy on the ship. On Friday, I met up with Erica, Jack and a few other people and we all went to the train station to catch a train to Mambalam, where we tried to spend some extra rupees. Erica was on my Agra trip and she kept making noise about getting a pair of Indian pants. She ended up getting four pairs for around twenty dollars American. There really wasn’t too much else that happened on Friday. Leaving India was kind of depressing though. Like I said, India is definitely my favorite country so far.

Fort Agra

Taj mahal

Mauritius

Today was Mauritius. We got into port sometime before eight and the immigration officers were coming on board just as I was walking by the gangway, which was on deck two. I figured I'd get ahead of everyone and wait at the faculty and staff lounge in order to get cleared for immigration. When I got there, I ran into Mike and his friend and we went out on the seventh deck to get some pictures. Luckily, only people whose ID’s were 600-999 had to go through a face-to-face clearance for immigration, so because I was on an SAS trip that left early, we got to leave the boat first.On the way to the dock, I saw Katie and met Jamie from Alaska and Carol, who signs for the deaf girl on the ship. We talked on the way to the dock, which was about a 45-minute ride.

The island was beautiful, super natural almost. Mountains everywhere and plenty of sugar cane fields. Once we got to the port, all of us got onto the catamaran, which was about 50 feet long. There were only about twenty of us so it was not that crammed. After we sailed for a while, we got to the place where we tied up and then we went snorkeling for half an hour. The snorkeling looked very similar to Dominica. Now I have to write 1500 words on exactly what I saw in Dominica. Not sure how I’m going to pull that off just yet, but I have class tomorrow so I’ll ask my professor then. But anyway, after snorkeling, we sailed just off the coast to a beach and then were tendered in by a large dink to the shoreline. A group of us walked along the coastline for a while until we decided to go in the water, which was only about two feet deep. The whole atmosphere was like a giant bathtub. Carol, her girl, and Jamie all made friends and had a few drinks, so when they came back to the dink an hour later, they were kind of drunk.

When we got back to the Catamaran, we started to head back to the port. I felt that the day flew by and since we only had from around 8:30 in the morning until 6 at night, there really wasn’t too much else we could do here. Once we pulled up to the dock in our bus, I noticed that someone was being taken out of the ship in a wheelchair. When they got closer to us, I realized that it was Dylan. He was not responding to anything the crew and medical staff were doing and he looked quite pale. He got carried into a car and then the car drove off. It was really scary.

After I talked to people, I heard that he had been drinking all day on the beach and then when he realized he had an hour left before they needed to go, he went to the bar and started drinking as much as he could, not exactly the smartest thing to do. I was also told that on the way back, he was throwing up in the shuttle and that before he was wheeled out, he collapsed on the ship. Its 7:32 and we still haven’t been given notice about an extended stay, and we haven’t heard anything about Dylan’s condition. I hope everything turns out ok.

Port Louis

Catamaran in Mauritius.

South Africa

South Africa was amazing. Even though we arrived a day late, it was still so much fun. Some of the trips that were through SAS were canceled, including two safaris. I’m not sure if those people are going to get refunded either. We arrived in port at about 10:45 on Friday. Immigration had to do a face-to-face clearance of everyone before anyone could get off the ship. Luckily, my tour was able to get another flight and I didn’t have to leave the ship until 2:30 so I relaxed until then.

Cape Town airport was very much like any American airport, which surprised me. The city itself was like home. Our flight was at 5:00pm, so Brett, Jack and I decided to walk around the airport until our flight. The flight was about 2 hours to Durban. After the flight, we had a three-hour van ride to the lodge where we stayed.

The accommodations were very modern too. We had to walk down a dirt road in order get to our place. There were seven small houses, each with 2 separate areas and 2 beds. My roommate’s name was Andrew and he was a cool guy. After we dropped our stuff off, we wandered further down the dirt road to check out the bar and lounge. Everyone was there relaxing. I ended up going to sleep at around 1:30 in the morning.

The next morning came way too soon. We had to meet in the front of the lodge at 5:30 in the morning. It really wasn’t all too bad, but it was still a little rough getting up. The reserve was about twenty minutes away from where we stayed. Our guide’s name was Tom, an older man but a funny guy.

Throughout the day, we saw zebra, giraffe, water buffalo, elephants, antelope, and rhinos. We didn’t get to see any lions or leopard though, I was sad. We were fortunate enough to see about 80 elephants crossing a river, it was an incredible sight to see. We also got the experience almost being attacked by one. Right before we stopped for lunch, we came across a bull elephant in “must”, which basically means that it’s horny and can’t do anything about it. But apparently the males get very moody when they’re in this state. Of course, he was leaning against a tree about two feet off the road that we had to drive on. So we started slowly inching closer and he started making growling sounds until we got close enough to him that he actually swung his trunk at us and nearly hit the jeep. I almost shit my pants to be honest, but he didn’t follow us after that. We headed back to the lodge at about four in the afternoon. I decided to take nap until dinner at six. We had some sort of stew that was very good. I decided to go to bed early that night so I wouldn’t be tired tomorrow.

On Sunday, we had to be at breakfast at 8:30. Breakfast for me consisted of toast and croissants, which were excellent. We left the lodge at around 10 and got to the airport at 1:15. Our flight was at 2:30 so we didn’t have to wait too long at all. I decided to take the night easy after we got back to the ship, so I found a wifi spot and talked to some people from home.

On Monday, I slept in until around 11:30 because I had my animal whispers tour at 1:15. Lindsay, who also goes to QU, and I stuck together for the duration of the tour. It was about half an hour outside of the city to get to the place. Once we got there, we saw cheetahs in their enclosures. I immediately felt bad for them. After we saw a video on basic information about cheetahs, we were allowed to pet one. Once we walked outside, one was sitting on a table purring his head off. His name was Chobey and he was a 21 month old male and weighed about 60 kilos, which was slightly larger than average. He felt like pure muscle, there wasn’t a single ounce of fat that I felt on him. His spots were also a finer hair than the rest of what he had on his body, which gave them a three dimensional texture.

After the cheetah encounter, we were shown some other smaller cats like servals and black backed jackals, but we didn’t get to pet them. Then, we went to the birds of prey part of the center. We were all given gloves to hold the birds. The first bird brought out was a kite, which looked very similar to an eagle, but was smaller. The next two birds brought out were owls; one was a barn owl and the other was a spotted horned owl. The barn owl had piercing yellow eyes. The third bird brought out was an eagle named Sky. We didn’t get to hold him because he was too big of a bird. Apparently, he was an ambitious hunter as well. The trainer said that Sky, weighing only 1-kilo, was going after 25-kilo antelope.

The next birds brought out were vultures, and they were huge. Their wingspan was 2.3 meters. They were so big, they needed a running start in order fly. After the bird encounters, we walked about five minutes away to a winery to taste some wine. We all got to try 2 red wines and a white wine. All of them were good.

A little later, Ashley, Katie, Taylor, Lindsay, Caitlyn, and I all decided to go out to this place called Quay Four to get something to eat. They offered the same stuff an Applebee’s has. After we all ate, we went this club called Mercury, where we saw a lot of SAS students. After we spent about an hour and a half there, we went back to the ship. Right as we got to the ship gate, Ashley realized that she lost her wallet, which had her credit card, debit card, license, and ship ID. She had paid the cab driver from her wallet so we knew it was in a taxi. So the two of us ended up spending 2 hours looking from taxi to taxi trying to find it. Luckily, someone from SAS picked it up and brought it back to the ship. It was about 4:15 when we finally got back to the harbor for the night.

The next morning was quite difficult to handle. I got up at 8:15 in order to go to Table Mountain with Katie and Taylor. When we got up to the cable car place, we found out that they were closed because the wind was too strong. So after waiting about 15 minutes to see if they would open, we decided to just go back to the harbor and shop around a little. We ate a place called Mitchell’s, which had one of the best chicken fajitas I’ve ever had. Because I was so tired from last night, I decided to head back to the ship at around 2:30 and I took a nap until 5:00. We were lucky enough to leave port when the sun was setting. I think I took around 150 pictures within a 30 minutes time span. The sunset was a beautiful backdrop for the harbor as we left.

Table Mountain from the back of the boat.

Cape Town Int. Airport

MV Explorer route waiting to get into Cape Town Harbor

Harbor with boat in the background

Cape Town South Africa

The ship was scheduled to arrive on Thursday Feb 17th at 8 am. Due to high winds we were not able to dock until noon on Friday Feb 18th.

Ghana

On Sunday, we made port in Takoradi. It was hot and humid and there was a very distinct smell in the air. Sometimes the wind blew and it smelled like shit, but I couldn’t be sure. We got into the Mercedes bus that had very upright seats. They weren’t the most comfortable thing in the world for sure.

On the way to Winneba, there were brush fires along the side of the road. One was only a few hundred feet from a gas station. People were carrying stuff on their heads too, very much like pictures and movies. There were people who had nothing but shacks. When we stopped to pass certain boarders, people would try to sell us bagged food and water from outside of the bus.

Once we got to Winneba, we gathered at the welcome center where we had a greeting party of people. Included were members of the local government and a chief that did not speak English. A libation in twi was made in our honor to make sure we had a safe time in Winneba.

The hotel that we checked into was a lot better than the surrounding dwellings of people. There was only one bed and there were 2 of us to a room. The voltage of the outlets was 220v so we had to use a converter. Dinner consisted of spicy rice, chicken, French fries, and chewy salad.

After dinner, we went to the south campus of the University of Education at Winneba. Once there, we were greeted by the mayor of Winneba and a choir that sang for us. The lecture hall had what looked like seats from movie theaters. Throughout the whole time there, students sang and danced for us. Then, a group of older men in what looked like green togas played for us and people from the school began dancing. After that performance, students played what they call highlife music, which every student from SAS got up and danced to. Music is very much a part of their culture and entertainment.

When we left the lecture hall, we got to talk to the students that went to the school. There was a small barrier of communication because their English was not the best, but I understood that the guy’s name was Kofe and he seemed pretty cool. After we got back to the hotel, people were looking for a place to watch the super bowl. A guy at the hotel said that there was a bar down the road which turned out to be really awesome. We got a bus ride there, and the bar had a 30 foot projection screen which was unbelievable to find in Ghana. Their porch was outside and the weather was impeccable.

The next morning, we had breakfast across the street from the hotel. They had crepes and omelets which weren’t bad at all. After eating, we were taken to a different campus of the College of Education at Winneba. This part specialized in arts and theater, again, the students there performed for us and danced. I was grabbed by the hand to dance with a girl who later gave me her email address and phone number. After that, the group of us went to the market which was about two minutes walk away from the campus. I saw a group of people trying to get a picture with someone’s small girl, and they loved it. After that, we all walked back to the bus and it took us back to Takoradi. It was a tiring couple of days.

The past two days were pretty fun. Yesterday, Mike and a group of his friends decided to go to the market, so I tagged along. On the way out of the port, we were followed by people trying to make and sell us things. One pair of guys followed us for a solid 10 minutes before I said my name was Wilbert and he could make a bracelet for me. It was scorching hot outside that day. I was sweating pretty badly. When we finally got into town, we all wandered through the market. People seemed to be selling the same thing at every other stand. Beans, fruits, nuts, peppers, everything. I had one lady call me over because she saw my camera and then she asked me for money. I only said I had my camera, and she asked me to give her that. She started laughing after that of course, but I still felt bad for her.

After leaving that, we were a bit confused trying to find the way back to where we came from. We must have passed the same people at least three times. Many of them were friendly, waving, and asking if we were from America. I think there was a general assumption that all of us were rich because we were white and from America. We went to a grocery store where I could finally get water because I was dying of thirst. After that, we all tried to go to an internet café, but the taxi we got took us to the wrong place. So after getting a van, we were taken to the Vodafone main café where it was air conditioned and very nicely set up with about 30 computers. When we were there, this little girl tried to pull a chair up next to me when I was video chatting with sister. It was really funny; sister wasn’t sure if she was a girl a guy and kept calling her he and him. Of course Mike took plenty of pictures.

As for today, it was a really good time. My friend Scott was wiped from last night though. I got on the bus and saw him in the back laying down and I could tell he had a rough night. This bus was at least air conditioned, unlike the bus to Winneba.

Once we got to the community center, people were already drumming. We got there and 7 people were drumming while one girl was dancing. After they stopped, we clapped and because it was drizzling, everyone moved under a sheltered area. We were then shown 5 traditional African dances. One of which required the men to dress up and dance like girls. It was really funny, but apparently they do it help girls become beautiful when they reach puberty. Another dance was a simple rain dance, but it was still pretty amazing. During one dance, a guy came out walking on his hands and he did some pretty amazing things. He could do a split and walk around on his hands with his legs open, and he could easily stick his leg behind is head when he was standing. After they were done performing, we learned how to dance and sing they way they did.

Locals were watching us from outside of the gate and some were dancing with us while others were smiling. We learned two songs, one incantation was jelly-goobera-san-wan-man-na, that was the one I liked the most. After learning and practicing, the drummers did one more song and I was once again pulled to dance by some girl, except we were the only two dancing for awhile. It was a lot of fun, but it was exercise.

After dancing, we went to lunch at a hotel nearby. I had rice and chicken, which didn’t seem like a typical meal in Takoradi, but I didn’t complain. When we went back to the community center, we learned another song and how to drum to it. Kids ended up coming in from outside and singing with us. It looked like a scene from an SAS video. One that you never think would happen, but it did. They were very welcoming and let us take pictures of them. In the end, we got to dance and sing for them. After that, we got loaded on the bus and headed back to the ship. It was a lot of fun and even though I was required to do it, I had a really great time.

Kevin using Skype at the internet cafe

13 year old Susananh helping Kevin.

Internet Cafe in Ghana

Ghana marketplace

Sea Olympics

        Today was the day of the Sea Olympics. I’m on the second deck so that makes me part of the Aegean Sea. There are ten seas all together; Aegean, Red, Yellow, Baltic, Caribbean, Mediterranean, Arabian, Bering, Luna (faculty and dependants), and Sea Salts(lifelong learners). Last night we had the opening ceremonies, where each sea displayed their banner and showed off the cheer/chant. These were the first two events that would be judged. We had practiced our cheer as a sea for around half an hour before we were called up to the union, so we were feeling confident. Since the Aegean Sea is located between Turkey and Greece, our mascot was the turkey greaser. Our motto was Boom, because our chant went along with some Nelly song that said boom a lot. Anyway, we ended up getting 3rd place with our banner and 3rd place for our cheer.
        Today was nuts. At around 930 in the morning, the voice came on and said that there was a reschedule for events because it had rained all of last night and the deck was wet. So instead of dodge ball, it was musical chairs. Instead of volleyball, it was balloon volleyball, and most events had changes in time.
I woke up at around 1130, ate lunch with Kyle and Mike, who are both in the Baltic Sea. Of course we poked and prodded each other about who was the better sea. They both had signed up for Trivia, which was based on the voyager’s handbook, SAS information, and general random trivia. As we were eating, an announcement was made that dodge ball was going to be played on the court. So apparently the courts were dry enough to play on, which was good news for me because I did not want to play balloon volleyball. So after lunch, Kyle and Mike went to study for trivia, and I went to check out the synchronized swimming.
The event started at 1 and when I got there around 1255, the pool was mobbed. Our team was very dedicated because they were up the past two mornings at 6 in order to practice. I barely got to see the yellow sea do their routine which was first. After not being able to see the sea salts, which was second, I decided to go support dodge ball. When I got there, we were playing the purple team, which was the Bering Sea. We ended up beating them, but then losing in the following round to the Yellow Sea. I decided to stay and watch the other teams play it out before heading back to the synchronized swimming. I just barely missed my team’s event, but we ended up placing second so im guessing that everyone’s dedication paid off. I decided to go back to the basketball court to watch SAS basketball, which was like horse, but instead of H-O-R-S-E it was S-A-S, original right? Aegean ended up taking second in that too. Then volleyball was the next event. Aegean vs. Mediterranean was the last game in the preliminaries. Some of the teams were really good. I was convinced people played for their college, which made me feel pretty bad. When it was Aegean Sea’s turn, my partner Steph and I ended up losing 11-4 once it was over. I was pretty embarrassed but my teammates picked me up.
By this time, it was around 4 in the afternoon. After the game, the Aegean Sea people at the court decided to go to the main dining hall where dress your LLC was taking place. Oh, the LLC is basically our RA for our sea, or hallway. In this event, each LLC takes a slip of paper from a hat and each slip has an identity and they have to be dressed like what the slip says. One slip had Michael Jackson, one was Lady Gaga, one was an American tourist, and there were other funny ones. We had to dress Dustin, our LLC as a pirate. After the identity was drawn, people from each sea had to run back to their cabin to grab appropriate clothes to dress their LLC. I lent Dustin my white dress shirt. He ended up wearing eye shadow, a peg leg, hook, a parrot on his shoulder, tattoos, sharpied out teeth, a box of captain crunch dangling from his belt, a wig, and a bandana. I have no idea how someone had a wooden parrot, but it came in handy. Needless to say, we got first place in that event.
After all was said and done, Baltic placed third, Aegean placed second, and Red placed first. That means that red gets off in San Diego first, Aegean gets off second, and Baltic gets off third. I’m not sure how SAS sorts the order for the other seas. Today was a very full day, my throat is raspy and I’m exhausted and it’s only 945 at night. I’d say playing Olympic Games on a boat traveling around the world is a pretty memorable day in my book. Definitely won’t forget this one. We’ll be making landfall in 3 days, then no class for 5 days! But for now, I have to go to sleep so I can get up tomorrow and study for my world religions test.

Ghana Bound

Well on our way to Ghana. I still haven't really haven’t been able to wrap my mind around the fact that I’m going around the world, or that my next stop will be in Africa. I just got back from a sea meeting about the Sea Olympics. A sea is pretty much a deck or a certain number of rooms, for instance the Baltic Sea, Black Sea, and I’m part of the Aegean Sea. I have 72 people in my sea. The sea Olympics is very much like Olympic day from elementary school. It’s going to be held on February 3rd when there is no class and every sea will compete in are around fifteen events like three legged race, trivia, dodge ball, basketball, crab soccer, and even synchronized swimming. I signed up for volleyball so hopefully I can make it past tryouts because there are a lot of in the sea and only two people can play in volleyball. Oh, the water filtration system wasn’t really working its best today, so all the water on the ship has a salty tinge to it. That means shower water, tap water, water they serve, and even the water machine in the garden lounge. It’s almost unbearable, but if you drink it fast, you can almost get it down without dry heaving. As far as classes go, there really hasn’t been too much work. I must say, I thought I was going to be swamped with work but so far, the academic side of this voyage is more or less lacking. I’ll probably end up eating those words later. I also heard that in while on a trip in Manaus, people got scratched by a monkey and had to end up getting rabies shots. I’ll be sure to let you know if I see someone foaming at the mouth. I saw some flying fish for the first time today, it was pretty cool. They jump maybe about a foot out of the water and then spread what looks liked wings and glide a few inches above the surface of the water for anywhere from 3 to 10 seconds. It’s actually really cool to see 4 or 5 of them do it all at once. I tried to get pictures and videos, but it’s kind of difficult. That was my entertainment for today between classes. Not much else is going around the ship. Plenty of rocking and rolling, which makes me tired. I'm losing an hour of sleep tonight too so I'm going to go to sleep.

Rio de Janeiro

So it all started after I got back from the tropical hotel on the 23rd. I was the first one in the union for our Rio like a Native trip. Everyone else started to pile in and I realized I didn’t know any of them except Amanda who later became my buddy. Once everyone was accounted for, we all got on a bus and went to Manaus International Airport. A lot of people were tired and many people were sleeping on the ground and using their backpack as a pillow. After the first flight I was pretty tired. It was about 3 and half hours long and I didn’t get too much sleep. The second flight was about an hour long. It was very sunny once we got off in Rio. We met our tour guide named Rodrigo who reminded me of the main character for the movie Despicable Me. Once we boarded the bus, Rodrigo started to talk about the history of Rio. I don’t remember what exactly he said because I was so tired, but I remember him saying that 11 million people live in the greater Rio area. He also referred to the city as Rio Janeiro, not Rio de Janeiro. But anyway, the bus took us to Copacabana beach where we had breakfast at Nescafe Kiosk which was really good. They had all sorts of bread, cheese and meat to make breakfast sandwiches. After that, we were supposed to go on a bike tour of Copacabana but I was quite exhausted so I decided to head right back to the hotel, as did Andrew and a few lifelong learners. We stayed at the Windsor plaza a few blocks down from Copacabana palace and the beach. After meeting my roommates, we all met in the hotel lobby to go on a jeep tour through a favela. The jeeps that took us to the favela stood out quite a bit. It was pretty obvious that we were tourists. Rio is situated very strangely. Unlike you would expect, all of the rich people live near the beach and towards center city while all of the poor people who live in favelas are high up in the hills with great views. Once we got to the top of the favela, the view of Rio was breath taking. Surprisingly, all of the inhabitants of the favela were very welcoming. They would wave and say hi to us as we walked by their homes. Rodrigo said that they were proud that people from all over the world would come and visit their favela as opposed to another. Many of the houses were basic shacks, yet most of them had satellite and a decent sized TV. Once we got to the bottom, we needed to wait for the other group to come down. On the way back to the hotel, the driver of our jeep bought a jack fruit from someone on the side of the road while we were stopped at a red light. It was kind of sweet; I thought it was pretty good. Once we got back to the hotel, me and Andrew (not the same Andrew that I met earlier) decided to buy a bottle of Bacardi and drink a little before we went out to dinner with Stevie, the other Andrew, Malachi, Jamie, and Bryan. We went to a restaurant a few blocks away from the hotel. I got a beer and Caesar salad with filet mignon, which was really good. The total was 27 reals, which is around 15 dollars American. After going back to the hotel with everyone, we decided to drink a little more and then wander down towards the beach to find a bar. We weren’t the only ones either. I think it was agreed that everyone did the same. The bar that we ended up going to was filled with old men, and hookers along with little kids wandering around and trying to sell gum and small candy bars. I ended up deciding to go across the street to a beach bar where it was cheaper and a lot less crowded. It was probably one of the greatest moments to be able to relax on Copacabana beach with people my age. The city was beautiful at night. I ended up walking back with Jasmine, Jamie, and Andrew and went to sleep around 1:20. The next day, kyle, my other roommate from Boston, enlightened me to the fact that he tried to bring two hookers back last night but got stopped at the door to the hotel. Not really thing most sanitary thing I would have done. The next morning, we all met in the hotel lobby to get on the bus and take us to the Sugar Loaf Mountains. The first mountain we hiked up but some people, mostly lifelong learners, decided to take the cable car. It wasn’t too bad of a hike compared to Sleeping Giant Mountain. Once we got to the top, the view was incredible. You could see the city for miles and miles. I didn’t realize how big Rio was before I got to the top. Then we took the second cable car up and the view from there was even better. A 360 degree view of the city of Rio and the ocean. After taking the cable car back down the mountain, almost everyone signed out and claimed independence from the percussion class in order to spend a day at the beach. Andrew and I decided to have some Bacardi before we went so we relaxed on Copacabana beach for around an hour before getting dinner at a restaurant across the street from Windsor. At this restaurant, the waiter spoke French better than English so I ordered in French and actually got what I wanted; who would have thought French class could have paid off. After dinner, Rodrigo told us to go to the top of the Windsor for a surprise before we went sambaing. Once Andrew and I got there, the bartender gave us free drinks along with everyone else on SAS. Once we got to the samba club, we all ordered more drinks and some people got dinner, and then we hit the dance floor. I didn’t know how to samba, so I watched people before I asked Amanda to dance with me. We both had no idea what we were doing but it was so much fun. Then Amanda didn’t want to dance any more, but I still did, so I danced with Sarah. When she didn’t want to dance any more, I danced with Liz. After Liz had enough, I danced with Alex. When Alex was tired, I danced with Carter. I think I learned that when I drink, I like to samba. After we left the samba club, people were going out to other clubs, but I went to sleep at around 1:30. The next day, we all met in the lobby again at 9 and got into two separate buses to go to see Christ the Redeemer on Corcovado Mountain. We arrived at a train station at around 10, but it wasn’t your typical train, more like a slower monorail. It took us up to the top of the mountain, right at the feet of the Christ Redeemer statue. The view from there was better than the view from the Sugar Loaf Mountains. I don’t know what combination of words I have to say in order to give that view justice. Once we took the train back down, we all went to a smaller beach called Prainha. It was about an hour drive, but worth it. The water and the waves were great. I ended up throwing a Frisbee the whole time with Kyle, Brian, David, Hacob, Amy and two Brazilian kids that were around ten years old. It was a perfect ending for my time in Rio.

Rio - January 26

Christ the Redeemer Statue on Corcovado mountain.

View from the mountain.

Manus Brazil January 23

Picture from ship in Port of Manus.

Manaus Tomorrow!

I didn’t have class today, so what did I do? Lay out in the sun of course! it was around 80 degrees and humid, comparable to a cool summer day in Florida. Classes have been going great. Global studies has been a breeze so far. I was assigned to a group of 7 total people and we need to make a PowerPoint presentation surrounding the theme of HIV as it relates to locals in South Africa. Aside from that, no work outside of class. International business is turning out to be pretty easy as well. My professor is from the University of Florida and he seems really cool. We have only had to read outside of coming to class. The big project requires us, working alone, to come up with a product that would sell well in any port that we visit. He hasn’t told any details past that, so hopefully it’s nothing too hard. My world religions class is interesting. My professor is a very…spiritual guy, but knowledgeable nonetheless. We’re required to do 3 FDP’s (faculty directed practica) and write a 750-1000 word paper for each one expressing our opinion about the religion that we learned about and what we thought of the port itself, all of which are due towards the end of the voyage, which isn’t too much to ask for by any means. My human effects on the coastal systems class is quite a bitch though. My professor is great, but the work load is a little overwhelming. We’re required to do 3 FDPs and write a 1500-2000 word paper on each FDP about what we did, what kind of system it was, and basic threats that system is exposed to, and each paper is due two days after we leave the port the FDP was in. Plus, we have to individually make a 10 minute presentation which is due towards the end of the semester. A little much for now, but manageable. My music class seems like it’s going to be pretty easy. My professor is a crazy older Indian guy with a thick Indian accent, but he seems really cool. He shared his first Grateful Dead concert experience with us during the first class. He told us how his roommate showed up in their apartment with his girlfriend, explained to him that they were doing LSD and how to get to the concert, and then how he was engulfed in a smog of marijuana smoke when they arrived. But anyway, we’re only required to do 2 FDPs and write at least 1000 words each about anything involving the music we learned about in port. That can include what type it was, how we thought it sounded, what instruments were being played, how the instruments were made, anything like that. But no real outside work for that class aside from reading. Well, think I’ve explained my academic situation thoroughly enough, hope you’re happy mom. The Roommate situation is great. We don’t see too much of each other but when we do, we get along pretty well. Oh, did I mention he’s gay?  I think I’ve brought this up to date well enough. Tomorrow is Manaus and I’ve got all day to explore before my flight to Rio! Definitely should be a good time. I’ll try to update this  as much as I can in Rio.

The Amazon

The title pretty much says it all. I woke up this morning and I was in the Amazon River. I remember learning about it back in elementary school, all the shit saying it was a mile wide and everything, but it’s entirely different when you’re in it. I can look to one side and see trees in detail, but when I look to other side, I can barely see the coast. The water is the same color as mud, completely opaque. I’m fortunate enough to be enjoying near 80 degree temperatures at 5:30 in the evening. Hope this weather lasts for awhile. The day after we left Dominica, the seas were extremely rough. It was pretty entertaining to see the parade of people walking out of my global studies class with their hand over their mouth or a nauseous look on their face. Plus watching them actually walk out was hilarious. We have a different speaker every time we have class. today’s speaker was, well bland. She talked about the economically stand point of the “global south” or third world countries. It was educational, but dry. The speaker before her was very active in helping young girls from Naipaul stay in school instead of being sold into slavery. He was a psychologist that wrote and published over eighty books so he knew a thing or two. His presentation was a lot better than the one today. Aside from all of that, there’s really nothing to do on the ship after class aside from work, eat, sleep, talk or watch one of 6 channels on tv. Only a few days until we get in Manaus, then off to Rio!

Dominica

Dominica was a blast. We got into port at around 8 in the morning. I met up with my friend Kyle and we went exploring. We ended up going to the Botanical Gardens, which had some awesome trees. Then we found a trail (Jack's Walk) which took us up to the top of a hill where you could see the whole town of Roseau. After that, we met up with some friends and took a cab to these huge waterfalls (Trafalger Falls) one of which had a pool at the bottom that you can swim in, pretty freakin amazing.

Today, (Monday Jan 17)I got to go snorkeling in Champagne Reef. Got to see all kinds of stuff. Just got back on the ship and I'm really tired. All in all, pretty great first port. Still 100 days left, can't wait to see what else I encounter.

Sunday Jan 16 - Dominica

Just wanted to let you know classes are all good. My music teacher is pretty funny and my human effects on the costal system prof seems prettty good too. Looks like theres gonna be a lot of work so I'll be kinda busy when I'm at sea.

Got into Dominica at around 8 this morning. It's around 11:55 and I'm just about to head out with Kyle B.

(posted for Kevin)

Friday - Jan 14

Stopped in Puerto Rico to take on fuel. Here is shot of fuel ship. Took my first malaria pill - ship made a big deal about it. Boat has been rocking a lot. I'm ok but a lot of people are getting sick. Haven't seen anyone get sick but I have seen lots of spots. I'm fine just tired all the time.

Food is kinda crappy already. I've already been into my snacks. Classes are fine. I have my first B day of classes tomorrow. Hopefully they're cool.

Checked out the back of the picture on my wall - "Theres some good shit on the back of our painting"

(posted for Kevin)

Thursday Jan 13

Been in meetings all day. First day of class is tomorrow. I'm prety excited. Met some more people. Been spending a lot of time with Kyle who goes to Bently and is from New York. We are already an hour ahead. (posted for Kevin)

Wed Jan 12 - On the Ship

Just got my email setup. Its free so you can email the whole time if you so desire. Eveything is cool. Met a few people from the Philly area. One girl went to Souderton, another from West Chester and group of guys from King of Prusssia. I'll keep you updated. Gotta go to sleep early, so I'm gonna hit the sack. (Posted for Kevin)

MV Explorer sendoff from Nassau

It was an emotional evening for many parents as the MV Explorer set sail for it's 104 day Semester at Sea journey around the globe. Many parents stood on the pier as the ship broke port and sailed out of sight for it's next port-of-call in Dominica.

Congratulations and good luck Kevin -- Michelle, Mom and I hope you have a fantastic voyage and many great experiences. We'll see you in 104 days in San Diego.

Dad

On board

The boat is a bit confusing right now but I'm sure that will change. My roommate seems pretty cool so I'm pretty happy about that. The room is pretty small and I still have yet to fully unpack. I think were leaving port at 6 because of the people who were delayed by the snow storms. Kind of bittersweet but I know I'm going to have a lot of fun.