Ship Life

It's been a long few days here in the middle of the ocean. We've been lucky to have smooth seas the whole way. Today it is very rainy, cloudy, and stormy. There was so much lightning last night yet the water was really calm. 

 

Yesterday (Thursday) was a reading day and Sea Olympics. Each hallway is divided into a sea!

 

Caribbean (My Sea!) is orange

Agean Sea is navy blue

Baltic Sea is light blue

Bearing Sea is purple

Yellow Sea is yellow

Arabian Sea is black

Red Sea is Red

Mediterranean Sea is green

Luna Sea (Faculty and Staff) is pink

Sea Salts (Life Long Learners) is white

 

The sea that won the sea olympics gets to get off the ship first in San Diego. The Red Sea won first and we ended up coming in fourth.

 

Sea Olympics was really cool...events included synchronized swimming, spoon races, crab soccer, basketball, volleyball, dodgeball, trivia, tug of war, crew suit races, card stacking, dress your LLC, banner contest, and chanting contest. The synchronized swimming was the best!!! The Sea Salts had five elderly men in their mid 80's in the pool area wearing white shirts and shorts. They were also wearing their bright orange life jackets. When the music began they dropped their shorts and had on speedos underneath...the eldest guy must have forgotten about this part so when he dropped his pants he had some nice white undies on. Then they got in the pool and basically did swim lessons in sync. It was so funny! All the other seas did a great job as well...it was a lot of fun to watch. The day ended with a BBQ dinner which was delicious!!!! I felt like I was eating normal American food again! Burgers, hot dogs, and cheeseburgers with corn on the cob, potato salad, and baked beans. So YUMMY!

 

As we continue to get closer and closer to Africa, it gets hotter and hotter! Everyone is listening to songs with the word Africa in the lyrics....we're all so excited! Just as we are all getting into the swing of things we're going to arrive in Ghana and then we'll have to do it all over again!

 

There are many rumors around the ship like:

We run out of peanut butter by the end of the voyage

20 people left the voyage

There is a Taco night

They kick you off the ship if you get pregnant

They kick you off if you fail classes

There are no more bananas until Ghana

They grind up the left over food and dump it in the ocean

The drinking water will be salty for the remainder of the voyage (Thank God that's not true)

 

I've noticed that the later you stay up...the better conversation gets. Since we don't have computers to constantly stare at and facebook to be on, instead we actually get to know the people around us and have some great conversations! But these usually happen late at night so you have to juggle sleep with conversation! I've been getting lots of sleep lately. Losing an hour every other day is no fun! We are losing another hour tonight so we wil be five hours ahead of New York! It's crazy! And then to think when we arrive in San Diego we'll be three hours behind New York!

 

Classes are going well...mostly projects which is annoying. I think I enjoy the actual class part a lot better at Miami. I feel like I learn way more. Here, the focus isn't so much on the class, but on the experience which is to be expected. It's really interesting to compare business classes here to those at Miami.

I'm wondering what it will be like to arrive in Ghana. I can't really imagine pulling up to Africa. All I can picture is this rickety dock, some wooden huts, and then African animals grazing in the background. I'm sure it will be nothing like that but I really don't have any idea what to expect!

 

That's about it...it's almost dinner time and the State of the Voyage is tonight...which I guess is like the State of the Union! On the table for tonight (literally) is pasta (who would have guessed???), bread, salad, and shrimp jambalya (sp?). I've realized I'm kind of forced to try new things on this ship or else I will starve. So I've learned to love pears and grape juice. I know I know....that isn't that "out there" but I'm working on it!

 

This experience so far has been amazing and like nothing I've ever done before (obviously!). Thanks to everyone for all your support and updates and daily emails that keep me going. It's great to hear from everyone at home and every day I get up excited to check my email!

 

I'm trying to figure out if it's possible to attach resized images to these blog posts. We'll see if I ever get it to work!