So What Really IS Between Brazil and South Africa?

After getting back from the Amazon trip (as you can tell from the previous post) I was beat and would have been content staying on the ship. I found plans with my friends, though, and we soon set out on another adventure.

In the meantime before we left around 3, I tried to have a relaxing and chillful afternoon for a couple of hours before we had to depart. I had time to check my Email, and let everyone know that I made it back from the Amazon alive and well. That’s an important thing to do. I know there are people back home who were on pins and needles the entire time I was gone (you know who you are) who didn’t know if I was going to make it.

As I’ve later learned, in past Semester at Sea trips to the Amazon, if you told someone that you were going to go to the Amazon, it was like volunteering to contract some awful disease. In the past, there were two missing accommodations that we had in place for us. First, when we were piranha fishing, the guides on the boats put the raw meat on the hooks. Previously, the students were allowed to bait their own hooks. As a result of touching raw meat from the Amazon, and not properly cleansing themselves, people became very sick. Secondarily, during on riverboat meals, we used disposable plastic utensils for every meal. Before leaving for the trip, the doctor told us that he never gets sick when he travels because he filters the water twice, avoids ice and lettuce, and brings his own utensils, and washes them. The riverboat used to reuse actual silverware, and the washing practices were sub par, allowing people to contract diseases in that way, too. We avoided these practices, and we all came back alright.

The afternoon and evening’s activity was that we were going out to dinner. But not just any old dinner, we were going to a place that at least half of the ship had already been to, and raved about. So it was our turn to head out. The place was called Boi Preto, and it’s a famous Brazilian Steakhouse. I’ll explain the unique way it works in a while. The only crux that we had to be aware of was that we had to be back in time for on-ship time, two hours before departure, at 9 pm. As long as we were back by then we were fine. We had six hours to eat. Plenty of time.

Our group had swelled to a size of nine by the time that we left, and the taxis we can hire can hold more than that, so we went to a stand and began the process of prepaying for the taxi. We were there for fifteen minutes. Not because there was a line, but because people like to haggle.

The original rate was five dollars a person, one way. The place is over twenty minutes away, so that’s not bad. But the haggling began. They wanted four dollars, and the taxi people still wanted five. In what seemed like hours later, they agreed to the four dollars. Everyone paid, and the woman at the stand counted the money. Nine people, four dollars apiece, is $36. She counted to 36, and said we were two dollars short. Then the haggling ended, and the arguing began. I stayed out of it because it was starting to get nasty as Ugly American syndrome broke out. You don’t talk to people like they’re stupid. You just don’t do that. Eventually, someone else in the group got fed up with the arguing and gave the woman the “missing” two dollars, and we climbed into a van and went.

An interesting experience arises when you put your trust into a taxi driver as he takes you through some of the bad parts of town. Basically, you have to trust him that he’s taking you where you want to go, and that he’s not going to leave you. I had faith we would get where we were going. Some doubt mingled with others in the van. But, we got to the steakhouse safe and sound.

They told us if we wanted to sit as a group of nine, the wait would be an hour, but if we split, the wait would only a half hour. So we decided to sit as two separate groups. They had weird little appetizers sitting out for us. They were meatball-like, but not. I’m not sure what I ate, all I know is that I’m glad I took my Pepto tabs before I started eating. I felt like I could conquer all sorts of meats now.

Our number came up a little over a half hour later, and we sat down and learned how it would work. Each table has a title gold bar with a slider across it. If you want meat, you slide the bar to reveal the green side saying “YES MEAT.” If you did not want meat, you would slide to reveal the red side saying “NO MEAT.” This would tell the waiters if we wanted to be served or not.

The waiters walked around with large cuts of meat on large skewers, almost sword-like in size. When they walked by your table with their cut of meat, and you had “YES MEAT” displayed, they would prompt you if you in particular would like the meat he had to offer. If you didn’t want it, you shook your head or said no. If you wanted it, you would say yes, and grab the small pair of tongs everyone was given. The waiter then began to slice. About halfway through, he would stop so that I could grab the slice of meat with my minitongs, and put it on my plate once the cut of meat was liberated from the greater shank.

And this goes on and on as long as you want meat. It’s sort of like a buffet, but better. These Brazilians have figured this stuff out. I think I had at least fourteen or fifteen different cuts of meat from the servers. I have never eaten so much meat in my life. It tasted great. The meat was so good that one guy who had fish on his sword could not get anyone to take it, because everyone wanted more meat. I don’t know where in me I put it. I had a late lunch, too. Maybe I wasn’t eating as much as I thought I would in the Amazon. But the Brazilian steakhouse will remain to be one of my fondest memories of Salvador. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing, but it’s something, I’ll tell you that much.

After we decided that we couldn’t possibly have any more meat, we started looking for the dessert cart that wheeled itself around. However, for my group, the carto de alcoholo came around first, and I watched them look at this stuff. There’s a liquid that’s banned in the US that was on the cart. That’s because absinthe is something like 105 proof, or some outrageous number like that. And they wanted to try it. Those crazy fools. I could watch the alcohol get into their system in a matter of minutes, and they were not always thrilled with how it made them feel on a second to second basis.

As a result, we decided we needed to get these people back to the ship ASAP, before who knows what they turn into. I was annoyed that I’d miss dessert, but it was getting late anyway, and we still had to figure out how to pay for the check. There were five of us at my table, and there was one number at the bottom of the check. I claimed my soda and buffet charge, laid it on the table with some tip money, and watched everyone else struggle. It was almost as annoying as when we were trying to pay for the taxi.

Eventually, in a pile of bills and a couple of credit cards later, we were paid for and good to go. However, the other table of four had yet to ask for their check, meaning that there would be an ensuing fifteen minutes at least until the check was paid. But our cab driver was already outside waiting for us, threatening to leave if we didn’t come out soon. In addition, another group of seven girls from the ship were leaving at the same time as well, and we were all going to share the same taxi. 16 people, one taxi, and four dollars for everyone to pay. I knew already it was going to be very interesting to coordinate.

I sent our table out to the van to hold it and tell the driver that we were coming. I had the other table ask for their check so that they could start the process. I inquired with the table of seven ladies if they were ready to go, and they said they were working out their bill. When I turn around, my table has not gone out to the taxi, because they’re following the one guy that took a full shot of the absinthe. I told them to get him in the taxi.

As people came out of the restaurant, I counted heads and needed to get to 16. Once the last person was in the taxi, we shut the door and started counting to $64. What made this a little more difficult was that some people were paying with dollars, and others with Reals, which are two Reals to one dollar. 90% of the way through the twenty minute ride, we finally figured out the right amount, gave it to the driver, and made it back onto the ship with about two hours to spare.

At this point, I’m beat. Once I get back on the ship and stop moving, I feel like a wall hits me. Don’t forget that today started yesterday. That’s the logic that I have to use, that today, which is really Ash Wednesday, was actually still the day before. If you can’t figure out why, don’t worry about it.

I told everyone I’d be up around 11 to see us leave port, and went off to take a nap. I saw up leaving port, but I missed the first fifteen minutes or so, and wasn’t entirely conscious for the part that I saw.

Leg 3 – Salvador, Brazil to Cape Town, South Africa

I awoke to my global studies class in the morning to find something rather interesting. The professor had made a comment about the so politically incorrect term DWB, driving while black, in one of last week’s lectures, and let’s say that it was taken the wrong way. He spent the entire class proving, amongst other things, that he is not, what we’ll call here, racist. It was awkward and uncomfortable. But more awkward than uncomfortable.

And it went downhill fast from there. A recurring problem has been that professors feel they’re entitled to go beyond the set length of their talking time, and that cuts out the people at the end, who usually have the better presentations. It’s like there’s some kind of coalition against keeping people awake and interested. It’s really quite unfortunate and is just setting people up for angst and aggression to be relieved at a later time.

In a previous class, the lead lecturer, Dr. Dan (a psychologist teaching a global studies class – can you start figuring out why the class is an abombination?) had a photo of three African children. Because of their malnutrition, their stomachs were distended, or unusually bulbous. He put the photo up and said, as if captioning the photo, “Show us your belly buttons!” This was wrong on so many levels. It make him look like an uneducated and insensitive baboon (so he should fit in well once we get to Africa) and it makes it seem like nobody on the ship knows what they’re doing, which is largely false.

I bring up the belly button comment because a similar but different event happened in today’s class. He was discussing a study done where a jury was presented with information regarding a crime, and then one group was given the name of a man named Johnson, and the other Ramirez. Ramirez consistently received the harsher punishment, but that’s not what was going on here. Ramirez is pronounced Ruh-mere-ez. Dr. Dan pronounced it Ram-uh-rez. That’s not the common pronunciation of the name. In fact, I’ve only heard the name pronounced one way, so my mind is still boggled as to what the heck went on.

Over the course of the day, I knew I had two papers to get done, and I really tried to do them. Only one was due the next day, and the other one’s completion would just make life much easier down the road. I got one done, and thought about the other one. What can I say? I got busy. It happens frequently on the ship. Between class, eating, sleeping, and all the other assortments of distractions, it’s a miracle that anybody gets anything done.

I had a bit of an interesting lunch, that is very indicative of the shipboard community that we have here as opposed to that of Penn State. This would never happen there. I sat down with two of my friends I normally eat with, and shortly thereafter, one had to leave to go somewhere. Just after that, two other people I know sat down with us and were there for about twenty minutes. Then they had to go. Then another couple came over and sat down. Then the remaining original person I sat down with had to go, so now the table is down to three people. One of the two people that sat down had to go, leaving myself and one other person. Then one more person sat down that I knew, and then their friend came over as the other person who had been there the longest left. Then I had to go, but overall, in short summation, I sat with eight different people during my lunch, with never more than four people at the table at a time. That was fun, and like I said, would never happen at Penn State – it’s too big, and there are just too many people.

Then came the best part of the day – I got to take a nap. I don’t get the time to take them very often, but when I do, they’re great. Later in the evening, the Pre-Neptune Day festivities began with people shaving mohawks onto their heads. I know what you’re thinking, and no, I did not participate. You’re supposed to shave your head when you cross the equator, and we did that a week and a half ago. On that day, I got a haircut down to my short level. That’s close enough for me. But it wasn’t enough for a whole bunch of other people. I like to think that I have very good on the spot judgment. I was hanging out with two girls from Texas, Stacey and Jennifer, neither of which got a mohawk, and agreed that the people that did it will at the very least second guess what they did for quite a while.

In what I think is the most bizarre turn of events, two people got their mohawks that I thought never would. Do you remember Donna from the Amazon trip? She’s 75 and has a spiked mohawk now. I’m not sure how she was convinced to do it, but she did. And the other surprise was with the youngest person on board. One professor and his wife are on board with their months old baby, Rider. He got a mohawk for his first haircut. I’ll say this, if my parents did that to me, I’d be screaming bloody murder.

Then things started to get difficult. Tonight was the first of three nights in a row where we would have to lose an hour of sleep. We’ve done the hours one at a time before, so it will be very interesting to see how this turns out. I can’t say I’m looking forward to the results, because it’s going to make getting up at 7 very difficult.

In the morning, nobody was awake. It was like an entire ship of sleepwalking zombies. What makes this really difficult is that we work ourselves to the bone before reaching a port, and then try to do as much as we can in port, but then classes start right up again the day after we leave. There’s no recovery time, so we were really all feeling it this morning, especially in Global, which dragged on mercilessly.

Even though I was still horribly tired and not entirely awake, I finished the second paper that I was trying to write yesterday. I’m not sure how that one was completed, but it was. I don’t think I was typing out gold, but it was what it needed to be to get the job done.

Something very interesting started happening at lunch recently. They have a big, long table set up in the lower dining room, with little placards on it that say ‘Reserved.’ Nobody has yet to sit in any of the seats on the table. However, the Captain has started dining there for lunch. And somehow, students get to sit with him, and we couldn’t figure out how for the life of us. There were no announcements or sign ups or anything. It completely confounded us until we realized how it happened. When the Captain enters the dining room, they find enough students on line to sit with him and then usher them over. It’s complete and dumb luck, none of which I have.

As if being tired isn’t bad enough, sitting in a slow moving class is actually torturous, only because I physically cannot stay awake. I can do nothing to keep me awake in a number of my classes, but I have the most trouble in my cinema class. The lights are down and there’s a movie on. It’s almost exactly what I don’t need at that point in the day. I was so tired after that class that I just went back to the room and plopped down on the bed for a nap. I didn’t have time for it, but I wouldn’t be able to stay awake through anything I was doing anyway. I was so out of it when I woke up that I didn’t know where I was and I thought it was the next morning. I was wandering around the room in a dizzy stupor for a good minute or so until my mind cleared and I was able to get my bearings again. Yeah, that wasn’t good.

We’re not really sure why, but the boat is rocking and rolling back and forth pretty good, which is sending a whole horde of people down for the count with nausea and vomiting and things of that nature. When we’re all upstairs for Global, every so often you just see one person making a run for it somewhere. You’ve got to feel bad for these people. I’m just glad I can stand the motion, because I don’t know if I’d be able to make it if I was feeling ill the whole time. Especially stomach stuff, I can’t do stomach stuff.

Also, tonight they started the drug testing. They read off a list of 20 or 30 “randomly” selected individuals to give a urine sample. If it’s positive for drugs, you’re out at the next port. They’re really strict about that stuff. Supposedly, someone’s room was searched for drugs, and it was completely ransacked. I didn’t see it, but that’s the word on the ship. Let’s put it this way, I’m all for the random room searches, but if my room is ransacked and my stuff is everywhere, there’s going to be problems. I’m not going to stand for that.

Because tomorrow is a no classes day (more on that later) nobody was doing any work in the evening. My group and I watched ‘V for Vendetta’. It’s a modernish version of something like 1984. I thought it was alright, but got difficult to follow at a few points throughout the film. I’ve seen better films, and they shouldn’t have saved all the explosions for the end of the film.

Then I half-sulkily went to bed, knowing that we had to lose another hour of sleep at night. That was slightly disconcerting considering the morning’s events of the coming day.

The coming day was Neptune Day, and I’ll now proceed to give you a brief history. For a more complete and in-depth history, search for Neptune Day on any search engine, and you’ll find more than you need to know. Anyway, the first time that someone crosses the equator on a ship or ocean vessel, they need to be initiated for King Neptune, who, by the way, doesn’t actually exist. There’s a better chance of King Trident from The Little Mermaid existing than this supposed King Neptune. Regardless, amongst other activities, you’re supposed to shave your head. The people with mohawks started this process a couple days earlier. Today they shave it off.

In addition, the festivities begin way too early in the morning for our first day off. The crew walks by all the staterooms at least a few times around 7:30 in the morning, making very loud noises on drums and other assorted noisemakers. So there went sleeping in and recharging our batteries. Then, as we all tried to fall back asleep, they came on the blaringly loud announcements to tell us that the initiations would begin shortly. This consisted of (and this is real by the way) having fish guts dumped on you, jumping into the pool, climbing out, and kissing two fish and a ring. The ring was worn by the Captain, who was covered in green body paint. And the fish guts were water, milk, and flour, but somehow nobody figured that out. I didn’t participate in this either, again because I have very good on the spot judgment about my actions. After they finished those shenanigans, the head shaving began. The problem was that the outlets were overloaded and then the clippers overheated and burnt out. I’m not sure how those people got their heads shaved, but they did. And that was Neptune Day – nothing that couldn’t have waited until noon, and only a week and a half late.

The rest of the day I got some work done, but really focused on getting a nap in during the afternoon hours. I napped for three hours, and my roommate ragged on me. Let’s examine this. He says that I never sleep, which is somewhat true. I go to sleep around the same time he does and wake up hours earlier, and rarely nap during the day. He found this to be a major point of conversation, and brought it up every time I saw him the remainder of the day, referring to me as a “sleeping giant.” Which made no sense to me at all, but there are worse things to be called.

The shining moment of the day was dinner. They had barbecue grills up on the top deck and made hamburgers and hot dogs with all the fixings, including ice cream and apple pie. And we didn’t even have to pay for this ice cream, which was quite an added bonus, and also made the line incredibly long and slow moving. But it was probably the best meal that we’ve had since we’ve been on the ship. Recently, the food has become monotonous, now that we know the menu and its rotating basis. So this change of pace was quite welcome. And we got to sit out on the back of the ship and watch the sun set as we had dinner. It was quite a nice night to end our day of no classes. It’s the last break we get for the next two weeks, so we’re going to make sure that we enjoy it.

And unfortunately, our lovely evening was capped with that great disappointment again, we lost the last of three hours in a row. Getting up in the morning is going to be a sight to see.

So, in the morning, the professors of Global decided that this would be a great day to ramble on and on with very boring presentations. I don’t understand this. It’s like they actually think their lectures are stimulating at this early hour. A few days ago, this class was taking place at 6 in the morning. Very few things are interesting at that hour of the day.

The ship has also decided to slow down because we were going to reach South Africa a day and a half too early, which I found no issue with, but apparently there is issue in the ranks somewhere. As a result, we’ve decreased speed from about 20 knots down to 10. The speed of 10 is too slow to have the stabilizers active and operating, so the ship rolls back and forth a lot. This makes walking difficult, and the people without sea legs are really suffering now. It’s actually almost torturous to watch these poor people, but maybe they’ll get used to it in this go round. If they don’t they’re going to have a fun time around the Cape of Good Hope.

Alright, and then this happened: I previously told you that I was involved with the Ambassador’s Program, which has three subgroups, one of which is the Ambassador’s Ball, the big formal held on the ship towards the end of the voyage. There were openings to be President of the ball, and I applied to do that. Tonight, I found out I was selected to be the president of the ball. So that was very good. I was very happy and grateful about that. So now all remaining free time that I had will really start to disappear. I can’t wait to find out exactly what I’ve gotten myself into.

Because that Ambassador’s meeting ran long, I was late to my adopted family dinner. Let’s explain this: we can sign up to be adopted by a family on the ship. Some people have lifelong learners (making them their “grandchildren”), some people have faculty (making them their “children”), and I had the AV guy, John Paul, and his wife, who are both in their 20s, making us…I don’t know what that makes us. Brothers and sisters maybe?

Anyway, Jordie and Maria from Long Island are also in my family of six, so I joined dinner once I got out of my meeting, and tried to jump into the conversation that kind of sounded like it was ending. But from what I saw of my new adopted shipboard family, I’m very excited to be able to have dinner again and be able to stay fro the entire thing. I felt bad, but that’s what happens here on the ship – you get too busy to do everything that you want to do. Free time is hard to find and stuff starts to overlap. (Does this sound familiar?)

Later in the evening they had the adult talent show (adult meaning everyone in it is not a student). It was quite lovely. One of the professors did a John Mayer tune and ‘Stormy Monday,’ a lifelong learned read a touching poem about her life and travels, and the code enforcement officer did quite an impressive and modern piano rendition. I don’t care what anyone says, the code enforcement officer is thin, bald, and more frightening than most people I have ever seen in my entire life – and he knows it. That was a lot of fun, we all really enjoyed ourselves for an hour. And then we got to go to bed, without losing an hour of sleep, which was really exciting.

The next day, February 26^th, was incredibly uneventful for the most part, which was thoroughly enjoyed by me. I spent as much time as I could reading my Tutu book, which I really want to finish before reaching South Africa, but I’ve got a couple hundred pages left, and I don’t think that that’s going to happen, so I should probably shoot to finish it by San Diego in mid-May.

In the afternoon, I was to start my tutoring of the children on the ship, whose parents are faculty. There’s about ten of them, and I’d help them with their studies for about an hour. Unfortunately, the group for my time was a little on the large side, so I come back now every odd B day, occurring every four class days, or just long enough to almost forget to do it periodically. We’ll see how that goes, once it gets going.

Later in the evening, my sea, the Red Sea, had its Sea Social. The Sea Social is the soiree in the Faculty Lounge that each Sea, or residence area, gets to have once for the entire trip. So I went up there and hung out for an hour and a half. It was alright. Nothing special, but the food was halfway decent. That’s the trick, the kitchen can make better food, they just choose not to give it to us. But I had a nice night talking to my friend McKenzie and her roommate Emily. McKenzie’s coming with me on my safari, so at least we’ll know each other, so that will be good.

Some time around 11, we all got tired and decided that we were best off heading off to bed. We didn’t have time change, so we wanted to take advantage of every hour we could get our grubby little hands on.

In the morning, I had to create the database of people we have who signed up to help out in the Ambassador’s Ball, and then get that off to our advisor who really knows what is going on. I’m not there yet, but I will be.

Then the day got very interesting. In a very controversial move, the Diversity Club decided to make it Apartheid Day “in honor of our impending trip to South Africa.” This meant that the people that shaved their heads on Neptune Day were privileged and could go places where those who did not shave their heads couldn’t. I had a good deal. My hair was still short enough from my haircut to pass for either way, so I got to observe the goings on of the day.

I remember back in one of my older psychology classes that an experiment was done in California with people in jail cells and guards. It was supposed to last a week, but because the guards were on such a power trip and entitlement ride that they shut it down after a couple days. When you divide people, regardless of whatever educational value you try to reap, what ends up happening is that you piss people off. That’s what I thought would happen, and that’s what did. There were a handful of people that did not understand Apartheid at all, who took it too far, and ruined the experience.

If I was in on the decision making, I would have done everything I could to block it because we’re a ship of 700 or so students, and the last thing we need is to be divided and have potential to create animosity towards one another. It was not as carefully planned and implemented as it could have been. Intentions were good, but execution was lacking to really reap the educational benefits that were intended.

What’s most unfortunate is the actions of one of the people in charge of the diversity club. This person found someone eating where they were not supposed to, and this person chose not to participate because of moral or religious beliefs, or whatever – the reasons of non-participation are irrelevant. The person in charge, who we will now refer to as Rudey, physically grabbed this person and tried to force him out. Upon resisting, Rudey told him that he would have to leave immediately. Refusing again, Rudey told him that he wouldn’t be able to eat and stormed off in a huff. You’ll hear about Rudey again. Don’t forget him. Just remember the inappropriate and disrespectful things he says and does.

In the end, the Apartheid Day was an experiment that was best left alone. There were not enough positives to outweigh the few negatives that spoiled the bunch. Men in their early 20s should know better to curse out faculty with their young children next to them. I don’t understand how you do that. It’s immaturity and irresponsibility to the max. And if I had my way, it would be grounds for Dock Time at the very least.

Around lunch, they finally turned the engines back on to full speed, thus eliminated the rolling that we had been suffering through for the past two days. We can’t do the happy medium at 15 knots because we don’t think it’s fuel efficient.

Somewhere I found more time to read my Tutu book, so I plopped down on the back of Deck 6 and watched the day go by. I don’t always get out on the back as much as I’d like. Sometimes it’s too windy or the sunlight it too direct or I just don’t make it out there over the course of the day, but I did, and it was nice to get some fresh air.

Because dinner was wacky from Apartheid Day, the Academic Dean almost missed dinner and we were down in the dining room late, so he came and sat with us. His name is Mike and he’s a really nice guy every time I see him. Always outgoing, lively and loud. What more could you want.

And then I saw something that I was really very interested in. They showed “An Inconvenient Truth” in the Union. It was 90 minutes of a very good film. Al Gore knows how to deliver a PowerPoint, let me tell you.

Before I went to bed, I hopped onto the intranet system and pulled off the photos of the Amazon trip taken by everyone else. There were some good photos to complement the ones I have, as well as a number of photos that I didn’t know I was in. Finding some good ones of those was like finding gold. My camera doesn’t always like focusing up close on stuff, so I found some non-blurry versions of some of my photos that I will supplant them with. And then I looked at my watch, and rushed off to bed. You guessed it, we lost another hour of sleep that night.

After much delay, pomp, and circumstance, we finally got to be addressed by Archbishop Desmond Tutu. We’ve waited about a month to actually see our guest lecturer in residence actually lecture to us. Actually, some professors have convinced him to come into their individual classes at certain days throughout the past month, but I was not in one of those classes, and I don’t think any of my classes will have the opportunity in the future. I can hold out hope, but it ain’t looking that great.

Nonetheless, even with the Archbishop speaking this morning, some people still slept through Global, saying they didn’t know he was going to be there, which were all lies. Everyone knew about it, they just care more about their sleep than seeing this man speak. Because it’s kind of a big deal, the Union started filling up rather quickly, so we tried to get our professor to let us out a little early to make it down there, and she did. So we got down there about a half hour early, and the place was nearly packed already.

When it was time for him to speak, it was clear why he has been so successful in his life. He’s just a great speaker. In history, there are select figures that you can point out that were great speakers, and Tutu is one of them. He speaks in easily digestible sound bites that are very easy to understand, regardless of what point he’s trying to convey. It was beautiful to watch him speak. He talked about why he came on the voyage with us, and there were really two reasons. The first is that for him, it’s like a vacation. He’s got no plans for three and a half months. He tells us his secretary has to send back all these invitations he gets with the response, “Sorry, he’s at sea.”

The second thing he told us was the high regard that he has for young people. He really knows the power and the thought that we have and know that all of us that took the step to be on this voyage are already well on our way to doing very good things in the world. He said it, not me, while I do agree with it for the most part. (There’s still a few bad eggs on the ship, but they’ll be weeded out by San Diego in one way or another.)

And as if Tutu speaking in the morning wasn’t good enough, it was taco day for lunch. As the dean said as I walked by him, “Tutu and Taco Day together, now I can die a happy man.” I don’t think I can speak the same way, I mean I like tacos and the Archbishop, but I’ve got other things in life to look forward to, things like the remainder of my trip. After all, we’ve still only been to three of our twelve ports. And we all know they’re going to start coming fast and furious.

The husband of one of my professors is who we’ll call the guitar guy on the ship. He plays before all the preports and wherever and whenever. His name is Bob, and is a great guy. Anyway, I’ve got a guitar sitting at home that I just haven’t been able to get to yet, so Bob gave me my first guitar lesson, which consisted of how to hold the guitar, as well as the A and E chords. I’m what you call a beginner, and Bob is what you call an expert, so it was very interesting to see him tell me how to hold the guitar. He doesn’t get to do that very often I don’t think.

Also in the afternoon I had my first real day of tutoring and helping the children on the ship, but we had a special guest in class. There’s a gentleman, Gustavo, from the NOAA on the ship to launch drifters and probes into the ocean. He’s specifically on our ship because they don’t get many opportunites to launch stuff from our position in the South Atlantic because there’s not many ships that go through there, so he jumped at the opportunity. He’s leaving in Cape Town, and the last probe that he would help launch would be done with the kids. He taught a handful of students on board how to launch the rest and where to do it, so he can track it from his office in Florida.

So for the first 45 minutes, he had the kids ask questions about the ocean and that kind of stuff, and Gustavo was very good with that. He thought I was one of the kids (apparently there’s a 16 year old), but I let that slide. The same thing happens to my Dad. Anyway, they had all the kids sign the drifter, and I threw my name on there too, and then went off to the back of the ship and threw it over. Apparently, it’s not littering because it’s collecting scientific data. So that was a fun afternoon.

Towards the end of dinner, the professor that did the song I like is the one with the baby that started crawling in Brazil, his name is Rocky, and he was near us for dinner. This baby, Rider, is such a focal point of attraction for everybody on the ship that it’s going to be tough for that baby once we reach San Diego and he loses the hordes and hordes of attention that he’s been used to getting. I wish lots of luck to Mom and Dad.

Because we’re two days away from a country, tonight was Cultural Pre-Port. I wanted to watch from the Union, but my group didn’t. I was annoyed, and they didn’t have the sound working for the first five or ten minutes, which is when they give out all the good useful information. I’ll be sitting in the Union for the rest of our ports, I just don’t know if anybody will be with me.

Preport was good. They really try hard to make it fun and entertaining, but they do that and it turns into cable access after a while. They still need to work on it and iron some stuff out.

As if waking up when the alarm went off wasn’t bad enough, I’ve developed a sore throat. This means one of two things: I have a sore throat, or I’m getting a cold. Whenever I get colds, it’s always sequential. I never have the nose, throat and cough thing at the same time, they’re always in phases, and never in the same order. As always, I never bring lozenges with me anywhere, so I found a couple from someone else and popped them, and they really didn’t help at all.

Desmond was up early with us again, this time for a Q & A session in Global. He only got through about seven questions because he likes to expand upon them when he answers them. As I said before, he’s a very good speaker, even when he doesn’t know which questions are coming. How many times do you think this man has been interviewed in his life? It’s got to be thousands. He’s a seasoned veteran when it comes to this stuff, so while his answers were nothing spectacular, they were what you expected them to be – very good.

After all the time we’ve lost, I was ready to go back to bed after that, so I slumped down and fell asleep until lunch. I was out. If I have a cold coming on, they helped me out falling asleep, but if I don’t, it doesn’t matter because that’s how tired we all are. I’m very jealous of the other semesters that get to go around the world in the opposite direction and gain hours all those nights. Although we don’t go that way this time of year because the Pacific is very tumultuous and stormy, so I guess that might make it a wash.

In the evening we had our Logistical Preport, which further tried to make itself more entertaining than the cultural preport, whose sole duty is to be entertaining. This time we had Desmond singing and dancing, which I guarantee will be on the voyage DVD. His laugh is infectious and his dancing is, well, all his own. That was fun.

Normally on days when we don’t have class the next day, like the day before we get to port, people stay up later and play games or sit on the internet, or something. I like to get up and watch us come into port with the sunrise. Needless to say, I went to bed on the early side.

And we lost another hour in the middle of the nights. That’s the fifth hour. Daylight savings changes once every year, and car accidents in the States spike hugely. Imagine if they did five of those in a week. And today when I got up at 5:40, I knew I’d have a long day of stuff to do in port, so I knew I’d really be feeling it later.

Next time, I promise you Africa: