At Sea

The last few days of class have by far been the most depressing lecture topics yet. As we travel to South Africa, in Global Studies class we have discussed apartheid, HIV, their shortage of food supply, genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan, and the political unrest and violence in east Congo. Semester at Sea has a very unique design to the academic portion of the experience. Teachers are to tailor their syllabus around the countries and regions we are visiting, making lectures and readings according to what we are all learning in Global Studies. It is very neat to see the emphasis on certain topics that in a normal university, you would only receive through perhaps one class. For example, in my Women’s Studies class we were asked to watch the documentary “The Devil Came on Horseback,” where an ex-marine spent six months taking pictures as a “neutral observer” in Darfur, experiencing the (non-negotiable) genocide first hand. He came back to the States and for a while sat on the footage he had, knowing that bringing it into the media would stir a lot of controversy. After much debate with himself and his family, his sister contacted the New York Times and they covered his story. This was 2004, and from there, as most of you know, the effort has spread like wildfire. The Save Darfur organization asked him to do speeches at rallies all over the U.S and he has become quite famous for his story. If anyone from Kappa is reading this, tell Kujawa to watch this, she’ll love it! Jess and I thought about her the whole time we were watching it. J It made us want to put on our “Save Darfur” shirts we bought from her, which we brought with us, but probably shouldn’t wear when get to Africa. Anyways, probably the saddest thing I learned in my Women’s class was the terrible violence in Congo. We learned about the corrupt “soldiers” that are going into these villages and raping and murdering by the thousands. In class today we watched a documentary called “Lumo,” filmed by an NYU film school grad that also spent much of his time at Heal Africa, a women’s clinic in rural Congo that takes in women who are brutally raped by these rebel groups. After spending some time there, he decided to make this documentary with his knowledge in film, and won many awards at film festivals in the U.S. This documentary focused on the brutality of these rapes and the physical need for surgery to even repair these women’s chance at ever living a normal life again. What I found so interesting, though, were the women’s faith in God. Many of them were cast aside by their families, friends, villages, and husbands after they were “ruined” by these violent rapes, and many of them lost everything. Many of them had four or five surgeries, without anesthesia, to repair the damage, and often times it was unsuccessful. However, throughout all of these horrible experiences they kept saying that God would heal them, and they knew through Him their suffering would end. I found this so inspiring that they could remain so strong, when so many people give up faith over so much less. I’ll stop writing before I go into what we learned about Female Genital Mutilation, but unfortunately this is part of the voyage of discovery- learning what most people choose to ignore, even our government, and trying to figure out what we can do about it. Until next time! Xoxo Marissa

Neptune Day!

There is no celebrating Valentine’s Day on this ship… it was Neptune Day, the initiation sailors go through when crossing the equator. Although we crossed the equator last week, for some reason they like to put off celebrating it until late- it might be so we forget about Valentine’s Day all together, I’m not sure. Since we had no class today, we had a social last night, which included standing in line for over 15 minutes to get probably the smallest glass of wine you’ve seen in your life. This must be their way of monitoring what we drink, because by the time you stand in the line twice you’ve given up on the whole thing. We did figure out, though, that once you get your first drink, immediately go back in line and socialize with your friends in line and by the time you’ve finished your first drink, you’re at the front of the line for your second! Worked out well. The party’s theme was “Party Animals” and everyone was supposed to dress up like an animal, which is very difficult considering no one considers packing anything along those lines when you have to fit your whole life in two duffel bags. People got pretty creative, though, I was impressed. Some guy took the plastic cover for his sleeping bag and got in it and called himself a caterpillar.
We were woken up at 7:30 this morning by the crew all dressed up in crazy outfits, blowing train whistles and beating on pots and pans and screaming. Everyone negligently got out of bed, for the most part, went and ate breakfast, and either watched or took part in the festivities. The Neptune God sits on a chair that overlooks the pool, and the process goes: stand outside the pool, get fish guts poured on you, jump into the pool to wash them off, get out of the pool, kiss a big disgusting fish, and then bow to Neptune and Minerva. After everyone who wanted to do this, the head shaving began, and I kid you not, girls shaved their heads!!! Have no fear, every hair is still securely in place on my head, and Jess’ and Tessa’s too, in fact we didn’t take part in any of the fish gut, jumping in the pool business because, well that’s just not really our thing. We woke up last night to the roughest seas we have seen yet. We had to duct tape our drawers shut, things were falling off the shelf and waves were crashing into our windows, and it’s still going on as I’m writing this. I resisted the temptation to take anti-seasickness meds because they knock me out and I’m worthless for the rest of the day. (Take, for example, Jess who is in our room asleep right now for this very reason.) It’s been raining on and off, so we haven’t been able to really enjoy our day off by laying out, but it’s nice to catch up on all of my reading! We only have a few more days at sea until Cape Town, and all the fun starts all over again! I have heard some pretty crazy stories about people getting things stolen in Brazil since being back on the ship, but most of the stories consisted of people doing things that Semester at Sea specifically told us not to do.
I am continuing to enjoy my classes. We had our first Global Studies exam the other day, and it was OK- not too hard, not too easy. We are currently studying apartheid in South Africa, which is interesting because it corresponds with the book I’m reading for my Women’s Studies class, “When I was White.” I am learning a lot of interesting things about South Africa that I never knew, like television was banned until like 1976, or something crazy like that. Also something I learned that I guess I never thought about… the word “hobo” comes from “homeward bound,” which makes complete sense, but I honestly never stopped and thought about where the word hobo came from. Am I the only one who didn’t know this? Dad: to answer your question about what I’m going to discover while on this trip is where words come from that I have never thought about, ha only kidding, that wouldn’t really be money well spent. I assure you, I’m learning much more than that. Until next time! Xoxo Marissa

Rio de Janeiro (aka The Most Beautiful City)

Copa... Copacabana

Jess and I woke up after a late night on Wednesday morning around 5 a.m. to wash Carnivale off of us, grabbed our bags, thank the Lord we packed the night before, and headed to meet our group at 6 a.m. We flew to Rio and arrived to an overcast sky. Slightly disappointed that we were staying in Copacabana on the beach, and couldn´t actually lay out, we decided to take a much needed nap. As most of you know, if I go go go, I will fall flat on my face with a kidney infection, and Jess needed that nap, too, so that´s what we did. We woke up and explored the beach and, a little hesitant to wander any where on our own, we picked a nearby restaurant and ate our dinner. Communicating with the Brazilians has really not been too difficult for me! While taking taxis all over Salvador I was pretty much the communicator, using what I know of Spanish, and we got by OK. Eating meals is funny though, we just point, they laugh because they know we don´t know how to say it, and the people are very friendly and understanding of our lack of Portugese. The next day we went to one of the largest, most famous favelas (shanty towns) in Rio. This may sound scary, I admit when I found out we were doing this I was very hesitant, but the guide explained to us that in Rio in favelas, the people are poor, not muggers and they don´t want to hurt you. We went to a Samba school, and then off to Sugar Loaf mountain, where we took a cable car 1200 feet (I think feet, now I can´t remember, sometimes the guide translated measurements so we could understand, and sometimes he didn´t). Sugar Loaf mountain is a series of two mountain top cable car rides, to get to the actual peak of this mountain. The view here in Rio is fabulous! The guide explained to us that this view, while not as high as the view from Christ the Redeemer, is a great way to get to see the city from a view. We could see the Copacabana beach where our hotel was, and all of the water and little islands that surround Rio. After Sugar Loaf mountain it was off to an authentic Brazilian BBQ restaurant where they carve the meat onto your plate and have the most fantastic buffet of salads, sushi, shell fish, veggies, fruits and desserts! I told you it was the "No Carb Left Behind Tour." All day I hadn't really felt well, and this was the icing on the cake... let's just say Brazilian food and I are not meant to be. The next day was my absolute favorite and also the most beautiful day we spent in Rio. The sun was out and the beach was so lively! We rode around in 4x4 open air Jeeps that took us through the rainforest- the largest urban rainforest in the world! It was up up up, and after about an hour ride we arrived to Christ the Redeemer... that thing has a lot of steps to get to it, but well worth it. Of course the base of the statue was very crowded, everyone trying to get a good picture with Christ. They have a Chapel inside of it where you can pray, or whatever it is you'd like to do I guess. I bought Dad a rosary here, and a post card of the statue. The view was phenomenal, it was so breathtaking to be able to see all of gorgeous Rio beneath you. I actually got teary eyed standing next to one of the Seven Wonders of the World overlooking one of the most gorgeous cities I have ever seen. My descriptions, and even my pictures don't give it justice, but hopefully you are inspired to make a trip to Rio and see it yourself!! We leave tonight for Cape Town, South Africa... and you know what that means... a safari, cycyling the winelands, and hopefully some bungy jumping or sky diving. Until next time! Xoxo Marissa. PS I am currently trying to upload pics but it is SO slow... I will hopefully put some on shutterfly.com, and post the link on here! Look for pics soon!

Salvador, Brazil

Oh the fun we had at Carnivale!!!

We arrived in Salvador, Brazil Tuesday morning around 6:30 a.m. Jess and I woke up around 6 to eat breakfast and watch us pull into the port, and it was already HOT!! After waiting a few hours, they finally let us off and a group of us jumped in a taxi to buy our Camarote tickets. Tuesday was the last day of Carnivale (I’ll describe that experience later), and the best (and safest) way to experience Carnivale is to be in a Camarote, which is basically a large two or three story balcony that you have to buy a ticket for, where a special ugly/ weird shirt, and then have toooooo much fun! We went to the convention center where we were told we could buy these tickets, and for a pretty penny, I might add. We really didn’t know what to expect, we just knew that the streets were lined with these very private balconies that over-looked the streets and the party going on beneath you, without actually getting mugged. We felt like it was money well spent. The nicest girl helped us buy our tickets; she spoke English and went out of her way to help us figure everything out. After we got our tickets we headed back to the port area to explore Salvador. We walked, and walked, and walked some more, and I’d say it was about 90-95 degrees outside! After eating a late lunch, we headed back to the ship so those of us who had trips the next morning could pack before we left for the Camarote. We met back up with our group of about 14 people and took a taxi to our balcony. At this point, it was still light outside, thank God! I have never, in my life, seen such a huge mob of people in one place! We, of course, were on one side of the parade, as it was going by, and our balcony was on the other, so after waiting 15 minutes for this particular section of the party to go by, we ran across the street to our Camarote, which I should add was sponsored by Skol, the one and only Brazilian beer which is pretty much the only advertised company you see here. We had on our special/ ugly BRIGHT yellow, neon shirts that were completely see-through. People here get really creative when it comes to wearing these things… girls cut them all sorts of ways, tie them with strings, wear them as crop tops and since they are pretty much one size fits all for the ladies, they adjust them many different ways so they can show off their tummies… that seemed to be the goal of the shirts for all of the women. The guys would typically just cut the sleeves out and make them into muscle shirts. When we showed up, there were tons of these Camarotes, so we had to look for our bright yellow balcony, which was pretty easy to find. We found some locals in the same shirts as us and they escorted us across the parade to get into the Camarote. Once inside, we made our way to the edge of the balcony so we could observe the party down below. Now, I’m going to try to explain this “parade” the best I can, but I’ve honestly never seen anything like it, so I’m not sure I’ll do it justice. Basically, you have this parade, and like any typical parade it has float-like things with usually a band, or some sort of music and then people dancing around in between the floats… well this is how it sort of is. Instead of floats, there are these semis (yes, like big 18 wheelers, driving around in the parade), and where the bed of the truck is, they have scaffolding that gives the truck two levels, the top is for the band and singer, and the bottom is for the people who have paid ridiculous amounts of money to ride on one of these things, and they, too, have a heinous shirt on in some weird color or pattern. The bottom floor, where the people are, has it’s own bar, and then behind the truck there are MORE people in the same shirt dancing around to the music it’s playing. From what I gathered, people will pay over 500 dollars to ride or dance behind their favorite band’s truck. About every 15 minutes, a new semi would roll in, and a new band would stop right in front of our Camarote (we had the best location!) and perform for about 15 minutes. Then, after they were through, the balcony DJ would play music, often American music and we’d dance around and wait for the next semi to come. What amazed me was that EVERYONE knew the words to all of the songs, young and old!! It seemed like every band and singer that rode in was as famous as the one before them and everyone loved all of their songs! The singers were very into their performance and many of them had dancers jumping around, which I thought was impressive considering for a lot of the time they are dancing on a moving vehicle! But it was so great, everyone just jumped around, all of the people behind the truck were literally jumping and singing and everyone was having such a great time. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many drunk, happy people in one place having such a good time as I did at Carnivale. In our particular Camarote, they served, of course, Skol beer since it was sponsored by them, mixed drinks, and these weird fruit drinks that were probably the greatest thing. Basically, there is a special bar tender, and he puts in the fruit of your choice, I chose pineapple, and they put A LOT of pineapple into a shaker, with ice, water, sugar, and shake it around until it becomes a thick juice, then he adds the vodka, which thins it out. They pour it into a glass and it’s sooo good… it’s like a homemade juice drink and every once in a while you get a big chunk of fruit! Mmmmm. After being at the Camarote for about five hours, we figured we should head home since a lot of us had early trips the next morning. The most difficult situation the entire night was trying to get out of the mob of people observing the parade from the side streets. We were going against the crowd, and everyone was looking at us like where are you going, the party is that way??!! Well I could go on and on about Carnivale, it was SO much fun, but needless to say, we made it back safe and sound and no one had any issues in our group with getting anything stolen! Carnivale has a bad rap, but if you’re smart and travel in a decent sized group then no one really gives you trouble. Next blog: RIO!!!! Xoxo Marissa

Almost to Brazil!!!

Tomorrow we port in Salvador, Brazil, and according to our inter-port lecturers from Brazil who have been on the voyage from Puerto Rico, it is a country to fall in love with. Something great about this “Voyage of Discovery,” is I actually have time, well I wouldn’t call it “time” because I also need to be reading my class-assigned books, but I have the opportunity to read books of my choice and enjoy them! Not to say I haven’t enjoyed the books I’ve read for class thus far, but for probably the first time in my life I am reading multiple books I want to read and look forward to doing this for the next three months. I have already finished one James Patterson novel (not his typical novels, but a love story), complements of Lauren, I guess she thought a sappy romance novel would be good for me to read only days after sailing away from Ryan… it wasn’t, but it did make me cry (because it was so good, not because I was sad- I think) while laying on the beach in San Juan.
After finishing that book, I was swamped with assigned readings for class- being at sea for seven straight days= seven straight days to read a lot for class, with a day off to catch up on what you have already put off until the last minute! For my Women’s Studies class, we are reading Violence in the City of Women, a book following terribly sad stories of women and their abusive relationships with their husbands in Bahia, Brazil. The book is written by an anthropologist who sits in on these court cases of women finally having the opportunity in rural Brazil to press charges against these wife- beaters. I read horribly frightening statistics in stories of battery and then stop and read it aloud to Jess… she is probably getting annoyed with me, and finally after the last horribly graphic story she says, “I don’t know how you’re reading that.” So far the book just makes me sad, it has opened my eyes to a new culture, and made me REALLY glad I don’t live in rural Brazil, or anywhere that viewing women as a possession is OK. The next book I have to read for the same class is When She was White… I haven’t started it yet, but the title alone interests me. Yesterday, in the same class, we discussed sex trafficking in Brazil, and sex tourism- now I’ve heard of “trafficking,” but not “sex tourism.” I won’t go into details, but it was extremely disturbing and all it made me ask was, “What the hell are these governments letting people get away with!!!???” Let’s just say, I really like this class, and I’ve only had it three times! Today, I had my group presentation for my other humanities class, Human Unity and Diversity. My group, as I said in previous posts, was assigned the topic of globalization, and from what I could gather from the teacher, she seemed to think we did a good job- so hopefully that means a good grade. I can’t remember if I said this in previous posts, but I’m only taking 12 hours—so every grade REALLY counts, all four of them! Either way, that’s 20% of my grade over with in the first week of class!
So, back to me loving this whole reading thing- I am currently LOVING the book I started yesterday- Eat, Pray, Love, by Elizabeth Gilbert. And yes, it was featured on Oprah, and no, that is not why I bought it… it was recommended by many people, so I gave it a try, and it was at Costco for half the price before I left! After class today, I laid out on the deck with my new best friend, and now sadly, I am half way through it. I made myself stop so I’d have some to read on my trip to Rio. Anyways, the book is great- it’s about a woman who has what I’d call a mid-life crisis and her life falls to pieces and so she decides to travel to Italy, India and Indonesia to find herself again- well I’ve been to Italy, I’m going to India, and I’m going really close to Indonesia by traveling to Malaysia, so I was instantly intrigued. She calls it her “Voyage of Discovery,” exactly what Semester at Sea refers to this whole adventure as… and as my Dad has already said, he can’t wait to find out what it is I am going to discover! Anyway, at one point, while in Italy, she explains that she is on a “No Carb Left Behind” tour (probably because she is in Italy, where aside from Paris’ croissants, they have the most wonderful food, not to mention, gelato!!), and the great food she is eating, which made me decide that I, too, am going on that tour, and I guess if I come off this ship looking a little different, than well, my family still has to love me anyway, and Ryan promises to do the same, then I guess I’ll see you all in 20 pounds!! (Not really, I actually hope this doesn’t happen… but I’ve decided that I’m at the point of no return on this “Voyage of Discovery” and what’s the point of doing it “half-assed” (sorry, as one of my teachers has said, there’s just no other word that means quite the same thing and is as appropriate), if you don’t mind me saying so.) Well, until next time! xoxo Marissa.

Crossing the Equator!!

Feb. 2nd, 2008- We Crossed the Equator!

Saturday around 2:30 p.m. my time (11:30 Dallas time) we crossed the Equator!! It wasn’t as exciting as it sounds, except we didn’t have class and got to lay out in the sun all day and relax! We aren’t celebrating Neptune Day (the celebration of crossing the Equator) until after Brazil, I’m not really sure why, but whatever, it’s another day off from class. It is weird having class on Sunday, I am losing sense of my days while at sea because every day is so similar.
Now on to the important stuff—Because I stopped reading comments on my first blog, after I started posting more blogs, I had NO idea Rachael was having a GIRL!!! I am glad I was probably the last to know, but oh well…. I am SOOOOOOOOOO excited! It made my day! J I was beginning to lose hope!
Anyways, we are almost to Brazil, and I am very excited, everyone is ready to get off the ship! The ship is divided into “Seas,” which are basically your hallways, so Jess and I are the Adriatic Sea. This is our team for Sea Olympics, which are pretty much just semester-long competitions between Seas. Tonight we have our first Sea Social to meet other people in our Sea/ hallway.
Classes are still going well, in my Human Unity and Diversity class, we were assigned group presentations and I volunteered to have the first one (which is tomorrow!!!) so I could get it over with—20% of my grade already out of the way! My group’s topic is discussing if Semester At Sea students are examples of globalization. My Women’s Politics class also has a group presentation, but this one is a little more intense and has to be an hour, so I signed up for a much later presentation time. My group’s topic for that is mail-order brides and child trafficking in Vietnam. So, my presentation for that isn’t until after we go to Vietnam.
I signed up for a few more day trips on my own for South Africa, since my Safari doesn’t leave until a few days after we arrive in Cape Town. I am going to an orphanage, which will probably be very sad, but I hear it’s an awesome experience. This counts as one of my Faculty Derived Practica (FDP) which most teachers require at least one so you can write about it and get a grade. I am also going to cycle in the hills to multiple wine lands, which will be fun and a good workout because it is a total of 29 kilometers!! First we cycle ten km’s, take a break and then 19 more! Now, I’m not very good at converting km’s to miles, but I’m pretty sure that’s far… if anyone knows exactly how far, I’d love to know! It’s an all day affair so I have to mentally prepare myself, but hey, you get wine out of it, so how bad could it be!!?? Ha! Well I better be going to Global Studies to learn more on Brazil, until next time! Xoxo, Marissa

Ship Life- Rough Seas

Rough Seas

The seas last night got pretty rough around midnight, and our books started to fall off of our bookshelf and it was kind of hard to sleep. Observation: working out on a ship that is going up and down constantly is pretty difficult! We have been at sea since Monday night and it is a very bizarre feeling knowing you are only surrounded by water with minimal communication to the outside world. We have Saturday off from class to “relax,” aka: catch up on all of our assigned reading. They started showing in-cabin movies at night which are pretty interesting. I guess they try to show at least one movie that has something to do with where we are going because tonight they are showing one that has something to do with Brazil.
Every morning we have Global Studies class, which the entire ship is required to attend. Every office and desk shuts down during this class, and everyone goes to listen to that day’s lecturer speak about the upcoming country. Today and the last few days we have had speakers with some knowledge about Brazil, including a few people who have lived there. Jess and I are getting pretty nervous about going to Rio de Janeiro when we port, but the speakers make us feel better about Carnival. We have a guided tour that leaves at 7 am on Wednesday and we fly to Rio and have a few days to explore the city, as a group of course! Each night we have “leisure time” but I’m pretty sure this is going to be spent finding Internet cafes and trying to skype rather than exploring Brazil’s nightlife.
We are still meeting new people, and are currently trying to figure out how we are going to get to the town in South Africa with the Guiness Book of World Record’s tallest bungee jump. I won’t write about the bungee jumping again until after I do it, so those of you opposed to us doing it can pretend you never read that. We are also planning our trip in China independently. (as opposed to an organized trip through SAS) Our goal is to get a group together to travel to the Great Wall, possibly stay at a hostel, which I’m not too thrilled about, but I hear there’s a few that are actually really nice. One way to get to the wall from where we port is to take a 24 hour train ride… that is not one of our options!
Classes are going good. I couldn’t add a fifth class because apparently everyone on the ship needed the same class as me and I am too far on the waitlist to really have a chance. Darn, looks like I’ll be taking 12 hours for the first time in my college history, I’m really looking forward to it. I am taking a Business Communication course with Tessa and Jess which is basically a repeat of everything I learned as a PR major at OSU my freshman and sophomore years. I am also in a Women’s Studies class which I really enjoy. We are split into groups to do a final oral presentation, which is a majority of our grade. My group’s discussion is the issue of mail-order brides in Vietnam; I’m really looking forward to learning more about this. My last elective is Human Unity and Diversity, and so far we are reading from a book on anthropology in North America. I also enjoy this class, however I am no anthropology major like many of my classmates and I have some catching up to do. All in all, my classes have very interesting and thought-provoking discussions. I am finding academics on the ship to be slightly different and more challenging, but so far in the seven or so novels I am required to read, they all seem interesting. Until next time! Marissa