Day 1 (01-19-09)

Today we set sail from Nassau in the Bahamas. And so the semester begins. First impression? Favorable. After boarding the ship I found my room and later realized that my room appears to be the only one on the 5th floor with students in it. All of the other rooms on 5 are for faculty and staff members. Weird. And my roommate is a junior in high school. His parents work on the ship and he’s just coming along for the ride. This is his 3rd voyage with SAS. Rough childhood, I know.

Anyway, the boat is definitely rocking. A lot of people have already gotten sick, but I’m sure the uneasiness will wear off for them eventually. Personally, I think it’s kind of nice. Every time I sit down on my bed the ship rocks me to sleep. Oh well.

Day 2 (01-20-09)

We had orientation all day today and, as expected, it was terribly boring. But we did get a break in the middle of the day to watch live coverage of Obama’s inauguration, and later on there was an Obama-rama party. And there was cake. Needless to say, I was pleased.

I have a feeling this is going to happen to me several times over the semester, but I had a conversation with this incredible professor at the party. I didn’t catch his last name at the time, but he went by Terry. For starters, he was wearing an anti-Bush t-shirt, which was amusing in its own right, but this guy had stories for everything. He was born in Ireland, lived in Libya until college when he went to the University of Minnesota, and now he’s been in South Africa since then. Once in South Africa, he became a banker and met his wife, who just happened to be the personal assistant to the Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and she has now held that title for 22 years. Under the Apartheid government, his son was being forced to join the military at the age of 15, and Terry was not about to let that happen. So after some dealings had gone south in his banking industry, he became an activist for South African rights and he’s been doing that ever since. Oh, and he’s currently involved in some little lawsuit… he’s suing the South African President. Wait, what? Who does that? How does one even go about suing the leader of a nation? Ridiculous.

Also, update: we’re in the middle of nowhere in the Atlantic Ocean right now. Land is currently not visible in any direction and won’t be for another week. Our current ocean depth is 5,500 meters, which is something like 19,000 feet. Gulp. But I have two classes for the first time tomorrow and I’ll have another two the following day, so we’ll see how that goes.

Day 3 (01-21-09)

For the first time since first semester freshman year, I got out of bed and ready in time for breakfast. At 8am. On purpose. There’s no way that’ll last. The required course for everyone onboard, Global Studies, met for the first time today. Although the class itself may be intolerably monotonous, the hippie professor should be interesting. He was definitely a flower child. The dude’s got long gray hair in a ponytail, purple t-shirts with tye-dye, Freddy Mercury references, and anecdotes about his pickup truck and its many bumper stickers (Have you thanked a green plant today?). Yeah.

Well I have 5 hours until my next class so I think it might be naptime. I just wanted to post some highlights and let everyone know that all is well. Oh, weather notice: it is currently 77 degrees and sunny. Not to gloat or anything, I’m just saying.