Day 89 (04-16-09)

Today, the only thing really of note was the Talent Show. The planning committee that I’m a part of put on a talent show for the shipboard community. It was a long night; we had 34 acts performing. But it was lots of fun… singers, dancers, Chinese yo-yo, juggling, band performances, comedy skits, spoken word performances, etc. Mayhem. It lasted 2 hours. But we loved it. Afterwards, we all just kicked back and relaxed around the ship. We’re in the home stretch… time to soak it all in. More sea days to come, I’ll try to live them up also.

Day 90 (04-17-09)

Class. Boredom. We’re all avoiding the white elephant. No one wants to admit the fact that we have less than 3 weeks left. I’m included in that group.

There was a Multicultural presentation tonight in the Union. We all gathered together and one of the counselors read out a list of things that students could relate to. If a certain statement applied, you stood up. The purpose was to see some of the diversity that we have onboard the ship, and for us to realize that there are some major social, economic, and cultural differences even between those of us in the room. The exercise worked very well. I thought it was pretty eye-opening seeing some friends that I’ve known for months stand up when asked, “Have you ever helped your family to pay the bills? Has your family ever relied on welfare and food stamps? Will you potentially be barred from marrying a person that you love due to sexual orientation or other social/political reasons?” Stuff that us upper-middle class straight white guys don’t usually think about.

Afterwards, we had a “block party” for those of us that live on the 5th deck. It was pretty fantastic. A gathering of faculty/staff and 5 kids aged 14-19 eating ice cream cake together. Delicious. I’m pretty pleased with the 5th deck situation. Living up with the faculty is probably a much different experience than living down with the other students, but it’s what I’m used to and I don’t think I’d change it if given the choice. I mean, seriously, free cake.

Day 91 (04-18-09)

Pre-port. Finally. We’re almost at another port. Hawaii is tomorrow. Oahu. Honolulu. Family. Mother. Father. Sister. Grandmother. Wowzers. People from my little bubble back in Pennsylvania actually still exist. Who knew?

One of our professors on the ship has lived in Hawaii (on Molokai) for the past 13 years, so he gave a presentation on the islands and gave us some background on the culture and the people and whatnot. And then there was hula. I like hula.

Plus, he played a song by Brother Iz (Israel Kamakawiwo’ole), a popular Hawaiian singer that you may know for his version of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” It was a good time.

Yikes. We have to be awake at 6am tomorrow for our customs checks. Time to crash.

Day 92 (04-19-09)

“Living in Americaaaaa…” This is how they chose to wake us up this morning. At 6:12am. Ugh. Why does this process have to start so early? Silly America. You and your security laws. Wait a minute… America? HOLY $&*# we’re back in America! I don’t like saying that one bit. But if I have to be back in the states, why not Hawaii? It’s like… BARELY the Unites States. Plus, I suppose it will be nice to see my family again. Or something.

After they made us walk through the faculty/staff lounge, hold up our passports to our faces, and then walk out again, it was only 7am. Now what?

Time for some breakfast and a look outside. Good news: It’s absolutely beautiful outside. Welcome to Oahu. We’re docked at the Aloha Tower and it’s sunny and it feels like Hawaii. Ha, go figure. The next hour is spent showering and packing some things for my family to take with them. Wait a minute… ahhhh my family is here!

I run down to the gangway somewhere around 8am and I wait. And wait. And wait. Some people are allowed off the ship, but I’m not one of them. Also, they’re letting people onboard, but only in very small groups. Oh great, more bureaucracy and red tape. I snag a cell phone from someone. They’re coming. But where? I can’t peek around the corner to look outside. Wait, there’s a head. Nope, don’t know her. That’s someone else’s mom. We must be getting close. Another 5 minutes. Another group of people. Wait! Outside! That’s a familiar face. Kelly’s here. Oh, there’s mom. Alright, that didn’t actually take too long. Soon enough, they’re all onboard and it’s time for the family moment. Sister hug. Mother hug. More mother hug. A chorus of “Awww” flows through the line of students trying to leave the ship. Mother is still holding on. Okay, seriously mom, I’ll hug you more later, let’s just get out of everyone’s way, people want to see Hawaii and we’re blocking their access. Sheesh.

The next hour or so is dedicated to a tour of the ship. My parents weren’t able to see the inside of the ship in the Bahamas, and Kelly/Grandmom had never even seen the ship before.

After showing them around and giving them some souvenirs, it was time to depart and see some of the island. We went to the car and made our way to the most important destination of the day: The Cheesecake Factory. I scouted it out before hand and dropped some oh-so-subtle hints about a possible meal here, so we made a point of stopping. Chicken and biscuits. Strawberry Lemonade. Chocolate Fudge Cheesecake. Mmmmm…. Tastes like America. Afterwards, we went back to the hotel to relax for a little while. I showed off some pictures. We shared stories. It was fun.

Next up: Luau. Big pig barbeque right on the beach. Lots of Polynesian dancing. Hips shouldn’t be able to do these things. But I’m glad that they can. Spear throwing. Fire spinning. And the people sitting next to us were from Media, PA. Small world.

Unfortunately, my mother and grandmother had already been in Hawaii for several days before the MV docked this morning, so they had to fly home tonight on the red-eye. But I’ll be home again in a couple weeks, so I supposed they’ll see me again soon enough. Dad, sister and I crashed at the hotel for the night with a friend of mine from the ship, Elise. She’s spending the day with us tomorrow, so it makes sense for her to just crash with us tonight. Arghhh we have to wake up early again tomorrow. I suppose it’s bedtime. Goodnight.

Day 93 (04-20-09)

Hawaii: Part Two. 6:30am, time to wake up. Now why would I choose to wake up at 6:30am when I’m in paradise? Shouldn’t I be sleeping in? No no no. Today, we skydive. And in order to beat the rush of SAS kids to the airstrip, we have to be there by 8:30am. Let’s go.

As it turns out, Honolulu traffic isn’t nearly as bad as we though it would be. We passed by the city with no problem and made it up to Skydive Hawaii headquarters by 8am and we were surprised to see some jumpers already in the air. Apparently it was really windy yesterday and no one was able to jump. So they opened up early today to give some of yesterday’s overflow a chance to get airborne. How nice. After signing eight or nine sheets of paper that said “I acknowledge that skydiving might maim or kill me, I’m choosing to do it at my own risk, and no person but myself can be held accountable for anything that may go wrong,” we got harnessed up. I was attached to a guy named Big Jim. He was crazy. We got along. I requested to do a back flip out of the plane and then tumble around through the air for a little while so it would feel like we didn’t have control. He just laughed and told me he had little to no regard for his own life, and he didn’t really care about mine, either. Suffice it to say, our senses of humor meshed perfectly. We got up in the plane and Elise was first to jump. She screamed bloody murder as she fell out, so that was fun to witness. I went next, and we back-flipped and tumbled and flew and posed for the camera and all that nonsense. Great jump. More fun than last time. Here, they were so relaxed with everything. There was no mandatory dive training on the ground. No rules as to how we had to leave the plane or hold our posture while falling. They just let you jump and have fun with it. But out of all of us, Kelly got the most bang for her buck.

So I’m floating to the ground with Big Jim after the parachute deploys, and he points something out to me. He says, “See that parachute over there? Someone’s on a reserve chute.” I looked over at where he was pointing and there were two parachutes next to each other. One was open and holding a tandem group. The other was collapsed and looked like a deflated blue balloon, floating away with the wind. Hmm… that person is above me, so they probably jumped after me. NO WAY. Is that Kelly? I steered the chute for awhile and then we made our way to the ground. A minute or two later, Kelly landed and, sure enough, she was the one using the backup. Apparently her jumpmaster pulled the cord on the parachute, and it opened, but its lines were tangled around each other. He tried adjusting it for a minute or so, but then he gave up and cut it away. Which led to another freefall that caught my sister incredibly off guard. But the backup worked. So, ya know, that’s good.

Anyway, we left the airfield and headed around the North Shore to see the other side of the island. Sandy beaches, lush tropical fauna, etc. As we rounded the Northeast corner of the island and headed south, we drove past Kaaawa Valley, an area where many scenes from Lost are filmed. Lost is filmed entirely on Oahu, and all of the scenes that take place on the inner portion of the island are shot at two locations, one of them being Kaaawa Valley. There wasn’t enough time for a tour of the area, but even just looking at the valley from the road, you could tell that the mountains and the valley looked just like the Island.

Lunchtime: California Pizza Kitchen. BBQ chicken pizza. Delicious.

Stopped by Kelly’s house to take a tour, and then went to Sea Life Park to check out where she works. She showed us around and gave us the scoop on her animals. I personally liked the penguins and sea lions. I think playing with them all day would be a sweet job. Plus one for Kelly.

Afterwards, we headed back to Kelly’s place to relax for a little while. Her beach is pretty much the best thing since sliced bread. If you’re into beaches and stuff. It’s a beach for locals. So no one ever goes there. When we walked out to the water, there was one other guy on the beach, and he was doing work collecting tree branches or something. Take that Waikiki. We sat in Kelly’s house for awhile talking about SAS with her roommate Dani who was lame and didn’t skydive with us. Actually I just said that because I know she reads this… I know it wasn’t your fault. Sorry none of your plans worked out these past couple of days.

Ugh, 4pm. Time to head back towards the pier. Why don’t we have more time here? Sheesh. After a stop at the grocery store for some essentials (Pop Tarts, instant soup, and Bugles), Elise and I were back aboard the MV with 20 minutes to spare. Dinner on the ship was halfway decent though. Lots of macaroni and cheese. When the ship pulled away at 8pm, I saw my dad standing on the pier watching us leave. So I went to my cabin, called him, and grabbed the industrial strength laser pointer I got in China. Then I shined it straight up in the air. Unfortunately, he couldn’t see it… too much ambient light. So I shined it down into the water right in front of him. Judging by his reaction (and all the curious voices I heard in the background), I think I lit up the entire bay in green. So that’s pretty cool I guess.

Aloha Hawaii. I wasn’t even looking forward to your sights that much, but I was pleasantly surprised. Kthanksbyeee.

Day 94 (04-21-09)

I did absolutely nothing today. Everyone was pretty down today. I mean, it’s the first day of a 7-day stretch at sea. Plus, we just left Hawaii, which we only got to see for two days. Not nearly enough time. What’s there to be happy about? We only have two weeks left. We should be in “savor every moment” mode. But instead we just sleep and finish up homework all day. It’s sad.

Today: Slept through Global. Woke up at 12:30pm. Ate lunch. Played some games. Went to class at 4:15pm. Ate dinner. Met with a group about a project we’re presenting tomorrow. Worked on the project. Played more games. Sleep.

How useless.

Day 95 (04-22-09)

So today I had my final presentation in my Shakespeare class. That was really the most exciting thing that happened all day. Our group took MacBeth and set it in modern-day Thailand. Duncan owned a sex club. The three witches were the three “showgirls.” Lady MacBeth was the head prostitute and MacBeth was the bouncer. It sounds weird, and it is, but it worked. I think we did well.

Oh and they showed the Breakfast Club on tv tonight. Great movie. I followed it up with a nice long sit on the outside deck staring into the darkness and the water (since I don’t have very much time left to do that), and then Austin Powers 2. Solid night. Oh and we lose another hour tonight. Figures. That means that, as of tomorrow morning, we are 2 hours behind Boulder and 4 hours behind the East Coast. It was so much cooler when we were 13 hours ahead. And in the stretch between Japan and Hawaii when we crossed the International Date Line, I really felt like I was time traveling. I had no idea what time it was. We lived the same day twice. It was awesome. Now it’s just pretty much normal. And I’m not a fan of normalcy.