SINGAPORE 10/31-11/1

Singapore is a first world country so most of the things I saw seemed normal to me. However Singapore laws are crazy strict! If you are bored one day you should really look up their laws. This country was very orderly, unlike all of the other countries, which were complete chaos.

        I really enjoyed this country. It was a nice break from all of the poverty I have been witnessing.  I really used this as a “ME” port. The first day Emma, Leah, Carren and I went shopping at the mall. It was really cool finding a Forever 21 in Singapore. We decided to eat lunch in the food court; I even found chicken & rice. It was okay, but the chicken was cold and there was not much flavor. After lunch we did so more shopping and then went back to the ship to start getting ready for the Singapore flyer.The Singapore flyer was so amazing, it was huge.

Our friend Celeste had bought tickets before we even got on the ship. She ended up not selling them all. None of the capsules were full. We were supposed to have 10 in ours and it was only us four. The table setting was very elegant and the courses were very nice. They looked to pretty to eat. The view was incredible.

Looking at the city from the ferris wheel was breath taking. I really enjoyed getting dressed up with the girls because for the most part we are in sweats or sweating!

        On November 1st we got up early and got a coffee and then headed to Santosa. Our cab driver did not know what we were talking about when we asked him to take us to the Merlion. I thought this was really funny because all cab drivers have to be born in Singapore and be a Singapore Citizen. We made it to Santosa and he asked the gate guard where the Merlion was. She said take your first right and after two round a bout take a left. He took a left and then went to two round a bouts and too another left. Then he asked a guy for directions and he told him to go back to the gate and keep going straight and then make a left after the second round a bout. He started going off I hate Santosa and I hate this part of town and I hate when people give me wrong directions and on and on and on. It was humorous to me because I thought you had to be from Singapore so the cab driver would know how to get around but unfortunately, that still does not help. He was so mad he got the wrong directions when he got the right directions and he just did not follow them. WHOOPS!

We ended up finding the Merlion but it was closed so we started taking pictures around the area and then headed inside this resort to find a breakfast place. We ended up not finding a resort; it was more like a resort world. There were so many stories and hotels and things to do. There was even a Universal Studios. I think it would be really fun to come here for a family vacation. I did not get to see everything that this country had to offer. I feel you would need a good two weeks to see everything. I also was told that in about a year a water park will be open. We found this candy store and started taking pictures with the life size displays outside.

The kid side of us was coming out. The store finally opened, but the candy was so expensive we decided to pass. We headed back to the Merlion. The Merlion was really cool, we watch a video on how the Merlion came about. We got a lucky coin at the entry gate and deposited it in the lion’s mouth. A lucky ticket came out and I had to redeem my prize at the gift shop. We first went to the Merlions head and looked out from there. We could see our ship and much of the country from it. The beaches looked beautiful. This made me wish we could have stayed longer. We had a service visit so we took the tram back. At this point Emma and Carren were not feeling well and then I started not to feel well. We headed back to the ship and were grabbing our service visit tickets when we realized that all the service visits for the rest of the day had been cancelled. We were sad, but also it was nice because we all three were feeling sick. We decided to grab our computers and go to a Starbucks and get some Wifi. I was so happy I was able to talk to my family and send some pictures. Emma got her Bubble Tea that she loved and we grabbed a few things to spend our left over dollars on and then headed back to the ship.

        This port went by extremely fast and we did not have time to do much. I barely had time to get post cards sent out. So I apologize in advanced for the messy post cards.
        Today was a reading day!!!! It was the best reading day ever!!!!!!! I went to bed at 6:30pm last night and woke up at 11:00am. I had to go meet with my professor real quick to let him know what topic I would like to write about for my fetal development class. I grabbed a quick bite to eat and then went back to my room to take a quick nap and I did not wake up till 4:30pm. Emma and I did not realize how tired we actually were. We needed this day to recoup. We cleaned our room and got things organized. I got up to start working on homework and I got sea sick all of a sudden. I never get sea sick. It was really weird and I still feel a little blahhh..  I took a shower and did some laundry and started to feel better! I am pleased to announce that I have still done all of my laundry by hand and same with Emma! Thanks to my dad for his amazing clothes line that he needs to patten for the SAS store.

        Tonight we had pre-port. We will be in Viet Nam tomorrow.  Emma and I are getting up at 5:15 to watch the sunrise and also see land on both sides of us as we make it up the Mekong River.
        I will be going to the Cu Chi Tunnels and Cambodia. I am excited but do not know what to expect emotionally. I cannot believe it has only been one day and I am almost going to be docked in Vietnam! This trip blows my mind. We also gained an hour last night so I am now 14 hours ahead of the West Coast.
        I just wanted to mention and ask for your prayers. There is a girl, Genna, which used to live a few doors down from me in my hall.  She has the worst strand of malaria and has been in the ICU in India. Her parents are with her, but almost all of her organs have shut down and then started to work again, but her lungs have shut down and she has to wear a mask that just pushes oxygen in her all the time. There is no TV in her room and she is not a fan of India food. When she was leaving the ship she told Dean Sue I will meet you guys in Vietnam. Unfortunately, that is not the case and it looks like she will not be joining us at all. I ask for your prayers for her and her family, they really need them!
        On a better note, I love you guys all and I will be home in less than 6 weeks! =)

INDIA 10/22-10/27

Words cannot begin to describe what I have experienced in India. In fact, I do not think there are words that could describe this country.

 I arrived in India on Friday the 22nd,  I had the Dalit Work Project from 12:00pm to 6:00pm. We took it easy in the morning since there would not be time to get off the ship and then back on to make our field study at noon. At 11:45 we headed outside to catch our bus but when we walked outside there was a massive line, I was confused what this line was, I had never experienced this when getting off the ship. The line turned out to be the guards at the gate checking our passport and our custom forms, strange because they just had a face to face passport check on the ship before the ship got cleared. I was like okay whatever who cares I am in India!
        Once on the bus we got to the port exit gate and we were stopped again, this time an officer boarded the bus and checked all of our passport and custom forms again!  India is extremely strict and has high levels of security since they have had terrorist attacks. We finally made it outside of the port gate and there were lines and lines and lines of motorcycles and auto-rickshaws everywhere! Jenny had told me about the traffic and the rickshaws before I left, so I knew that was one thing I needed to experience.
        Traffic was insane and so crazy! I cannot begin to describe it. I have come to the conclusion that we are the only country that believes in traffic lights and lanes. India’s traffic was worst then every country I have been to so far. The auto-rickshaws, bikes, motorcycles, and cows take over the roads. They use their horns every second, even more then in New York, and that is the signal to the other drivers to get out of the way because they are switching lanes. They get right on the back of the cars bumpers and honk their horn till they move out of the way. They never apply brakes; they will hit the car before they would ever think of applying the brakes.
        After making it through this horrible driving experience we finally make it to our destination. I did not know what I really was going to be doing except, painting a community building. When I got off the bus there were children screaming and waving, music, drums and people greeting us. There were also flashes going off right and left, we felt like celebrities.  An Indian Women was standing right outside the bus; she placed a necklace of flowers over our heads and placed it gently on each of our necks. She was holding a bowl of red powder; it looked like baby powder died red. She dipped her two fingers in the bowl and then put a red dot on all of our foreheads.
        The tour guide kept trying to get us to move throughout the crowd, which seemed impossible. After the tour guide and his workers helped push the people away, we were able to continue moving forward inch by inch. I hated how they just hit the kids on the side of the head to make them move. It broke my heart. They were just so excited to see us and touch us and the adults would whack them across their heads, it killed me. We were able to make it to the community building.
        They had this huge banner toward the front of the chairs. The sign read Semester at Sea Dalit Work Project Group and had a picture of our ship and some other words on it. They had all of us sit in chairs facing the front where other people from the community were sitting. The flashes continued to go off and men yelling look over here, look over here. We were so confused what all of this was for. We were just here to paint a building for them. For about an hour, they just gave speeches.  They were just thanking us for coming because we had helped break the cast and on and on it went. Finally, after the opening ceremony was over they handed each of us a different bucket of paint, blue, yellow, green, or pink. Then they brought us to the area they wanted us to start painting. It was extremely watered down and we were painting over dirt, bugs and old newspapers that were all on the walls. I was in charge of painting the outside of the house and the stairs a blue color. The news crew was yelling at us, “Hey you, bend down, no you stand up, act natural like your painting the house.” They took hundreds of different pictures of us painting the house. I actually made the paper!
        I was done with the front of the community building and the left side. So they moved me to the right side. When I was walking over there, members of the community were pointing and laughing. I was confused and thought it was because I am blonde and really white. It turned out that they were laughing at the blue paint that had splattered onto my face. The women were licking their fingers and wiping it off my face. It was not coming off so they ran into their house and got a bucket of water for me to wash my hands off. They tried to get me to wash my face off, but I did not want that water on my face. I was able to divert the situation.
        Their English skills were not good. They were trying to ask us if we had eaten lunch yet and if we were thirsty. We were really nervous about the food and drinks. We told them we had just eaten but they insisted on us taking a break and at least having a drink. So they brought out a two litter of soda/juice and opened it for us. I heard the seal pop so I knew it would be okay to drink. Unfortunately, I do not like soda or juice and I do not drink it. Emma knew this and she was trying to get to me and drink my cup of soda without them seeing , but they were just staring at us, watching us drink it. I had no other option but to drink it. I was able to finally stomach the whole glass.

        The individuals that surrounded me were trying to ask if my eye color was fake. Their son spoke pretty good English and was able to translate for me. They had never seen someone with blue eyes and they thought it was so different. They loved it. They were so happy when I held their son. By standing next to them, and having a conversation, we breaking the cast and they were joyful for this. This was a huge day for them; we were making history as we stood in front of them. They never asked for money, they just wanted us to touch them and take pictures with them or of them. After we would do that, they would thank us. I continued getting chills throughout this entire day. I just felt the joy and love that was in the air. I knew this was going to be a great day, but it was only about 3 o’clock.

        After we were done talking with them, we were able to go through the community and visit with the families who would be using the building. We were greeted the same way by everyone as we made our way through the village. The families were so welcoming and wanted us to touch each of the children. Many of the Indian people would ask for us to take their picture. They would want to see the picture after and then would thank us for taking their pictures. Their faces would light up so bright as they looked at their own image on the screen. The one thing that really affected me was the way they lived. There were hundreds of people all around living in these huts or building made out of tin. It broke my heart. I was glad to see that they were all happy and did not look depressed. It still boggles my mind how they were so happy when they had nothing. Children were walking around with ripped clothes or no clothes at all. In America we look bad at children who do not have shoes on but in India you look at the children strangely if they do have shoes on. It was very abnormal to see a child have a simple pair of shoes on. As we made our way through the village, it was like a parade, there were Indian woman outside in the streets preparing the food they did have. It did not look very sanitary; I do not understand how they were able to eat the food and not get sick from it. I loved watching their everyday life unfold in front of me. This experience was a huge eye opener to me. In America we worry about having the nicest car and if we have the latest Iphone, but in India, they are just worried if they have enough food to survive. This opportunity really helped me open up my eyes and realize that I do not need all of these “extra” things in life to be happy. This day was amazing and I could not have asked for a better first day in India.

        The next day I had to be in the Union by 4:30am to leave for my trip to the Taj Mahal. I decided to get up at 3:00am and get all my stuff together and email my mom. We meet in the Union, got our itinerary, and were told to go outside to load up on the bus. We went through security and got onto the bus. I got a seat to myself and began writing in my journal so I could catch up. Half way through the tour guide asked what I was doing and I told him I was writing in my journal. He then asked if he could sit next to me. I said yes hesitantly, and moved my bag onto my lap and scooted over toward the window to allow him to sit next to me. He instantly leaned closer to me and put his hand around my back and grabbed my boob and began rubbing me. I was trying to push him off and tell him I had a boyfriend back at home but he would not stop. He was rubbing my skin and my face and trying to get closer to me and take pictures of me. I was getting louder and he still would not stop. I looked over to the Semester at Sea guy that was watching this entire thing go down and he did not help me at all. We finally arrived at the airport and the guide stood up and then turned around and tried to kiss me I yelled NO and told him to get away. I mouthed it to the Semester at Sea guy what had happened and he told me that I would be okay and I would lived. I was shocked and felt like I was out of line and that I did not need to tell anyone. So I just kept my mouth shut.
        We got inside of the airport and got our boarding passes. We hopped in the bus that brought us to the airplane. The airplane looked just like the normal air plane I take on South West. The plane had steam coming out of the top that help make the air not so dry. The flight went really well and we landed in New Delhi. We found our bus driver and he took us to visit the Qutab and the Indian Gate.
        I cannot begin to describe the poverty I saw here in India. I still cannot even come up with words to describe it. Neither pictures nor words will even begin to do justice. This will never be able to be explained. It is something you just have to experience it.

        We were very hungry and wanted to eat so we decided to change up the itinerary and went to Forte Grand to eat lunch. Lunch was held in one of the ballrooms. It was buffet style and all Indian food. I liked the rice and loved the naan. I ate so much naan it was crazy. After we finished up with lunch, we continued with the itinerary. Around 4pm we went to the hotel and checked in. We had to put all of our bags through security and get searched before we were allowed into the hotel. The hotels name was Le Meridian. This hotel was extremely nice.
I am still trying to figure out why this 5 star hotel existed in India when there was so much poverty outside. We went upstairs to our room and took a nap before we headed out to do a city tour at 5:30pm.
        We saw tons of Monkeys running around; some of the monkeys had babies on their backs or their stomachs. It was so cute how the baby latches on the mommy! I really wanted to bring a monkey home, but I knew I could not. =(   

The cows were all over in the streets. All of the traffic stops if there is a cow in the road. The cow is considered sacred. They do not lock the cows up in pins or eat them. At breakfast they have chicken sausage not beef sausage. It was weird seeing cows in the department stores and traffic backed up for hours because of a cow in the middle of the street. I thought this was extremely neat that they had something that meant this much to them.

        After we finished up at Humayun Tomb, Raj Ghat-Mahatma Gandhi’s Samadhi and Imperial building we headed back to the hotel for dinner. I went to my room first to drop all of my stuff off and my phone was ringing. I ran into my room and answered it! It was Emma! I was so happy that we were staying at the same hotel even though we were in two different groups! We went and had dinner in this amazing ballroom! It was extremely elegant, but the food was not that good.
        We had to get from New Delhi to Agra. So we took a train for 2 1/2 hours and got there safely. The Taj Mahal was next. We arrived there and so many beggars/hagglers approached us; Children, adults, people with disabilities. I did not even know what to do. I wanted to help them all, but I knew I could not do that. My instant thoughts were to help the young children, but all I could think about was Slum Dog Millionaire. I felt I was helping this horrible problem. There was this one boy who would not leave me alone. He was 12 years old but he looked like he was 8 years old because he was so malnutritioned. He was trying to sell me these keys chains and I was like no I cannot bring them inside the Taj Mahal. He was like okay let me tell you the truth you cannot bring them inside. He was like, “you are my sister I will give them to you for free.” I said, “No, you go make profit off of them.” He was breaking my heart. Then he asked me, “Will you come buy them from me after you guys inside.” I said, “of course.” I felt extremely guilty after I said yes. I felt like I was doing him injustice, but then I thought to myself maybe I helped him from being beaten to death because he did not sell them for his master. This situation made me so sad.
        We almost made it to the entrance when I saw this older haggler slap this younger haggler to the ground. The older haggler grabbed the child's key chains out of his hands and through them to the ground until some of them broke. Watching this happen and not being able to interfere even made me feel smaller than before I just wanted to run back to the bus so I did not have to witness these horrible things happening.

        We made it inside the Taj Mahal. It was absolutely gorgeous. There were tons of Indian families surrounding the building and courtyard. Mothers were approaching me asking me to take pictures with their children. Some of them even went to the extent of asking me to be in their family portrait.

My friends were telling me that they were asking me because I looked so much different than they did. I had blonde hair, blue eye, and really white skin. We ran up to the top where the Taj Mahal was and put on our red booties so we could go inside. The two tombstones that were inside was the guys tombstone that built the Taj Mahal and the other was the girl he built it for.  The inside was not as extravagant as I would have thought it was going to be like, but the outside made up for it. We also went to the Agra Fort. It was cool because you could see the Taj Mahal from it. That night we left Agra and headed to Jaipur we were suppose to have a 6 hour bus ride but it turned into a 8 hour bus ride. The traffic was really backed up in this one area. Our tour guide was trying to figure out what was going on, there were cops with their guns pulled out, so he phoned his boss and asked to find out what was going on. His boss told him it was a riot and that we needed to turn around for our safety. So that is what we did, later on we found out the road ended up being closed until 10:00 that night! I am so glad we decided to turn around.
        The next day we headed to the Amber Fort, this was where we were going to try to ride the Elephants to the Fort. We had to drive there fast and get in line as quickly as possible because the elephants are only aloud to make two passes up to the fort. Our group ran to get in line. We did not want to miss this once in a lifetime experience! We were able to get to the front of the line and there were enough Elephants for the entire group. I was so excited some of the Elephants faces were painted. I was next and my elephant was approaching me. I was thrilled to see his face was painted! Yay! 

So Adorah and I sat on the back of the elephant and enjoyed the ride up to the fort. I liked riding the elephant much better than riding a camel. It was way smoother and more comfortable and I was not sore the next day. We got off the Elephant and started taking pictures with them. They guys that lead the elephants were hitting us telling us to tip them. So I would place the money in the Elephants trunk and he would hand it to his leader. It was very cool. We did a city tour of Jaipur and saw the City Palace and the observatory. Both of these places were very interesting! I enjoyed both of them.
        Later that night we finally convinced our tour guide to let us off because we wanted to go shopping! He had the bus stop and let all of us off. He had us follow him for about 20 minutes. We had to make it through this tunnel that only fit an auto-rickshaw. I still am in shock that I made it through this tiny tunnel with all of my toes and body parts! I will never be able to describe how this was and how I felt. All I can say is it is a miracle I lived!!!!! The smell let alone inside of this tunnel was horrible and I thought the smell itself would kill me.
        Our tour guide said to meet at the bus at 8:00pm. I instantly popped up and said NO!!!! I am not staying out here at night with all of this traffic and commotion, I have not even had time to practice in the day time, and there is no way! He decided to change the time to 7:00pm. We had an hour to shop. The guys decided to leave us because we wanted to head back toward the bus and shop at those shops they looked less chaotic. Leah, Ashley, Emma, Sophie, and I made it inside this store that sold the pants Ashley wanted. Everything is going well, she is trying on the pants and all of a sudden the lights go off. We run outside because we do not want to be in this tiny closet with two guys who are strangers. Ashley tells us that she really does not like those pants. We try to communicate that to the guys and they chase us to the next store. Asking us what price we would pay. We are trying to tell them we do not want them and we would have paid them the price they were asking if we wanted them. We finally make it into the other store. We bought a few things. We glanced at our watches and realized we were cutting it close and we need to run to the bus. We threw them the money and made it to the bus on time.
        We decided we were not done shopping. So we went to the stores in our hotel. We bought a few bracelets. Then the next day it was all travel back to Chennai, India. We got back around 10 at night.
        On the last day of India we decided to get up really early and leave by 8. We got off the ship and got an auto rickshaw. He asked where we wanted to go so we told him Spencer’s Market. He said there not open yet, let me take you to a different store, then I will take you there for the same price. We looked at each other and were like okay sounds good to us. The place he tried to take us was not open yet so he said I will take you somewhere else. We get to the other place and it was closed. He turns to us and tells us they will be open in 10 minutes, let’s just go around the corner and I will show you this temple. We were like fine just for a few minutes but we do not want to go inside because we are not dressed appropriately. The auto-rickshaw driver said we were dressed fine. This Indian man approached us and said that we must go in. We said no we are not dressed right and he told us we were dressed fine and we had come a long ride I insist you must come in. We were still saying no and he was like for me? Please? So we broke down and said yes. He took us to where we needed to take our shoes off. Emma and I looked around and noticed everyone had their socks off, so we took ours off too. We started to head inside and our taxi driver told us to go put our socks back on. The random guy had us follow him inside and started telling us all of this stuff about their gods and all of this stuff and I was taking pictures. Then he took us to a table and said you need to pay for a photo pass since you were taking photos. I said I do not need to take photos I will just put my camera away. He was like no you have to pay for it and you can take as many photos as you would like. I was like fine whatever and ended up just paying for it. He then took us to this kitchen and was explaining about it and how it feeds 300-500 daily. The next words out of his mouth were, you can make a donation and then they will put your name on the board. We were thinking to ourselves okay we really need to get out of here and get going. This is our last day in India. He continues touring us around and a wedding was going on and we felt so disrespectful. We continued telling him we needed to go and he just kept asking for donation for this or that. After we finally got him to let us leave, he asked for 300 rupees each for showing us around somewhere we did not even want to see in the first place. We were like no all we have is 100 rupees, he was like no. We told him that is all we have take it or leave it. He would not take it so I turned to Emma and said come on lets go. We started walking and he was following behind. We grabbed our shoes and started putting them on and he said you need to pay for your shoes, so we give him 5 rupees. The he decides he will take the 100 rupees. We gave him the money and went to our auto-rickshaw guy and told him not to take us to anymore places and we wanted to go to a place to buy a sari. He took us to a really expensive one. So again we had to tell him to take us to a cheap one. He took us to a cheap one and Emma bought one. We were ready to go to Spencer Market but he kept taking us to these really expensive places. We finally made it to a mall, not the mall we were trying to get to, but we got to a mall. We were told there was wifi there, but there was not and all the stores were still closed. We decided to try and get another auto-rickshaw to Spencer’s Market because we heard they for sure had wifi, however,  they ended up not having any wifi at all. IT turned out good though because we were able to get Naan and a drink for lunch. Then I went and bought a sim card so I could call home. I called my mom and told her we were heading back to the ship and I would call her in 20 minutes. Over an hour passed by and we were still not back at the ship. The auto-rickshaw guy kept taking us to the same nice stores again. I got so mad; I yelled at him and told him to take us back to the ship, no more expensive stores. We told you we have no more money, we gave it all to you. It turned out that the auto-rickshaw drivers get paid every time they bring someone to these stores. We were so beyond frustrated, we were glad to be back on the ship and did not care we were back early. Like I said earlier, I cannot explain India very well; I am still trying to comprehend it myself. You really just have to experience it yourself.

Taj Mahal

More at Sea Days.....10/18/10

Three more days until I am in Chennai, India! 
Tonight I will be going to an Explorer Seminar: “Human Sex Trafficking in India.” I will also be trying to get caught up and packed  for my trip to the Taj Mahal. The trip is for 4 days and 3 nights. The first day I am in India I am doing the New Delhi work project. I have the last day free, so I will be able to do whatever  I did not get to do. After India I have a reading day and two days of class then I will be in Singapore. I cannot believe how fast this next month is going to go. We will not have that long of days at sea until we are leaving Yokohama, then it will be 10 LONG days at sea! It is going to be so miserable, I am going to be ready to be home!

Mauritius

On the 13th We decided since midterms were over we wanted to have a yogurt on the seventh deck and then play cards. It was really fun sitting outside and relaxing. We went to pre-port, I was really upset with the presentation they gave us. They flat out told us that this was our “SPRING BREAK”. They told us what bars to go to and what beers to order. They never spoke about what food to try or great places to visit. I am getting very disappointed with Semester at Sea. They promote drinking so much more than I ever thought they would. What professor gets up in front and tells the entire ship board community what the best beer is in Mauritius! Hello....we are in a different country to see the beautiful culture it has to offer, not buy the best beer they serve on the island. This makes me  just a little confused, we took an alcohol class prior to boarding the ship and students have been expelled because of drinking, but they are going to direct us on where to get good alcohol. WOW!!  I am so glad that my friends are not into the whole party thing and I am able to see the cultural aspects of the countries we are visiting. I am able to have an amazing time and have a drink on the beach! There is a balance and spending your time in port drunk is not it.

The next day we arrived in Port Louis, Mauritius at 7am. I did not watch the sunrise, it was already up by the time I made it to deck seven. I expected the view coming into the port to be breathtaking. Unfortunately, it was not like that. Yes, it was pretty, but I thought there was going to be miles and miles of beaches. That was not the case. It just looked like every other port. I was very disappointed. Everyone was telling me this was the prettiest place in the world. I would have to argue with that! I do not want to sound like the beaches were not nice, because they were extremely nice, just not what I thought it was going to be like.

We ate breakfast, then waited for the announcement to say, “The ship has been cleared.” It only took an hour and a half to clear the ship. We were so thankful since we only had the first day to explore and see the island, since the second day, we had an orphanage visit. When we got off the ship, we turned to the left and tons of water taxi were there waiting for us. We had to go down about 6 stairs to get to the dock. The stairs were extremely shaky and two guys were holding on to the stairs so they would not move away from the dock. I walked a few more feet and was in front of the water taxi. These boats were not easy to get on and off of. They were very uneven. After the gentlemen helped me get on the boat, I found a seat. It was so crowded, they had shoved about 15 of us on this tiny boat, we barley could move. This guy began to maneuver his way through the crowd, he was stepped on my back like I was a stepping stone. I had to ask Emma if I had shoe prints on my back. I did not just in case you were wondering. =)  The water was crystal blue, it was beautiful and peaceful. The water taxi took about 10 minutes to get to the center of town. The Island is much more developed then I thought it was going to be. I thought it was going to have tons of beaches and 5 star resorts all over the island, and in the middle I thought it would be trees and sand.  I was completely wrong, there were so many cars, people, and buildings everywhere! Traffic was also a huge probable here. It takes a long time to get to your destination because of all of the traffic. The island is small and the population is 1.3 million. I also think the roads are not as well developed as the untied states and that contributes to the traffic problems.
This is a closed currency country so finding an ATM was first on our list. We found an ATM that looked like a reliable one and withdrew money.
A guy had us follow him to the market, it was really unique.

It was inside a building. We all three bought sun hats and these huge beach bags. We all looked so cute; we had our sun hats, beach bags, beach towels, and huge sunglasses. We looked like we should of been filming a movie. Emma and Carren were laughing at me because everything I was wearing was pink! My swimsuit, towel, hat, sunglasses, and bag were all pink! They said I definitely looked like a California girl! Oh how I love my color pink. LOL  We were walking passed a homeless girl and her son sitting on the side of the road in a corner, we felt so bad. We saw a food cart up ahead on the left. We decided not to give her money, instead we bought them food and water. Carren took it to them and Emma and I stayed back. We did not want to overwhelm her or her son. Carren said it looked like she was tearing up when she gave her the bag of food and drinks.
        A taxi driver approached us and asked if we wanted a taxi, at first we said no and then we decided we wanted one. He said he would take us to the beach and on the way there he would show us the Jummah Mosque, other important things in Mauritius, the post office, and then the beach for ten dollars each. We thought that sounded good. He grabbed his taxi and we jumped in.
Jummah Mosque was our first stop, before we stepped inside we told him we did not feel that we were wearing was appropriate to go inside. He insisted that we were fine, and proceeded on leading us in. Everyone inside was starring at us, we felt so uncomfortable. When I asked if I could take a few pictures he said that was fine. The people began to glare at us even more! For some reason, I do not think pictures were aloud and I know for a fact we were not dressed appropriately. We were so glad once we got out of that awkward situation. The taxi driver took us to a few other important places and then he took us to the post office. After we waited about 15 minutes, he was like lets go, we have waited to long! We were the next people to be helped, but we listen to him and jumped back into the taxi. He drove us to the beach area and there was also a post office there, so we got our post cards and post stamps and then we were finally off to the beach. He brought us to the first one, but it was kind of small, and not what we were looking for. So he said he would take us to another beach down the street. This beach was still not as big as we thought, but it was very pretty and the water was light blue.

There were food stands and ice cream stands all around. We decided to eat at this one restaurant that faced towards the ocean. It was a Chinese restaurant. I got chicken and rice! It was so delicious!  We also got alcohol beverages! They were very good as well. After we finished up with our meal, we went down to the beach and laid out. It was so peaceful. We wrote on our post cards, in our journals, and read. I could have fallen asleep, it was that peaceful. Emma and I went swimming in the ocean, then sat on the beach and let the water keep splashing us, it was so nice. We found a cab and asked if he could take us to a resort, but he did not understand what we were saying. We decided to go back down on the beach and watch the sunset. After the sunset we headed back to the waterfront. Emma and Carren love Indian food so they wanted to eat at an Indian restaurant. I have never tried Indian food and I was very nervous! Emma told me what type of chicken I should order. The meal ended up being extremely good. We called our parents and then head back to the ship. We were off to the water taxi but a taxi driver said he would take us to the ship for only 5 US dollars. This was cheaper then the water taxi, so we said sure. Once we were in the car, he told us not to tell anyone, even the other taxi drivers that he gave us a ride for 5 US dollars. We asked him why, and he said because he would get in trouble. He also said that he just really needs the money so he could go to the pharmacy and buy medicine because him and his wife are sick. Emma and I were in the back seat about to cry, it broke our hearts. We decided to give him 20 US dollars. He was so grateful.
        The next day we had the Children's Terre De Paix visit. We went and visited a children's shelter. They are in charge of removing children from abusive families and placing them in foster care, kind of like CPS but they are not government foster care. They have set up this program to teach the children life skills. They have physical education, arts, agriculture, writing, math, and a variety of other life skills. We got the chance to go around to some of these groups and interact with the children, it was a very cool experience. It was much harder to interact with the children here, because they did not speak English. One of the groups taught us how to say a saying. Which means without other people I am not a person. Si Pena ou Pena nou, Si Pena nou Pena ou, Se nou nou se ou,ou ou ou, nou nou nou. I thought it was really cool they were able to teach us.
        Then we went to another building so they could show us what the EU (European Union) donated. EU donated 140,000 dollars to go to the children of ages 0-7 years old. This place looks like it belonged in the United States! It was outstanding!

Words will not even begin to explain it. I will have to post pictures so you can see and understand what I mean by this. It did not fit into the community, it stuck out so much, it was a phenomenal building.
        It was time to head back to the waterfront. We stopped at the mall and bought a few last minute things, had lunch, and went to the grocery store to buy food to stock up. After we were back on the ship, we took a nap, then went upstairs for a BBQ. The food was okay but still not amazing.
        On ship time has passed and over 100 people got dock time for being late and about 250 people boarded the ship drunk. I am in amazement. These Students paid a fortune to be here and they are wasting their time in port drinking! IDK, but it is beginning to get really annoying. Enough rambling on about drunk people!
        In 5 days I will be in Chennai India. I am excited about having a reading day before we arrive in port. Reading days are days when we do not have class. They are catch up days. Most of us use them to catch up on sleep. We lack sleep and are always so tired, however, this reading day is not a normal reading day, it is the Sea Olympics! This is when all of the different halls on the ship compete in different varieties of games. The winners get off the ship first in San Diego. I normally am not competitive, but  this time I definitely will be! I want to be the first one off!!! I am the Baltic sea and we are going to win!

At Sea 10/13/10

Time at sea has been okay but not the best. The last 5 days I spent a lot of time working on homework, writing papers, and studying for mid terms. The first day back at sea was a reading day. I spent a lot of time catching up on sleep and working on homework assignments. Mid terms went well and I am all caught up on work and most important sleep! I also started a second book and am already finished with it. I only have one other book I bought in South Africa, I did not realize I was going to read through two books so fast!  I normally hate to read. But, I have feel in love with the serious of L.A. Candy by Lauren Conrad. Now I have to wait till I get home in December to buy the third book because it does not come out until sometime this month and I will not be in anymore ports that would have an English copy. Hopefully, I can get it in Hawaii and read it on the beach!
After dinner a group of friends and I walked outside to watch the breathtaking sunset. OH MY it was so beautiful!!! The sky was filled with a hot pinkish reddish color from the sun. It was gorgeous. Then we headed up to the 7th deck and right when I stepped up on the last step I looked to the left and I saw land!!!! We were passing Reunion Island, as I type this blog we will be able to see an active volcano.
Tomorrow we will be docking at 8:00am! This is our "Spring Break"!!!! We are all so excited! We cannot wait! We have been looking at pictures and oh my it is gorgeous. If you guys have time you guys should look up some pictures! I am off to finish listening to pre- port, finish my amazing book and then off to bed to get some good rest.  I am sure we will not be sleeping much while we are in Mauritius, since we are only here for two days! :(

10/7 & 10/8

Today is October 7th and I got up at 6:30 had breakfast and headed over to the mall to upload more pictures and try to Skype some people, but nobody answered =(
I felt so loved, NOT JK! I am heading to the orphanage at1:00. I bought some more little toys, clay, markers, paper, and candy for them!

Today is not what I had hoped and expected. Well..... The SAS field program today was HORRIBLE! I do not know what I paid 73 dollars for and why I wasted my second to last day doing this field program! I will be complaining to the field office. I am very disappointed. I am really really mad that I wasted 73 dollars but the fact that I could have went shark diving or went and saw the penguin colony or done a day safari, was a bigger deal to me. I just wanted to interact with the kids. That is all I wanted to do. The orphanage was 45 minutes away. That would not have been a problem if we would have had more time, but the trips hours were from1:30 to 5:45. We spent 30 minutes at the orphanage and that was it. We barley were able to interact with the children.
The Orphanage itself had a great set up. There were these houses and they called them Clusters. There was one worker per cluster. They call her the mom. The moms would each have 9 kids. It was a really cozy feeling. There was a sitting area, a kitchen, and two to three bedrooms. The infant center had over 30 babies in it with only three workers. There were pack n plays all lined up in the bedrooms with babies laying in them. It kind of reminded me of a nursery in the hospital back in the day. Then we headed over to this field were I thought we would play soccer with kids...there were no kids, it was just other SAS students...... it was so stupid. Then we headed for the bikes and all of the bikes were to big for me so I couldn't even ride a bike. The people that did ride the bikes said they did not even go through the township.
I am not going to continue boring you with my horrible day. Tomorrow I have an operation hunger ticket but I decided not to go because I have heard that it was a waste of time and we did not even feed kids. I have decided to go to the green market and hang around town and have a more relaxing day! I will be getting a good nights rest tonight! I need it. I have had a really really busy week. I also need to start working on homework tomorrow. I will probably get on the ship way before on ship time so I can take a nap before I start my homework. I will talk to you guys soon. Sorry to bore you with a disappointing blog!

Today is the last day in Cape Town, South Africa. I am sad to leave this port but not as sad as I was leaving Ghana. I still think Ghana has my heart in a very special way, but the thing is, each of these ports have captured my heart in different ways. I will never be able to say such and such was my favorite country. I am glad I will not be able to say that. So please don't ask me what my favorite country was, because the answer will be all of them!
Emma and I slept in till 8:00. This was not intentional, I originally set my alarm for 7:15, but I kept pushing the snooze button. The funny thing is, the only reason we got out of bed at 8:00 was because we wanted to make breakfast. When I got up, I was itching like crazy all over my body! My legs, stomach, arms, and feet it was crazy. I looked down on my legs and there were bumps everywhere. They kept on appearing while we were eating breakfast. I decided to take some Benadryl and put itching cream on them. I thought it would be smart to go talk to one of the nurses. They said, “they just look like some type of bug bite and to do exactly what I had already done and come back to see them if they get worse or if they are not gone in 48 hours. We threw on sweats and headed up to deck 5 to grab a quick bit to eat.  We grabbed a cab for 60 rand and went to the Green Market and Long Street. The Green Market was cool. It was a lot of the same stuff that all the other markets sell. There was this neckless that is made out of recycled paper. It was really unique. We decided we wanted to walk back to the Waterfront because it was such a gorgeous day. It was not to cold and not to hot and there was this perfect breeze. We went through the craft market again and then got back on the ship. We waited for Emma's computer to charge. We wanted to come to the mall and work on homework and grab our last lunch and coffee in South Africa before we boarded the ship for good. Today’s on ship time is 6:00pm. I have so much homework and studying to do I am going to head back to the ship around 3:30. I also want to buy a book from the book store because I am almost finished with mine. I think I have began to enjoy reading! I love to go through bookstores now! So strange, me liking to read? Weird.
We are going to spend our last few rands at the grocery store to stock up on some snacky foods!