Hilo, Hawaii, U.S.A {Part 2}

The second day in Hilo, I woke up exhausted and got ready for my trip to Volcanoes National Park. The ride to the park was really long, and we had basically done it the night before. At the park, we got to see a few craters from the volcanoes, and a lava tube. The “lava tube” was the coolest part of the trip, because it was this hollowed out tunnel created by a flow of lava. Basically, the morning was a good photo op. After the trip, I grabbed my computer and went to go find lunch with my friends. We ended up taking the free Hilo shuttle and it took FOREVER, and there were a bunch of really really rude locals on it. It was shocking to hear some obnoxious locals given how unbelievably nice and friendly everyone was up until that point. But they were young, so who knows what the generational difference does.

After lunch we headed back to a market by the port, where there was free wifi, and EVERYONE was camped out outside trying to use it. I tried to skype with Amy, but we couldn’t get it to work so that was unfortunate. Finally, we walked back to the ship a little after 4, to learn that the most intense screening and searching was done at the end of the last day at port.

The second day of Hilo was, clearly, not the most fascinating and I don’t have much to say. However, I really enjoyed the city and would love to go back there someday to see everything that I didn’t have the chance to see.

Onward to Honolulu…

p.s. 9 months until I am 21

A few pictures! And there are some on facebook that everyone can see...

Hilo, Hawaii, U.S.A. {Part 1}

ALOHA! 5:30 AM, January 24, 2010. Hilo, Hawaii. My LLC (living learning coordinator, like an RA) Jenny came knocking on our door to wake us up, and the person who makes the ships announcements started her annoying speak. I waited in bed while my roommate, who is an early riser went to get the door and spoke to her. I stayed in bed also, while the first five seas (halls) were being called to the Glazer lounge to go through US Customs. Finally, at 6:30, I had to head up the few flights of stairs, in my pajamas, to go through the amazingly quick process. It amazes me everyone we do pretty much anything that I would expect to take forever on this ship because they have it down to a science. We sped through, I didn't stop moving once, in and out of the room. Since I was meeting my friends at 8:15 and it was 6:35, I went back to sleep of course.

At 8:15, I met up with my friends to go out on LAND! It was very exciting, my friend even got down to kiss it. We walked out of the pier, following a bunch of other sasers, down the road that the sign said Hilo went to. About half a mile or so down, we decide we might be going in the wrong direction (we wanted to go to a black sand beach) and stopped. I ran into the gas station to ask the woman where we are, and we have our first interaction with a Hawaiian in Hawaii. She had no idea what I was talking about (mom and dad I am sure you are not surprised) since I said black sand beach. It was actually called Richardson's and there was just black sand there. We were confused. She told us it was 2 miles in the opposite direction, so there was a fail. And then she offered to CALL US CABS!!! When was the last time that happened to you in a gas station? She was so helpful, and it was awesome. When we finally arrived at the beach we hiked our way through the sand and over rocks and in water to end up at this giant rock in the middle of the rough waters. (A LOT of SAS people were on it).. What I discovered, was that I had my sea legs, not my land legs, and balancing on rocks and in the strong-currented water was not an easy feat. Anyway, we made it to the rock and decided that it didn't seem like a very fun place to stay and sit. So after walking around for a little, my friend falling in the water, and having trouble figuring out what to do as a large group, we ended up going back to the sand part. We then realized that we had not stopped for beers as planned, so my two friends and I started our trek up the road that we came from in search for a convenience store. After walking for about a half hour, a van with a tour guide/driver pulled up and asked if we wanted a ride. We said no, but asked where the nearest convenience store was. She offered to drive us there for free (once again, when has that ever happened to YOU?) Her name, we learned is Theresa and she is the best! She dropped us off, I remembered that I was a nice person and tipped her anyway and we grabbed her number in case we needed another ride and headed into the store. The woman working was very funny, and my friend Amanda who was buying the drinks had a great conversation with her. With three cases of beer in tow, we left the store and headed back down the long road to the beach, and within seconds, what do you know? Theresa pulls up next to us with two SAS boys and offers us another free ride on the boys. It was awesome. When we got to the beach there was a man getting stuff out of his car that Theresa introduced to us, his name is Cool and he will become a great part of the story later.

We headed back to the beach, which had gotten pretty packed with SASers since we left, andshortly discovered that we had way to much beer, as not everyone of us ended up wanting to drink. Anyway, Cool had set up a nice chair and stuff next to where we were sitting and one of our friends went over to hang out with him. He had some fun stuff with him, and when we offered him a beer and he rejected it saying that he couldn't and was on probabation, but would we like some fun stuff. As we would learn, growing this fun stuff and then sharing it with the community is a very popular practice in Hilo, Hawaii and everyone on the ship came back with some story or other about it. (just so we are all clear, I said he offered it, not that we took it) When the lifeguard came over, he didn't say anything except that he wasgoing to tell the SASers on the big rock that they couldn't be swimming over there. All in all, a very relaxed a carefree city so far. We hung out listening to Cool's words of wisdom and really interesting stories about Hawaii culture and history. He was pretty awesome, but we found out that he got injured in a surfing accident after 30 years and he had to stop, but that he has been sober for 9 yearsso that was good haha. A little later, one of his friends came to the beach and was doing handstands on rocks. It was amazing, we all got pictures. When it got to be around lunch time we ordered pizzas to the beach from this INCREDIBLE pizza place. Cool ended up getting his own pie... the pies were 19 inches. Eventually we left the beach and I went downtown with a few of my friends and window shopped, made a reservation for dinner that night, and basically just hung out. Hilo is a really cute town, and a good mix of touristy with the local Hilo culture very evident. As Theresa pointed out to us later that night, the crime rate is low, and the cops are NEVER out, and people are just all in all very calm.

At 5ish, we went back to the ship to shower and get ready for dinner. We went to dinner at this place called Cafe Pesto, and it was delicious, but freezing inside. After dinner, we split into two groups, and the 21 year olds went to go to the bars, and the rest of us went to go on a lava adventure that little did we know would end up being one of the most fun nights I have ever had. At 10:15, we were picked up from the dock, 8 of us, to go to  see the lava at night. Theresa was taking us, and it was 45 minutes away. She had a lot of really cool pictures from when the land that we were standing on used to have houses (that are now underneath the hardened lava) and what it looked like as the volcano was erupting, as she had family that had lived there the last time it erupted. Seeing the lava at night was really cool. We weren't THAT close, but we could see it glowing bright from where we are, and it was lighting up the sky and clouds. One of my friends told us to turn off our flashlights at one point and just feel it all, and she was a genius, it was so cool. We were literally in the middle of nowhere, hadn't passed any person or car in over a half hour, and standing on lava in Hawaii. It was really great to just take it all in.

After we were done with the lava watching, we got back in the car to go see some more stuff. Every so often on this long road, that apparently we were not supposed to be on at night, we would pull over and Theresa would pull out her photo album and show us what the spot we were at looked like before and during the volcanic eruption. There was one place, where the house used to have an ocean view, and now the ocean is half a mile further back than it used to be. We couldn’t get over all that used to be in that area (290 houses) and that now you can see people in the middle of building new homes in the same spots, even though the volcano is still active! Under the lava that we saw, there used to be all these homes and such. It reminded me of Israel and lots of places in Italy where they find evidence of life under each layer of land there that they excavate. So, we stopped at cool photo-op places along the road, and got some great pictures out of it. At about midnight, we are driving along and all the sudden find ourselves in front of this absolutely gigantic tree down in the middle of the road. Of course, someone in the car decided that we should move it ourselves, and so we got out to do it. Theresa was getting a kick out of it. And don’t worry, of course I contributed to helping... my friend Elena and I took pictures and video and laughed at their pain (kidding, kind of). We (as in they) eventually got it out of the road and we continued on. Theresa showed us this cute little bar in the middle of nowhere, but we didn’t want to get out and drink, mostly because I was the only one that really could. Finally, we ended up at the water that Theresa kept talking about. She was really excited about the gates being opened and not having to jump the fence, but not so happy about the other random car in the parking lot, as she didn’t want him breaking in to her car. {Side note: It was a pretty creepy, and sketchy night, and I must say, I apologized to my friends at a point because I knew I was being my normal paranoid self and they were like no, you are totally right in feeling that this is creepy. So there parents. Also, when you read this don’t worry that I am going to be doing unsafe things in other countries, this was definitely a US only type of activity.}  So we park, and Theresa grabs some towels andwe head towards the hot spring. There was one long sign that my friends were shining light on and we were reading it and she yelled at us not to read it so I only got halfway down. So, at 1am, we went swimming in the hot spring, it was so much fun. {Important and amazing side notes: 1. My friend Elena lost her ring in the water and was really sad. She went back there coincidentally with SAS today, and FOUND HER RING on the sand in the water. Apparently, it had something to do with the high and low tides, but we were in the OCEAN. 2. My friend Leigh who also went back today took a picture of the sign that Theresa told us not to read, and it said do not aggravate the fish and eel or something to that extent. SO happy I was not aware.} AnywayS, conclusion of the night was that I was happy that we (or I) chose to go do what I did instead of the bars. It was an awesome night and no one elses even compared.

At the end of the day, if I had to choose one word for Hilo, it would be CHILL. People are just awesome, and so amazingly chill. If this day is any indicator of what the rest of my semester will be like, nothing will ever compare to it again in my life. It has already proven to be one of the most exhilerating, adventerous days ever. I cannot wait to continue on.  ALOHA!

I'm on a Boat... San Diego,California; Ensenada, Mexico; Middle of the Ocean {Part 5}

Day 7. A2. January 21st, 2010. 3 days till Hawaii. Day of the week: Unknown. So many different ways to keep track of time on this ship it is crazy, but definitely doesn't make it less easy. If I wasn't keeping a journal where I write the day of the month and such, and have a calendar next to my bed, I would have no clue what day it was at all times. We are in a nice little bubble here, and literally have no clue what is going on around the world, which is ironic since we are traveling around the world. It is so weird that even though we have only been on the ship a few days, and I have been traveling for over a week now, I feel like we have been living on this ship for months. While Hawaii is quickly approaching, and everyone is excited for land, I know that once we get past this leg of the trip ad the one to Japan, the semester will go by in a flash, and I obviously don't want that to happen. So it is a weird mixture of wanting it to speed up for land, and slow down so that I can dwell in every minute of the semester.

So, I started to sit out the third day, and officially decided, along with everyone that I was with, that this is THE BEST study abroa program. You truly cannot find one that is better than this. I sat outside for HOURS studying, sleeping, reading, etc. in BEAUTIFUL weather. Everyone is just so much happier in warm weather, it is incredible. The waves were getting pretty bad in the afternoon, so after class I went to lie down in my room, which wasn’t the best idea since it was super rocky there. A little bit later I went to a meeting for Students of Service. I signed up for two groups- one is the SOS Auction in April, where we raise money for both some of the field programs that we do and the scholarships that they have for the students. I am chairing that one. The other one I signed up for is basically just a general raising awareness and creating different events for different organizations. After that my friends went to eat, but I felt too sick so I just watched and then spent the rest of the night playing lots of games- like taboo, egyptian ratscrew, and this game that involved a circle and running around screaming moo, and yee-haw! It was a LOT of fun. That night the waves were SO bad that when we were out on the top deck, we would literally slide in chairs from one side to the other with every wave. It was, as everything seems to be, fun and terrifying all at once.

NO ONE slept on the ship that night, due to awful waves and everything in the rooms sliding back and forth, opening and shutting. It was pretty awful. Some of the professors cancelled or rearranged their classes even because they were too tired to teach. In that sense, it is nice that the professors understand where we are coming from when we can’tdo work or are exhausted in class. The following day, with the continuing awful ocean, the gym was closed, the elevators were shut down, we weren’t allowed on the side or front decks, there were no chairs or tables out on the decks because EVERYTHING had to be secured all over the ship. It was absolutely crazy. I found my alarm clock at the OPPOSITE side of the room that I had left it, my entire nightstand detached from the wall and toppled over, and every drawer in our room was blockaded.

The next morning, following my sleepless night, I dragged myself out of bed and went about my day. I had a class, a meeting, played some card games and then at night we did Speedfriending. What we thought it would be was like speed dating but with friends, but instead it was just everyone clumped together in a hallway basically, not able to hear each other speak, crowded, etc. but I still met some people and it was entertaining. After that I drank for the first time on the ship.. it was very interesting. I met some more people, and then PASSED OUT!!!

After the most soundless, incredible nights sleep after (especially because of the awful night before that). However, I was unbelievably exhausted in my classes and had a really really hard time keeping my eyes open… and the small classes makes the professor aware of when you can’t keep your eyes open. After classes I sat outside for awhile. It started off overcast but when the sun eventually came out it was so bright that it hurt to open my eyes and so strong that I felt like I was on fire. At 8:00, we had our first cultural pre-port. We have two types of pre-ports before every country, the cultural and the logistical. The cultural was slightly boring, mostly because while yes, it is Hawaii and the culture is not exactly American, it is not as interestingto me as the other placeswe are going to. For most people, it is just a vacation type place. Following that we went to a coffee house, which was AWESOME. There are some incredibly talented people on the ship, and not only singers and musicians but poets. There was a professors daughter that read two poems that are “slam poetry” and I could not believe that a person could write like her, at any age but especially because she is only high-school age. Throughout the night we were learning about how there is a new rule that they were enforcing this voyage about high risk activity, including high-contact sports, bungee jumping, and sky diving, which absolutely stinks. I have been mentally preparing myself for sky diving for a month now, and my group was cancelled because it was through facebook and they had all of our names. There are still a good group of people going that weren’t in our group though. It is the thing that everyone says to do in Hawaii.

Today was just what is now a typical day on the ship…. Went to classes, laid out, hung out with some friends. We had the logistical pre-port today, which was basically them repeating, you ARE in the US still, but make sure not to go down poorly-lit alleyways because guess what? They are potentially dangerous. I am shocked. They also finally opened up the front of the ship, so my friends and I were up there for a while looking at the stars. There are a bunch of people sleeping out there tonight, but the problem is that people have said to do that so that you can watch the sunrise AND us pulling into port, but we have to go through immigration starting at 6am so it isn’t going to work out and be worth it. Instead, my friends and I are sleeping out there in between Hilo (which is pronounced HEEEEELLO for anyone wondering) and Honolulu.

One extra thought, everyone is starting to plan Japan and while at least one of my friends and I want to go to as manyplaces as possible, we were sitting with some people who were just like, I don’t need to go to more than one city.. as long as I can RAGE, I will be fine--clearly are wasting their money and have no concept of how much they can get out of this trip. For me, it is like I obviously want to go out in these countries and have fun and stuff, but my main goal is not to get shitfaced in every country and miss out on all that there is to see and do. Some people just piss me off. Anyways, another thing thatpeople have been saying is that the ship is rehab because of all the limited drinking rules. It’s funny. Ok well have to wake up in just a few hours for HAWAII!!!! ALOHA!

I'm On a Boat... San Diego,California; Ensenada, Mexico; Middle of the Ocean {Part 4}

Hello hello friends and family and maybe even strangers! Sorry it has been a while since my last post, it has been kind of crazy around here. The rough seas were absolutely gigantic waves- apparently, we are getting the back of the storm that hit the West Coast and the low pressure system that is causing them are the worst EVER recorded! But I am happy that it is over with and that we hopefully won’t have anythinglike that until later in the trip! Only a day until we get to HAWAII YESSS I cannot wait for land! So, during this journey around the world, I have been not only blogging but writing in a journal everyday so that when I haven’t written for a while (like now) I can remember everythingI want to tell you guys. So I guess I will go with just what each day has been like.

So, we have classes A days and B days (every other) and so far I have had a few of each. 3 of my 4 classes are TINY, AND you see the professors everywhere so you can’t exactly fake sick or slack off. It is definitely very different from my 300 person lectures that I have had at Wisconsin or even my 20 person classes there… It is interesting to compare to people from other schools because one of my friends who goes to an extremely small college was saying that the Global Studies class (big one) is such a weird thing for her because she is used to tiny classes all the time. These classes are definitely going to create a different studying habit for me-I haven’t had very rigorous classes the past year or so because the professors in my major are big on just learning not grading.. which is great for me! Also, at Wisconsin I am used to having just tests or just papers with mixes of small projects. All my classes here are BIG projects with tests and sometimes papers. So it will require me to spend a lot more time working… which happens to be fine, since as I have more time on my hands than I ever had it’s something to do more than anything.

The first day I woke up for class at 7:30 (AH) and made my way to Global Mental Health. The professor seems like he could be good, as he hasa really big passion for the field and definitely knows a lot. He said that he isn’t big on giving out bad grades which is awesome and that he will more than happy to get to know us and write us recommendations if we need them (AWESOMER). Following that I was able to stay in the same classroom, in which the collapsable walls were collapsed and ta daa, I was in the Union, where I had Global Studies, the class that everyone has to take. Global Studies has been my favorite class thus far- they bring in speakers including the professors and guests that areon the ship for one interport journey. The main professor is a character, he is so entertaining and awesome. The coolest part of this class in my opinion is that we have a big group project to work on. We get into groups of about 6 and work on creating a lesson plan for 12^th graders—the plans will go to the school of education at UVA and then they will choose the top 10 projects that will be the recipients of a grant (not the technical grant BUT we can put it on our resumes!). So I am hoping to get that cause it will be awesome.

One side note, there are 14 people from Wisconsin on the ship. Every day I feel like I meet someone new from there. It is pretty cool. We are one of the top college populations here, but Colorado, Chapman, Pitt, Bucknell and possibly a few others that I am forgetting have numbers in the 20s and 30s! And some of those schools are SMALL. But yeah definitely am better friends with some of the Wisconsin people now than I ever was at school.

My next class that first day was Contemporary Moral Issues. The class I guess has the potential to be interesting but it is a philosophy class and I am not very philosophical. However, the class is filled with people that I have met and liked so at least theres that. I just wish that the professor didn’t straight lecture so much, it is boring.

After dinner that night, we got big card games going- it is practically all we do here, I absolutely love it. The stars that night freaked me out—A) because they were super bright and there were so many of them. B) the first one I noticed I had thought was a plane because it was moving up in the sky.. a second later I saw it shooting down and gasped because I thought it was crashing. Turns out, WE were moving, not what happened to be Mars. After hanging out playing cards, we got involved in a GIANT game of catchphrase, and then charades. It was a lot of fun.

The second day of classes I had Global Studies and Small Group and Team Communication. The latter we get into groups to implement projects in a country (I chose India) and sounds like it will be really cool. That night I had a meeting for Vicarious Voyage, the program that I want to do where we are basically pen pals with an classroom in the US. The meeting was disorganized and a waste of time, but since I am writing this 3 days later, I now know that I am paired with a classroom in Amityville, NY and with some kid on the ship that I only know is funny and has a super Jewish last name. Afterwards, I had dinner and then got involved in a giant game of Taboo and Mafia—lots of fun!

Ok so this is a really long post so I will update more in a new one later! Miss you everyone!

rough seas

We have been experiencing what they refer to as "rough seas" the last few days due to storms in the distance. Currently, my roommate and I are sitting in our room watching the MASSIVE waves coming towards us and then while she gets all excited when we go flying, I freak out. Its funny because you can hear with every big wave things crashing all over the ship, like other people's drawers and things and books and probably people themselves. And then you hear following that "oh, shit!" Its a nice mix of hilarious and terrifying. Not really sure what I signed myself up for right now...

I'm On A Boat... San Diego Day 2; Ensenada, Mexico; Middle of the Ocean {Part 3}

Monday, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, we spent not on a break or 3 day weekend, but in orientation meetings, most of which were painfully boring and which all ended with the speaker saying, by the way, all of what I am telling you can be found written down in your cabins. Anyways, the day started at 9 and we heard from people from the Honor something or other (the people who handle the discipline stuff) and the library and IT staff about the library and computers, respectively. After those, we walked around procrastinating until a much needed lunch and then went to go rest until the next set of meetings. Luckily, I spent this set in a classroom with a bunch of people and one of the people who spoke for about an hour no one could understand so we were all just speaking over him or sleeping. It was bad. At around 4:00 we finally finished everything and went to hang out at the pool with some people, then had dinner and headed over to the involvement symposium by 7:30.

The involvement symposium wsa interesting, there were activities in around 10 different categories to choose from. I signed up for almost everything including:

     Kids Rule!- babysitting or tutoring one of the 20 adorable kids on the ship

     Vicarious Voyage- Penpal program with a classroom in the US, send them things from each country

     Students of service- in charge of fundraising, money goes to places we visit and the SAS scholarship fund

     Social justice club- they are not really sure what they do yet but it could be cool depending on what they do

     Peer mentor for career services- helping people with resumes and cover letters and such... I took a semester-long class on this stuff last semester at Wisconsin so hopefuly I will be of some assistance.

     Seder- I plan on going to the Seder the first night on the ship and then am in the process of figuring out and finding people to do the second seder with in South Africa. I might do more Jew things if they arise

After that, I went to play trivia, played with 2 other Wisconsin people, met 3 more Wisconsin people while sitting there. There are 14 of us on the ship, we are one of the largest college populations.. I had no idea that all these people were going, or that some of them existed so its cool. We are all constantly wearing Wisconsin clothes so they are easy to spot. My trivia team won second place and then I headed to bed. Both my roommate and I couldn't fall asleep and both realized that the beds are incredibly uncomfortable and that the night before we were so tired that we didn't even realize it. 3 hours later, I fell asleep only to have to wake up 5 hours after that. Fun stuff... also, we have a set of drawers next to our heads and they kept opening and shutting all night-  very annoying, but duct tape is banned. My roommate and I both talked about how it is annoying how people are already forming their little cliques that they basically came on the ship with and how we don't like it because we don't want to just be friends with the same few people the whole time. And I have been like hanging out with different groups of people and I don't want people thinking that I don't like them just because I am not only with them. So hopefully it will get better now that people are meeting people away from their friends in classes and clubs and field programs in port.

Heres one fun thing we learned during the orientation with the global studies professor (everyone takes this class)... here are the 10 most popuated countries in order:

1. China

2. India

3. US

4. Indonesia

5. Brazil

6. Pakistan

7. Bangladesh

8. Nigeria

9. Russia

10. Japan

We did some exercise in order to remember it- don't remember the exercise but I remember the countries! bye for now!

I'm On A Boat... San Diego Day 2; Ensenada, Mexico; Middle of the Ocean {Part 2}

Adios Mexico, Aloha Hawaii! {side note: i wrote this whole long post about embarkation day and then my computer restarted on its own before I could save it, so that sucked} Anyways, on d-day (or I guess e-day), I woke up at 6:30, packed up, ate breakfast, checked out of the hotel and checked in with the SAS staff. I got my room number (4035), but, as I suspected, they never told you the name of your roommate. So we said bye to San Diego, and started on our way to Ensenada, Mexico on my bus of 99% NYers since the buses were organized by zip code. If anyones ever traveled from California to Mexico, they will be aware, as I now am, that there are 1500 check-points and toll booths, and it is not as relaxed as Weeds might make some expect. The first, big border crossing a man came on the bus with a list of names that he needed to see. Only one of the people was on the bus, her name is Rachel, she is from Mount Kisco and goes to Wisconsin. She was off for a WHILE and no one knew what was going on. While we were waiting, though, a man came on the bus with a guitar and started singing for us, no one was really sure whether he was hired by SAS or just some random man. When he finished he pulls out a plastic bag and asks "ok, tips now?" and walks up and down the aisle shoving it in peoples faces. This is the first time that it really hit me that I am embarking on this voyage where I am going to interact with people in all different cultures that have different customs and lifestyles, etc. Thats not to say that this kind of thing wouldn't happen in the US, I am sure it does all the time, but it definitely made me realize what was about to do for the next 109 days. Eventually, Rachel got back on the bus (her picture was too light and they thought she was a terrorist), and we went on our way again. About an hour later, we had to stop at another check-point and everyone looks out the window and the guitar guy had followed us and was sitting outside the bus. It was crazy and hilarious. He wasn'[t allowed back on the bus...

About 2 and a half hours later, we finally arrived at the ship. Everyone sees the port in the distance and this gigantic ship and some were like WOW that ship is huge I wasn't expecting that! Little did they know our ship was the little one hidden behind it, that was a Carnival Cruise Ship. We had to go through a bunch of security screenings and check-in points to finally be left to explore the ship on our own. It was really exciting to walk around. Even though I had seen hundreds of pictures, and even taken a tour of the ship over the summer, I had a completely different perspective this time. However, all my friends were making fun of me for knowing all these random things about the ship and where and what everything was due to my extensive research. Ater lunch (which were delicious tacos that people have written actual blog posts about when they have them in the middle of the semester after weeks of nasty food), I went back to my room to unpack my stuff. I met my roommate, her name is Mackenzie (I think thats how you spell it), she is from Seattle and goes to school in San Jose.

At 4:00 that day we had a muster drill where I met my new best friend for the trip. His name is Andrew and he is 8. He told me that at the last life boat drill that they had his tooth became loose! He is absolutely adorable and I have already deemed him my replacement Brian. The muster drill took a while because they couldn't find someone or something so that was annoying, but oh well.

At 5:00, I headed up to the pool area with a bunch of people to watch the boat leave the port. I ran into one of my Wisconsin friends and we ended up going to play dodgeball with some people since the boat was delayed a while due to some immigration issues. {Side Note: We played dodgeball with 8 year olds, not only a bunch of 20/21 year olds by ourselves.} After some dinner, the boat finally started to depart Ensenada and we started our rocky, nauseating journey to Hawaii!

At 8:00, we had a community meeting (with everyone on the ship) that is broadcasted to classrooms and loungesbecause not everyone can fit in the Union. I really enjoyed the academic deans speech, he was a funny guy. He spoke a lot about felxibility ad how it is the most important thing to be on this ship and throughout the semester because of the kind of trip it is and the places that we are going. Anyways, during this meeting, the ship started to rock even more, and people were getting sick and running out left and right. I heard about a lot of people getting sick that night. Luckily, both my roommate and I have not had anythingmore than a little stomach discomfort. All I keep thinking is thank god Lorrie didn't do this trip, she wouldn't have left her bed yet at this point with her motion sickness issues.

After the community meeting we had "sea meetings." The entire ship is separated into seas based on where our room is. For instance, my sea is the Adriatic Sea and we are all the rooms on one side of the ship (either Port or Starboard, couldn't tell you yet) that are on the 4th deck. So that was cool.. Every sea has an LLC, which stands for Living Learing Coordinator and is basically an RA. Mines name is Jenny and her son is Andrew,my little 8 year old friend, so that is fun. Each LLC is in charge of some sort of activity category (for instance mine is religion and spirituality and at the involvement symposium that I will discuss later she was in charge of getting people to sign up for bible studies and such). Before bed I took dramamine and wasn't feeling too great and passed out around 10:00, already excited to be on land.

So, that was the first day! Full of stuff already! More to come as soon as I can... it has been a lot harder to post these than I have expected, but now that classes started I have much more time on my hands to spend not doing work... ta ta!

I'm On A Boat... San Diego Day 2; Ensenada, Mexico; Middle of the Ocean {Part 1}

AND its going fast AND I got my nautical themed pashmina afghan! Sorry if that doesn't sound familiar to anyone reading this but its a reference to a song from an snl group. Funny stuff, everyone keeps singing it.

SO I AM ON A BOAT!!!!! I am already having an amazing time, I know that this is going to be an incredible semester and I am so excited that I am actually getting to do it! It is just so surreal, and I keep having to pinch myself to remind myself that it is happening. I don't know if it will ever sink in, just as there are days that I walk around Madison saying to myself, "Wow, I am in college here." So first things first- yesterdays events!

So, since I am trying to not use the internet at all until Hawaii, I cannot remember what my last update was. So I will start from Saturday morning. I woke up feeling nice and well-rested, I slept so unbelievably well, probably becaue I was much calmer after meeting some people and seeing that they were nice. So, I woke up, got my complimentary breakfast and tea in the club (thanks dad!), then skyped with Annie (miss you!) and then at around 11 set off on my own to go venture around San Diego. I went to Little Italy Farmer's Market, which was really cute and fun-- I had a lot of great pesto. And then while I was waiting for a cab, I spoke to Kara about recommendations for what to do in San Diego, hoping that she would have something since she is moving there pretty soon. She recommended the zoo, but we came to a joint conclusion that going to the zoo by yourself is a pretty freaking depressing thing... and really only for pedophiles (spelling?). Sooo then I went to Westfield's Hortons Plaza, which is what they call an "open-air mall" and the structure of it is just really amazing. Its like a multi-level maze. So I got a delicious panini lunch there and then went on search for a cheap, public transportation route back to the hotel. I ended up waiting for the bus that I found on my phone, but the driver told me I was on the wrong side of the street. So I went to the other side, and got on the right bus just a few minutes later. Took the bus to the airport, got off a stop to early, so walked a little and then took the hotel shuttle from the airport to the hotel with a few other SASers from Minnesota who had just arrived. We didn't know any of the same people, very sad. Finally, I got back to the hotel around 2.

At around 2:30, I went to sit outside by the pool with my book, but it was FREEZING because the sun wasn't out. So, I switched to inside and sat for a little before heading back upstairs. A few hours later, I showered, got ready to meet some more people, and went to meet up with my mom's friend's college friend's daughter who is doing SAS (did you follow that?). She was really nice, I met some of her friends who all go to Bucknell and then eventually went back to my room when they all left for dinner with their parents. I ordered some room service dinner, relaxed for a little and then headed down to the hotel bar. I spoke to this one girl a little while waiting for drinks, and then sat down at the bar by myself looking around awkwardly while she went back to her family. Thank god for her, she was so nice and invited me over to join her fam, said they were just talking about SAS so I wouldnt really be intruding. We eventually et up with other people and headed outside where a large group of SASers had gathered. At 12:15, I headed upstairs, and eventually got to sleep by 1, extremely excited for the next day.

ps. i am currently using a pc after using a mac all through college so far, and for all the commercials that they make for it, the worst difference that I have found is that this pc does not have spell check for everything, including emails.

More updates to come later. Currently rough seas and I must go to sleep...

I am OFF

Hi from the bus everyone! I have left my bags for the ship staff to handle now (thank god), got my room number (4035), and am ready to be in ensenada already! The trip there is 2 and a half hours... And we are currently passing the cruise terminal in san diego. Still do not understand why we are not leaving from here. So I will try to update again late tonight with what my day was like yesterday and how this day goes... But so far, so good!
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

San Diego, California, United States

Hello from San Diego! It has been a long, long day. It is currently 1:30 here, 4:30 am at home, so I am thoroughly exhausted. My flight was long and interesting--they had the seatbelt sign on 90% of the time due to "turbulence" and even stopped the drink and food service because they were expecting it to be so bad. However, no turbulence ever occured, and I sat impatiently in my seat like a good little passenger waiting for the sign to turn off to go to the bathroom... for over an hour. I really had to pee. Then, I arrived at the airport in San Diego, frolicked over to baggage claim excited to be in warm weather, and then remembered that I had to deal with carrying two extremely large suitcases and my carry on to find the shuttle to the hotel. I waited for the shuttle for about 45 minutes with two other SASers even though it was supposed to be coming every 20 minutes. I finally arrived at the hotel at 9:45, over an hour after my flight landed. Then I waited 20 minutes to be checked-in to the hotel because the two people in front of me were having problems and arguing with the people helping them. I ran into one of the girls that I know from school and met her friend, they were going to sleep. So finally, I got to my room after 10, put my stuff down and started to wander around the hotel looking for a group of sasers that were supposed to be at the hotel bar. Eventually I went on facebook, got the number of one of the people who had posted about a meet-up at the hotel, and he told me that they were outside. So about an hour and a half later, I am back in my room. I met a lot of nice, friendly people, for the most part when I first got outside people were really friendly but I guess I was there way after other people and they were kind of splitting off into circles not long after I arrived... so I stayed with the same few people the rest of the night, but that was fine. Don't know what my plans are for tomorrow yet, seems that people find the zoo too expensive, or don't know what they are doing, so I will figure it out. I plan on having a nice complimentary breakfast due to my platinum sheraton membership number that my dad has and get access to the club floor or something of that sort. Sooo so far, so good. Met a LOT of new yorkers tonight, much different than the midwest group I am used to haha. Well, thats all for now! If I can update tomorrow, I will... otherwise next stop: Ensenada, Mexico-- embarkation day!!

p.s. I would like to give a shout out to my cousin Rachel for passing her road test! YAY Ray!!

view from my room

All My Bags Are Packed, I'm Ready To GO...

Trying out my new travel backpack, umbrella, and adorable new mini laptop

Foreign Currency!!!

He Rocks in the Tree Tops All Day Long...

Twitter is now the latest way to track my whereabouts around the world... i have never used twitter to post things so we will see how it goes, but I will try my best to keep people updated with where in the world I am on it. Sooo ALI'S TWITTER can be found if you click that link, as well as on the right side of the blog. Leaving in 12 hours for San Diego! Can't believe this day is finally here!! Goodbye New York, see you in May!

"Explore. Dream. Discover."

Hello 2010! Only 5 days until I embark on the greatest adventure of my life! In the midst of procrastinating in my planning, purchasing, packing, and panicking for this exciting semester that starts in only FIVE days, I decided to write about WHY I wanted to do this trip (and part of how I convinced my parents). But first, in the last week every person who I have mentioned to that I am doing SAS (including the dental hygienist, the guys working at Sports Authority and American Terrain) have known about what it is without my saying it. Up until now, pretty much everyone that I mention it to at home doesn't really know about it so it made me laugh a lot that so many people are all the sudden so aware that the program exists.
So back to WHY. The why, why, why Wisconsin's I have finally gotten used to with a solid answer down whenever anyone in-state asks me why the hell I chose Wisconsin coming from NY. And now it is why Semester at Sea, why not Spain, or Italy, or Prague, or some great European country?? Why would I, Ali Unger, want to go to Asia, Africa and South America on my semester abroad?? I started answering this question for the first time September 2008, as 15 of my family members and others sat around the dining room table the morning after my cousins bar mitzvah. I had recently discovered SAS, and after doing a TON of research on everything imaginable, I dove into to introducing the idea to my parents. I got many absolutely NOT, no ways, and are you out of your mind's? and now, about 16 months later, I am just days away from embarkation. Sadly, it is not just because I am GREAT at convincing people, but because others are better (such as the many that my mom discovered coming out of the woodwork that had done SAS in the past and RAVED about it.)
MY top 10 reasons:
Reason #1 I love ships
Reason #2 With the limited internet and television access, it will be a nice break from my media filled life in the US
Reason #3 It will open up a world (pun intended) of opportunities to seize post-graduation if and when I fall in love with some of these countries
Reason #4 I get to celebrate Passover, my all time favorite holiday, in Cape Town, South Africa (SO COOL)
Reason #5 I want to go to places that I will, most likely, never return to in my life
Reason #6 Even if I do return to these places when I am 40 or 50, I will have a completely different perspective, and most likely be not as interested in doing some of the things that I would like to do
Reason #7 If there is any time to learn, explore and discover different cultures and gain more insight into the world outside North America, its the perfect time, environment, and collection of countries that you can possibly get within this short period of time
Reason #8 What better way to support my education at Wisconsin (Child Development major) and aid my future career path than by visiting schools, orphanages, etc. and interacting with children from all around the world
Reason #9 I want to step out of my comfort zone
Finally, reason #10 I can. I found the program, fell in love, convinced my parents, and am incredibly lucky to have them supporting me on this journey. It's the biggest reason that I have because while I am anxious and nervous that this long-awaited voyage into the unknown is creeping up quickly, I know that I would regret not doing it for the rest of my life. So I am seizing the opportunity while I can, and hope to come out a better, different person on the other side.