6/17
MV Explorer
This morning I had my alarm set for 9am to be sure I would wake up and get ready in time to leave around 10am, but I woke up at 7:30. I guess I was too excited to sleep…and that was after going to bed at 2:30 last night so I must have been really ready for the day.
After checking out, I found another Summer at Sea student, Corey, and shared a cab to Prince George Dock at Nassau Port. On the way there our cab driver played a Bruno Mars CD and drove with the windows down, which felt amazing in the heat and humidity even though it mercilessly tangled the hair I had blown dry that morning. Once out of the car I paid for leaving my hair down and sitting next to the window the whole way by looking like a lion (in the best possible way). Corey and I gathered our luggage and staggered over to the port entry for the MV Explorer. The line was insane…possibly on par with the Indiana Jones ride as Disneyland. It took us at least five minutes just to walk from the begging of the line to the end of the line, and about an hour and a half to get through it to security. Luckily, all us students in line had plenty to talk about, the line was in the shade, and I had a bottle of cold water, so the time passed quickly. Oh, I also discovered while in line that the drinking age while on the ship is 18, not 21…ca-ching. I found out my room number, 2006, and tagged all my luggage. Once we got to security, (which looked like it has just been set up in what was normally used as a storage warehouse, with giant paper mache tiki gods, dragons, and dancing people that looked like they belonged on a float) it was obvious why the line was so long. All 750 Summer at Sea students and their 2 and ½ months worth of luggage were going through one scanner and one metal detector. By that time, though, I was so relieved to pawn my bags off on to a truck (which drove them to the ship where they magically appeared outside my door once I boarded the ship) rather than having to carry them that I didn’t even grumble about the inefficiency.
Once past security, we picked up our ship IDs (which are also our room keys and “ship credit cards”) and I discovered where the passport photo I had sent months ago to SAS had been used. Then, we rounded a corner and there it was: the MV Explorer! I will at some point be posting pictures on Facebook…but until then you can find a few pictures of the ship and more descriptions of what it contains on the Semester at Sea website I posted in my last blog. The ship is amazing. I am so excited that this will be my home for the next 2 ½ months. I’m sure that for the first week or so I’ll be getting lost a lot (yeah, yeah…we all know about my sense of direction, or lack thereof). I haven’t toured the whole thing yet, but the parts I’ve seen are very nice. Someone told me that this is a new ship, built in 2006. I would definitely believe it…everything looks new, which is impressive considering how many overexcited college students it handles. Student rooms are on decks 2-4 and split into “inside” (without windows/portholes) or “outside” (with windows/portholes). I think each deck is named a different sea…kind of like dorms but more theme-appropriate. I’m in the Aegean Sea, on deck 2 inside, room 2006. The halls seem pretty maze-like to me now, but hopefully I’ll be navigating them easily in no time.
Of course, as soon as I boarded the ship I went straight to my room. All three of my bags were waiting outside my door. I opened my door, stepped into my room and immediately regretted the amount I had packed. The room is pretty small, even with European-width twin beds to save more space, and didn’t look like it had that much storage. Somewhat daunted, I began unpacking all my stuff. I’m not sure if the room got bigger as I unpacked or if I just thought the stuff I had would take up way more space than it actually did, but I had no problem fitting everything. I wish I had packed some hangers, because I have all my dresses on three, but other than that I didn’t need any more space. There was plenty of room under my bed for my suitcases, one of which I am using as a “drawer” for swim suits. The bathroom is compact as I expected, but the shower is a little bigger than I thought it would be (although still small…it’s definitely not for shower parties) which is a definite plus. Another plus was arriving an hour or two before my roommate. I was able to unpack and put away all my stuff before she came, which was much easier than both of us trying to unpack at the same time. I took pictures of my room, which will get up on to Facebook soon (hopefully).
I took myself on a little tour of the ship, and by the time I got back, my roomie was there! Her name is Parul and she is from Gainsville, FL. She is a pre-med Psych major and spent last summer backpacking through Europe. As she was unpacking she saw my Toms in the closet and said “Toms? Oh, we’re going to be friends.” I agree. She is super easy to talk to and seems very friendly, outgoing and adventurous. I’m sure we’ll get into some trouble (the good kind, obviously) this trip. After we had chatted awhile, she motioned to the 4’x4’ painting on the wall above her bed (there is a 4’X4’ map of the world above mine) and asked if I had taken it down yet. I told her no and she must have noticed my confusion because she told me that it had advice on the back. We took it down and almost the entire back was covered in writing from past Semester at Sea participants who had been in our room. “10 Best Things I Did,” “Favorite Memories from Summer 2009” and “What NOT to do on Semester at Sea” were all titles. I haven’t read then all yet, but I can’t wait do so and then add my own at the end of the journey ☺
It’s about 3:45pm Nassau time, and we have our emergency drill in fifteen and then orientation after that. I’ll come back and blog on those after. The bow on my dress just broke and my roomie was kind enough to let me use her super glue to fix it (I know Mom, I should have brought a sewing kit). Unfortunately, I decided to pinch the dress and the bow together for a minute with no barrier between the glue-soaked fabric and my fingers, so my dress now has a bow on one side and the first layer of skin from my thumb on the other. First (and only?) injury of Summer at Sea ☺
So it’s about midnight now, and the combination of sea-sickness meds (just in case) and rocking of the boat is making me very sleepy. It’s a good thing, though, because tomorrow we have massive orientation from 9am to 9pm…and if tonight’s mini-orientation was any indicator, I don’t think it’s going to be very exciting. This isn’t to say that being on the ship isn’t exciting…definitely the opposite. Meeting so many people today was awesome and a little overwhelming…kind of like freshman year all over again, except we are concentrated in a much smaller space. But, listening to all the rules and regulations, having all the professors introduced and a mix of other must-know information gets pretty tiring after awhile. Oh well…I’m still looking forward to tomorrow because it will mean I’m really starting Summer at Sea.
Our hour-long first orientation, with all the passengers on the ship, went well. There are life-long learners on the ship, which as far as I can tell are adults doing Summer at Sea (don’t get any ideas Dad), and one of them is 88 years old and has done some Semester at Sea program 24 times! Our next orientation was by deck, and was only for students. It felt very much like a watered-down freshman dorm orientation. My deck is the smallest, with 72 people, and is called the Aegean Sea. Our color is orange and our mascot was supposed to be the sea lion, but is actually the lion because, quoting our SAS version of an RA (an LCC) Jenni, “a sea lion was too hard to make out of a paper plate.” Orange paper plate lions decorate each of our doors, and it’s nice that they’re working to create a sense of unity within floors, it reminds me that this really is like mini-freshman year. We also have a “deck sign” which is a lion paw (and, if desired, a growly lion face).
Dinner and snack (small 10-10:30pm meal) were both pretty good- both served buffet style in both (for dinner’s case) or one of the two dining rooms on the 5th and 6th decks. I checked out the pool, which is smallish but serviceable, the exercise room, and stood on deck to enjoy the wind and be surrounded by ocean. After snack, a few friends and I looked stood out on the stern deck to watch the stars. We hoped they would be beautiful and covering the whole sky considering how far from light pollution we are, but the moon was so bright we could only see about the same amount as in Laguna Hills. Hopefully toward the end of our Atlantic passage the sky will be dark enough to be able to stargaze properly. On our way back to our deck, we passed a few guys playing guitar and piano and singing, and stopped to hang out with them for a bit. They were playing the chord progression game where the musicians play a chord progression and everyone sings lyrics of as many songs match that progression. They tried it with “I Just had Sex,” but nobody wanted to stop singing those lyrics long enough to switch to another song.
I did discover during today’s orientations that I have a total of 125 free internet minutes for the journey. Certain websites, mainly academic websites for classes or other U of Virginia or Semester at Sea websites, do not cut into this total, so I can use them without logging in. Also, I can use my Summer at Sea email account, vescholtes@semesteratsea.net, as much as I want without cutting into the 125 minutes. Also, the ship has cell service (“cellular at sea” aren’t they cute) which means I can use Facebook and Skype on my phone as substitutes for texting without using the internet. So, the best ways to contact me are:
Email: vescholtes@semesteratsea.net
Facebook: send me a message or post on my wall ☺
Skype: ginnyscholtes
Love from the Atlantic,
Ginny
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