Did someone say "Disney pictures?"

sorry about that. Just as i was about to post I ran out of internet minutes on the ship.

Anyways, I`m at a manga cafe in Tokyo right now. Tokyo is...well...incredible to say the least. I`m surprised that I`ve remembered so much stuff from my Japanese classes.
I hope these pics work this time. It`s hard to tell because EVERYTHING is written in Japanese font on every website AND on the keyboard.

We took this on the subway. The official start of our journey.

Tomorrowland.

Kyle, Mark, Alice, Kate, yours truly. This is our favorite. The woman who played Alice was SUCH a good Alice. Literally, even when she was by herself, the girl didn`t break character.


Myself, Noopur, Kate, Jess, and Kyle on top of the peak in Hong Kong.

sorry about that. my internet minutes on the ship ran out as soon as i tried posting the pics.

Now I`m at a manga cafe in Japan, and HOPEFULLY it`ll work....everything`s written in Japanese characters, including all of the fonts on every webpage.

Let’s Talk About Global Studies, Shall We?

I wrote this about a week and a half ago immediately after taking the third Global Studies examination. Read on, it’s pretty fun:

So we all have to take Global Studies. We must attend this class everyday while at sea (though many people DO skip it, since it’s so easy to just stay in your cabin and not come out). You’d think that traveling around the world would provide an easy backdrop for this class be a wonderful experience. Well you thought wrong.

I’m not sure if other students have commented about this class in their own blogs, but I’d like to throw in my two cents concerning this course.

We just had the third test yesterday, and I must say that I’m not doing so well. Now keep in mind, I’d consider myself a good student. I make the Dean’s List every semester; I’m a member of my school’s honor society; I’ve received a few English/writing awards, and I usually take a full workload every semester (just last semester I had to take 7 senior-level classes, because I’m doing this study abroad and can only take 4 while on ship). I’m not bragging; I’m just trying to make the point that I’d consider myself a good student and do plenty of work each semester, but even though I’ve studied for every one of these Global Studies tests, I haven’t done well on them.

Why?

Well first of all, the class itself is pretty horrible. Mr. Dan Christie. He’s the man of the hour on this ship, for he’s the one who teaches this class. He’s a psychology major, and he teaches the class like a psychology course. Don’t get me wrong, he’s a nice guy, and he’s intelligent, but when it comes down to it, he shouldn’t be teaching a class like this. Not only is he a psychology major, but he’s poor public speaker, especially when he’s required to hold the attention of over 700 students, faculty, and staff. Maybe a history or social science professor should have helmed the responsibilities of this course? Just an idea.

Some of the other professors that speak time to time are really good speakers. Heck, my English professor hasn’t spoken once in Global Studies, but he’s an unbelievable speaker and could easily hold the attention of all the students. Even many of the interport lecturers (people from the specific countries and lecture about the specifics in each country) aren’t very good and talk about things that don’t/won’t pertain to us. For example, on our way to Vietnam, the Vietnamese speaker had an entire lecture on how one can make successful business deals in Vietnam. Granted that’s great and interesting for a business student, how does it pertain to the rest of us (especially when we only have 3 days between Malaysia and Vietnam to learn as much as possible about this country)? I honestly have no idea what the Chinese interport lecturer was talking about today. He skipped around so much and didn’t talk about ANYTHING relevant. It’s a waste of our time.

Like I said, we had our third test yesterday. Each professor who lectures apparently writes his/her own questions for the test. This makes for a very imbalanced/incoherent test. Not only that, but the answers are always worded differently than the notes that were taken during class time. That wouldn’t be a big deal if it was just a normal class, but when we’re bombarded so much information everyday, AND we’re learning it all when traveling in-between countries, it’s very difficult to memorize everything.

Finally, what ticks me off the MOST, is the fact that the information taught in this class really isn’t relevant to us at all. Our lessons should concern issues and elements of the countries that we SHOULD know before arriving. So many times when wondering around countries, I learn something new and think, hmmm, maybe we should have been taught that in Global Studies.

For example, after traveling to Mauritius, we spent an entire day on CORAL REEFS. Coral reefs? This isn’t a science class. Another day we had three of the female professors talk about “gender studies.” As soon as they said “gender studies,” and I saw these three women, I KNEW it was going to be the same, old, generic, feminist critiques on how all women are persecuted and hated around the world. Don’t get me wrong, I’m for equality and care very much about issues surrounding women today such, but I hate the fact that they just used the lesson as feminist propaganda, rather than concentrating on the facts and issues that may help us understand the issue in more depth.

This class seriously COULD HAVE been incredibly powerful, very educational, and easily could have been the greatest, most meaningful class any of us have ever taken. Traveling around the world while learning about the countries we’ll be exploring…that sounds awesome. Instead, we get Dan Christie saying awkward things, professors bombarding us with their own beliefs, and every other student sitting around bored to death as we discuss “structural violence,” “negative peace,” and other random subjects that just don’t have any context.

So yeah. I wrote that awhile ago, but still hold roughly the same opinions. I also have a problem with the pre-ports for the last couple of countries. Through most of the trip we’ve had a cultural and logistical pre-ports the two nights before entering each country; each meeting was mandatory and lasted an hour each. These pre-ports provided us with the basic information that we needed to know for each country, but for the past two countries we’ve only had one pre-port that lasts alittle over an hour each. The reasons they combined both pre-ports was because, OBVIOUSLY, there’s not too much culture in Vietnam and China.

Seriously, why rob us from valuable information because A) the instructors/staff are too lazy to create two separate presentations for us or B) they think that we don’t care enough? Not even that, but the information they give us is alittle ridiculous. For example, during the China preport, they cut out the interport lecturers presentation of the “Dos and Don’ts for China,” but still had a 10 minute presentation on the pop culture/music around China. Hmm…maybe, just MAYBE those do’s and don’ts could be relevant to us all.

They think that we don’t want to sit through and learn all of this stuff, but most of us do! Most of the “7^th deckers” don’t really care about this valuable info because they certainly have more important things to do.

Ok, enough negativity. We have less than a month left, so I’m honestly trying to appreciate everything and remember as much as I can while on this ship. It seriously has become a home to me, and I’ll definitely miss it. I apologize if there was too much bitching in this post, but I just finished this test and needed to vent.

Hong Kong Escapades

So we were docked in Hong Kong. It was my first and only full day in the crazy nation that’s made up of over 200 islands. We were actually docked at this very posh/expensive mall. That’s right…a mall. Hong Kongians are major consumers, maybe even more so than Americans. So once you walk off the ship, you’re inside the labyrinth of a Hong Kong mall. Very odd indeed. Expensive clothes done the racks of the stores. Immense televisions occupy the lobby with newscasts concerning Virginia Tech students. And signs written in Mandarin characters line the ceilings.

Me, Kate, and Kyle made our way out of the mall, and were waiting inside of a hotel lobby as Mark was trying to find information on obtaining a Japanese Rail Pass. We were flipping through brochures with hopes of finding the most perfect activities to do while in Hong Kong, since we were all leaving the next morning for Beijing, China. Kyle suddenly mentioned “Hong Kong Disney,” and I laughed as I saw the excited look on his face; I instantly shrugged off this preposterous idea. After thinking about that idea for about 10 seconds, I began second-guessing it, and when Kate enthusiastically agreed, and Mark mentioned that he’d never been to Disney World before, I was totally for it! Why not do something crazy and totally fun? I rode an elephant in Vietnam; went bowling in Malaysia; visited a movie theater in India, so this seemed completely natural. Plus I love randomness!

After a quick lunch, the four of us hit the very clean Hong Kong subway, and found the route that led straight to Hong Kong Disneyland. The subway was seriously the exact opposite of a New York subway; it looked brand new and didn’t smell like dried urine. We had to transfer twice, and when we made it to the third subway station and the train came in to pick us up, we were amazed and excited that all the windows were in the shape of Mickey Mouse heads...very rad. We danced onto the train and found the entire cars decked out with fancy Disney decorations and crazy blue seats. The train took us straight to the front gates of the park…very efficient travel indeed.

“Please exit the train, watch your step, and have a magical day at Disney’s Magic Kingdom.”

We were so happy and enthusiastic to be there. To their shock, Kyle even hugged a few of the ticket ladies while passing through the gates. Yea for enthusiasm! It was surprisingly not very expensive; the crowds were surprisingly absent; I was surprisingly excited as hell. Like the subway, the park was very clean and fresh. It only opened 2 years ago, so everything was still brand new. We took TONS of pictures, rode tons of rides (including Space Mountain 3 times, since there was no line), ate some excellent Chinese food, and saw this AWESOME Disney 3-D show in one of the theaters. To anyone reading this who was with me during our last Disney trip, yes, there were still briefing rooms at the start of every ride. And yes, “no raving on the rides.” All in all, it was an incredible afternoon of fun. All four of us were in need of a day without cares or worries, and we definitely got that while at Hong Kong Disneyland. We should star in our own Disney commercial


Afterwards, we made our way back to the main city. In case you’ve never been to Hong Kong, it’s seriously the NICEST and most beautiful city I’ve ever seen. It’s HUGE. After stopping for some coffee, we caught a 2-story bus and enjoyed sitting in the very front of the second floor with a full view of the city out the large window and saw everything, including the colorful buildings, the giant ferris wheel, and a soccer field WITH a game going on. I was ready to leap off the bus to catch the game, but figured that I’d hold out, because we were traveling straight up to the peak of the hill overlooking the city. In case you haven’t read my earlier entries, soccer (football) is the only sport I really give a crap about.
The drive up the hill kept getting higher, and HIGHER, and HIGHER, until we were so high that we saw nothing but fog and mist. We were traveling to the top of the peak in order to gaze over the city AND see the awesome laser/light show that happens every night at 8 pm. The bus left us at this mall/shopping center that had a viewing spot on top of the roof. We made it to the roof, but there was NOTHING but fog, and more fog. Seriously, it looked like a scene from a horror film.
In order to still make the trip worth it, we decided to shop around the mall for awhile. After buying some cheap t-shirts, we soon walked back to the front entrance and saw another separate mall across the lobby (Hong Kongians LOVE their shopping apparently). We made it inside the mall, made it to the second floor, looked out the giant window, and there, my friends, was the city. Of course we couldn’t see anything earlier…we were on the wrong building! After traveling up at least 5 or 6 more escalators, we finally made it to the very top, and had a few minutes to gaze at the spectacular view of Hong Kong. It’s seriously the most gorgeous city I’ve ever seen. Simply spectacular. We only had a few minutes because it suddenly began POURING rain.

The night was still young. Kate had read about a Men’s Market and a Women’s Market near each other with clothing and other stuff that would interest each gender. Not only that, but they were both open really late. Excellent! On our way down the giant hill, we met this guy from Chicago who would win in a Paul Giamatti look-alike contest. He’s apparently responsible for opening all of the Bubba Gump Shrimp Company restaurants/stores all around the world, and he had just opened one in Hong Kong a few months ago and was still in charge. Anyways, he was on his way home from work, and knew how to get to the market, so he offered us some other travel advice and kept us company until we made it back to the subway.
The subway train took us to the center of the madness…the center of the city. Lights everywhere. People everywhere. Crazy noises and sights bombarded us as we continued to search for the market. This wasn’t a nice neighborhood though. Very sketchy people and really sketchy streets indeed. This, of course, added to the enjoyment. It’s also worth noting that we spotted a 7-Eleven every 5 minutes while walking. Don’t fool yourself though; even though there were abundant amounts of 7-Elevans, don’t slurpees in sight.

Instead of finding the market, we found a restaurant (we hadn’t eaten since Disneyland). Actually we found many “restaurants,” but this one seemed like one of the classier places in the area, but that really wasn’t saying much. Most of the restaurants looked like they served cheap street food out of garbage cans, but at least this place looked decent and had carpeted floors and televisions. The food WAS decent, but it was still an experience. It’s really odd ordering food when there’s a language barrier between you and the waitress. You literally have no clue what they’re going to bring out for you…you simply hope that it’s somewhat close to what you actually ordered. I also thought it was funny that they served all Chinese food, yet they didn’t have chopsticks. Only forks…..booooo. As long as it was decent food though, who cares?
At this point it was around 11. We decided to just walk back to the ship…though we had NO clue how far away the ship was. Along the way we crossed some crazy parts of the town. At one point I saw a bunch of bootleg DVD stores just like we’d seen in Vietnam. “Hey guys, can we stop here and check out what they have?” Everyone agreed. We made it up to these five stores lined up in a row, but every single one had nothing but porn, and porn, and more porn. So of course, I totally loaded up on supplies.

Ummm…yea just kidding.
We walked away, and began walking faster as we noticed where we were. The term “men’s market” can be interpreted many different ways. The streets were filled with nothing but “saunas”, XXX clubs, and vendors selling sex toys. At least it was a well-lit area.
Soon we made it out of this district, but entered a new territory…the very dark streets. Our small map told us to keep following this one road in order to make it back to the ship, so that’s exactly what we did. After a half hour or so we saw the mall, walked through the empty hallways, and boarded our ship.
Our only full day in Hong Kong treated us to Disneyland, some traditional food, a spectacular view of the city, meeting some fascinating people, and some adventures inside the city as well. I feel like I saw everything I needed to see.

So I served my time in 'nam

I’ve traveled by many modes of transportation on this trip so far: a ship (obviously), smaller boats (lifeboats, water taxis, river boats), cars, motorcycles (thanks to Vietnam), a train, rickshaws, bicycle rickshaws, kayaks, subway, giant elevators, airplanes, buses…and now…I can add ‘elephant’ to the list. That’s right.

The Elephant Monologues



Wednesday morning, our 3rd day in Vietnam, James, Ben, and I boarded a plane that took us to Buon Ma Thout. This is a small town in the middle of the country…in the middle of nowhere. The reason we chose this town to fly to was because it was only an hour away from Yok Don National Park: the national park in Vietnam where one can ride elephants. At the beginning of this trip, I made a couple of goals for myself. One minor, yet more fun goal was to ride an elephant…cross that sucker off the list. Unfortunately another goal was to see a soccer game, but you can’t win them all!

Anyways, we arrive at the airport in Buon Ma Thout after an hour plane ride from Saigon. We got swarmed by taxi drivers, but found a guy who spoke somewhat decent English. He drove us to the park office and meet with a park official in town. After a somewhat useless chat with this woman, our driver then drove us out to the actual park (about an hour away). The park was pretty rundown…kinda like I was hoping my safari would be in Africa. The guy in charge told us that we should leave, find something to eat, and then come back, because the elephant was still “crossing the river.”
We visited this very dirty café/restaurant on the side of the road. They didn’t even have menus; it literally looked like somebody converted their large front porch area into a dining area. We told the woman that we wanted “rice, egg, and chicken.” We did get rice, egg, and chicken, and surprisingly, it was decent…and surprisingly, I didn’t get insane amounts of diarrhea from it (thanks Pepto Bismal!).

We then returned to the park, just as the elephant was coming in from its river trek. It wasn’t a HUGE elephant, but it was big, and plenty big enough to hold the three of us on its back. As weird as it sounds, this was seriously an amazing experience. We rode Tiger (we named it Tiger, because we were in Vietnam and Tiger’s the official beer of the country, for the logo’s everywhere) for one hour around the woods, up and down steep hills, and across a river twice. The river was so deep that Tiger had to hold its trunk above the water in order to breath while trekking across. Tiger also did a lot of eating throughout the journey; he also did a lot of farting. Elephant farts literally sound like a lion roaring. I got most of the highlights on video, but all in all it was a completely rad experience.
Afterwards, we asked our driver if there was anything else to see around the area, because we had a few hours to kill until we had to catch our flight back to Saigon. We stopped at a coffee plantation. I forgot to mention that Buon Ma Thout is the area where they grow all of the Vietnamese coffee. This farm was owned by a friend of our driver, and this guy and his wife were hilarious. As soon as he saw James and I holding cameras, he brought us into his house, sat us down in his living room (keep in mind that this was a really old farm, so I use the term “living room” very loosely), and brought out all of his cameras and photos to show us. He was a lot of fun.
When we arrived back in the town, our driver took us to the shop that sells the actual coffee that we saw on the farm. The woman sat us down and made us a few cups of coffee and tea for free. This was an amazing strategy, because the coffee was so good that all three of us bought some beans.

We still had a few hours to waste, because our flight wasn’t until 8:10, so our driver took us to this really nice restaurant in the town. They must not have been used to white people visiting, because the whole staff was obsessed with us. Every time I took a drink of soda, the waiter would come over and pour more in my glass. It got to the point where I would wait until he wasn’t looking and then take a drink. Unfortunately the Tiger girl (the girl dressed in a scantily clad Tiger outfit) usually filled in for the waiter when he wasn’t looking, so my drinking strategy didn’t always work.
The menu to this place was insane. There was even a “Special Live Forest Animal” section that included snake, weasel, rabbit, and other foresty creatures. I was wondering how they prepared the animals in this section of the menu. Like did they own a petting zoo in the back of the restaurant, or did they just have the cook go outside, find a random weasel, club it, throw it in a burlap sack, then cook it to our meat-eating pleasures. I don’t know. All I do know is that I originally ordered rabbit leg (I wanted to try something weird, and the “Cobra stew” was alittle too out of my league). I ordered the dish, but then our driver shook his head “no.” “Don’t order that,” he said. I’m sure his warning benefited me in the long run. I had beef instead.
Our driver was an interesting guy. At some points he spoke English really well, but then 10 minutes later he’d act like he had no clue what we were talking about. He did teach us some useful Vietnamese phrases and such though and showed us pictures of his wife and talked about how he used to be a school teacher. Really nice guy. We ended up giving him over 400 dong for his services (dong’s obviously the Vietnamese currency, in case you didn’t know).
We made it back to the airport almost two hours ahead of schedule. The Buon Ma Thout airport consisted of two rooms: the room where one purchases tickets, and the waiting room. The small plane takes off in the parking lot outside the airport. At least they were punctual, because we ended up getting back to Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) ahead of schedule.


Clothes Shopping/The Zoo

On our first day, as soon as we set foot in Saigon (I’m going to refer to the city as Saigon, rather than Ho Chi Minh City, since that’s what most people refer to it as), four of us began searching for a tailor that’ll make suits for a reasonable price. Everything’s pretty cheap in Vietnam; this includes nice suits, so many Semester at Sea people take this opportunity to have suits tailored to their needs
. In the end, we found a store owned by this woman. Her husband makes suits, and she offered us the best price. I planned on getting two nice suits made. The woman’s husband measured us all (very thorough, of course), and we planned on picking them up on the fourth day of our visit (Thursday).
On Thursday, Kyle, Ben, and James, and I stopped in at noon, but we were shooed away by the woman, because the suits apparently weren’t going to be ready until 5 pm. We had to kill some time, and we had already gone shopping and I had already bought my Japanese Rail Pass (all of the goals for the day). About half of the group went to visit the War Remnants Museum, while Kyle, Eric, and me visited the Saigon zoo!!!!!! I know, it sounds very lame, BUT by the 4th day, we were running out of stuff to do in the actual city that didn’t consist of wondering aimlessly and shopping.
Our zoo visit was the weirdest time I’ve had in a long time. First of all, all of the animals were insane. Maybe the zoo was too close to the roads, and the car exhaust messed with the animals brains. Maybe the workers fed them other animals. They were all so violent . The animals liked to fight with each other. I got some awesome footage of bears fighting, crocodiles attacking each other, elephants dancing (yes, I said dancing), a lion pacing back and forth for a few minutes, and a chimpanzee who was obsessed with us and spit at Kyle a number of times. What was cool about the zoo was the fact that we were so close to the animals. Seriously, I could have reached out and pet an ostrich or fed an elephant or stepped on a crocodile. The tourist population was limited to the three of us though. Seriously, there was hardly anybody in the deserted zoo, which also added a certain creepiness to the situation.
The only other group people that we saw were some school children. We assumed they were on a field trip, but began to think differently when we heard the marching snare drums. We walked near the main entrance of the zoo and encountered the group of school children standing in a large circle. Two students were holding flags: one was a Vietnamese flag, the other some random red flag. They were marching slowly to the beat of the drums, as other children were screaming out random sentences in Vietnamese. This weird Communist-esque exercise freaked the hell of out us. I seriously thought that I was going to get shot in the head for videotaping this activity. So that’s what kids do when they visit zoos in Vietnam.

At 5 pm, Eric and I made it back to the woman’s shop. I was the first one there, and her husband had just delivered the suits, so I got to try mine on first. To my honest surprise, they both fit perfectly! I tried them on in the middle of the store, and though it felt rather odd as the old man was trying to help me try my pants on, it was hilarious at the same time.

It reminded me of something that happened on the 2nd day. I was in Ben Thien Market, looking for some stuff to buy. This is a giant indoor market that sells everything from clothes to crafts to horribly smelling food (people walked around with huge buckets of vinegar with odd-looking chunks and bits of food floating on the top) to electronics to shoes to whatever. I thought that the guys selling stuff in India and Malaysia were bad, but these women in the market were incredibly annoying.

I’d be walking down the shallow passageway between booths, and a woman would jump out, dangling a shirt in front of me. I’d dodge her, but then there’d be two other women behind her waving stupid-looking polo shirts in my face. After ignoring them, another lady would reach out her arms in front of me and try to pull me into her booth. I’d say “no” very sternly (I got really good at this), but then she’d smack me in the arm and mutter some insulting Vietnamese phrase. This sort of activity would continue during my entire time shopping in Vietnam. If one makes eye contact with ANY item someone is selling, the seller will run towards you and offer to show you more and give you “best price…best price just for you!” In the other countries, I thought these shenanigans were rather funny and humorous, but in Vietnam it began to get slightly annoying. This is coming from a guy who gets ticked off even when someone in Best Buy offers me an Entertainment Weekly with my purchase. Seriously, just leave me alone people! At the same time, I used this to my advantage, for whenever I was buying something, if the seller didn’t match the price I wanted, I’d just walk away. One minute later the seller would find me, then offer to sell me the item at my price. Works every time!


Let’s get back to the story at hand. I found a really nice pair of pants in this indoor market that I wanted to buy, and I got the lady to sell me that pair and a nice pair of jeans, both for $18 (by the way, almost everybody in Vietnam takes US $1 bills. It’s pretty convenient). The lady looked at my waist and told me that I was a specific size, but I didn’t believe her because the size she was telling me was much bigger than my size in America. Even in India I bought a pair of size 30 pants and they fit the same as at home, but I honestly didn’t believe this lady and asked if there was anywhere in the market that I could try on the pants. She pointed to the center of her booth. You only live once. I tried on the pants in public, and they both fit perfectly! Good job lady! I love my new pants!

Back to the suits (sorry---I know I’m jumping around a lot, but don’t feel like telling stories in order today). My suits fit perfectly, as did everyone else’s. The lady selling them to us was hilarious. On the first day when I was trying to bargain her price down, she got ticked off at how cheap I was asking, and pulled on my ear after smacking me in the shoulder. When we were picking up our suits, the entire time she was trying to get us to buy these kimonos for 10 bucks. When we’d say “no,” she’d smack us on the shoulder. Fun times.


War Remnants Museum

On the second day in Vietnam, two of us visited the War Remnants Museum, a 30 minute walk from where our bus shuttle dropped us off. It was originally called the Museum of American War Atrocities and War Crimes…the original title suited the museum better.
The pictures and exhibits featured in this museum were incredibly startling and very sick: countless dismembered bodies, burnt corpses, photos of innocent civilians getting shot in the head, and other startling photographs filled the walls, while a display with a guillotine that was used to chop prisoners heads off and several prison chambers occupied the outside.
War is not pretty, especially when our own country is causing it. It felt rather odd to be an American while walking around this museum. The effects of the war can still be seen on the streets of Vietnam today. I passed many civilians and beggars who were disfigured due to Agent Orange outbreaks during the war, and I walked past a few people whose faces looked like they were melting off their skulls–this was due to napalm attacks. Pretty intense stuff, but oddly enough, most Vietnamese like Americans. I also learned that in Vietnamese schools, when children learn about the war, they learn that most Americans actually protested and totally opposed the war. Rather than it being the PEOPLE who killed many innocent civilians throughout their country, they learned that it was the GOVERNMENT that was responsible. This, of course, is what the kids learn while they’re actually in school and not out at the local zoos marching around.

So yeah, I’m hoping that journalists and others continue to take pictures and video while in Iraq, because I’m thinking that we’ll have another atrocity museum built in a few years.
I’ve honestly found that most people around the world DO like Americans. Seriously. For example, somebody in Malaysia told me, “I LOVE Americans. Good People! Just Hate Bush.” That’s honestly the general consensus everywhere we go.


Mekong Delta

Remember watching Martin Sheen sailing down the river in Apocalypse Now? Well the river that was featured in the movie was based on the Mekong River, the predominant river in Vietnam. Our ship had already sailed down the Saigon River in order to make it into Saigon, but this trip was different.
We booked the trip through a tour agency we found downtown. The 2-hour van ride to the river was monotonous though…three of us were scrunched up in the very last bench seat in a van with virtually NO legroom. The trip itself proved to be much more entertaining.
We sailed down the river in small little passenger boats, ate traditional Vietnamese food (rice, spring rolls, fruit, banana wine, honey coffee, etc.) in this jungle-pavilion area, took a tour of the jungle while sitting in these little row boats with our awesome rice hats on, and did some other crazy stuff along the way. All in all, it was a pretty incredible day that only cost us a mere $7.

The Food and the Traffic

While writing about India, I made an overly big deal about crossing the street in downtown traffic. Though it was very difficult in India and Malaysia, neither country compared to the traffic in Vietnam. It was SO MUCH FUN to cross the street! We get a packet before each country that has general information that we all need to know before leaving; this is what the packet says about crossing the street:

“Cross-walks do not exist in Vietnam, so in order to cross a busy street in Vietnam all one has to do is step out into oncoming traffic…the motos and buses will maneuver around you until you have reached the other side. Do not run as they will not be able to gage your movement; just keep a steady pace.”

This was so true. For five days I literally walked straight out into busy oncoming traffic, and the drivers would just drive around me. 90% of the vehicles on the road were motorcycles, and at least once or twice the handlebars of a motorcycle hit my backpack…that’s how close they were. Some close calls here and there, but oddly enough the only time I made contact with a motorcycle was when I ran into some lady’s parked motorcycle while walking off the sidewalk. I know…I’m an idiot.
The other thing I’m going to talk about is food. Now I’m not a huge eater (ask anybody I know at home…I only eat when I’m hungry), but I’ve been talking a lot in these entries about food. Why? Well I’ve discovered on this trip that there are two things that make a country unique (especially most third world countries), and these are the food and the traffic patterns. Seriously.


With that being said, the food in Vietnam was surprisingly good. I wasn’t sure if I was going to like the traditional cuisine, but it all satisfied my taste buds like no other. In Malaysia I felt like eating mostly American food, but in this country, I ate all local cuisine (even when it looked a bit odd).

There’s a lot more I can say about Vietnam. If anyone has any questions or wants to know about anything else I did while in the country, definitely let me know. This country, like India and South Africa, is very difficult to write about, because I saw and experienced so much stuff, and it’s all often impossible to put into words. SOOOOO many details that aren’t in this blog, but yeah, I can’t make everybody happy.

I’m REALLY excited about China, but can’t really express in words how excited I am for Japan. I’ve seriously waited to visit Japan for a long time, and now, finally, I’ll be able to roam the crazy streets of Tokyo or relax near an incredible temple in Kyoto or maybe, just maybe, catch a football game or a baseball game, or at least find a nice record store with some underground Japanese music. Hopefully. I CAN’T WAIT!!!

P.S. – I bought WAY too much stuff in Vietnam, but got a lot for my buck. SOO many DVDs!!!!

Some last minute India pics

I figured I'd post a few pics from India.
Still none from Malaysia yet, but we'll see.


I'm posing with one of my homestay family's cows.

The entrance to the large Hindu temple we visited. "What do they got in there, King Kong?" (name the movie quote (it's an easy one)).

Me with our host during our homestay. This was in front of their shrine in their prayer room.

Me and the drummers hanging out after everybody left for the night.

The group of kids that asked me 10 million questions, including if I've ever been on the moon. Really awesome kids actually.

Just a few, but i still haven't gotten pictures from other people yet.
That's it.
rick

The Malaysians Don’t Have Easter Eggs in their Stores, but They’re Still Cool in My Book.

So Malaysia’s over, and we’re on our way to Vietnam. The next few countries are probably the ones I’m most excited about, but for now, lets discuss Malaysia.

It’s a unique country with many emerging cultures. It’s mostly Muslim, but there are also Chinese (especially in the area we were at), Indians, some European, etc. Languages include Malay, Mandarin, Tamil, etc.
We docked on the large island of Penang, which is right off of the mainland. Georgetown (the capital) is the second biggest city in Malaysia. It was clean (huge fines exist for littering), safe (prison sentences exist for weapon possession), and the people were overall very kind. Many cultural aspects exist that we had to keep in mind. For example, speaking loudly in public is very improper. Even pointing with ones finger is very inappropriate; instead, people used their whole hand.

Like I mentioned in the last post, we weren’t able to dock at the actual dock. Our ship’s just too damn big it seems. Instead, we were forced to utilize the lifeboats and take them to and from the docks. This got annoying in about…say…5 minutes. The long waiting lines, the hot lifeboats, the fact that they never arrive on time, and I ALWAYS seemed to arrive just after the boat left, so I had maximum waiting time. Granted, I shouldn’t be complaining, because I just spent four days in Malaysia!

I initially escaped the dreaded waiting lines of the lifeboats the morning we arrived, because I had signed up for an SAS trip titled “Mosques and Temples.” Appropriately enough, we spent the day visiting various mosques and temples. We toured about 6 different religious temples; this included everything from Islam to Taoism to Buddhism to Hinduism to a mixture of a few. Many temples were quite extraordinary to view. Just beautiful. Around 3 or 4 o’clock, we arrived back at the dock, but I didn’t feel like sailing back to the ship. Instead, three of us visited this really snazzy bookshop/coffee shop a few blocks down in the city. The coffee was happening, yet the books were all a little too “new age” for my tastes.
That night I did yet ANOTHER SAS trip. This was a Malaysian Welcome Reception, and it consisted of visiting a university and watching a Shadow Puppet performance. The performance was pretty trippy at times, yet it was funny and enjoyable to watch in the auditorium. Afterwards I went up to the stage and talked to the performers/tried out some of the percussion instruments that they used. They fed us some good Malaysian food outside, as well as some tasty tea/coffee (though it had nothing on India’s coffee).

When we returned, about six of us visited an English pub down the street from the ship. They played nothing but Oasis the entire time, and the guys working there were really kool. It wasn’t crowded AT ALL, so the waiter allowed a few of us to jump up on the stage and jam for a bit. He invited us back to open mic night Wednesday.

A few of us decided to travel to the Penang National Forest on the morning of the second day. Chad, James, Kyle, Tina, and I took two separate taxis about 45 minutes away from the ship, and began hiking the woods located near the very tip of Penang. The heat and humidity ensured sweat drenching. We hiked along the trails only for 2 hours or so, but we saw (and almost got attacked) by some monkeys, encountered a giant monitor that looked and crawled like a dinosaur, crossed some fun bridges, hung out at the lookout point that was located STRAIGHT UP a bunch of steps, and followed some incredibly long ant parades. It was surely a fun afternoon in the woods.

Unfortunately our taxis left us there, so we had to call for a van to transport us to the major mall. There’s literally a huge mall in every city we dock in. This mall was pretty large. It had five floors, but most of the stores were either
a) trendy female clothing
b) massage chairs
c) massage parlors
d) foot massages
e) non-massage-oriented places (bootlegged DVDs/computer software)

We ate, then we walked around the mall, then moved on to the city. The major streets, like India, were insanely difficult to cross at times. We strolled towards the ship, met up with two friends, and went right back out.
We hit up an outside Indian restaurant, and then we proceeded to a Malaysian bowling alley.

Malaysia loves their bowling. A bowling league was happening when we arrived, so we had to wait till they were finished. The room overlooking the bowling lanes held some pool tables, so we decided to hang out there. The problem was that these pool tables were monstrous. Not only were the tables built football stadium-lengths, but the pool balls were completely different as well (much smaller than usual), and there were at least 10 more balls than usual. The only guy working up on this level didn’t speak English, and we were the only other ones present in the lonesome room. What does one do in situations like these? You make up your OWN game of pool.
This wasted about an hour. We then took to the bowling lanes. Unfortunately I completely sucked tonight, so after 2 games I decided to quit while I was ahead, and meet up with a few of the girls that were hitting up the karaoke bar.
The karaoke bar was closed (too early maybe…it was only 9 o’clock or so). We found a decent outside restaurant, and came across a band that only knew mid-90s American pop rock songs, so it was definitely a nostalgic evening. The five of us then caught a cab and made it back to the ship in good time.

One thing I forgot to mention that happened on the 2nd day. My friend James and I were both craving a soccer game. Soccer’s really the only sport I enjoy watching, and I really wanted to attend a soccer game in another country. Brazil had Carnival, so I couldn’t find anything there. India had too much other stuff to do. This leaves Malaysia and Vietnam to find a decent soccer (football) game to attend. We found a travel agency, and the guy told us, in broken English, where the stadium nearest to Penang was located. He also informed us that there would be a game the following night at 8:45 pm. How exciting! We were incredibly pumped, and spent most of the 3rd day hanging around the mall and the city, because me, Chad, and James were going to leave early around 3 or so, because the stadium was further away, AND we’d have to arrive early to grab some tickets.

We caught a cab outside the dock. The cab driver hesitated the long distance, so he named a huge price for the trip. We bargained him down a good bit and were off! This excursion also required us crossing over to the mainland. I guess the bridge connecting Penang to the mainland is the longest bridge in southeast Asia, and yes, it was pretty long. As we were crossing the bridge, I asked the cab driver how long the ride will be. He said that he didn’t know…he’s never been to this part of the country before. The cab drier then began calling his friends, asking them where this stadium was. After passing the tollbooths, he also asked the toll guys where the stadium was. Bad, bad sign.

It WAS a long cab ride, and I was very tired, so I actually fell asleep…actually all three of us fell asleep at certain points. Eventually I woke up and began saw some signs for the stadium. Yes! Soon, I was pleasantly surprised to see a pretty huge soccer stadium in the middle of a field with a giant parking lot. It was still very early, but we figured that we’d buy our tickets and let our cab driver be on his way.

He dropped us off in the front. The only other visible sign of life was a small group of food stands sitting in front of the parking lot near the road and a village was further down the street. We walked up to the main gates.
Do you remember the movie National Lampoon’s Vacation, when the family travels across the country and FINALLY makes it to Wally World, and the amusement park’s closed for another couple of weeks? Well…these three security guards stared at us bewilderingly the entire time we were walked down the parking lot.
I asked one what time the game started, already having an idea that the words he was about to say PROBABLY weren’t to be what I wanted to hear. They laughed at us. Apparently the first soccer game at this stadium isn’t until May 2nd. The people around the outside food stand didn’t speak good English either, but we found out through the paper that the closest football game was at least 2 hours away…and we didn’t have a cab…and the bus didn’t drive through this part of the country…and we obviously didn’t have a car.
We were clearly in the middle of NOWHERE. Not only that, but since all of us took naps in the cab, we didn’t even know which direction to backtrack towards.

A small village lay off in the distance, so we decided to stomach the incredible sun and walk towards the homes and shops with hopes of finding a phone and a number to call for a cab. This clearly looked like a scene from a horror film. We walked around small village looking for someone to help us. Nobody spoke a word of English. The adults shot mean looks at us. The school children pointed and laughed at us. Needless to say, we quickly left and walked back towards the stadium.
We walked all the way back to the security guards, and asked if they had a phone # to call for a cab, and they all shook their heads “no.” The one younger guard could speak very limited English. He walked over to his car, waved us over, and told us to get in. Walk in to a stranger’s car? At this point, I really didn’t care…as long as he would take us somewhere near some civilization.
This incredibly nice guy drove us 40 minutes out of his way, and took us to a mall close to the bridge (where we could grab a taxi). Talking with him was kind of difficult. I was trying my best NOT to fall asleep, but was also trying to have a decent conversation using limited English, since he WAS helping us out.

This is just one example of the kindness we’ve been encountering through many people in other countries. Most individuals are so polite and always willing to help, even if they don’t speak the same language. Even though some Americans are the most polite people in the world, our general population doesn’t possess this mentality. Most Americans will point a foreigner towards the right direction, then walk away, because let’s face it, one can’t put his or her life on hold just for some stranger. The people we’ve been encountering won’t point you to the right direction; they’ll stop everything and physically take you there, and probably start a cool conversation with you on the way.

So we’re at this mall, still on the mainland. We ran into another problem. There was a bomb threat on the Penang bridge. Later on, we found out that there WAS an actual homemade bomb sitting on the middle of the bridge, and because of this, nobody could enter Penang, so we just waited around the mall.
Even after the bridge re-opened, most cab drivers wanted an arm and a leg to drive into Penang because of the traffic. After much negotiation, we found a driver who’d take us there for 50 ringgets, which was somewhat decent.

The music this cab driver played was HIDEOUS. Cheesy love songs for over an hour in Malaysian traffic was enough to make me feel sick. When we entered the city, it was quicker to walk than to sit in traffic. Chad went back to the ship while James and I went out to the English pub. The waiter remembered me, and told me to definitely bring my friends out later tonight (it was only around 8ish). I ate a very non-Malaysian dinner…a ham and cheese double-decker. Didn’t care…I had enough ethnic food for one visit.

We then explored the city for a while, and found this really cool night market. It had tons of different food, clothing, live music, and all together a really chill atmosphere. We found a McWaffles stand (it sported the arch and everything). Their menu consisted of only three things: a waffle, one scoop of ice cream, or two scoops of ice cream. Real complex, I know. I had a scoop of some weird flavor, but it was a good enough desert.

We ran into a group of our friends, traveled a 20-minute walk back to the English pub. Two older guys and the waiter were jamming up on stage…but they had no drummer. The waiter waved for me to get behind the kit, so I played about 4 or 5 songs with them, and had an unbelievably fun time. It felt SO good to play again. They all seemed pretty impressed. We played all American stuff, so nothing too crazy.
This was when things began getting weird, because everyone in the group wanted to now go to a club…a club that was in the same exact spot we had just come from 20 minutes ago. They all left, but my friend Jen waited for me to finish up a song, and we met the rest of the group outside the club, located near the nightlife section of town.
Jen apparently made great friends with the owner and general manager a few nights ago, because she got them to let us all in for free. Surprisingly, after about 15 minutes, everyone wanted to leave yet again (don’t ask me folks, I thought it was weird too). Jen and I stayed for a while, because I was getting sick of walking back and forth. We danced with a bunch of local guys on the dance floor to some techno and had a blast.

Alas, I had to arise early the next morning in order to attend a service visit at a home for physically and mentally disabled people. The service visit, though rather long, was really great. The residents weren’t used to visitors, especially American visitors, for most only knew Malay and no English. They were still kind and willing to play some games and draw some pictures with us. I drew them a picture of our ship with Captain Jeremy proudly standing near the front. His presence brought happiness to their eyes.

After the service visit, two of us decided to hit up the botanical gardens, located right outside the city. The gardens were all together pretty boring, except when Matt almost got attacked by a pack of monkeys. We were taking pictures and videotaping near the entrance, but suddenly one monkey bolts right towards us (the last thing I have on video is a monkey sprinting towards the camera), and a bunch more begin to congregate as well. Pretty scary. I began hiding my camera away in my bag, because I had heard stories about monkeys jumping up and stealing peoples cameras, and these monkeys were NOT getting my video camera. They were all following Matt though…following REALLY closely. They also started hissing and yelling, but luckily they stopped and ran towards this little Asian boy that was throwing candy at them. I hope the poor boy made it out alive.
We took a taxi back to the mall where we were able to use some FAST internet! FINALLY! The ship’s internet is so, SO slow, and it costs 40 cents per minute. This is why I usually have little to no pictures to share on here…it takes forever to load them.

I met up with the rest of the group while at the mall. I also bought this sweet little Batman bear that I’ll attach to my backpack zipper. After stopping at the bread store, the grocery store, and a 7-Eleven (I wanted a slurpee), we took two taxis back to the ship, and luckily made it back in the nick of time, because as soon as we showed up, the line for the ferry began stretching out to the road.

We arrived at the ship, ate a horrible dinner (seriously, the food’s beginning to really get old, but we have some good days every once in a while), and then made plans for the evening. A few of us watched a bootleg copy of the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie in my cabin. I love how it was showing in the theater on the 5th floor, OR someone could just travel down to the 3rd floor and buy the bootlegged DVD in one of the DVD stores. The quality was sufficient on a laptop, though the movie severely sucked.

Malaysia proved to be a good time. I was hoping to buy a copy of the Koran here, just because it was a predominant Muslim country, and it be a great souvenir. Oddly enough they didn’t carry them in the bookstores and I couldn’t find them anywhere else. As far as books go, Harry Potter and The DaVinci Code are seriously the most popular books in every country, in every language.

Our ship’s going almost 30 knots at the moment, which is insane. This is the fastest passenger ship in the world, and we’re going really quickly because of pirate attacks in these waters. I must admit though, a pirate attack would be pretty fun.

We’re now docked in Singapore for a few hours in order to refuel. There are small boats circulating our ship; I think they’re seriously pirate ships, I don’t care what anybody says.

We get to turn our clocks BACK tonight!! Such a wonderful Easter present. We’ll be sailing into Vietnam on Monday, and I already have a few crazy plans up my sleeve for this country. I’m not going to give anything away, but let’s just say that you’ll hopefully read about some elephants real soon. I know what you’re thinking…elephants playing soccer…exactly.
I’ll try to post some Malaysia + more India pictures if I can.

Happy Easter folks!

India part 2

So before discussing Malaysia, let’s finish with my adventures in India!

Chennai is a pretty interesting city. Let’s hear it for Chennai!
They were actually affected pretty severely from the tsunami, so the rebuilding process has been pretty successful it seems. The city’s great, yet I still found much comfort in leaving the confines of the crowded streets and traveling to the rural areas of India. The Semester at Sea trip I signed up for lasted 2 days, 3 nights, and took place in the small, small village of Erode.

My big trip to rural India (don’t try to find it on a map anywhere…I couldn’t) began at 10 o’clock in the evening, when 30 of us met in the Union and left for the train station.
Chennai is an interesting city at night. Giant billboards hover over the bridges, but one can still notice the dirty mattresses covered with human bodies that lay on the sides of the streets, and the many, many guys peeing and defecating against walls and off the sides of bridges. Charming. The air is thick and the smell slaps your nostrils with the feeling of discomfort…yet I still appreciate it.

The train station was also packed with bodies. People were lying around, sitting, and pacing all over the lobby. We eventually found our train and plowed into our reserved area…the first class car (way to go SAS!). I was honestly expecting something really terrible, but it wasn’t too shabby at all. The “rooms” were separated by curtains; they were actually just four bunk beds, with a tiny table in the center. I ended up sharing a room with Kara, Lydia, and Marissa. How do I remember their names so well? Well about 7 or so of us played the name game, among other games throughout the night until 1:30.
Theft seems to be a problem on trains in India, so I slept with my backpack next to my head. Kara called the top bunk, so I was fine with the bottom bed. It was small and pretty dirty (I’m not even going to comment on the greasy, dirty windows that were inches from my head all night), but I surprisingly slept well.
I was awaken around 6:30 in the morning when the lights suddenly flashed on. We were apparently about 3 minutes from the train station, so I had to put my contacts in and make sure none of my possessions were snatched in the middle of the night very quickly before leaving. Everything was cool. Unfortunately I had no clue where Erode is (remember what I said about the map?), so for 3 days I knew I was SOMEWHERE in India (later on I found out that it was west of Chennai).

Now I should probably talk about this specific trip I signed up for, right? It was called an “Erode Village Homestay.” Ok, that’s enough info for now.

After leaving the train station, our large group split up into two smaller groups. Half of the group went to the village for the day/night, while the other half stayed on this farm. I went with the farm group, and I stand by my decision.
Our host family has apparently hosted many SAS students in the past. They were an older couple with a LARGE family (almost all of people that worked on the property and/or lived around the village and around the house were family members…they’ve have problems lately hiring new workers). Their house was pretty big (3/4 of an acre), and it was beautiful. Most of the rooms were pretty empty, and it was only one floor, but compared to the other living conditions of people around Chennai, one could tell that they were definitely loaded ($$). All of the rooms were very open, and the fresh air surrounding the house was extremely pleasant (compared to the thick Chennai air).

About 10 of us were staying in the guesthouse, while another 10 stayed in the actual home. Matt and I were the only guys, yet we somehow got stuck with the only room with beds, a fan, and our own bathroom, while the other 8 girls had to share their own bathroom (I’m sure there were lines a’plenty).
Before leaving for the farm tour, we had our first experience with the family’s homemade coffee and tea. Have you ever tasted heaven? No…no you haven’t, because you haven’t tasted this family’s coffee and tea. I know, you’re all REALLY jealous. You should be. They fed us their coffee and tea at least 3 other times during our visit. Granted I could spend the whole rest of the blog talking about the deliciousness, I’ll move on to other, less monumental things.
The host couple’s niece took us around the farmland. Apparently they own a couple hundred acres or so, but she showed us the coconut trees, and some of the other vegetation they grow. It was pretty cool actually. I also made a new friend on this walk. His name is Supermani (obviously don’t know the spelling, but it’s spoken like it’s spelled); he was the son of one of the family’s workers, and he cut school in order to show us around the area. Really cool kid. Probably about 18 years old or so, but him and his friend followed me around through most of our farm visit.
We also visited other places around the vicinity of the house. This included a small town and a local school. The kids were really cool, and they all LOVE being videotaped.

When we returned to the house, we ate a traditional Indian lunch on giant leaves while sitting on the floor. It reminded me of the scene from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom where they ate the villagers food at the beginning of the film with flies flying around them and such. Well, this food was MUCH better obviously, but it still had that sort of feel in my mind. My friend Kate and I kept being forced more food. It took us some time to realize that we had to fold our leaf in half to signal that we were finished eating. Ohhhh local customs!

They took us to the village market where I bought this sweet slingshot. It was later confiscated from my backpack when boarding the ship because I’m a REALLY big idiot and forgot to hide it in my towel. At least I only spent roughly 15 rupees (a few cents) on it.

After returning to our host family’s house and freshening up, they kindly showed us their supply of cows located near the back of the house. They then gave us a tour of the inside of their house. This one woman who’s been working for the family was so cool. She looks like she’s 80 or 90 something years old, yet she still does all the cleaning and a lot of the hard labor around the property. Honestly, this woman reminded me of my grandma. When my grandma lives to be 100 years old she’ll definitely be the same exact way…she’ll always look and act like she’s only 50 or so.

Dinnertime was splendid. Following dinner was a performance from a local percussion group outside in the dark. They were pretty cool, but after their performance I left the others and hung out with the percussionists for a little while. Even though they didn’t speak a word of English, we all still enjoyed each other’s company. I’ve also never seen drums like the custom-made drums they played. They showed them to me, but I sadly won’t be able to purchase any cool-looking drums like these anytime soon.

Sleeping in the room was comfortable, thanks to the fan that hovered over my head. At least I was rooming with someone that I’m forced to share a room with while on the ship, and not some embarrassing 7th deck party monster. I must admit though, some of the girls on this specific SAS trip were pretty damn stupid. Seriously, like, I’m like, totally NOT joking like like like (cue permanent confusing-looking face). Some girls totally forgot to pack their bottles of common sense before leaving their houses last February, and now, folks in India know this to be true as well.

The second day of our Village homestay/trip began with us saying our goodbyes to our host family. SAS advised us to bring gifts to thank them for their hospitality, so I brought them a Pittsburgh snow globe (from the Steelers store…luckily everything was cheap there when I left, for obvious reasons), assuming they’ve probably NEVER seen real snow before. I’m sure the family has a whole storeroom in their house filled with nothing but SAS gifts from students, but the woman still seemed like she enjoyed the cuteness of my gift.

We began our second day at a local school where we ate breakfast, and then made our way to two Hindu temples. The second temple was huge. It was like an amusement park…an amusement park filled with nothing but shrines and temples. One could get blessed by an elephant, bathe in the river, or simply congregate and walk through various shrines. I REALLY enjoyed my time here…such an interesting atmosphere. I bought a few books there too.
I studied Hinduism in-depth while at home in Pittsburgh for a religion class I took, so I knew a good bit about the many different gods, customs, and rituals involved with this complex religion. It was so refreshing to actually see the aspects that I studied happening in real life around me.
I also really dug walking around to all of these places in bare feet. Even though I probably stepped in horrible, horrible diseased-infested areas, I honestly don’t care. It’s a small part of the Hindu culture that I really enjoyed, so there!

The carpet weaving building that we visited was really cool. The machines these people utilize are so incredible to look at, and it’s fascinating to watch these men and women weave these intricate patterns with the old contraptions. They really work hard. That’s honestly a reoccurring aspect of the people of India…all of them are extremely hard workers.
Outside the medicine factory, I striked up a conversation with these younger 3 kids. They were pretty rad kids, so I grabbed some Starbursts from my backpack and gave them each one (I also had to give this older woman one, because she kept sticking her hands in my face when I started handing them out…so bitchy).
We also visited a handicapped-childrens orphanage. They sang some spectacular songs, danced, and showed off their various talents. When it came time for US to perform for THEM afterwards, what did all of us talented college-level students chose to do? The hokey pokey. How embarrassing. At least all of the kids will know what to do if they ever have the opportunity to attend an American wedding.
In all seriousness though, these kids were physically disabled from the crippling effects of polio. Surprisingly, they all had wonderful spirits as we played and interacted with them for another half hour afterwards. Seriously, really nice kids…and they all also loved my video camera too. Just wait till you see the footage!

Lunch was held back at the school. This elementary/high school was seriously like a college campus. We were told that it was one of the better public schools in India, and I seriously believe it. The teachers were really talented and caring individuals. A few teachers traveled with us throughout the day on the bus, and it was cool to have the opportunity of asking so many questions about India schools and such. The kids were really great too.
For example, right after I finished eating ,I had to use the toilet. Sorry, that’s actually a lie. Let me rephrase that.
For example, right after I finished eating, I had to utilize the awkward cement hole in the ground. That’s better.
Anyways, after peeing, I walked out into the hallway and this classroom of kids surrounded me, and suddenly I was their teacher for like 20 minutes. They asked me sooo many questions it was ridiculous, but a lot of fun. Specifically, there was this one really young kid with thick-rimmed glasses that had some cool questions for me.

“Have you ever been to the moon in America?” he asked.
“haha. Nope. I’ve never been on the moon.”
“You know Neil Armstrong?”
“Yeah, I know who Neil Armstrong is.”
“Neil Armstrong! First man on the moon! 1969!”

The kids were so much fun. They’re all incredibly HUGE WWF fans. Every other time I saw them that day I’d hear “Hey Rick! Come and see this,” and then they’d show me their cricket skills or slide down a stair handrail or something. Funny stuff. We also saw a “cultural performance” put on by the school’s dance team, and played the girls basketball team at some basketball. I, of course, sat out since I have no basketball skill whatsoever.

You think we were done? Of course not! After the school, we left for a medicine factory. Now don’t get me wrong, the medicine factory did have some really interesting stuff to see, but honestly, if you’ve ever seen the Box Factory episode of The Simpsons, you may have SOME idea of what the medicine factory was like. After such a thrilling day, even though the medicine factory offered some insightful sights, it was still pretty dull.
Our next stop was a quick snack nearby. We then proceeded to ANOTHER school. Keep in mind it was around 7 o’clock at night, but these were kids whose parents worked at the medicine factory and/or nearby factories. It was like a daycare/school it seemed. It was on the second floor of a building and wasn’t especially huge. The building was beautiful though.
I was honestly beginning to get tired of all this small children interaction. Too many kids for one day. These kids were the funniest though. I autographed and signed my name for at least half a dozen small children. I was asked my name around 20 times by about 20 children (Rick isn’t a common name at all…actually many of them couldn’t really pronounce the ‘r’ very well); I videotaped a good bit (again…they love the cameras), and two of us sang the ‘itsy bitsy spider’ to this young girl.
We proceeded down the hallway to this meditation room. We meditated for about 30 minutes, but the woman stopped giving directions after about 10 minutes, and this made no sense. The room was also perfectly dark, and we’ve had a really long day. I can’t meditate when a bunch of college students are lying on the floor, snoring loudly; I just can’t work in these conditions!

It was getting late, and we needed to catch our train soon, but we still had enough time to drop the teachers off at their homes and then make it back to the school for some dinner. The dinner was amazing. One of these days I’ll have a horrible food story. I was fortunate to not get Delhi belly while in India. Anyways, we were also served watermelon juice (an instant orgasm in my mouth), and this ice cream that was preposterously incredible. We were finished in rural India. Back to the train station.

Running through the airport has been somewhat common for me on this trip. Running through train stations can now be added to the list. We weren’t in a huge hurry, but we did have some trouble figuring out where our train car was going to stop. While quickly walking, we passed many stands and people selling stuff…this included a towel stand with this very awesome Batman towel. Matt and I instantly broke off from the group and each enthusiastically bought a Batman towel, because hey, it’s Batman! (I’m a huge Batman fan if you haven’t been able to tell).

I’m very happy I bought this towel, because the sheets lying on my bed in the sleeper train had these disgusting stains on them (possibly blood stains no less). I was more than happy to sleep on my brand new towel, and I had a good sleep. Just like last time, I woke up about 2 minutes before entering Chennai train station. We then made it back to the ship! The ship’s bitterly cold air conditioning FINALLY felt good. I had an astonishing time on this trip. Seriously.

The last day in Chennai consisted of an early breakfast at this somewhat shady inner-city restaurant (I literally didn’t sleep after arriving back on the ship. I DID get a wonderful shower though), some wondering around the mall, a quick visit to an Indian museum, and a SAS trip. This SAS trip SUCKED! We were supposed to visit a Bollywood film set. INSTEAD, we visited a film processing plant (uhh, I’m serious), and the backlot of a student-made film. We apparently weren’t allowed to visit the real movie studio, because they were filming a movie and didn’t want visitors…wasn’t that the point of the whole trip? I really didn’t like this trip in any way.
The bus dropped us off at the mall instead of taking us to the ship, because they felt so sorry for us. I met up with Eric, Ben, Jess, and James, and we had another wonderful meal…at Pizza Hut. I loved all of the food eaten in India, but honestly, it felt great to just bite into a juicy cheese pizza. We felt the same affection for this pizza.

My rickshaw ride back to the ship was literally the rickshaw drive from hell. I don’t really feel like going into detail, mainly because I’m getting tired of writing. Let’s just say that I made it back in good health, and that’s all that matters. A few friends are still apologizing for what happened, even though it wasn’t their fault, but I’ll have to save the story for another day.
I walked along the roadside market area near the ship. Very shady area, but I needed to get rid of some rupees. I bought a few bootlegged DVDs; there were TONS of sellers selling them.

I made it to the ship on time, and felt sad that we were leaving India. A wonderful country. A great experience. I wish I could go into detail about this port, along with every country, because I’m won’t. There are so many details and silly little things that I can’t appropriately put into words. There are so many thoughts that race through ones head. So many feelings. I have a difficult time writing all of this stuff (I work on my blogs/journals/homework later on at night when people start sleeping), so going into deep detail is nearly impossible. Plus it would be too long. Who would want to read it? I wouldn’t.
There are no words that I can write that may describe these trips in full, and if you understand that, then maybe you’ll understand how fun, emotional, and intense many of these trips are.

Give me a day or two to write about Malaysia. I have this stupid, huge group project to work on for one of my classes, and I’m going to be spending WAY too much time working on it.

Remember…lifeboats are :(