May 2007
It’s hard for me to believe that my trip around the world is almost over. It is really bitter sweet. I’m excited to go home and see everyone that I have been missing but at the same time I don’t want to say good-bye to all of the wonderful friends that I have made on this journey. We have been though so much together. They have become my classmates, my friends, and my family. It is sad knowing that we will probably never all be together again. Ranging from the west cost to the east coast and places in between, there is just no telling when we will see each other again (although we do have a reunion trip to Greece in the works).
For the first time, I feel that I have truly realized that there are so many things in my life that I have been taking for granted. I am so blessed to have loving and supporting family and friends, a roof over my head, food on my plate, a bed to sleep in, clothes to wear, and a job that I love. I have been taking for granted that I can vote, get a good education, have access to good healthcare, marry who I want, and wear what I want. I have been taken for granted even the basic necessities that a lot of the world goes with out, such as electricity and running water. Most only hear or read of the things that I have seen even though it is also present back in the US. We are just blind to it.
I am honestly also really afraid to go home and back to my life or “reality” as some may view it. I really feel that going back isn’t going back to reality. Reality is what I have been living these last few months. I have learned so much on this trip and I guess that my biggest fear about going back home is that I will so easily fall right back into my old habits; that everything I have learned will be forgotten in a way. That everything I have seen and experienced won’t matter. That it will no longer have the same impact on me that it once did. I am now part of an extremely privileged group of society. Less than one percent of the world’s population has gone all of the way around the world. Now I feel as though I have this responsibility that I need to fulfill.
I am afraid that I will drop the ball.
I’ve been told that the greatest culture shock I will have will not be in South Africa, India, Vietnam, or Japan. It will be going back to the US and back home. I believe it. For starters, it will take me a while to re-adjust back to having a normal routine. Here on the ship, I literally have to take it one day at a time. There is no normal schedule by any means. I have 2 days of classes here, a trip here, 6 classes there, another week break, and then I get tested on material I learned a month ago. I sleep when I am able, which in general is rare. It doesn’t matter if it is 4am or 3pm. My physical, mental, and emotional limits have been tested to the max both on and off of the ship. My body is about ready to fall apart. I honestly don’t think that it could handle another port of sleepless nights, strange foods, and constantly being on the go for fear of missing something. (I actually felt guilty when I did manage to sleep in port.) On the ship, there were always papers to write and tests to study for. I usually felt sick on top of it all. But don’t get me wrong, I loved it all and I would do it all over again in a heartbeat. But I think that the culture shock will come from the American lifestyle and everything that I had but never realized. I just hope that you all stick with me as I re-adjust. It is not going to be easy. I may ask you to drive me around at night so that I can fall asleep since I now need the rocking of a ship, train, or plane to sleep. I have been keeping my blog updated so that you could follow me on my journey even though I found it impossible to explain what I have experienced. I know that you will not understand although you will try. Just understand that I am not exactly the same person I was when I left. I mean I am, but I am just a new and improved version (I hope).
With this new responsibility to help change the world, I realize that I have to start small and I have to start with myself. I want to be a better daughter, sister, granddaughter, girlfriend, and friend. I want to walk more and drive less. I want to consume less and volunteer more. I want to eat healthier and actually exercise when I say that I am going to. I want to take full advantage of my education and make an impact with it. I want to paint and read more. I want to pay more attention to what is going on in the world.
There has not been a single aspect of my life that hasn’t been impacted in one way or another by this trip. I’ve thought about what has happened in my past, what I am experiencing in the present, and what I want to do in future. And there is so much I want to do in the future. So the question is: has this truly been a life changing experience? I’d say so, but only time will tell.
Love,
Laura
Monday, May 14, 2007
Tuesday, May 8, 2007
LOTS OF READING FOR YA'LL...
If you have already read about hong kong day 1 and 2 start here... :)
China Day 3: Train ride to Beijing
The train was about 5 times nicer and cleaner than the one I took in India. The bathrooms however, were just as disgusting. Seeing the hole in the floor that goes right down on to the tracks just disturbs me. I don’t think that I can walk along a train track ever again with out being disgusted. I also firmly believe that every guy who ever used that hole had terrible aim and missed… I was wearing long pants…‘nough said. I got stuck in the middle bunk… and watching me climb up in to it every time was a sight to see. I’m just glad that I didn’t get the top bunk since I probably would have died trying to climb up there with my backpack on. Brandon was in the other middle bunk right next to me. I slept probably about half of the time. It was SO nice. They had really nice heavy blanks that have been the closest thing to my “marshmallow” down comforter from home (which I miss a lot on the freezing cold ship). When I wasn’t sleeping, a group of us played the card game Golf. I was horrible at it, but it helped pass the time. It did fly by pretty quickly which was a relief.
China: Beijing Day 4:
We took a van to our hostel after getting off of the train. We managed to cram 16 people in it some how. We had been driving a little ways and then we starting to recognize some things… we realized that they had driven us in a big circle and that our hostel really wasn’t that far away from the train station. Hmmm… we are big idiots. I couldn’t help but laugh though. We dropped our stuff and headed out to explore for the rest of the night. Our hostel was located on this small but extremely busy street with lots of little street venders and stores. We looked around at the little shops for a while before some of us headed to Tiananmen Square. It was a few blocks away so we decided to walk there. The buildings were closed by the time we found our way. It didn’t make a whole lot of difference since a lot of things were closed due to renovation for the 2008 Olympics. We saw the famous picture of Mao and walked around the square. We were soon hungry and decided to try a Chinese restaurant for Peking duck, a Chinese specialty. I didn’t think that it was all that great since it was mostly skin and fat. Of course I didn’t feel good after I ate it, but everyone else seemed to enjoy it. Teddy, Jeff, and I got a little lost trying to find our hostel. Eventually we figured out that we were in fact on the right street, but that we had just walked right past it. I was completely wiped out so I used the Internet for a little while and then went to sleep at about 3 am.
China: Beijing Day 5:
Rise and shine! We were picked up by our tour guide, Tony, at 6:30 am. We were scheduled to visit the Temple of Heaven, The Forbidden City, The Great Wall, and The Summer Palace. The Temple of Heaven was so beautiful. It was situated in a peaceful park were groups of people could be seen practicing yoga and playing games. I would have loved to people watch, but we were on a tight schedule. The Forbidden City was crawling with tourists, mostly Chinese ones. Flags or some pretty funny looking neon hats distinguished big tour groups from one another. Once again, the major buildings were closed due to renovation, which was disappointing. The strangest thing of all though were the Chinese people who wanted my picture. The first time it happened, I was sitting on the steps waiting for my group to use the bathrooms. As I was sitting there, a Chinese man pulls out his camera and blatantly starts to just take pictures of me just sitting there. I was a little weirded out. A few minutes later, I noticed a different Chinese man watching me. When his girlfriend/wife met up with him, I could see him point to me and say something to her. She looked at me and they said some more things. She was acting shy. I knew what was going on… he wanted to take her picture with me. I didn’t say anything but instead I watched out of the corner of my eye. She came a little closer and posed. I chuckled to myself as he took her picture with me looking around. Eventually, I motioned for her to come over and get an actual picture and that’s when it began. Before I knew it, I had also taken a picture with her boyfriend/husband and then two other men who were observing the fiasco from afar. This kept occurring through out the entire day. It was weird though because no one else in my group had experienced this, not even the other blonde haired girl. I had fun with it but it made me realized how much it would suck to be a celebrity. After the Forbidden City, we headed to a tall section of the Great Wall for some hiking! I actually was not very excited, at least not at first. It wasn’t until I was on it and climbing that I got in to it. The hike itself was a major workout. The stairs, when there were some, were EXTREMELY steep. They also just had flatter sections that were so steep and smooth that I slipped several times. I was worried about falling and breaking my camera. The view from the top most point of our sections was absolutely incredible. You could see the wall continue on forever as it zigzagged and winded its way up and down the mountain ridges. I was just in awe.
China: Qingdao Day 6
Qindao was… well completely depressing. It was grey and there were almost no people around, at least anywhere semi-close to the ship. After our flight got in from Beijing, we took a 45 minute cab ride through the depressing city. It got more and more gray and icky the more we kept driving. When I got back to the ship, I called several peoples rooms only to find them sleeping. Sleeping? Wait, sleeping at noon while in port? Unheard of. Apparently there was nothing else to do in Qingdao, and they were right. Teddy, Anna, and I went out for a bit in search of some internet. With a little help from a local, we did find it. Not only did we find the internet, but we found all of the people. EVRYONE was there… playing computer games. I laughed so hard. We used it for a little bit once some computers freed up. We then spent the rest of the time walking around the city. It was so sad looking that it just made me want to cry. We decided that we had had enough and headed back to the ship around 5pm. That was 5 hours before on ship time. Normally I’m running to the ship because I’m cutting it close to getting dock time (the penalty for being back on the ship late). Like everyone else, I went to sleep. Good night and good bye China!
The two days before Japan
I had lots to do and little time to do it in. I had a test in religion and paper due in western civ. on the second day. The sea was a bit rocky the night before the paper was due. I had been feeling crummy since china’s brutal beating and this was just the icing on the cake. When I went down to purser’s desk to get seasickness medicine, he told me that he ran out due to a high demand. Obviously I wasn’t the only one feeling it. To make matters worse, I had no idea what I was going to write for my paper. I sat in my bed for about 2 hours trying to come up with something. I had nothing and I still felt sick. Our papers are completely open ended… we just have to write about how the west is present in the world and relate it to what we have seen in port. As easy as it sounds, I couldn’t think of anything that I could write a long enough paper on. Ugh. I went to sleep instead and wrote a terrible paper on Islam in the morning. I didn’t care. Japan, here I come!
Japan Day 1: Complete Chaos
As is the ritual before every port, we had pre-port lecture followed by watching a few episodes of house in somone’s room. I also had a “family” dinner that night so I was busy running around the ship.
The morning of arrival was complete chaos. Japan has even more strict landing codes than China did. Everyone on the ship had to get their temperature taken the night before. In the morning we also had to walk through a termodetector to make sure that none of us had a fever. I got up at 7am to a hazy gray harbor. For the first time I didn’t even bother to take any pictures. I ate breakfast with Finnly and Anna and then went back to bed since I wasn’t feeling well. I skipped the diplomatic briefing and got up at 11 to go through the thermodetector. I went back to my room and packed for Japan. After eating a small lunch on the ship, we picked up our passports and headed out.
Until pre-port, we were completely unaware that we would be getting off of the ship so late. We had to change our schedule around because of it. Luckily, we planned on wingin’ it the whole time so we had no reservations that needed to be cancelled. Originally we were going to go to Hiroshima that afternoon but that was no longer going to happen. Instead we decided to go to Kyoto instead and find a place to stay over night. Our first goal was to get our Japan Rail Passes. I lucked out. I had ordered mine the week before I left for the Bahamas. It is good for three months after the date of purchase. Mine just so happen to have been bought exactly three months ago. Luckily, it expired the next day. If it had expired I probably would have just stayed on the ship and went around Kobe by myself, which I would have been fine with if it weren’t for the $250 I would have wasted. I was relieved to say the least.
After getting the passes, we headed for Kyoto. Although I had already been to Kyoto, I was really excited to be going back. It was one of my favorite cities in Japan. THE best restaurant was located somewhere to the right of Kyoto Station… were exactly I couldn’t remember. I knew it was a little hole in the wall that all of the locals go to and although they serve one dish, there is generally a line out the door to eat there. I had been talking about going back since I knew I was going on SAS. I would be surprised if I found it though.
We went to try and view some temples before it began to get dark. We took the local bus from the train station to a temple. As soon as we had stepped off of the bus, it began to downpour. I was soaked. It gave me an excuse to finally get the clear umbrella I had been wanting since China. Everyone had been making fun of me for it but they too broke down and bought one. By the time we made it to one or two of the temples, they were already closed. It was still fun to walk around. It was incredibly peaceful even though it was located right in the city. The rain so quit so I was stuck carrying around that damn umbrella for the rest of the trip. Oh well.
We decided to start walking back towards the station. We were walking along the street when I noticed a sign that said “guest house.” I decided that we should stop and check it out since it was starting to get dark and we still had no place to sleep. Of course it was really nice and cheap, but they were full. However, they did give us information on other hostels in the area so we booked rooms with another one. Finding the place was a challenge as I figured it would be from experience. Eventually, after asking several locals, we found it hidden away in a side street. It wasn’t that bad either. It served its purpose as a place to unload our bags and sleep at night. It was also close to the station, which was key since we had an early bullet train ride to Hiroshima in the morning. We unloaded our stuff and headed towards the station to try and find my restaurant.
Now it has been about a year and a half since I was last in Kyoto and we all know my memory isn’t that greatest. It would be impressive if I actually found it. I knew that it was on a small side street to the left of Kyoto Station’s main entrance. We came across a street that looked familiar and it had a short stretch of buildings that held some promise. One of them did seem like it might be it, but I remembered the inside looking differently. We decided to keep walking and see what else we saw. After A little bit, we decided to go back at try it out. It served the dish I remembered, and a line outside of the door quickly formed after our arrival. We all had the same thing, udon soup, and it was delicious. It was just as I remembered it. I am still not sure if it was the same place or not, but I guess it doesn’t matter. The food was amazing! Luckily, all of my friends enjoyed it just as much as I did. Success! We walked around a little bit more and I found my favorite green tea ice cream bar. So SO good! We relaxed in a little coffee shop and internet café before going back to the hostel. That night I couldn’t sleep for the life of my. My brain was going a million miles a minute and it would not stop. I pretty much analyzed my entire life: past, present, and future. Ugh. I got an hour of sleep before getting up. All I have to say is thank god for all of those hot coffee vending machines located every block. I would have died that day if it weren’t for them.
Day 2: Hiroshima- Good so far…
It was another beautiful day. It felt like spring outside. Peace Memorial Park was absolutely stunning. We saw the A-bomb dome as it was the day after the bombing. I’ll give just a little history. On August 6th 1945, the United States dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima. It detonated about 600 meters above the city center (now the A-bomb dome). The city was destroyed in an instant. The bomb exerted extremely high pressers of several hundred thousand atmospheres and it exceeded more than a million degrees Celsius at its hypocenter. It burned, and crushed almost all buildings and people inside of them within a 2-kilometer radius. The people of Hiroshima are now hoping and pushing for the elimination of nuclear weapons.
I found their overall attitude towards the bombing so incredible. There was no hostility or anger. They only wished for peace and the elimination of nuclear weapons. The museum took a good 2 hours to get through. Although it wasn’t nearly as graphic as the Vietnam War Museum, it was still extremely powerful. We saw many pictures and artifacts, which included victim’s skin, hair, and fingers. I just about lost it at one point since I was already feeling ill.
Afterwards we went to see if there was a baseball game in the afternoon. There wasn’t. We went to one of the huge department stores where we ate lunch before catching our train to Tokyo. Mary Alice and I had bought a bottle of wine for the train ride. We drank it out of Mcdonald’s paper cups. Classy, I know. It was a fairly long train ride. I didn’t sleep a whole lot. When we arrived in Tokyo we decided to call one of the hostels that I had a brochure on. They had space so we headed towards that district. It ended up being in the middle of nowhere, although it was really nice. Major tensions were picking up in the group… which didn’t help either. It was a boring night. We ate dinner from the seven eleven since we couldn’t find an open restaurant. I went on the internet for a little bit and tried updating some things. We had to pay for the showers so I had to quick one. As I was rushing, trying to get the shampoo out of my hair, I realized that I haven’t had any time to just relax and enjoy anything. It’s always go, go, go. You don’t want to miss anything. I went to sleep at around 2 am.
Day 3: Tokyo- pretty much a disaster, except for a few good parts.
This day was nothing but a complete disaster. Everyone pretty much had a meltdown at some point in the day. I don’t even think that I want to write about it. At one point, I just wanted to go in to a laundry mat, sit down, and watch the dryer go around and around. That’s how bad it was. People were not making any decisions. People were picking fights with others. Everyone was just at the end of their ropes. However, there were two times were I had a lot of fun. The first one was at Cirque Du Soleil. Now, I had never heard of it before but everyone seemed to know and love it. My roommate and her friends just about died when I told them that I was going. I agreed to buy a ticket a couple of weeks ago without really knowing anything. They weren’t cheap by any means so I was really hoping for something amazing and oh my, it was that and so much more. I ended up with the best seat in the house: front row, center. Mary Alice was right next to me while Brandon, Shantel, and Finnly were further back. I could literally reach out and touch the dancers/singers if I wanted to. At one point, Mary Alice and I were holding each other’s hand because we were convinced that one of the gymnasts was going to miss the stage and end up in our laps as he jumped through some hoops. The show was just really incredible. They would do these elaborate acrobatic performances. They would jump through hoops, fly in the air, sing, dance, juggle… all at a level I never thought humanly possible. At one point I was sitting there thinking to myself, “Am I really watching a 10-person pyramid jump rope double Dutch style? Yes, yes I actually am.” The entire show was just unbelievable.
Afterwards, once everyone calmed down, we went back to being indecisive and irritable. We had talked about going and signing karaoke. I wasn’t so sure that I was exactly in the mood for it, but I would be up for it if everyone else was. Finnly was the only one who openly wanted to do it. We were standing outside, all dressed up in the cold. I finally decided that I was going to go to Shibuya. I’d go by myself unless anyone wanted to come and I told them that they were all more than welcome to join me. I knew Shibuya had a great nightlife and karaoke. Mary Alice said that she would come with. The rest of the group still couldn’t make up their minds. This is when I just about lost it. I told them that I was leaving in 2 minutes and that they had to decide for themselves. I wasn’t going to tell them what they wanted to do. After another 10 minutes or so, they finally decided to come with me and we would all go and do karaoke. We got to Shibuya and easily found a karaoke bar. Once inside though, everyone became indecisive again. I’m not sure if it was because of the cost or what. I could tell that Finnly really wanted to do it and that she was getting up set because no one else seemed interested enough to make up their mind. I was more than willing to pay and so was Mary Alice. After standing there for a while, we all got a room. We paid for two hours of karaoke and two hours of unlimited drinks. After going though everything, I’m just glad that it turned out to be a blast. There were no tensions. We sang and drank and the time just flew right by. After paying, we left and walked around for a while. At this point the subway had stopped running. It would start running again at 4am. The group wanted to take a taxi back to the hostel. We had a lot of trouble trying to get one. Once we did get one, the first thing Brandon told the driver was that he didn’t speak Japanese. The taxi driver immediately took off. Because there were five of us, we would need to taxis. This seemed impossible so Mary Alice and I decided to stay back and get one later or try and walk back. We ended up talking with 5 Japanese guys who were our age and wearing their business suits at 2am. It was really pretty hysterical talking with them. One of them wanted to come back to the states with me as his girlfriend. I was like hmmm… no. lol They soon ditched us because there were five of them and only two of us. We then found a 24 hour restaurant were we ordered pizza and wine. We sat there until 6am. We watched businessmen come in and pass out before their food was even served to them. They always seem to be leaving work or on their way to work. It is nuts. We made our way back to the hostel on the subway. I realized that I had lost my Japan Rail Pass. It was bad… I got yelled at for sitting in the subway station while waiting for Mary Alice. I was in no mood… I must have given the guy a look of death as I got up. We figured that my pass must have slipped out from between the subway maps that I had been carrying. Something foolish like that. Now I just had to sneak my way back to Kobe all of the way from Tokyo. Great. By the time we got back to the hostel and went to bed, it was 7:30 am and the sun had risen.
Day 4: Tokyo and back to Kobe
Mary Alice and I woke up alone and headed out to see Tokyo Tower. I knew that it was somewhere close so we decided to just try and walk there. It was another beautiful day out. It ended up being a little hike, but we had nothing else to do that day except make our way back to Kobe. We did a little window-shopping on our walk there. We stopped and got a pizza for lunch. It wasn’t the greatest pizza but it sufficed. At this point, we were both broke and needed an ATM. Ugh. I hate trying to find ATM’s that accept our debit cards. It’s always such a pain. As we were walking towards the tower, looking for a bank, we stumbled across a Subway. You have no idea how badly I have been craving a sandwich. I hadn’t had one since I left. We both got super excited even though we had eaten only a little bit ago. We went in with high hopes only to find out that they don’t accept credit cards. What? What?! Oh… they are trying to kill me! Crushed, we kept walking. We did find a bank that accepted our debit cards so we were set. Tokyo Tower was the same. I bought a lot of their special banana chocolate that I know my family loves… so lets just hope I don’t eat it all before I get home. ☺ We began to make our way back towards the main shopping area since we still had some time, or at least we thought. After dilly dolling around we suddenly realized that we had to haul some serious butt in order to catch our train. We had NO idea where to catch the train however. This would not have been a problem normally, but because I was an idiot and lost my JR pass we HAD to catch this train or else I would have to cough up a lot of cash to pay for a train ride back. At least with our previously reserved tickets, I had a chance of sneaking through. So with this new discovery, we pretty much ran though the subway station. I had a general idea of where the train might be… but general idea in the city of Tokyo is still pretty much a shot in the dark. We caught a subway and then had to switch lines. We were standing on the train, discussing where we were going when a Japanese girl turned to us and asked if we were going to Kobe. We said yeah and handed her our tickets. She looked and them and then looked and us and began talking really quickly and saying a bunch of Japanese names. Luckily, we got the gist. We were supposed to have gotten off already and switched lines again. The doors then opened, Mary Alice and I looked at each other, and then dashed out of the door… still trying to put together what she was saying. Time was ticking. We had only 20 minutes to get to our train before it would leave us. We then back tracked a stop and switched lines. Some how we made it to the station on time. Now, the only thing left was sneaky me though. The plan was to do a sneak hand off of her JR pass. She walked though… and no hand off. Oh no. I showed her my ticket and she asked for my JR pass. S-H-I-T. What am I going to do? Mary Alice said turn around. She began opening my backpack… genius! She rustled around a bit and brought out “my” pass. It got me though and we had 10 minutes to spare. Sneaking me back through the second time was a breeze… I lucked out.
Day 5: A Day of walking in Kobe
That’s basically what we did; we walked and shopped. I got a few things and managed to get my hands on some mozzarella cheese! I would have loved to spend another day in Kobe, but it was time to start heading back to the US and Hawaii. I had a long 8 days ahead of me…
4/6/2007
The happenings of crossing the Pacific Ocean:
I’ve pretty much been sleeping all day everyday. Exciting, I know. I wake up at 8, go to class, and go right back to bed at 12 with out setting an alarm. Sometimes I would wake up for dinner sometimes, usually only because the evening’s announcements would wake me up. There were two times where I woke up in the late afternoon and thought that it was morning. Ugh. My sleep schedule is so messed up. Two nights ago I couldn’t sleep at all, got really seasick that day, took some meds, and slept through my class. Oops. I also missed taco day because I was sleeping and on the ship, missing taco day is like missing Christmas. Poor Andrew (my cabin steward) tried to clean my room about 3 times a day but every time I was either sleeping or attempting to write a paper. My life was completely scattered around the room so I told him to forget about even trying to clean it. I love Andrew and I think that I might try to sneak him home with me.
We had the Ambassador’s Ball the other night. It was super crazy and a lot of fun. All of the girls wore the dresses they had designed in Vietnam and the guys wore the suites they had tailored. Like most, I ware my pajamas 24/7 when on the ship so it was a lot of fun to see everyone dressed up to the max.
As for classes, I had two finals today and I have two more after Hawaii. I’m ready for them to be over. I don’t feel like I learned a whole lot from my classes. All of my learning took place in ports.
Here are some more thoughts as I start to pack up and head back home.
Things that I will miss:
The hit or miss scrambled eggs in the morning, the complete darkness of my room, the nice rocking of the ship, House marathons with my friends, not having a cell phone, my cabin stewart Andrew, being able to get to class in one minute, the 7th deck bistro’s grilled cheese sandwiches that saved my life, getting back from an exhausting day or few days and finding letters from home on my door, always waking up in a new country, watching movies on “the loop”, using vacation as an excuse to buy things, magnetic walls, my friends, and home (aka, the ship).
Things that I will not miss:
23 hour days, the not nice rocking of the ship, the nasty chlorinated water, starfishing it, “the voice” waking me up during my nap times, Dan Christie’s voice and Global Studies class, actually all of my classes, the food, the lack of cheese, and paying god awful amounts of money for the internet.
China Day 3: Train ride to Beijing
The train was about 5 times nicer and cleaner than the one I took in India. The bathrooms however, were just as disgusting. Seeing the hole in the floor that goes right down on to the tracks just disturbs me. I don’t think that I can walk along a train track ever again with out being disgusted. I also firmly believe that every guy who ever used that hole had terrible aim and missed… I was wearing long pants…‘nough said. I got stuck in the middle bunk… and watching me climb up in to it every time was a sight to see. I’m just glad that I didn’t get the top bunk since I probably would have died trying to climb up there with my backpack on. Brandon was in the other middle bunk right next to me. I slept probably about half of the time. It was SO nice. They had really nice heavy blanks that have been the closest thing to my “marshmallow” down comforter from home (which I miss a lot on the freezing cold ship). When I wasn’t sleeping, a group of us played the card game Golf. I was horrible at it, but it helped pass the time. It did fly by pretty quickly which was a relief.
China: Beijing Day 4:
We took a van to our hostel after getting off of the train. We managed to cram 16 people in it some how. We had been driving a little ways and then we starting to recognize some things… we realized that they had driven us in a big circle and that our hostel really wasn’t that far away from the train station. Hmmm… we are big idiots. I couldn’t help but laugh though. We dropped our stuff and headed out to explore for the rest of the night. Our hostel was located on this small but extremely busy street with lots of little street venders and stores. We looked around at the little shops for a while before some of us headed to Tiananmen Square. It was a few blocks away so we decided to walk there. The buildings were closed by the time we found our way. It didn’t make a whole lot of difference since a lot of things were closed due to renovation for the 2008 Olympics. We saw the famous picture of Mao and walked around the square. We were soon hungry and decided to try a Chinese restaurant for Peking duck, a Chinese specialty. I didn’t think that it was all that great since it was mostly skin and fat. Of course I didn’t feel good after I ate it, but everyone else seemed to enjoy it. Teddy, Jeff, and I got a little lost trying to find our hostel. Eventually we figured out that we were in fact on the right street, but that we had just walked right past it. I was completely wiped out so I used the Internet for a little while and then went to sleep at about 3 am.
China: Beijing Day 5:
Rise and shine! We were picked up by our tour guide, Tony, at 6:30 am. We were scheduled to visit the Temple of Heaven, The Forbidden City, The Great Wall, and The Summer Palace. The Temple of Heaven was so beautiful. It was situated in a peaceful park were groups of people could be seen practicing yoga and playing games. I would have loved to people watch, but we were on a tight schedule. The Forbidden City was crawling with tourists, mostly Chinese ones. Flags or some pretty funny looking neon hats distinguished big tour groups from one another. Once again, the major buildings were closed due to renovation, which was disappointing. The strangest thing of all though were the Chinese people who wanted my picture. The first time it happened, I was sitting on the steps waiting for my group to use the bathrooms. As I was sitting there, a Chinese man pulls out his camera and blatantly starts to just take pictures of me just sitting there. I was a little weirded out. A few minutes later, I noticed a different Chinese man watching me. When his girlfriend/wife met up with him, I could see him point to me and say something to her. She looked at me and they said some more things. She was acting shy. I knew what was going on… he wanted to take her picture with me. I didn’t say anything but instead I watched out of the corner of my eye. She came a little closer and posed. I chuckled to myself as he took her picture with me looking around. Eventually, I motioned for her to come over and get an actual picture and that’s when it began. Before I knew it, I had also taken a picture with her boyfriend/husband and then two other men who were observing the fiasco from afar. This kept occurring through out the entire day. It was weird though because no one else in my group had experienced this, not even the other blonde haired girl. I had fun with it but it made me realized how much it would suck to be a celebrity. After the Forbidden City, we headed to a tall section of the Great Wall for some hiking! I actually was not very excited, at least not at first. It wasn’t until I was on it and climbing that I got in to it. The hike itself was a major workout. The stairs, when there were some, were EXTREMELY steep. They also just had flatter sections that were so steep and smooth that I slipped several times. I was worried about falling and breaking my camera. The view from the top most point of our sections was absolutely incredible. You could see the wall continue on forever as it zigzagged and winded its way up and down the mountain ridges. I was just in awe.
China: Qingdao Day 6
Qindao was… well completely depressing. It was grey and there were almost no people around, at least anywhere semi-close to the ship. After our flight got in from Beijing, we took a 45 minute cab ride through the depressing city. It got more and more gray and icky the more we kept driving. When I got back to the ship, I called several peoples rooms only to find them sleeping. Sleeping? Wait, sleeping at noon while in port? Unheard of. Apparently there was nothing else to do in Qingdao, and they were right. Teddy, Anna, and I went out for a bit in search of some internet. With a little help from a local, we did find it. Not only did we find the internet, but we found all of the people. EVRYONE was there… playing computer games. I laughed so hard. We used it for a little bit once some computers freed up. We then spent the rest of the time walking around the city. It was so sad looking that it just made me want to cry. We decided that we had had enough and headed back to the ship around 5pm. That was 5 hours before on ship time. Normally I’m running to the ship because I’m cutting it close to getting dock time (the penalty for being back on the ship late). Like everyone else, I went to sleep. Good night and good bye China!
The two days before Japan
I had lots to do and little time to do it in. I had a test in religion and paper due in western civ. on the second day. The sea was a bit rocky the night before the paper was due. I had been feeling crummy since china’s brutal beating and this was just the icing on the cake. When I went down to purser’s desk to get seasickness medicine, he told me that he ran out due to a high demand. Obviously I wasn’t the only one feeling it. To make matters worse, I had no idea what I was going to write for my paper. I sat in my bed for about 2 hours trying to come up with something. I had nothing and I still felt sick. Our papers are completely open ended… we just have to write about how the west is present in the world and relate it to what we have seen in port. As easy as it sounds, I couldn’t think of anything that I could write a long enough paper on. Ugh. I went to sleep instead and wrote a terrible paper on Islam in the morning. I didn’t care. Japan, here I come!
Japan Day 1: Complete Chaos
As is the ritual before every port, we had pre-port lecture followed by watching a few episodes of house in somone’s room. I also had a “family” dinner that night so I was busy running around the ship.
The morning of arrival was complete chaos. Japan has even more strict landing codes than China did. Everyone on the ship had to get their temperature taken the night before. In the morning we also had to walk through a termodetector to make sure that none of us had a fever. I got up at 7am to a hazy gray harbor. For the first time I didn’t even bother to take any pictures. I ate breakfast with Finnly and Anna and then went back to bed since I wasn’t feeling well. I skipped the diplomatic briefing and got up at 11 to go through the thermodetector. I went back to my room and packed for Japan. After eating a small lunch on the ship, we picked up our passports and headed out.
Until pre-port, we were completely unaware that we would be getting off of the ship so late. We had to change our schedule around because of it. Luckily, we planned on wingin’ it the whole time so we had no reservations that needed to be cancelled. Originally we were going to go to Hiroshima that afternoon but that was no longer going to happen. Instead we decided to go to Kyoto instead and find a place to stay over night. Our first goal was to get our Japan Rail Passes. I lucked out. I had ordered mine the week before I left for the Bahamas. It is good for three months after the date of purchase. Mine just so happen to have been bought exactly three months ago. Luckily, it expired the next day. If it had expired I probably would have just stayed on the ship and went around Kobe by myself, which I would have been fine with if it weren’t for the $250 I would have wasted. I was relieved to say the least.
After getting the passes, we headed for Kyoto. Although I had already been to Kyoto, I was really excited to be going back. It was one of my favorite cities in Japan. THE best restaurant was located somewhere to the right of Kyoto Station… were exactly I couldn’t remember. I knew it was a little hole in the wall that all of the locals go to and although they serve one dish, there is generally a line out the door to eat there. I had been talking about going back since I knew I was going on SAS. I would be surprised if I found it though.
We went to try and view some temples before it began to get dark. We took the local bus from the train station to a temple. As soon as we had stepped off of the bus, it began to downpour. I was soaked. It gave me an excuse to finally get the clear umbrella I had been wanting since China. Everyone had been making fun of me for it but they too broke down and bought one. By the time we made it to one or two of the temples, they were already closed. It was still fun to walk around. It was incredibly peaceful even though it was located right in the city. The rain so quit so I was stuck carrying around that damn umbrella for the rest of the trip. Oh well.
We decided to start walking back towards the station. We were walking along the street when I noticed a sign that said “guest house.” I decided that we should stop and check it out since it was starting to get dark and we still had no place to sleep. Of course it was really nice and cheap, but they were full. However, they did give us information on other hostels in the area so we booked rooms with another one. Finding the place was a challenge as I figured it would be from experience. Eventually, after asking several locals, we found it hidden away in a side street. It wasn’t that bad either. It served its purpose as a place to unload our bags and sleep at night. It was also close to the station, which was key since we had an early bullet train ride to Hiroshima in the morning. We unloaded our stuff and headed towards the station to try and find my restaurant.
Now it has been about a year and a half since I was last in Kyoto and we all know my memory isn’t that greatest. It would be impressive if I actually found it. I knew that it was on a small side street to the left of Kyoto Station’s main entrance. We came across a street that looked familiar and it had a short stretch of buildings that held some promise. One of them did seem like it might be it, but I remembered the inside looking differently. We decided to keep walking and see what else we saw. After A little bit, we decided to go back at try it out. It served the dish I remembered, and a line outside of the door quickly formed after our arrival. We all had the same thing, udon soup, and it was delicious. It was just as I remembered it. I am still not sure if it was the same place or not, but I guess it doesn’t matter. The food was amazing! Luckily, all of my friends enjoyed it just as much as I did. Success! We walked around a little bit more and I found my favorite green tea ice cream bar. So SO good! We relaxed in a little coffee shop and internet café before going back to the hostel. That night I couldn’t sleep for the life of my. My brain was going a million miles a minute and it would not stop. I pretty much analyzed my entire life: past, present, and future. Ugh. I got an hour of sleep before getting up. All I have to say is thank god for all of those hot coffee vending machines located every block. I would have died that day if it weren’t for them.
Day 2: Hiroshima- Good so far…
It was another beautiful day. It felt like spring outside. Peace Memorial Park was absolutely stunning. We saw the A-bomb dome as it was the day after the bombing. I’ll give just a little history. On August 6th 1945, the United States dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima. It detonated about 600 meters above the city center (now the A-bomb dome). The city was destroyed in an instant. The bomb exerted extremely high pressers of several hundred thousand atmospheres and it exceeded more than a million degrees Celsius at its hypocenter. It burned, and crushed almost all buildings and people inside of them within a 2-kilometer radius. The people of Hiroshima are now hoping and pushing for the elimination of nuclear weapons.
I found their overall attitude towards the bombing so incredible. There was no hostility or anger. They only wished for peace and the elimination of nuclear weapons. The museum took a good 2 hours to get through. Although it wasn’t nearly as graphic as the Vietnam War Museum, it was still extremely powerful. We saw many pictures and artifacts, which included victim’s skin, hair, and fingers. I just about lost it at one point since I was already feeling ill.
Afterwards we went to see if there was a baseball game in the afternoon. There wasn’t. We went to one of the huge department stores where we ate lunch before catching our train to Tokyo. Mary Alice and I had bought a bottle of wine for the train ride. We drank it out of Mcdonald’s paper cups. Classy, I know. It was a fairly long train ride. I didn’t sleep a whole lot. When we arrived in Tokyo we decided to call one of the hostels that I had a brochure on. They had space so we headed towards that district. It ended up being in the middle of nowhere, although it was really nice. Major tensions were picking up in the group… which didn’t help either. It was a boring night. We ate dinner from the seven eleven since we couldn’t find an open restaurant. I went on the internet for a little bit and tried updating some things. We had to pay for the showers so I had to quick one. As I was rushing, trying to get the shampoo out of my hair, I realized that I haven’t had any time to just relax and enjoy anything. It’s always go, go, go. You don’t want to miss anything. I went to sleep at around 2 am.
Day 3: Tokyo- pretty much a disaster, except for a few good parts.
This day was nothing but a complete disaster. Everyone pretty much had a meltdown at some point in the day. I don’t even think that I want to write about it. At one point, I just wanted to go in to a laundry mat, sit down, and watch the dryer go around and around. That’s how bad it was. People were not making any decisions. People were picking fights with others. Everyone was just at the end of their ropes. However, there were two times were I had a lot of fun. The first one was at Cirque Du Soleil. Now, I had never heard of it before but everyone seemed to know and love it. My roommate and her friends just about died when I told them that I was going. I agreed to buy a ticket a couple of weeks ago without really knowing anything. They weren’t cheap by any means so I was really hoping for something amazing and oh my, it was that and so much more. I ended up with the best seat in the house: front row, center. Mary Alice was right next to me while Brandon, Shantel, and Finnly were further back. I could literally reach out and touch the dancers/singers if I wanted to. At one point, Mary Alice and I were holding each other’s hand because we were convinced that one of the gymnasts was going to miss the stage and end up in our laps as he jumped through some hoops. The show was just really incredible. They would do these elaborate acrobatic performances. They would jump through hoops, fly in the air, sing, dance, juggle… all at a level I never thought humanly possible. At one point I was sitting there thinking to myself, “Am I really watching a 10-person pyramid jump rope double Dutch style? Yes, yes I actually am.” The entire show was just unbelievable.
Afterwards, once everyone calmed down, we went back to being indecisive and irritable. We had talked about going and signing karaoke. I wasn’t so sure that I was exactly in the mood for it, but I would be up for it if everyone else was. Finnly was the only one who openly wanted to do it. We were standing outside, all dressed up in the cold. I finally decided that I was going to go to Shibuya. I’d go by myself unless anyone wanted to come and I told them that they were all more than welcome to join me. I knew Shibuya had a great nightlife and karaoke. Mary Alice said that she would come with. The rest of the group still couldn’t make up their minds. This is when I just about lost it. I told them that I was leaving in 2 minutes and that they had to decide for themselves. I wasn’t going to tell them what they wanted to do. After another 10 minutes or so, they finally decided to come with me and we would all go and do karaoke. We got to Shibuya and easily found a karaoke bar. Once inside though, everyone became indecisive again. I’m not sure if it was because of the cost or what. I could tell that Finnly really wanted to do it and that she was getting up set because no one else seemed interested enough to make up their mind. I was more than willing to pay and so was Mary Alice. After standing there for a while, we all got a room. We paid for two hours of karaoke and two hours of unlimited drinks. After going though everything, I’m just glad that it turned out to be a blast. There were no tensions. We sang and drank and the time just flew right by. After paying, we left and walked around for a while. At this point the subway had stopped running. It would start running again at 4am. The group wanted to take a taxi back to the hostel. We had a lot of trouble trying to get one. Once we did get one, the first thing Brandon told the driver was that he didn’t speak Japanese. The taxi driver immediately took off. Because there were five of us, we would need to taxis. This seemed impossible so Mary Alice and I decided to stay back and get one later or try and walk back. We ended up talking with 5 Japanese guys who were our age and wearing their business suits at 2am. It was really pretty hysterical talking with them. One of them wanted to come back to the states with me as his girlfriend. I was like hmmm… no. lol They soon ditched us because there were five of them and only two of us. We then found a 24 hour restaurant were we ordered pizza and wine. We sat there until 6am. We watched businessmen come in and pass out before their food was even served to them. They always seem to be leaving work or on their way to work. It is nuts. We made our way back to the hostel on the subway. I realized that I had lost my Japan Rail Pass. It was bad… I got yelled at for sitting in the subway station while waiting for Mary Alice. I was in no mood… I must have given the guy a look of death as I got up. We figured that my pass must have slipped out from between the subway maps that I had been carrying. Something foolish like that. Now I just had to sneak my way back to Kobe all of the way from Tokyo. Great. By the time we got back to the hostel and went to bed, it was 7:30 am and the sun had risen.
Day 4: Tokyo and back to Kobe
Mary Alice and I woke up alone and headed out to see Tokyo Tower. I knew that it was somewhere close so we decided to just try and walk there. It was another beautiful day out. It ended up being a little hike, but we had nothing else to do that day except make our way back to Kobe. We did a little window-shopping on our walk there. We stopped and got a pizza for lunch. It wasn’t the greatest pizza but it sufficed. At this point, we were both broke and needed an ATM. Ugh. I hate trying to find ATM’s that accept our debit cards. It’s always such a pain. As we were walking towards the tower, looking for a bank, we stumbled across a Subway. You have no idea how badly I have been craving a sandwich. I hadn’t had one since I left. We both got super excited even though we had eaten only a little bit ago. We went in with high hopes only to find out that they don’t accept credit cards. What? What?! Oh… they are trying to kill me! Crushed, we kept walking. We did find a bank that accepted our debit cards so we were set. Tokyo Tower was the same. I bought a lot of their special banana chocolate that I know my family loves… so lets just hope I don’t eat it all before I get home. ☺ We began to make our way back towards the main shopping area since we still had some time, or at least we thought. After dilly dolling around we suddenly realized that we had to haul some serious butt in order to catch our train. We had NO idea where to catch the train however. This would not have been a problem normally, but because I was an idiot and lost my JR pass we HAD to catch this train or else I would have to cough up a lot of cash to pay for a train ride back. At least with our previously reserved tickets, I had a chance of sneaking through. So with this new discovery, we pretty much ran though the subway station. I had a general idea of where the train might be… but general idea in the city of Tokyo is still pretty much a shot in the dark. We caught a subway and then had to switch lines. We were standing on the train, discussing where we were going when a Japanese girl turned to us and asked if we were going to Kobe. We said yeah and handed her our tickets. She looked and them and then looked and us and began talking really quickly and saying a bunch of Japanese names. Luckily, we got the gist. We were supposed to have gotten off already and switched lines again. The doors then opened, Mary Alice and I looked at each other, and then dashed out of the door… still trying to put together what she was saying. Time was ticking. We had only 20 minutes to get to our train before it would leave us. We then back tracked a stop and switched lines. Some how we made it to the station on time. Now, the only thing left was sneaky me though. The plan was to do a sneak hand off of her JR pass. She walked though… and no hand off. Oh no. I showed her my ticket and she asked for my JR pass. S-H-I-T. What am I going to do? Mary Alice said turn around. She began opening my backpack… genius! She rustled around a bit and brought out “my” pass. It got me though and we had 10 minutes to spare. Sneaking me back through the second time was a breeze… I lucked out.
Day 5: A Day of walking in Kobe
That’s basically what we did; we walked and shopped. I got a few things and managed to get my hands on some mozzarella cheese! I would have loved to spend another day in Kobe, but it was time to start heading back to the US and Hawaii. I had a long 8 days ahead of me…
4/6/2007
The happenings of crossing the Pacific Ocean:
I’ve pretty much been sleeping all day everyday. Exciting, I know. I wake up at 8, go to class, and go right back to bed at 12 with out setting an alarm. Sometimes I would wake up for dinner sometimes, usually only because the evening’s announcements would wake me up. There were two times where I woke up in the late afternoon and thought that it was morning. Ugh. My sleep schedule is so messed up. Two nights ago I couldn’t sleep at all, got really seasick that day, took some meds, and slept through my class. Oops. I also missed taco day because I was sleeping and on the ship, missing taco day is like missing Christmas. Poor Andrew (my cabin steward) tried to clean my room about 3 times a day but every time I was either sleeping or attempting to write a paper. My life was completely scattered around the room so I told him to forget about even trying to clean it. I love Andrew and I think that I might try to sneak him home with me.
We had the Ambassador’s Ball the other night. It was super crazy and a lot of fun. All of the girls wore the dresses they had designed in Vietnam and the guys wore the suites they had tailored. Like most, I ware my pajamas 24/7 when on the ship so it was a lot of fun to see everyone dressed up to the max.
As for classes, I had two finals today and I have two more after Hawaii. I’m ready for them to be over. I don’t feel like I learned a whole lot from my classes. All of my learning took place in ports.
Here are some more thoughts as I start to pack up and head back home.
Things that I will miss:
The hit or miss scrambled eggs in the morning, the complete darkness of my room, the nice rocking of the ship, House marathons with my friends, not having a cell phone, my cabin stewart Andrew, being able to get to class in one minute, the 7th deck bistro’s grilled cheese sandwiches that saved my life, getting back from an exhausting day or few days and finding letters from home on my door, always waking up in a new country, watching movies on “the loop”, using vacation as an excuse to buy things, magnetic walls, my friends, and home (aka, the ship).
Things that I will not miss:
23 hour days, the not nice rocking of the ship, the nasty chlorinated water, starfishing it, “the voice” waking me up during my nap times, Dan Christie’s voice and Global Studies class, actually all of my classes, the food, the lack of cheese, and paying god awful amounts of money for the internet.
Thursday, April 26, 2007
HONG KONG BABY!
Hong Kong Day 1
For over half of the voyage, I had no idea what I was going to do in Hong Kong or China. Most of my friends had already booked trips through SAS and I had missed the deadline by a day. My plans managed to materialize during the few weeks before arrival. I found out that my friend Geoff (pronounced Jeff) was planning an “indy” trip, which included going to the great wall. Seeing the great wall was my only goal for China. So, with very little information on the rest of the plans or who else was going, I booked my flight. I actually had very little knowledge of the daily plans until I was there and doing it. If there are one or two things that I have learned from traveling on SAS, it’s be flexible and just go with it. So that’s exactly what I did and the following entry is what became of the big question mark that I called China.
We arrived in the center of Hong Kong on a hazy (or smoggy?) cool morning. It was incredible. Surrounded on all sides by tall buildings and skyscrapers, we ate a quick breakfast out on the ship’s deck while taking in the immensity of the great concrete and steel jungle that awaited us. I was anxious to get off of the ship and explore. To my surprise, the gangway off of the ship led straight in to a huge shopping mall. I’m sure that it was planned. It was a nice treat after our usual dock sites of dirty, stinky, industrial areas.
Teddy, Mary Alice, Anna, Brandon, Finnly, and myself all set out to explore the city. As usual, I am in a daze as we wander around the city. I am always content just walking around and taking it all in. We stopped in to look at some shops but our first goal of the day was to find the Mountain Hardware store so that people could by jackets. Brandon had gotten an address from who knows where. We quickly figured out how to maneuver the subway system and made our way there. We saw a sign for the store from the street. We went up about 10 flights of stairs before we figured out that it was no longer there. There was a second address that was further away. We decided to try that one instead. After another subway ride, we finally found it. It was located inside this incredibly huge 16-story shopping mall. Hold me back and cut up my credit cards ASAP. Actually, I didn’t buy anything. Shocking, I know. Our next goal was to find a travel agency because people needed to buy their Japan Rail Passes. We found one and quickly became friends with them because we had to go back about 4 more times. While they were being processed, we went to a local pub and had a drink. We did a little more browsing and then headed back to the travel agency. I picked up a little $5 oil painting… I think it was a good first purchase. The rail passes we not ready yet so we went out to dinner after having worked up a bit of an appetite. After dinner I was stuffed so much that I even passed up getting my fav. ben and jerrys ice cream. I still dont know what I was thinking. We went and got the rail passes, except for Mary Alices because they had spelt her name wrong. More shopping blah blah blah. Later that night Teddy went back to meet up with people and the rest of us ate dinner. Mary Alice and I ate pizza while the other three went for sushi. The pizza was so so good, but it was pretty gosh darn expensive. We had a nice talk, enjoyed some wine and desert. It started to rain right before we left to meet back up. As soon as we had crossed the street though, we both could immediately tell that Finnly had had a little bit to drink because her southern accent was the strongest I had ever heard it. It was hilarious. She tried to deny it, but there was no point. It was too obvious. We all started to head back to the ship to watch a movie but I wasnt quite ready to do that. I had been doing that for the last several days on the ship and I am only in Hong Kong so often... so Mary Alice and I headed out to find a bar. After walking around for a while and stopping in and out of a few shops, we found ourselves in a Aussie bar with a bunch of middle aged men. We had only planned on having a beer but that soon turned in to a few beers because we got to chatting with a man from Texas and his Chinese business partner. (He and Mary Alice talked about the south) They offered to buy us a couple rounds and no way was I going to pass up a free Corona or two. After that we called it quits and headed back to the ship. Once again, a bunch of drunken SASers were making their way back as well. I dont think that I have ever been more embarrassed before in my life. It happens it every single country, and I would have thought that they would be over getting absolutly wasted in port by now, but I was wrong. O well. It was a great first day and I was ready for bed!
Hong Kong Day 2
Ummm... day 2. What did I do? That is an excellent question. It is amazing how quickly my memory fails me... Oh yes, Brandon and I hung out the entire day before meeting up with our independent group to Beijing. We woke up early and went to starbucks. yes starbucks. It was great. I was able to use the internet for almost two hours. I talked with both of my chriss and it absolutly made my week. I also bought a green tea frapp in memory of study days in Minnesota with Kelle! Good times, kinda. I pretty much had to force myself off of the internet in order to go explore Hong Kong some more. we had some fun going in to some fancy designer stores and we went back to the huge mall from the previous day. We decided to split up for a couple hours so that we could do our own thing. It was sooo nice. I think that it might have been the second time on the entire trip that I was alone (the other being South Africa). I dont mind going off on my own in port, and a lot of time I would like to. My friends freak out and dont let me though, which i guess is a good thing too. (and Im sure that my mom LOVES that lol). I just wandered around. I didnt buy anything yet again. Phew. That could have been a disaster. I think that I will break off more in Japan as well. We will see. I love interacting with the sales people the most. They are so much fun. After a while, we met back up and I ate some really awful Chinese fast food. ugh. and I thought that the fast food in the states was bad... Once again, it made me a bit sick later, as usual. Im not sure what we did after. I think that we made our way back to the ship, quick packed, and went to meet up with our group going to Beijing. There were 12 people going in all, which made me really nervous since it is next to impossible to travel with a large group. I also knew only three of the other people going. I knew Teddy, Geoff, and Brandon. After meeting up, we made our way to the hostel. It took a while because it was very well hidden, and well, none of us speak Chinese. It makes it a little difficult, but eventually we made it! Brandon, Teddy, Geoff, and I all shared a room so we just dropped our stuff down and headed back out to grab some dinner at a local sushi restaurant. Once again, I passed on the sushi and only order a lemonade. It turns out that lemonade in Chinese actually means Sprite. So, I ended up drinking the hot tea that they serve for free. lol. Eh, what are you going to do right? The ladies night market was next on the list. Night markets are a ton of fun... I love markets in general. The US is really missin out. After that, we quickly made our way to the tram up the mountain were we got a panoramic view of the entire city at night. It was absolutly stunning. I really hope my pictures turn out, although I know that they will never be able to capture it completely. Brandon and I then split off from the group and did our own thing. The only problem was that we did not have a key to our room. Eeks. Eventually we called it a night and headed back to the hostel with our fingers crossed that someone would be there. I was fully prepared to sleep outside on the concrete in my clothes. No one answered the buzzer when we got there. We went up to the office and luckily they were still open so the owner let us in to our room. We then had some pillow talk and Teddy showed up a little later. We had no clue were Geoff was but eventually he came in after we had all passed out. Today just made me wonder how the rest of the trip was going to go. Tomorrow we were off to Beijing on a 24 hour train ride. woohoo!
For over half of the voyage, I had no idea what I was going to do in Hong Kong or China. Most of my friends had already booked trips through SAS and I had missed the deadline by a day. My plans managed to materialize during the few weeks before arrival. I found out that my friend Geoff (pronounced Jeff) was planning an “indy” trip, which included going to the great wall. Seeing the great wall was my only goal for China. So, with very little information on the rest of the plans or who else was going, I booked my flight. I actually had very little knowledge of the daily plans until I was there and doing it. If there are one or two things that I have learned from traveling on SAS, it’s be flexible and just go with it. So that’s exactly what I did and the following entry is what became of the big question mark that I called China.
We arrived in the center of Hong Kong on a hazy (or smoggy?) cool morning. It was incredible. Surrounded on all sides by tall buildings and skyscrapers, we ate a quick breakfast out on the ship’s deck while taking in the immensity of the great concrete and steel jungle that awaited us. I was anxious to get off of the ship and explore. To my surprise, the gangway off of the ship led straight in to a huge shopping mall. I’m sure that it was planned. It was a nice treat after our usual dock sites of dirty, stinky, industrial areas.
Teddy, Mary Alice, Anna, Brandon, Finnly, and myself all set out to explore the city. As usual, I am in a daze as we wander around the city. I am always content just walking around and taking it all in. We stopped in to look at some shops but our first goal of the day was to find the Mountain Hardware store so that people could by jackets. Brandon had gotten an address from who knows where. We quickly figured out how to maneuver the subway system and made our way there. We saw a sign for the store from the street. We went up about 10 flights of stairs before we figured out that it was no longer there. There was a second address that was further away. We decided to try that one instead. After another subway ride, we finally found it. It was located inside this incredibly huge 16-story shopping mall. Hold me back and cut up my credit cards ASAP. Actually, I didn’t buy anything. Shocking, I know. Our next goal was to find a travel agency because people needed to buy their Japan Rail Passes. We found one and quickly became friends with them because we had to go back about 4 more times. While they were being processed, we went to a local pub and had a drink. We did a little more browsing and then headed back to the travel agency. I picked up a little $5 oil painting… I think it was a good first purchase. The rail passes we not ready yet so we went out to dinner after having worked up a bit of an appetite. After dinner I was stuffed so much that I even passed up getting my fav. ben and jerrys ice cream. I still dont know what I was thinking. We went and got the rail passes, except for Mary Alices because they had spelt her name wrong. More shopping blah blah blah. Later that night Teddy went back to meet up with people and the rest of us ate dinner. Mary Alice and I ate pizza while the other three went for sushi. The pizza was so so good, but it was pretty gosh darn expensive. We had a nice talk, enjoyed some wine and desert. It started to rain right before we left to meet back up. As soon as we had crossed the street though, we both could immediately tell that Finnly had had a little bit to drink because her southern accent was the strongest I had ever heard it. It was hilarious. She tried to deny it, but there was no point. It was too obvious. We all started to head back to the ship to watch a movie but I wasnt quite ready to do that. I had been doing that for the last several days on the ship and I am only in Hong Kong so often... so Mary Alice and I headed out to find a bar. After walking around for a while and stopping in and out of a few shops, we found ourselves in a Aussie bar with a bunch of middle aged men. We had only planned on having a beer but that soon turned in to a few beers because we got to chatting with a man from Texas and his Chinese business partner. (He and Mary Alice talked about the south) They offered to buy us a couple rounds and no way was I going to pass up a free Corona or two. After that we called it quits and headed back to the ship. Once again, a bunch of drunken SASers were making their way back as well. I dont think that I have ever been more embarrassed before in my life. It happens it every single country, and I would have thought that they would be over getting absolutly wasted in port by now, but I was wrong. O well. It was a great first day and I was ready for bed!
Hong Kong Day 2
Ummm... day 2. What did I do? That is an excellent question. It is amazing how quickly my memory fails me... Oh yes, Brandon and I hung out the entire day before meeting up with our independent group to Beijing. We woke up early and went to starbucks. yes starbucks. It was great. I was able to use the internet for almost two hours. I talked with both of my chriss and it absolutly made my week. I also bought a green tea frapp in memory of study days in Minnesota with Kelle! Good times, kinda. I pretty much had to force myself off of the internet in order to go explore Hong Kong some more. we had some fun going in to some fancy designer stores and we went back to the huge mall from the previous day. We decided to split up for a couple hours so that we could do our own thing. It was sooo nice. I think that it might have been the second time on the entire trip that I was alone (the other being South Africa). I dont mind going off on my own in port, and a lot of time I would like to. My friends freak out and dont let me though, which i guess is a good thing too. (and Im sure that my mom LOVES that lol). I just wandered around. I didnt buy anything yet again. Phew. That could have been a disaster. I think that I will break off more in Japan as well. We will see. I love interacting with the sales people the most. They are so much fun. After a while, we met back up and I ate some really awful Chinese fast food. ugh. and I thought that the fast food in the states was bad... Once again, it made me a bit sick later, as usual. Im not sure what we did after. I think that we made our way back to the ship, quick packed, and went to meet up with our group going to Beijing. There were 12 people going in all, which made me really nervous since it is next to impossible to travel with a large group. I also knew only three of the other people going. I knew Teddy, Geoff, and Brandon. After meeting up, we made our way to the hostel. It took a while because it was very well hidden, and well, none of us speak Chinese. It makes it a little difficult, but eventually we made it! Brandon, Teddy, Geoff, and I all shared a room so we just dropped our stuff down and headed back out to grab some dinner at a local sushi restaurant. Once again, I passed on the sushi and only order a lemonade. It turns out that lemonade in Chinese actually means Sprite. So, I ended up drinking the hot tea that they serve for free. lol. Eh, what are you going to do right? The ladies night market was next on the list. Night markets are a ton of fun... I love markets in general. The US is really missin out. After that, we quickly made our way to the tram up the mountain were we got a panoramic view of the entire city at night. It was absolutly stunning. I really hope my pictures turn out, although I know that they will never be able to capture it completely. Brandon and I then split off from the group and did our own thing. The only problem was that we did not have a key to our room. Eeks. Eventually we called it a night and headed back to the hostel with our fingers crossed that someone would be there. I was fully prepared to sleep outside on the concrete in my clothes. No one answered the buzzer when we got there. We went up to the office and luckily they were still open so the owner let us in to our room. We then had some pillow talk and Teddy showed up a little later. We had no clue were Geoff was but eventually he came in after we had all passed out. Today just made me wonder how the rest of the trip was going to go. Tomorrow we were off to Beijing on a 24 hour train ride. woohoo!
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
The 3 long days before
In between
MORE Vietnam!
DAY 3
This was a day full of missions. Surprisingly we managed to accomplish all of them and then some. Our first goal of the day was to find out when the water puppet show was. I needed something to write about for 5 pages for my world music class. We figured that the best bet was to ask the tourism information center. Needless to say, we were sorely mistaken. When we asked them about it, they didn’t know the times but they said that it was at the zoo. One woman told us to go to the bookstore that was down the street and ask. So we went and asked them there and either they didn’t know or they didn’t understand what we were asking. I decided to try and look in a tourism book. No luck. We went back to the tourism center to ask again or to see if we could use a phone to call the zoo and ask. This time she said to go to the theater, which after two attempts to try and find it, we finally found it… right next to the bookstore. Why she didn’t say theater first is beyond me. Even after all of that work, the theater looked a wee bit sketchy so we didn’t even bother asking. We went and shopped some more figuring we could just head over to the zoo after lunch and hopefully we would catch a show. We went back to the market in search of a few specific items. Unfortunately, we entered right in to the smelly food area. I just about lost my breakfast as made our way through it. It was lunchtime by the time we were done at the market. We wandered until we came across a good-looking restaurant (which doesn’t take long in this city). I satisfied my Wisconsinite craving for cheese with a pizza. It was the most westernized food I have had in an extremely long time. I think my stomach was relieved to get a break. Afterwards, we took a taxi to the zoo. We made it there and asked the gatekeeper where we were supposed to buy tickets for the water puppet show. Apparently, they are sold at the history museum. We looked at the map and saw that it was somewhere down the block or around the corner. Should have been easy to find right? Wrong. We had rounded the corner and walked a good several blocks and didn’t see it anywhere. We asked several locals for some guidance. The first time we asked, we were directed right. The second person we asked directed us left. Either we had missed it or they don’t know what they are talking about. After laughing a lot and walking around in some more circles, we found it. It ended up being pretty much next to the zoo entrance. Go figure. It was actually a building that Mary Alice had made a comment on at the beginning. We were just happy that we found it and just in time to catch a water puppet show. For those of you who don’t know, a water puppet show is where elaborate wooden animal puppets dance/move in a little pond. The pond is located in front/inside of a little building where the puppeteers are. The puppeteers are actually standing up to their waste in the water behind a mesh screen so that we can’t see them. It was pretty awesome. This history museum its self wasn’t that great. It had a lot of pots. The coolest thing was a woman mummy who died in 1890 and was discovered in the 90’s. After, we decided to go to the
Next on the list was shoe shopping. I bought a pair to wear with my dress to the ambassador’s ball because I left all that type of stuff at home (silly me haha). As normal, I was given the shoes in a bag and handed a receipt. We had started to leave when I realized that I had never actually paid for the shoes. We turned back around, found the two girls helping me, and asked them where I would go to pay. They were SO confused. Eventually the two security guards came over to see what was going on. No one seemed to understand that I needed to pay. When they finally understood, or seemed to at least, the response was “come back tomorrow.” What? Come back tomorrow? Seriously? I had to pay for them now since I was going to be busy all day tomorrow. The girl then told us to follow her, and she took us to a bank. I already had money so I just handed her the money and the connection was finally made. I’m pretty sure that I could have left from the beginning with out paying. It was weird. After some DVD shopping, we were on our way to dinner when I looked in the shoe bag and saw a hat too. I started laughing and was like “where the hell did this hat come from?” Mary Alice cracked up and was just like “oh
Day 4
Today was my day trip to the
Later that night, Mary Alice and I went back to see our favorite ladies at the dress shop. My last dress fit almost perfectly. We went out to dinner while they finished the last minor adjustments. John and Kim had recommended a restaurant to us and although it was expensive, it was great. I had my first salad since leaving home and it was… umm… so good. You have no idea how much I miss food, esp. salad, pizza, and subs. After picking up the dresses and dropping them off at the ship, we took our first motor scooter rides to an internet café. The motor scooters are SO much fun. They drive like maniacs and it was awesome. I was sad that I waited so long to try them. I guess a large number of people on the ship had bad muffler burns and I know that my roommate got in to an accident (don’t worry, she is fine). I spent a good hour enjoying the free internet before heading back to the ship for the night. Over all, another fantastic day in
Day 5
Today was another early morning… as is usual in port. I had another SAS trip planned only this time to the Cao Dai temple and the Cu Chi tunnels. I was very excited. Anna, Mary Alice and myself had signed up weeks ago and I had been looking forward to it ever since. The day started with another long bus ride. This time little sleeping due to frequent stops. The first stop was at a local market, were we basically walked around for 15 minutes. Our second stop was at the Cao Dai temple. The temple was enormous but incredibly beautiful. It was highly decorated and brightly colored. It was a long semi open aired building with huge carved pillars running down the length of the sides. Several stories above, the light blue painted ceiling with silver stars could be seen. Tourists were able to watch from the balcony. They pray 4 times a day and we were able to see the noon prayer. From above, I could see about 200 robed people kneeling on the checkered tile floor below. For those of you who don’t know, Caodiasm is the end result an attempt to create the ideal religion. It combines elements of many different religions from both the east and the west. These religions include Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, Hinduism, native Vietnamese spiritism, Christianity, and Islam. They believe in one God, souls, and communicating with the spiritual world. The eye is the God of Caodaism, and it was depicted in the center of every window in the temple. (see I do learn something, although strangely enough I didn’t learn it in my world religions class. go figure)
After the temple, we had a surprise stop a Vietnam War memorial/cemetery. After going to the War museum I could just imagine all of those soldiers rolling over in their graves as we walked around. At this point in the day, it was INCREDIBLY hot and humid. I don’t think that I have ever experienced such hot and stagnant air before. I had a hard time breathing even just walking around. I didn’t stay out long because at one point I bent down to take a picture and got extremely light headed and just about fell over on my way back up… needless to say I was probably a wee bit dehydrated.
Next was the Cu Chi tunnels! I saw a huge crater that was left in the earth after being bombed by the B52’s. HUGE. We saw the various booby traps used by the Vietnamese. One was called “the souvenir” because it left deep cuts in the legs of soldiers who stepped in to it. I couldn’t help but laugh at the humor of it. We saw and had the chance to try and squeeze in to the hidden tunnel entrance. And let me just say that they are very sneaky (and tiny!). We got down and dirty as we crawled around like little kids in both the original sized tunnel and the 30% enlarged tunnel for tourists. We took tons of pics, a few videos and had ourselves a good time. It was incredibly hot inside… I was breathing in the sweat as it dripped off my nose. Gross I know, but it gives you a good idea of how hot it was. I can’t imagine living in those little tunnels for 55 days at a time like the Vietnamese did. Incredible. Then I was able to shoot an AK47! I know, me, with a gun. It’s a scary thought. It was pretty awesome even though I was deaf in my left ear for about an hour afterward. The three of us then slammed a beer down before crawling in the tunnels again. Dirty and smelly, we all boarded the bus for the ride back to the ship. Once again, we grabbed our last in-port meal and used the internet before on ship time at 9pm.
Over all, I had a complete blast in
Up next,
Saturday, April 14, 2007
Vietnam
DAY 3
This was a day full of missions. Surprisingly we managed to accomplish all of them and then some. Our first goal of the day was to find out when the water puppet show was. I needed something to write about for 5 pages for my world music class. We figured that the best bet was to ask the tourism information center. Needless to say, we were sorely mistaken. When we asked them about it, they didn’t know the times but they said that it was at the zoo. One woman told us to go to the bookstore that was down the street and ask. So we went and asked them there and either they didn’t know or they didn’t understand what we were asking. I decided to try and look in a tourism book. No luck. We went back to the tourism center to ask again or to see if we could use a phone to call the zoo and ask. This time she said to go to the theater, which after two attempts to try and find it, we finally found it… right next to the bookstore. Why she didn’t say theater first is beyond me. Even after all of that work, the theater looked a wee bit sketchy so we didn’t even bother asking. We went and shopped some more figuring we could just head over to the zoo after lunch and hopefully we would catch a show. We went back to the market in search of a few specific items. Unfortunately, we entered right in to the smelly food area. I just about lost my breakfast as made our way through it. It was lunchtime by the time we were done at the market. We wandered until we came across a good-looking restaurant (which doesn’t take long in this city). I satisfied my Wisconsinite craving for cheese with a pizza. It was the most westernized food I have had in an extremely long time. I think my stomach was relieved to get a break. Afterwards, we took a taxi to the zoo. We made it there and asked the gatekeeper where we were supposed to buy tickets for the water puppet show. Apparently, they are sold at the history museum. We looked at the map and saw that it was somewhere down the block or around the corner. Should have been easy to find right? Wrong. We had rounded the corner and walked a good block and didn’t see it anywhere. We asked several locals for some guidance. The first time we asked, we were directed right. The second person we asked directed us left. Either we had missed it or they don’t know what they are talking about. After laughing a lot and walking around in some more circles, we found it. It ended up being pretty much next to the zoo entrance. Go figure. It was actually a building that Mary Alice had made a comment on at the beginning. We were just happy that we found it, and just in time to catch a water puppet show. For those of you who don’t know, a water puppet show is where elaborate wooden animal puppets dance/move in a little pond. The pond is located in front of a little building where the puppeteers are. They are actually standing up to their waste in the water behind a mesh screen so that we can’t see them. It was actually pretty awesome. This history museum its self wasn’t that great. It had a lot of pots. The coolest thing was a woman mummy who died in 1890 and was discovered in the 90’s. We decided that we wanted to go to the War Reminisce Museum too. We piled two of us (along with all of our bags) in to a tiny little man-powered rickshaw. Hilarious. The poor guy had to pedal us all of the way there. It took us a while to get there but after many laughs, close calls, and stares we made it. The museum was incredibly moving. It was basically consisted of a lot of graphic pictures of the war and the victims. It read just about every caption of every picture in the entire museum. There was one particular photo that I don’t think I can ever forget. It was a picture of a US soldier holding up the top half of a Vietnamese civilian, as if he (or now it) were a prize. The only thing that made it recognizably human was the head/face. The rest of the torso was just shreds. One could see the rest of the body in a shredded heap on the ground. There was also a comment book which contained a lot of hostile/negative entries towards Americans, Bush, and Iraq. That was the Debbie Downer portion of the day, but I am so glad that we decided to go. We went back to the ship, showered, and went back to Chi Chi for our dress fitting. 2 of mine were ready. The black one turned out great! I just had them adjust the length. The turquoise satin one turned out as well. Don’t worry mom, it’s not that bad. You’ll probably just say it looks like lingerie like you always do. I was very happy and couldn’t wait to see the last one the next day.
Next on the list was shoe shopping. I bought a pair to wear with my dress to the ambassador’s ball because I left all that type of stuff at home. As normal, I was given the shoes in a bag and handed a receipt. We had started to leave when I realized that I had never actually paid for the shoes. We turned back around, found the two girls helping me, and asked them where I would go to pay. They were SO confused. Eventually the two security guards came over to see what was going on. No one seemed to understand that I needed to pay. When they finally understood, or seemed to at least, the response was “come back tomorrow.” What? Come back tomorrow? Seriously? I had to pay for them now since I was going to be busy all day tomorrow. The girl then told us to follow her, and she took us to a bank. I already had money. I just handed her the money and the connection was finally made. I’m pretty sure that I could have left from the beginning with out paying. It was weird. After some DVD shopping, we were on our way to dinner when I looked in the shoe bag and saw a hat too. I started laughing and was like “where the hell did this hat come from?” Mary Alice cracked up and was just like “oh Vietnam, always an adventure.” So now I have a baseball hat and I have no idea where it came from. Everything we have done in Vietnam has turned in to some kind of story, hence why my entries are so long. Dinner was great. I had calamari and some beef thing that I couldn’t get myself to finish. We then went to an Internet café and had some coffee. We were getting ready to leave when the power on the entire street went out. I just turned at looked at Mary Alice and said, “it’s because we are here.” Again, we just laughed because when we left we saw that it was only our little shop that still didn’t have power. What a fitting ending to a crazy day.
This was a day full of missions. Surprisingly we managed to accomplish all of them and then some. Our first goal of the day was to find out when the water puppet show was. I needed something to write about for 5 pages for my world music class. We figured that the best bet was to ask the tourism information center. Needless to say, we were sorely mistaken. When we asked them about it, they didn’t know the times but they said that it was at the zoo. One woman told us to go to the bookstore that was down the street and ask. So we went and asked them there and either they didn’t know or they didn’t understand what we were asking. I decided to try and look in a tourism book. No luck. We went back to the tourism center to ask again or to see if we could use a phone to call the zoo and ask. This time she said to go to the theater, which after two attempts to try and find it, we finally found it… right next to the bookstore. Why she didn’t say theater first is beyond me. Even after all of that work, the theater looked a wee bit sketchy so we didn’t even bother asking. We went and shopped some more figuring we could just head over to the zoo after lunch and hopefully we would catch a show. We went back to the market in search of a few specific items. Unfortunately, we entered right in to the smelly food area. I just about lost my breakfast as made our way through it. It was lunchtime by the time we were done at the market. We wandered until we came across a good-looking restaurant (which doesn’t take long in this city). I satisfied my Wisconsinite craving for cheese with a pizza. It was the most westernized food I have had in an extremely long time. I think my stomach was relieved to get a break. Afterwards, we took a taxi to the zoo. We made it there and asked the gatekeeper where we were supposed to buy tickets for the water puppet show. Apparently, they are sold at the history museum. We looked at the map and saw that it was somewhere down the block or around the corner. Should have been easy to find right? Wrong. We had rounded the corner and walked a good block and didn’t see it anywhere. We asked several locals for some guidance. The first time we asked, we were directed right. The second person we asked directed us left. Either we had missed it or they don’t know what they are talking about. After laughing a lot and walking around in some more circles, we found it. It ended up being pretty much next to the zoo entrance. Go figure. It was actually a building that Mary Alice had made a comment on at the beginning. We were just happy that we found it, and just in time to catch a water puppet show. For those of you who don’t know, a water puppet show is where elaborate wooden animal puppets dance/move in a little pond. The pond is located in front of a little building where the puppeteers are. They are actually standing up to their waste in the water behind a mesh screen so that we can’t see them. It was actually pretty awesome. This history museum its self wasn’t that great. It had a lot of pots. The coolest thing was a woman mummy who died in 1890 and was discovered in the 90’s. We decided that we wanted to go to the War Reminisce Museum too. We piled two of us (along with all of our bags) in to a tiny little man-powered rickshaw. Hilarious. The poor guy had to pedal us all of the way there. It took us a while to get there but after many laughs, close calls, and stares we made it. The museum was incredibly moving. It was basically consisted of a lot of graphic pictures of the war and the victims. It read just about every caption of every picture in the entire museum. There was one particular photo that I don’t think I can ever forget. It was a picture of a US soldier holding up the top half of a Vietnamese civilian, as if he (or now it) were a prize. The only thing that made it recognizably human was the head/face. The rest of the torso was just shreds. One could see the rest of the body in a shredded heap on the ground. There was also a comment book which contained a lot of hostile/negative entries towards Americans, Bush, and Iraq. That was the Debbie Downer portion of the day, but I am so glad that we decided to go. We went back to the ship, showered, and went back to Chi Chi for our dress fitting. 2 of mine were ready. The black one turned out great! I just had them adjust the length. The turquoise satin one turned out as well. Don’t worry mom, it’s not that bad. You’ll probably just say it looks like lingerie like you always do. I was very happy and couldn’t wait to see the last one the next day.
Next on the list was shoe shopping. I bought a pair to wear with my dress to the ambassador’s ball because I left all that type of stuff at home. As normal, I was given the shoes in a bag and handed a receipt. We had started to leave when I realized that I had never actually paid for the shoes. We turned back around, found the two girls helping me, and asked them where I would go to pay. They were SO confused. Eventually the two security guards came over to see what was going on. No one seemed to understand that I needed to pay. When they finally understood, or seemed to at least, the response was “come back tomorrow.” What? Come back tomorrow? Seriously? I had to pay for them now since I was going to be busy all day tomorrow. The girl then told us to follow her, and she took us to a bank. I already had money. I just handed her the money and the connection was finally made. I’m pretty sure that I could have left from the beginning with out paying. It was weird. After some DVD shopping, we were on our way to dinner when I looked in the shoe bag and saw a hat too. I started laughing and was like “where the hell did this hat come from?” Mary Alice cracked up and was just like “oh Vietnam, always an adventure.” So now I have a baseball hat and I have no idea where it came from. Everything we have done in Vietnam has turned in to some kind of story, hence why my entries are so long. Dinner was great. I had calamari and some beef thing that I couldn’t get myself to finish. We then went to an Internet café and had some coffee. We were getting ready to leave when the power on the entire street went out. I just turned at looked at Mary Alice and said, “it’s because we are here.” Again, we just laughed because when we left we saw that it was only our little shop that still didn’t have power. What a fitting ending to a crazy day.
Thursday, April 12, 2007
Vietnam. OH my! The adventures I have been on in this country...
Day 2
It was so incredibly hard to get up the second day even despite my excitement for the events planned that day. I was lucky enough to get on a SAS service visit to a local school for the deaf. Getting on a service visit is next to impossible since the demand is so incredibly high. You have no idea how excited I was to finally get on one. I had been trying since port number one. Unfortunately, I had forgotten that I had already signed up and paid for an over night trip to the Mekong Delta before I had even left Madison. Even though it was a fair amount of money, I quickly decided to forgo the over night trip, loose my money, and do the service visit instead. I am SO glad that I did. We arrived at the school early in the morning and they greeted us with several performances. Several girls did two Vietnamese dances and the boys danced to some “hip hop.” For a while I had forgot that they couldn’t hear until I noticed that their teacher giving them signals as to when the song started. It was pretty incredible. We then had some time to interact with the students. The kids were about 6 to 18 years old. We were given paper and markers to draw with. Mary Alice and I sat down with the cutest little boy. He helped me with most of my drawings lol. I must not have been doing them correctly. I’m not sure how much I should have trusted him since he seemed to get more marker on his legs than on the paper. He would decided when I would use which color by taking the marker out of my hand and giving me another. A little bit later, a boy (14 years old) came and sat down next to me. Eventually we got to drawing animals for each other. Either of us would draw an animal and we would both write its name in our language. I’m surprised he recognized my drawing of a frog…it was horrendous. I also busted out the butterfly stickers I had brought with me. Let me tell you, any time you bring out stickers in a school you are bound to have a good time. One girl took the whole sheet and ran with it. A few minutes later I saw her covered in them. When we left to go to the zoo, I saw half of the stickers stuck to the floor. I felt so bad… but it was pretty funny. We each paired off with a student to be with at the zoo. The 14 year old boy was pretty much stuck to my side at this point making him my kid. Mary Alice and I told our leader that the two of us should not be held responsible for two other human beings. Our friends already had called dibs on our stuff because none of them believe that the two of us will make it out of this country alive. Seriously, they did and I don’t blame them lol. We all boarded the bus but there weren’t enough seats for everyone so I ended up sitting on the floor in the back. It was one of the most silent bus rides of my life even though there were tons of conversations going on. It was interesting to watch them interact with each other. I noticed that there was a lot of hitting one another in order to get the other persons attention. It was boiling outside by the time we arrived. Mary Alice’s kid was on a power trip and my guy sauntered along making the whole keeping track of our kid difficult, esp. since they couldn’t hear/understand anything we said. They bolted straight for the reptile center, which made me laugh because Mary Alice is deathly afraid of snakes. So for a while I was responsible for two human beings. Eek. Scary thought I know since I can barely keep track of myself most of the time. I managed though. They didn’t seem real interested in the rest of the zoo since I am sure they have seen it a million times. We just followed them around a lot. We met the group back up for lunch (which was from the ship). My kid had absolutely NO idea what the mustard packet was or what to do with it. I tried to explain it to him but of course it was extremely difficult. Eventually I got it across to him that it went on the sandwich. I had him taste it first before I helped him put it on. We did the same with the mayo packet… and judging the face he made after tasting that one, I threw it away. After lunch, they jumped some rope and we left to drop them back off at the school before going back to the ship. I wished we would have stayed at the school and spent more time with them in their element because that was incredibly fun. The entire experience was pretty amazing, and as I said earlier, I am so glad I went.
We arrived back on the ship and took a quick shower after sweating all morning in the hot sun. We met up with our friend Brandon for the rest of the day. He is such a good sport. We dragged him back with us try on our dresses and get them adjusted. I was a little nervous but it didn’t matter because mine weren’t done yet. I’d have to come back tomorrow. Mary Alice tried hers on and got them refitted but would also have to come back tomorrow for a second fitting. Afterwards, we went back to the market to do some serious damage… and I was successful. I forgot to mention it in the first day’s entry, but at the market Mary Alice and I were walking around looking at stuff when this old man stopped us and asked with the up most enthusiasm, “would you like to buy some postcards?” As usual, we said “no thanks.” He responded with an “Oh my god! But why not?!” It was the funniest thing I had ever heard in my entire life. His facial expression and tone of voice were priceless. It was as if we had chosen to die by torture right then and there than to live. We have been laughing about it ever since. We hope to go back and try to video it so that people will understand how incredibly funny it was. He did a version of it again the second day so our fingers are crossed for a third time. The market is an interesting experience in itself. Brandon and Mary Alice both got hit at least once. Women would grab and you and try to sell you things. One time a woman grabbed my arm as I walked by and she held on as I kept walking. Eventually I said “uh, I kind of need my arm. Can I please have it back.” After a little while longer she gave up and I was freed. The smell in the market is also a bit overwhelming. The corner of the market devoted to food made my stomach curl. We tried to push through all the people as quickly as possible before we all got sick. After the adventures at the market, we did more shopping as we made our way to go and get a message. Which reminds me that I never mentioned what it’s like to cross a street in Vietnam. Imagine about 40 mopeds and 5 cars and a truck or two coming at you all at once and crossing anyway. That is pretty much what it is like. For those of you who know my fear of crossing the street in Madison when the crosswalk sign is red, you’d be impressed. I actually find it fun. It’s kind of like playing a game of dodge ball with vehicles. I’ve had a couple of close calls, but no harm done…yet. We made it alive to the message place we had picked out. If I will remember one experience from vietnam, it will be the massage I received. Mary Alice, Brandon, and I all get put in to this pretty tiny room separated by some hanging cloth. Brandon gets his own little stall and Mary Alice and I get put in one that has two massage tables in it. Before we know it, two women are pretty much undressing us right there. We were like “hmm, is there like a towel or something.” We were laughing shock and disbelief. Was this really happening? Oh yes, it was. They handed us each a towel but it hardly mattered. Eventually we got situated and they started. To say the very least, the towel served almost no purpose whatsoever… Mary Alice and I got close very quickly. We were pretty quiet at the beginning of the massage. It was a little rough but still good. The two giving us massages would talk and then laugh about something. I assumed that they were laughing about us. At one point, the woman got on top of me and started walking around. All I could think was “I have a little Vietnamese woman walking on me right now.” I wasn’t expecting it since we ordered the hot stone massage. We were lying there when we heard a new person come in next to us… a few moments later we heard an English voice ask “Is there a towel or something?” We both laughed and thought “welcome to our world.” It was when the Christmas music came on that I completely lost it. Mary Alice and I couldn’t stop laughing. The whole thing was just hilarious. I was laughing so hard that I was crying. Later, she cracked my neck and I could have sworn by the sound that she had cracked my head right off. It felt good though. At the end we were still laughing. It was the best spent $20 of my life solely for the experience and entertainment value I relieved from it. Afterwards that adventure as we like to call it, we went to Vietnam House for drinks and appetizers. I had the national dish apparently. It was a beef noodle soup. Pretty tasty. We then moved to a different restaurant for our main course. We left the business card of the restaurant on our friend teddy’s door with a time to meet us. We didn’t know if he would actually make it or not but he did. At the moment, I can’t remember what I ordered so it must not that been that great lol. Afterwards, we went to a new restaurant for dessert. I had a yummy strawberry banana smoothie while we sat and hung out for a good while. Exhausted, we all headed back to the ship to crash. Again, I tried calling my mom with no luck. MOM!! I wrote the first entry of Vietnam’s blog and passed out.
It was so incredibly hard to get up the second day even despite my excitement for the events planned that day. I was lucky enough to get on a SAS service visit to a local school for the deaf. Getting on a service visit is next to impossible since the demand is so incredibly high. You have no idea how excited I was to finally get on one. I had been trying since port number one. Unfortunately, I had forgotten that I had already signed up and paid for an over night trip to the Mekong Delta before I had even left Madison. Even though it was a fair amount of money, I quickly decided to forgo the over night trip, loose my money, and do the service visit instead. I am SO glad that I did. We arrived at the school early in the morning and they greeted us with several performances. Several girls did two Vietnamese dances and the boys danced to some “hip hop.” For a while I had forgot that they couldn’t hear until I noticed that their teacher giving them signals as to when the song started. It was pretty incredible. We then had some time to interact with the students. The kids were about 6 to 18 years old. We were given paper and markers to draw with. Mary Alice and I sat down with the cutest little boy. He helped me with most of my drawings lol. I must not have been doing them correctly. I’m not sure how much I should have trusted him since he seemed to get more marker on his legs than on the paper. He would decided when I would use which color by taking the marker out of my hand and giving me another. A little bit later, a boy (14 years old) came and sat down next to me. Eventually we got to drawing animals for each other. Either of us would draw an animal and we would both write its name in our language. I’m surprised he recognized my drawing of a frog…it was horrendous. I also busted out the butterfly stickers I had brought with me. Let me tell you, any time you bring out stickers in a school you are bound to have a good time. One girl took the whole sheet and ran with it. A few minutes later I saw her covered in them. When we left to go to the zoo, I saw half of the stickers stuck to the floor. I felt so bad… but it was pretty funny. We each paired off with a student to be with at the zoo. The 14 year old boy was pretty much stuck to my side at this point making him my kid. Mary Alice and I told our leader that the two of us should not be held responsible for two other human beings. Our friends already had called dibs on our stuff because none of them believe that the two of us will make it out of this country alive. Seriously, they did and I don’t blame them lol. We all boarded the bus but there weren’t enough seats for everyone so I ended up sitting on the floor in the back. It was one of the most silent bus rides of my life even though there were tons of conversations going on. It was interesting to watch them interact with each other. I noticed that there was a lot of hitting one another in order to get the other persons attention. It was boiling outside by the time we arrived. Mary Alice’s kid was on a power trip and my guy sauntered along making the whole keeping track of our kid difficult, esp. since they couldn’t hear/understand anything we said. They bolted straight for the reptile center, which made me laugh because Mary Alice is deathly afraid of snakes. So for a while I was responsible for two human beings. Eek. Scary thought I know since I can barely keep track of myself most of the time. I managed though. They didn’t seem real interested in the rest of the zoo since I am sure they have seen it a million times. We just followed them around a lot. We met the group back up for lunch (which was from the ship). My kid had absolutely NO idea what the mustard packet was or what to do with it. I tried to explain it to him but of course it was extremely difficult. Eventually I got it across to him that it went on the sandwich. I had him taste it first before I helped him put it on. We did the same with the mayo packet… and judging the face he made after tasting that one, I threw it away. After lunch, they jumped some rope and we left to drop them back off at the school before going back to the ship. I wished we would have stayed at the school and spent more time with them in their element because that was incredibly fun. The entire experience was pretty amazing, and as I said earlier, I am so glad I went.
We arrived back on the ship and took a quick shower after sweating all morning in the hot sun. We met up with our friend Brandon for the rest of the day. He is such a good sport. We dragged him back with us try on our dresses and get them adjusted. I was a little nervous but it didn’t matter because mine weren’t done yet. I’d have to come back tomorrow. Mary Alice tried hers on and got them refitted but would also have to come back tomorrow for a second fitting. Afterwards, we went back to the market to do some serious damage… and I was successful. I forgot to mention it in the first day’s entry, but at the market Mary Alice and I were walking around looking at stuff when this old man stopped us and asked with the up most enthusiasm, “would you like to buy some postcards?” As usual, we said “no thanks.” He responded with an “Oh my god! But why not?!” It was the funniest thing I had ever heard in my entire life. His facial expression and tone of voice were priceless. It was as if we had chosen to die by torture right then and there than to live. We have been laughing about it ever since. We hope to go back and try to video it so that people will understand how incredibly funny it was. He did a version of it again the second day so our fingers are crossed for a third time. The market is an interesting experience in itself. Brandon and Mary Alice both got hit at least once. Women would grab and you and try to sell you things. One time a woman grabbed my arm as I walked by and she held on as I kept walking. Eventually I said “uh, I kind of need my arm. Can I please have it back.” After a little while longer she gave up and I was freed. The smell in the market is also a bit overwhelming. The corner of the market devoted to food made my stomach curl. We tried to push through all the people as quickly as possible before we all got sick. After the adventures at the market, we did more shopping as we made our way to go and get a message. Which reminds me that I never mentioned what it’s like to cross a street in Vietnam. Imagine about 40 mopeds and 5 cars and a truck or two coming at you all at once and crossing anyway. That is pretty much what it is like. For those of you who know my fear of crossing the street in Madison when the crosswalk sign is red, you’d be impressed. I actually find it fun. It’s kind of like playing a game of dodge ball with vehicles. I’ve had a couple of close calls, but no harm done…yet. We made it alive to the message place we had picked out. If I will remember one experience from vietnam, it will be the massage I received. Mary Alice, Brandon, and I all get put in to this pretty tiny room separated by some hanging cloth. Brandon gets his own little stall and Mary Alice and I get put in one that has two massage tables in it. Before we know it, two women are pretty much undressing us right there. We were like “hmm, is there like a towel or something.” We were laughing shock and disbelief. Was this really happening? Oh yes, it was. They handed us each a towel but it hardly mattered. Eventually we got situated and they started. To say the very least, the towel served almost no purpose whatsoever… Mary Alice and I got close very quickly. We were pretty quiet at the beginning of the massage. It was a little rough but still good. The two giving us massages would talk and then laugh about something. I assumed that they were laughing about us. At one point, the woman got on top of me and started walking around. All I could think was “I have a little Vietnamese woman walking on me right now.” I wasn’t expecting it since we ordered the hot stone massage. We were lying there when we heard a new person come in next to us… a few moments later we heard an English voice ask “Is there a towel or something?” We both laughed and thought “welcome to our world.” It was when the Christmas music came on that I completely lost it. Mary Alice and I couldn’t stop laughing. The whole thing was just hilarious. I was laughing so hard that I was crying. Later, she cracked my neck and I could have sworn by the sound that she had cracked my head right off. It felt good though. At the end we were still laughing. It was the best spent $20 of my life solely for the experience and entertainment value I relieved from it. Afterwards that adventure as we like to call it, we went to Vietnam House for drinks and appetizers. I had the national dish apparently. It was a beef noodle soup. Pretty tasty. We then moved to a different restaurant for our main course. We left the business card of the restaurant on our friend teddy’s door with a time to meet us. We didn’t know if he would actually make it or not but he did. At the moment, I can’t remember what I ordered so it must not that been that great lol. Afterwards, we went to a new restaurant for dessert. I had a yummy strawberry banana smoothie while we sat and hung out for a good while. Exhausted, we all headed back to the ship to crash. Again, I tried calling my mom with no luck. MOM!! I wrote the first entry of Vietnam’s blog and passed out.
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