In Mauritius, chilling with lions and scuba diving, no big deal

It should be a crime that Semester at Sea only let us in Mauritius for one day, we only got a taste of the so many things that you can do in Mauritius. The sad thing is that Mauritius is probably our most inaccessible port so I really don't think I will be returning as much as I really want to. The flights there are extremely expensive and you probably have to do over 2 days of flying just to get there. Mauritius is a popular vacation spot for Europeans. To be honest, I never even heard of Mauritius until I applied for Semester at Sea and now I am glad I know about it. If you don't know where Mauritius is look at a map at it is located east of Madagascar. Mauritius is such a beautiful island, it reminded me allot of Puerto Rico except it was very economically stable and much more quiet. Quiet was such a good change of pace from all the extremely loud countries we went to.

Day 1

We heard of this place that you could play with lion cubs and cheetah cubs, so we took a taxi there. When we got there, we quickly realized that they did not have cubs to interact with, just full grown lions. We decided to do it anyways! The people gave us stick to defend ourselves incase the lions attacked and told us to not scream or run (I was traveling with a group of mostly girls and they did not like that rule at all). There was nothing between us and the lions, we could approach them and pet them. The entire time in the back of my head I was thinking that any second this animal can turn around and maul me in a second, and all I had to defend myself was a stick. You just have to respect the sheer size and strength of the lions when you are petting them. I was completely surrounded by them as well. Luckily, lions sleep 20 hours in a day and only eat at one time, which was not the time that we were there. I have to say, I didn't wake up thinking to myself that I was going to be chilling with full grown lions.

After that, we ate some typical Mauritian food, which is a mix of French and Indian food. It was really tasty, although it was funny that we were back to eating Indian food after leaving India. We then went to the beach and relaxed there for the rest of the time period. We met an interesting Mauritian at the beach who was trying his hardest to flirt with the girls in our group, he kept coming back asking us about the address to KFC university because he wanted to be a cook, I don't even know the address to my University! He asked the girls"what is the password for American women?" I thought that was funny how he put that. He tried hard, but he did not succeed with any of them.

We then went back to the ship to meet up with people and then went out to eat. We tried the local Mauritian beer, which is world renowned. We then went to a casino. I went in with 200 rupees, and left with 200 rupees. I played black jack and won 300 rupees, then I cashed the 100 rupees I won playing blackjack so we could play slots. I gave everyone in our group 3 coins so they could play slots as well, and one girl in our group turned that 3 rupees into 147 rupees! I was not so lucky when it came to slots. At least I did not lose any money at the casino! We didn't stay out too late because we had to wake up extremely early to go scuba diving, and it was well worth going to bed early!

Day 2

We literally spent the whole day scuba diving, and Mauritius is probably some of the best scuba diving I have ever done in my life! We woke up very early to get some breakfast, then headed of to Tamarin to do some scuba diving! We did a total of 3 dives, and each had something unique about it

The first dive we did was called cathedral, and for a very good reason too. There were caves that we got to go up into, and at the top there was this gigantic puffer fish. We went into another cave with an opening angle slight upward. The sun just gleamed inside and it was absolutely spectacular, it really seemed like we were in a cathedral!

The second dive we did was teeming with sea life. Before we went in, a boat approached us with scuba divers telling us that they saw a bull shark and to be out on the lookout. We were all very excited because we all really wanted to see a shark We saw this huge ray, lion fish were everywhere! There were a few barracuda following us as well. We were all antsy looking for the shark, unfortunately we did not see it. There is no doubt in my mind the shark knew we were there. We went pretty deep in this dive, probably around 100 feet.

The last dive had the worst visibility, but it did not change how amazing the dive was. Before we got in the water, there was squid everywhere on the surface! We saw the most amazing coral that we were all mesmerized by, it was called bubble coral. Some of it was glowing, there were eels living inside of it. I can't really use words to describe it, you just have to see the pictures that we took. That coral was just amazing and I have never seen anything like it!

After the last dive, we had to quickly get to the ship! There is something called dock time, which means if you are late to the ship you have to stay on the ship for a small period of time at the next port. Every 15 minutes you are late, you get 3 hours of dock time. Tamarin is an hour drive from Port Louis, plus there was traffic. We really did not want to get dock time in South Africa. Our driver ended up taking us to the wrong port! He didn't understand that the port was not our port, and we only had about 30 minutes to spare! When he figured out where we had to go, we ran into traffic! We finally arrived at the ship with about 10-15 minutes to spare, but then there was a huge line of people trying to get into the ship. Allot of the taxi drivers did not know where the ship was located! So we finally checked back into the ship with about 2 minutes to spare, we are not getting dock time in South Africa!

No matter how much sunscreen or hats I put on my head, it still gets burnt. Next week I will be doing safaris and cage diving with great white sharks in South Africa!

Taj Mahal Picture

Taj Mahal Picture
Originally uploaded by vic41234

Here is a picture of me at the Taj. I'll put a bald one of me up soon.

Neptune Day! I'm Bald!

Today we celebrated Neptune Day! Neptune Day is a line crossing ceremony that is a very old naval tradition, Semester at Sea has turned it into their own celebration. When a sailor who has never crossed the equator by sea they are considered a pollywag and most do certain initiation rights to be considered a shellback. Technically speaking we crossed the equator yesterday, so we kind of celebrated a day late but who cares, it was a fun day!

We got woken up bright and early this morning by the crew, around 7:30AM. The crew came dressed in togas banging on our doors, blowing whistles and playing their drums. Needless to say, it was quite loud and woke everyone up. I got some breakfast and after I finished, I noticed the crew back with their togas and playing music in the dining hall heading outside, only this time they were accompanied with the deans of Semester at Sea and other faculty all dressed up in appropriate attire. We all followed them outside to the pool deck for the start of the ceremonies. Our Executive dean was dressed as King Neptune and the faculty was his royal court. He demanded that we be initiated to a citizen of the sea. We then got "fish guts" poured over us (it was actually just a green liquid that smelt odd) and then we swam across the pool, got out of the pool and had to kiss a raw fish. We then had to kiss the rings of the royal court and then we were officially deemed shellbacks.

After that we had the option to shave our heads as part of tradition, I figured that I might as well partake. I have never shaved my head, I was even born with a full head of hair! Most people just got clippers taken to their heads, so they weren't completely shaved. After I did the official ceremony of clipping my hair I figured I should go big or go home so I decided that I wanted to be completely bald so my cousin bicked my hair with a razor. My head feels so weird! I can't stop rubbing it, and neither can people on the ship! I have had random people come up to me to rub my shaved head. My scalp is completely white because I have never even had short hair before, I am going to need allot of sunscreen for my head. My cousin also took her henna tattoo ink and put some designs in my scalp. Don't worry everyone, I will have hair by the time I get back.

I am surprised with how many girls shaved their heads, there has to be at least 10-15 of them. Bravo to them, I know hair is a big deal to girls. At night there was also a talent show and I must say that this ship has so much talent in it! There was allot of singing, dancing, poetry, a stand-up comedian, and my cousin also partook in the talent show as well with some latin dancing.

Mauritius in 2 days!

Engineer at Sea

Apparently there is an engineering themed voyage coming up for the short-term summer of 2011 and to promote this voyage to engineers, Semester at Sea interviewed me on the educational value of the voyage. I told them that studying abroad is extremely valuable for any engineer because we often do not realize the global implications that the products that we work on have. I also said that the classes might not help obtain an engineering degree, but the experiences that you have during the whole voyage will help you in your professional career and help you become a better global citizen to the world. I definitely recommend any of my fellow engineering friends to do this voyage, it is only a month long so if you are able to get an internship you can probably do both and it is also much cheaper than a normal voyage. Be on the lookout for the promotional video for this voyage because I will more than likely be on it.

Also, tomorrow is Neptune day which means tonight is the last night I will have hair. I haven't had a haircut this entire voyage because I figured that I am getting a free one soon. I'll make sure to update after Neptune day.

India!

India is a very interesting place. You cannot go into India with a closed mind, otherwise you will not enjoy yourself. They told us before we got there to not judge a book by its cover, to look deeper and you will find some amazing things. I can't tell you how true that statement holds in India. India is the biggest democracy in the world when it comes to population, so it is very important to learn about India.

Chennai

I almost did judge a book by its cover in India because I was sick and tired by people trying to rip us off in India. Two different auto-rickshaw drivers tried to rip us off, one wanted us to pay $50 for each person in the rickshaw! We got into a big argument with them for doing that. It seemed like at first everyone just wanted our money. There was also allot of trash everywhere.

But you have to understand that not everyone is like that in India and the majority of the Indian people are very nice and generally want to more about you and the United States. Thats why I did not jump to conclusions in Chennai. Besides the bad experiences with the auto-rickshaw drivers, we did have a fairly good time. We visited a Hindu family, and they were extremely welcoming and taught us much about how the Hindu family lives. We also visited a Shiva temple, which was one of the biggest temples in Chennai. We also saw a newly wedded couple visiting the temple, apparently that is one of the first things you are suppose to do after you get married in the Hindu family. We learned about many of the Hindu gods. Shiva is the destroyer, he is married to Poverty I believe is the name, and they had a son called Ganesh, which is the elephant headed god and he is also the removal of obstacles so many people have him in front of their businesses.

Delhi

After waking up extremely early (3AM!) we headed to Delhi and saw the capital of India. We saw Victory Tower. We saw some of of the embassies and the capital building of India. We then saw Humayun's tomb which was extraordinary! It was very much the same layout of the Taj Mahal. The entire time I was thinking about that if this tomb is not the must see monument in India, then how amazing is the Taj Mahal going to be. Humayun's tomb was built by the queen for her husband, while the Taj Mahal is the opposite. We saw families playing in the park which was really interesting and fun to watch. Monkeys were everywhere just roaming around. Then we went to where Ghandi was cremated.

Agra

We then took a train to Agra, also extremely early in the morning. We were on our way to the Taj Mahal! I figured if I were to every wear an Indian outfit, the Taj Mahal would be the place to do it, so many of us on the trip put on Indian outfits. I realized that Indian guys don't really wear Indian outfits out that much and they only wear it for special occasions, I got allot of strange looks. Some Indians did thank me for trying to fit into their culture.

The Taj Mahal is really as amazing as the pictures I have seen in books. It does not look real when you first get there, it looks like a backdrop in a picture or something. You don't realize its real until you actually go up to it and touch it. All the pictures that we took of it doesn't even look like that we are actually there. I was extremely impressed and just in awe with how big and how white it was, it was all just so surreal to me. It was perfectly symmetrical with two building next to it that looked exactly the same. The story of the Taj Mahal is actually a love story, which surprised me. The king loved his wife so much that he wanted to build a tomb so glorious so it could represent his love for her. He then wanted to build an exact replica of the Taj Mahal, except black, right across the river as a tomb for himself.

After our surreal time in the Taj Mahal, we went and visited Agra fort. This fort was built by the son of the person who built the Taj Mahal and it was used to imprison the person who built the Taj Mahal.

We then started our 6 hour bus ride to Jaipur and on our way we stopped at the deserted city. The deserted city was built by the mobile king who moved the capital to this location to improve his chances of having a son. Little did he know that this location did not have fresh safe drinking water, so he was forced to move the capital back to the original location. Pretty much, the deserted city was one big mistake, you would think water is one of the first things you look for when building a city. Regardless, the palace was still magnificent. It had a huge parcheesi board that actually used human female players. The king would sit in the middle and whoever won got a kiss from the king.

Jaipur

We got to Jaipur (the pink city) fairly late and our hotel had a club attached to it, so we all decided to do a little bit of clubbing that night. It was really interesting to see how Indians dance, it is very different than how we dance. Males and females keep a very far distance from each other because they respect each others space. It ended up being a really fun night.

Next morning we went to Amber fort. We started at the bottom of the hill and got to ride elephants to the top of Amber fort! It was so much fun doing that. The elephant sprayed itself with its trunk when we were riding it and I definitely got some elephant snot on my face. When we entered the fort, people were playing this really upbeat music welcoming to the fort. The fort itself provided an amazing view. It was pretty much a palace, there were ramps to every location so the king would just ride on a wagon to every location of the fort.

We also did a picture stop at the water palace, which is a palace built in the center of the lake. We also saw a very old observatory, which housed the biggest sun dial in the world. We also saw the City Palace. The City Palace had some ladies giving henna tattoos to everyone. Originally I didn't really want one, but a lady grabbed my arm and started drawing henna on my hand, so now I have a henna tattoo. There were also snake charmers everywhere in the city of Jaipur, seeing cobras was really cool.

Cochin

Cochin really changed my perception of the Indian people trying to take our money. We had the nicest auto-rickshaw driver and we hired him for two days. He took us to eat amazing food, simosas is probably one of the best tasting foods out there. He took us to see the chinese fishing nets, which we were there during the sunset so that made for some good pictures. Our driver even bought the girls in our group henna tattoo ink! At the end he didn't try to rip us off like the other rickshaw drivers did, he just wanted us to have a good time. When we asked him how much we owed him, he just told us to give him as much as we think he should get.

I also had the opportunity to play cricket in a park with some local kids. It was so much fun and I actually kinda get how to play now. The kids were really fun to hang out with and cricket is actually a fun sport. It is pretty much baseball with 2 bases and a 360 degree playing field.

We are now on our way to Mauritius and we are going to cross the equator for the first time, so Neptune day is coming up!

Sea Olympics

Before I explain exactly what the Sea Olympics are I just wanted to let everyone know that our ship stopped in Singapore to refuel. We then went through the Straight of Malacca two days ago and yesterday. I am happy to inform everyone that I am alive and so is everyone on the ship. Apparently there was a terrorist threat on the Straight of Malacca when we went through it according to CNN. That could explain the gun boats surrounding our ship for protection I guess. I don't know why some people were worried, it isn't like Semester at Sea would put all these students in a dangerous situation, they have been doing this for 100 voyages now. Don't believe me, here is the article:

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/asiapcf/03/04/singapore.malacca.terror.threat/index.html

Today we had our Sea Olympics, and I am very exhausted! Pretty much, every cabin area is assigned a sea to represent, my cabin area is the Baltic Sea. Luckily for me, our colors are orange so all the orange things I bought I can reuse them back at home for Gator games! There was events going on all around the ship and everyone got to participate.

I personally did the Extreme Musical Chairs, and yes, it was extreme. They tied our hands behind our backs and they threw wads of paper at us while we played musical chairs. I did quite well, I got in 4th place.

I also participated in the relay. In the relay there was many stations where you assigned some of your sea to go to, once completed they would pass the "baton" (which was a t-shirt) to the next station. Stations were located all around the ship so there was allot of power walking, we could not run for safety reasons. Some of the stations included leap frog, human wheel barrel, flip cup, mystery drink chug, library book find, whip cream pie (you had to find gum in a whip cream pie and then chew the gum and blow a bubble) and fishing. Specifically, I did the fruit pass. In this event, there was a team of four and you had to pass a fruit without using your hands. You had to place the fruit between your chin and your chest and had to pass the fruit that way. We did very very well in the relay, we came in second by 2 seconds.

Other events included dodge ball, tug-of-war, synchronized swimming, lip singing, ice cube chop stick grab, and many others. By far the funniest was synchronized swimming and the lip singing. Some of the choreographed dances were just hilarious. Our sea might not have done the best out of all the seas but we definitely had the most fun.

After the olympics, the crew actually grilled us hamburgers and ribs. I can't tell you how much I miss those things, it has been forever since I have had one! Then, we tried to see how many people we could fit into the pool. The pool became huge and pretty much a dance party. The pool on this ship is really small, it is more like an oversized jacuzzi!  The  pool was pretty much empty by the time we had to get out.

While all of this was going on, the crew was practicing man over board drills. They threw dummies off the boat and would turn around the entire ship, get into a life boat, and pick them up. We were all cheering for them when they picked up the dummy.

Today was such a nice break from the normal routine of classes. I practically lost my voice from all the cheers and yelling but it was a great time. I wished we could do this more often. Next big day at sea is Neptune Day, which is after India. India in a couple days!

Good Morning Vietnam! And Cambodia too!

I am getting so much experiences on this trip that I think far exceed the cost of Semester at Sea. Cambodia was definitely the highlight of my trip but I will highlight what I did by day.

Day 1 (Vietnam)

I went to the Cu Chi tunnels and learned so much about the Vietnam War, but through an entirely different perspective. It is weird, we are all used to hearing about the Vietnam War through the perspective of Americans but we never have heard about it through the perspective of the Vietnamese. They don't even call it the Vietnam War, they call it the American War! It was just weird hearing terms such as "American Killer Heroes," they celebrated this one female soldier who killed many Americans. Then we saw traps used to kill and injure Americans. We got to go through the tunnels which were really small, and it was surprising that about 20,000 people lived in there during the war. War is just a horrible thing, both sides have done horrible things it is just really weird listening to the other side and their perspective. I asked our tour guide if the Vietnamese people still were mad at Americans for what we did during the war, and he had some interesting things to say. He said something along the lines that if you leave bad things in the roots of a plant then the plant is going to grow bad. He said that war is a horrible thing and that we should instead forgive what happened in the past and instead grow the relationship between the USA and Vietnam.

I also got to shoot a fully automatic AK-47, baller!

At night we hit up the town. Crossing the street in Vietnam is probably one of the most fun things I have done. The streets are littered by thousands and thousands of mopeds. This society is built upon mopeds! When you cross the street you literally just walk into the street, walk straight and confidently and just walk into a street with thousands of mopeds. You don't dodge the mopeds, you are suppose to let them dodge you. Every time you cross the street your life flashes before your eyes! We went to a club with many other Semester at Sea students at night.

Day 2 (Cambodia)

We woke up extremely early to head to Cambodia. The resort we stayed at was amazing! I understand now why booking a trip through Semester at Sea is so expensive, they put you in the nicest hotels! We had some free time so we swam in the hotel pool. It was so relieving being in the hot Cambodian weather. We then went to Angkor Wat, it is the biggest Hindu temple out there. It is amazing what people can build! After exploring the temple we went off to a dinner show and saw some traditional Japanese Geisha dancing (why we went to a Japanese Geisha dance show in Cambodia is a good question, especially since we were just in Japan) and we saw a little bit of traditional Cambodian dance. At night, I got my first professional massage, it was extremely cheap at the resort so I figured why not? That massage was amazing, the massager cracked bones I didn't even know that I had!

Day 3 (Cambodia)

We saw more temples, including the one that was in Laura Croft: Tomb Raider! It was cool to see something that you could recognize in a movie! We also got to ride elephants around the temple! We also got to feed the elephants bananas!

At night we went to the markets and got our foots massaged by fish! Thats right, you heard me correctly, fish massaged our feet. You pay $2 (yes that is American dollars, Cambodians actually prefer American dollars to their own money) and you get a free beer when you do it. You put your feet in this water and fish come to you feet and eat all the dead skin off of it. I am extremely ticklish and was pretty much laughing the whole time! We then went to this bar called "Angkor What?" we have fun saying that name and has pretty much become an inside joke with everyone that traveled with us.

We also got to ride tuk tuks everywhere. Tuk Tuks are pretty much these small 4 person chariots attached to the back of mopeds. Erin should totally get one attached to her moped so she can take me to class when I get back to Gainesville.

Day 4 (Cambodia & Vietnam)

We got to visit a water village. This village was entirely built on boats, and not just normal boats, they were old looking boats. There was a school boat, basketball court boat, and store boats! Some villagers pulled up to the side of our boat, jumped into and and tried to sell us some sodas! Some other villagers pulled up to the side of our boat to show us a snake they had. We also visited some artisan village where they train mute and deaf rural villagers art so they can make things and sell it to provide an honest income to their families.

We then went back to Vietnam and went out again to the clubs. This time instead of taking taxis, we hired people to take us around on the back of their mopeds. I though walking across the street was insane, it is even crazier when you are on the back of the mopeds!

Day 5 (Vietnam)

I visited the Cao Dai temple, which is really a fascinating religion! It is the 2nd most popular religion in Vietnam. This religion believes that each religion has wisdom that you can learn from. The religion combines other religions to combine the wisdoms. Jesus Christ, Thomas Jefferson, and Nelson Mendela are some of their saints to name just a few of them. The religion is fairly new, it was founded around 1920 or so. The temple was extremely colorful and we got to watch a little bit of a service they have.

We then visited this mountain that is famous in Vietnamese folklore. Apparently there was this girl that loved this poor guy, but her parents arranged for her to get married to this rich man. She did not want to so she ran away and committed suicide on this mountain because she was so heart broken. I think that was the jist of the story of the Lady of the Black Mountain, their are many different versions. We then got to take alpine slides all the way down the mountains, it was so much fun!

Final thoughts on Cambodia

Cambodia was a huge eye opener for me! I was completely ignorant of the Cambodian genocide and how recent it was. Our tour guide's entire family was killed in the genocide, and the weird thing is that the genocide is so normal to them that when he talked about it it was like he was talking about anything else you would talk about in a normal conversation. The genocide killed 2 million people, and it was targeted at the intellectuals of society. Just wearing eye glasses could get you killed because that was a sign of intelligence. This genocide left millions orphaned and there was pretty much 2 generations that were completely wiped out.

Cambodians seem generally happier than any other country, even though they are much poorer. I was surprised to see very little beggars, there was many many vendors everywhere trying to sell you things, but at least they were trying to make an honest living and not trying to just beg for the money.

I want to go back to Cambodia once I finish my engineering degree and do some sort of project their in the Children's hospital or work with engineers without borders or something along those lines. One of the Semester at Sea students that I met on this trip got to visit the hospital and he was telling me how they need as much help as possible to provide healthcare for the millions of children. They are trying to start up a cardiology center as well, so maybe I could do something there. Or maybe helping provide clean water or something along those lines. This trip has really encouraged me to finish my degree so I can help the international community in some sort of way.