April 12th Number 1

Shipboard life has changed since we started sailing again from Taiwan.  They’ve planned activities for every afternoon, every night. Film festivals, silent and live auctions, soccer tournaments (sore subject), euchure tournaments, and ice cream parties. The thing is, it’s technically, even though it doesn’t feel like we’re even at school, “exam time”. This means that people are participating in events and then pulling all-nighters to finish papers and projects.

I’ve been fighting a sore throat which has developed into a cold recently, and have been leaving the room periodically at odd hours of the night to keep from waking Jenn up. I walk down the hall and take a lap around deck 2 (affectionately known as the Favelas throughout the ship now), and, to my surprise, there are people up. It’s 3 am! Go to sleep! Some are sprawled out with papers surrounding them, hovered over their computer, which is plugged into the wall with a European adapter because it doesn’t have any battery left. Some are talking, procrastinating the project that sits in front of them. It’s convenient, really. I don’t have Tylenol PM or nighttime cold medicine, but out of the 10 people sitting in the hallway, someone always has something I can take. If people are up this late now, I can’t imagine what our last night on board is going to be like. I think I’ll sleep outside on the deck…

Tonight was the shipboard auction. It was like any other auction, and proceeds went to Semester at Sea and voyages to come. Everything from raising the flag in Hawaii to blowing the horn in San Diego to trips at people’s summer cottages to Backstreet Boys and Lakers tickets were up for grabs. The ones I remembered, however, were the outrageous ones. Five boxes of Girl Scout cookies were auctioned off, and the Samoas and Thin Mints in particular went for $75 and $104, respectively (“$104 for 104 days on the 104th voyage!”). Another person paid $155 for a signed box of Captain Crunch signed by the captain.

The best was at the end, when two people went at it to be the first person off the ship.

Market value: Priceless

Final bid: $1,600. Twice.

They ended up settling on $1,600 each to get off the ship first and second. I could’ve done the first 9 countries again for that price!

Today was April 12th. Tomorrow is also April 12th. Time warp! We’re 15 hours ahead now. Tonight we “gain” an hour, but repeat the day. I think that means we lose 23 hours. Maybe that means I’ll be 8 hours behind when I wake up tomorrow? We’ll see I guess.