January 25-January 29: Hawai'i

So I lied…this one would be long too…oops.

Okay so not much happened the rest of the week before we docked in Hawai’i. Except I got sick. Two days before Hawai’i I came down with a sinus infection…sad story.

We dock in Hilo, Hawai’i, or The Big Island as they call it, on January 25. We had to get up at 6 am to go through immigration because the ship came from Mexico. It was a fairly quick process…in and out. After which, we went to Walmart. It was like a mad dash for Walmart. Everyone was in dire need of snacks among other things. Once we had all we needed we dropped it back on the ship. A friend of mine and I had about 2 hours before I had to be back to go on a Semester at Sea sanctioned trip. So a group of 5 of us walked along the side of the road, the rest were trying to find a beach. We found a gorgeous rock beach. It really wasn’t a place where you could lay out, but it had some great views. After a while my friend and I turned back and headed to our trip. We were doing the City Tour of Hilo.

The nice thing about doing these trips, as opposed to going off on your own, is that you get to meet a ton of people. Our first stop was at this Banyan tree “park.” Here there were large trees planted by Cecil B. DeMille, Amelia Earhart, and Babe Ruth. Then we went to this Japanese Garden called Liluokalani Gardens named after Hawaii’s last queen. It was absolutely beautiful. From there we went to Rainbow Falls. It was supposed to be a waterfall but since they haven’t had much rain this year it wasn’t flowing. But we got to see amazing trees and scenery. There were a ton of kids cliff jump from about 25-30 feet and I really wanted to but I didn’t get to the spot quick enough. Then we went to this local flew/farmers market because everyone was starving. Some kid bought some sugarcane…which I personally think isn’t really that good. After that we went to a local art museum, which was really nice to see locals’ works of art.

After that I met back with everyone on the ship. We hung out for a few hours and then went for dinner at a local bar called Shooters at 8pm. In a matter of 30 minutes it was swarmed with Semester at Sea students. SAS people were either at Shooters, this place called Margarita Village, and this world famous pancake house.

The next day I woke up and immediately went to my trip. I went to Volcanoes National Park, which is located on the Mauna Lao Volcano. I knew I few people on the trip so it was a good time. We went up to the top of the park and saw the Kilauea Caldera and the Kilauea Iki Crater. The crater was smoking which was pretty amazing to see. We then drove to the Kilauea Calder, which essentially was a live and active volcano. And as you looked down you people were walking on the surface. I really really wanted to go down but we didn’t have the time. From there we went to a trail that was created from a lava flow and so we got to see and walk the path of a lava tube. We went in these awesome caves and you were literally walking through the forest…pretty cool. After that we headed back to the ship. We had about 3 hours before we had to get back on the ship so a bunch of us went out to eat. 5 of us went to this place called Verna’s and the others went to that Pancake House. Verna’s was outside and you just walked up to this window and ordered. So everyone will be surprised to know…I actually tried something new!!! I know oh my god…am I feeling okay? Haha I really wanted chicken fingers, but they only had this thing called katsu, which was so good. Katsu is, what seems like 2 different types of chicken, breaded and deep fried. So I guess I really didn’t expand too much but I did expand my chicken palate haha. After lunch we got back on the ship and sailed to Honolulu.

January 27 was my first day in Honolulu/Oahu. I did another sanction trip with SAS. I went to the Polynesian Culture Center. This place was like Disney’s Epcot but with Polynesian countries and cultures and with more entertainment. It was a lot of fun and there is a lot to talk about and it is sort of hard to type about so I’ll just give the basics. The deal behind the center is that teens from Hawai’i, Tahiti, Fiji, New Zealand, Tonga, and Samoa came to Brigham Young University (probably spelled wrong), a Mormon college, to get and education and by auditioning/performing at the Center, they received free tuition. It was a 12 hours trip, which was exhausting and a 1h and 30min drive from the ship. We got there and went to a few countries. Then a few of us sat down for lunch and had a really interesting, somewhat enlightening, and frustrating conversation. Those who learned by facts felt they weren’t learning anything, but as an “art/entertainment” person I felt I learned a lot. You got to see different dances/songs/traditions from each island. Now, could I replicate them? No. Could I be able to recognize it? No. But I still learned something. I still got to see something I’ve never seen before. So that was a little frustrating, being the only one who felt they were learning something without having to know facts. After that we talked to a worker. It was nice to get her perspective on going to a Mormon college, working at the park, and representing her culture. From there we found a missionary worker from Hong Kong and Taiwan. The lady from Hong Kong was so sweet. She gave us a list of places to go when we hit Hong Kong, as well as two popular black market shopping areas. And she also gave us her phone numbers to call her when we got there. Talking with the Taiwan lady was really nice because we got a little more in depth with her culture and how it is comparable to the US.

I got back at 10:30 and met up with some friends on the Waikiki shopping strip, which is right by the beach. They had spent the day at the beach and met this waiter from Boston (who had only been in Hawai’i for 4 months) at Jimmy Buffet’s Margaritaville. Once I got there we met up with him again and he walked us around the nightlife in Waikiki. The 5 of us girls went back to his apartment and met is 2 girl roommates and his other guy roommate. They were really sweet…and not as creepy/sketchy/unsafe as it sounds. It was about 2:30 in the morning by the time we got back to the ship.

The next day was pretty boring, but fun. We woke up late because we were so exhausted and decided to not go to Diamond Head Rainforest/Waterfall thing and just went to the beach for 5 hours. I didn’t realize how hot the sun was and therefore didn’t put on any lotion. Needless to say it is 3 days later and I’m still super burnt.

So we’ve been back on the ship for 3 days, so we have about 8 more days to go…and nothing too exciting happens on the ship. I’ve gotten together twice with some friends to play cards. I went to salsa dancing lessons tonight. And I’m “involved” with this photography club and video club. I’m currently just planning what I’m going to do after my day trips with SAS in Japan.

I promise promise promise to write shorter and more often once in Japan. And on the probable chance that I don’t, you can expect a long detailed email like this after each port.

If anything exciting happens on the ship between now and Japan I’ll definitely let you know. But I really think the biggest thing that will happen is we will have gone from 80 plus degrees to 20 in a matter of a week. Boo hoo.

Okay, I’m really done now…wow this was long. I’ll write soon.

Okay…first blog entry, its going to be long cause its covering about a week so…here it goes.

Today is the 6^th day we’ve been on the boat. So we have 2 more before we get to Hawaii.

The first day was crazy. They said it would take about 2 and a half hours to get from San Diego to Ensenada. Well, it really isn’t that long, expect it took about an hour just to get across the boarder. They boarder guards were decked out in army gear and had small sandbag barricades everywhere. I was just waiting for the tank to come around the corner haha. The area was either really pretty or pretty impoverished…but interesting either way. I didn’t take any pictures because my camera was stuff somewhere under my seat. The one thing I wish I had taken a picture of was this HUGE colored statue of Jesus. He was on this hill alone and had to be at least 25-30 feet tall, probably taller. I think it’s only appropriate that Israel, or maybe even Florida, have gigantic statue of Moses :)

Getting on the boat was exciting and not too ridiculous…but it did have more security check points than an airport. The first meal was salad, some type of potatoes, some type of pasta, some type of meat, bread rolls, soup, and peanut butter and jelly. Some of my favorite foods! You’d think I’d be in heaven, except for the fact that it’s essentially the same meal every day for lunch and dinner…just different types of each. Breakfast is really good, however. But I found out today that there is NO cream cheese. How can you not have cream cheese? It’s like a sin in the world of Natalie. I’m making due with butter I suppose.

The first two days on the boat were orientation…BBBOOORRRIIIINNNGG. The worst part about it was that they kept emphasizing the same things over and over again and never talked about others. They were all just really repetitive and condescending, but I guess it’s all important stuff.

The seas have been really rough. We’ve hit swells ranging from 10-12 feet. People have been getting sick every which way. I got a little nauseous the first day and today but it was nothing a little Dramamine couldn’t fix. If you were sick enough they had to give you a shot in the bum…not fun. The boat is so rocky that one minute you see all ocean and a second later all you see in sky, and then back and forth back and forth. It’s actually really soothing at night when you’re trying to fall asleep.

The water has been so rough because apparently there were some big storms on the west coast. We’ve avoided a few out here in the ocean. The waves have been so bad that they had to close down the elevators, the gym, closed the pool, and tied off the chairs by the pool. You’re constantly walking on slant and into walls. Last night was one of the worst. The drawers next to our bed don’t stay closed and nothing stays put on your shelves because of the rocking. But last night, we must have hit this waves and everything came crashing to the floor…EVERYTHING, including my computer (which now won’t stay shut). And because the drawers keep slamming open and closed you can’t sleep because all you hear is bang...bang...bang. But my roommate, Abby, and I have gotten some tips on how to fix it. In class, people keep falling off their chairs. It’s just a mess, but other than that everything’s good.

They have had to slow down the ship because rumor has it we used up to much fuel the first 3 days by going fast that they only way we’ll make it to Hawaii is if we go slower to preserve full. Uh oh.

These past four days have been classes. Everyone has to taken this Global Studies and there are two sections so half of the ship is in each. The professor is crazy. He’s really animated, but a little all of the place. He also doesn’t really censor himself so some things he says come off as really racist or stereotypical…but you laugh because your like ‘oh my god I can’t believe he just said that.’ Overall, he’s a really fun teacher.

I’m a little disappointed with my photography class. Today was the second day of it. I thought it was going to be a photography professor who happened to pick the topics of architecture and landscape, but rather it’s a architecture professor who just happens to be able to use a camera, more or less. If I didn’t already know about film I think I would be so lost. The book doesn’t really use laymen/more commonly used terms. Instead of lens it uses the term objective, which is fine, but it doesn’t say that they are using that term in reference to lens so most people have no idea what it talking about. Today, he went over camera usage and again, thank god I know film. I could have taught it better…no joke. He would bring up a topic and talk about it and it’s functions without explaining what it was in the first place. I think in the end it will be fine. I just had higher expectations I guess.

My digital photography class is going to be a lot of work but a lot of fun. We have a one minute film due next week…with no editing...shouldn’t be to hard once I come up with a storyline. Then we have to 3-8 minute digital stories over the span of the semester. Along with that we have to do six installments of “show” for SeaTv. For this, we are broken down into production teams and go from there. SeaTv worried me at first but we saw a bunch of examples and it looks like a lot of fun, but a lot of work. And on top of that we have to keep a journal/scrapbook of what we do on our trips in the country and another one on our contributions to SeaTv within our production group. So it’s a lot of work.

My collage class is just a glorified scrap booking class. It seems fun, but a lot of work as well. We have to do a drawing a day. She said it only has to be like a ten minute thing…but what sketch is that good when only done in ten minutes? Clearly, being the perfectionist that I am, it takes a lot longer.

Besides all of the above…not much else is going on. I’ll write more often and shorter in the future.