Continuation

After we regained some strength and assessed the situation, we headed back to Cat’s.  Right as we got to the hostel, we saw the gang.  Perfect timing.  We told them the situation and they agreed (rather they did not refuse) to let us sleep in their already over-crowded 10-person room.  Once that had been settled we went to Prado the museum.

For dinner (at midnight) we went to a place called Mex Mex and I had the world’s best nachos. Ever. Our Peruvian waiter, Diego (my new boyfriend), thought I was ordering the nachos for the table.  He was greatly mistaken.  I ate the entire plate.  Diego was impressed and said no one had ever done that before.  Embarassing? I think not.  Quite a feat, in fact.  My picture is hung upon the wall of Mex Mex.  Maybe. You’ll never know until you go there.
Then we came back to the hostel and went to sleep.  A few of us had to share beds and sleep “butt to face” in the words of Jefe.  Definitely not the best night of sleep.

Day 3
Half of the group had an 8 o’clock train so they got up at 6:30 and “quietly” packed their things.  They collectively agreed to not turn on the light to let the others sleep.  It would have been a nice gesture if they weren’t talking loudly and throwing things and dropping things.  Oh well, it’s not like we were sleeping anyway.  At around 9, Alicia, Caroline and I snuck out of the hostel. Not only am I famous in Spain for my nacho-eating ability, but I am a fugitive for not paying for a night in Cat’s Hostel.  Crazy times.

We took the 5-hour train ride back to Cadiz and did some souvenir shopping in record time so as not to be late for check-in time.  We had to wait in line for about 25 minutes to get on the ship, but none of us received Dock Time.  Dock Time is when you come back late for check-in on the ship and you are forced to stay on the ship for a few hours at the next port.

It feels good to be back on the ship with a shower, my own bed, and free meals. The waves are really rough right now and I’m sliding all over the place.  Ah, to be at sea again. I can’t believe Spain is over and that I will be in Morocco in two days. 

Amazing.

Driddy Drid

MADRID (or Driddy):
Day 1
I went with a group of 13 to Madrid early on Thursday morning.  It is a five-hour train ride, most of which I tried to sleep.  Once we arrived in Madrid we went straight to a hostel called Cat’s Hostel.  The group I had tagged along with had already rented a ten-person room, so Alicia, Caroline and I got placed in a room together with other travelers.  Quite an experience sleeping on rickety bunk beds with a bedskirt as a blanket in a room full of strangers all of which were hairy, stinky, snoring men.   Oh hostels.

Once we had all secured our rooms, we went off to explore and eat in Madrid.  I am pretty sure we chose the most expensive places to eat (stupid) but the food was good. Probably walked for another 6 hours that day and then had another very late dinner. Thankfully, Greg, one of the guys in the group, knew Spanish pretty well so he was our leader and designated question-asker.  I dubbed him Jefe (Chief) and it seems to be sticking. At lunch, the group had been advised to go to a club called Joy that night because, “It’s jueves, everyone in Madrid goes there on jueves!”  Instead we decided to do a pub-crawl that Cat’s offered us.  Definite highlight of the trip. We were taken to 3 hole-in-wall bars and given free Sangria at one and tequila shots at the others.

At every bar, except the last one, the dance floor was empty until us Americans came in and took over.  It was literally our group dancing with a Spanish audience circling around.  I think we were pretty entertaining too.  Every time an American song came on (which was quite frequently since the clubs play a lot of American music) the group of us got really excited and sang it at the top our lungs.  I busted out my Zumba moves and some interpretive dancing which, as always, was a hit.   There was also lots of cheersing to ‘umbuntu,’ which is our voyage theme and it means something like “People are people through people.”  Umbuntu **clink**

We finished our ‘pub-crawl’ing at about 4:30 am and went to get the best churros con chocolate in the city.  I thought that we would be the only ones with this craving at 4 in the morning but alas there was line out the door.  Still, it was worth it.  These churros were ten times better than the ones I ate in Cadiz.  I wish I was eating them right now, in fact.  Finally, at 5 (a 23-hour day for me) we returned to the hostel. 

The room was pitch-black, so we fumbled through our things making a bit of a ruckus and our hairy, stinky roomies let us know they were upset by clearing their throats.  Okay, I get you’re awake and that I woke you, but I’m in Spain!  Payback was the next morning when they turned on the light at about 8 when I was still trying to sleep.  Live and learn.

Day 2
With a solid five hours of sleep under my belt, the gang and I decided to go on the free walking tour provided by the hostel.  Alicia, Caroline and I checked out of the hostel before the tour because we planned to head back to Cadiz that afternoon (foreshadowing).   This meant we carried our backpacks the entire tour. 

I am really happy we did the tour because we saw a lot of the sights Madrid has to offer and the tour guide, Adrian, is now our BFF, (when the tour was over he instructed us all to contact him on Facebook and also invited us to his birthday dinner that night).  Adrian knew his Madrid trivia and spoke very good English.  He discussed the incestuous royalty that used to inhabit Madrid.  He showed us the oldest restaurant in the world (it’s in Guiness, look it up); a church that took hundreds of years to finish because the Spanish are lazy drunkards (his words, not mine); a convent with nuns called Las Caramelitas, who never see anyone but they make the best almond biscuits ever (I know from experience).  He pointed out Museo Nacional Del Prado, an art museum that we went to later on.
We all loved Adrian and tipped him generously at the end of our tour. 

Everyone was tired and hungry after another long day of walking, but Alicia, Caroline and I needed to go to the train station so we broke off from the group.  We arrived at the Attocha Train Station, which is huge, about an hour and a half ahead of time and got in line to purchase our tickets.  Coach seats were sold out so Alicia and I bought first-class seats and when Caroline got up to buy hers the lady informed her there were no seats left at all.  Well the group that hostels together, stays together so we returned our tickets and bought tickets for the earliest train the next day.  Then we just sat in the train station because we were tired and cranky and had no place to go…..to be continued.

Espana Part I

1/31/09
18:51

I am back in my cabin aboard the MV Explorer after my whirlwind trip in Spain.  For the past four days I have lived the life of a Spaniard, but I think if I were to try and continue that lifestyle I would either be permanently sleep-deprived and chronically irritable or deathly ill…or both.  So here is the tale of my Spanish adventures.

CADIZ (Dizzy):
My time in Cadiz began wonderfully.  A group of girls including myself had decided to go on a run in port, so once everyone was cleared to leave the ship we started what will probably be one of the best runs of my life.  I was giddy.  It was so nice to be on land, to be in Spain, just to be.  I had a smile plastered on my face the entire time.  It was a great way to see the city, which is rather small.  As we ran through narrow cobblestone alleys bordered by beautiful buildings and along the Spanish coast, I tried to process the very idea that I was in Spain. SPAIN!

We returned to the ship and prepared for a day in Cadiz.  Caroline, Jill, Alicia and I began our day by grabbing a bite to eat at a restaurant called Caja Rural Del Sur. Don’t know what that means, but I’ll look it up later.  At this restaurant I found out that I had wrongfully assumed that many people would speak English in Spain.  After seating ourselves, we were given about 4 different menus to order from (a regularity in Spain) all in  Spanish and there was still other food options that were not included on the menu.  Jill and I decided to split a quesadilla con queso and we planned to ask for pollo as well (why not?).  Upon doing so in stilted Spanish, the waiter laughed in our faces and said, “No pollo” but it seemed more like “Stupid Americans”.  This was my first taste of Spanish waiters.  People in the service industry in Europe do not cater to you as they do in the U.S.

I did, however, meet one man that despite the extreme language barrier was quite helpful and he is my favorite person in Cadiz.  As I have mentioned I was on a mission to find art supplies while in Spain and after exploring the city for about four hours on foot, we chanced upon this tiny art shop in a back alley.  I was ecstatic.  I whipped out the supply list and started picking out paints and brushes.  A lot of the supplies I needed were behind the counter or in the back so I needed to ask for them.  Easy, right? No.  My Spanish vocab failed me as I have only taken one semester and we did not really go over “kneaded eraser” and “watercolor paper.”  Also, for some reason, the only foreign language I could conjure in my head was French.  But the man that owned the store patiently grabbed materials as I gestured and pointed and pieced together phrases like “papele por lapis” or “lapis numero quatro”.  Once I had all my supplies he even threw in a free vase for holding my brushes.  I love him.

The first day in Cadiz was exhausting.  After running 3 miles in the morning, we walked through and through the city for about seven hours surviving only off an early lunch, banana split-flavored ice cream and chocolate con churros (perfection).  After our treats and using the free WiFi in the town square we had a late dinner at about 11:30pm that only cost 3 Euros.  We proceeded to explore the bar scene after this.  We were too early for the partiers in Spain, however, so every place was just filled with people from the ship.  Cadiz had literally been taken over by SAS people and pretty much every where I went people were asking, “Semester at Sea?”, “Americanos?” “SASers?”  Except all those that were questioning were students, and we see each other every day, so it was kind of pointing out the obvious.  I finally headed back to the ship at about 1:30am (an early night in Spain) and went to sleep because I had to get up early for my 7:20am train to Madrid.

Una Dia Mas!

1/27/09
16:14

If you were wondering if I did indeed nap after the last entry, the answer is yes for about two hours.  And if you were curious if I napped again today for two hours, the answer again is yes.  I have to get out of this viscous napping cycle. 

After my second nap yesterday, I showered to revitalize my senses (sounds like a shampoo commercial) and in turn I had a pretty enjoyable night.  After dinner there was a mandatory informational meeting about Spain, which was a bit of a snooze since the speaker basically just read from his notes.  “Spain is a beautiful country (pause, look up at audience).  You will see many pretty sights (don’t forget to breathe). Don’t get these Spaniards confused with Mexicans (pause for pity laugh here).”  You know, things of that nature.  Quite boring. 

Next I went to pub night.  Woo pub night!  Last one before Spain.  Every night students are allowed to buy up to six drinks: two at dinner and four from 9 to 11 pm.  Beer, wine, and wine coolers are offered, no hard alc understandably.  Pub night is held on the top deck next to the pool (or bathtub depending on your outlook).  It gets extremely loud within minutes because everyone converses in EXTREME outdoor voices.  I am sure that watching pub night as an outsider would be quite comical.  A bunch of kids standing in circles, talking very loudly, wildly gesticulating, some dancing awkwardly because there really isn’t any music being played, lots of sexual tension, struggling to keep balance (not because of intoxication but because of the huge swells that have been rolling through the past couple of days).  Comical. I met some new people last night, whom I thoroughly enjoyed. 

Oh that reminds me, a girl who I grew up with at the Hickey household is also on this voyage: Mary Wyatt.  What a small world.  We first saw each other at Señor Frog’s the night before we boarded the ship.   It was exciting.  We talked a lot last night and hopefully we will travel together sometime during this trip.

Another restless night of sleep followed pub night, probably because I napped the entire day.  You would think the incessant rocking back and forth would put me right to sleep, but instead I could only focus on the constant squeaking of my roommate’s bed as we rolled this way and that.

Who needs sleep when Spain comes tomorrow?!  I cannot wait.  I plan to wake up early to see the vague outlines of approaching land and then watch the sunrise.  Sounds fantastic, right?  Oh to be on land.  We have been on the ship for nine days, meaning nine straight days of class.  That is a first for me.  Today, during my Econ class someone spotted a whale.* Everyone immediately stopped paying attention, that is, if they had been initially, which I doubt. The whale was really far away and you could only see splashes and water shoot up from its spout, but it counts.  I kept missing it, but I did finally see its water spout.  I also saw two birds, which is rather exciting since we have literally seen nothing but water for …nine days.

On our first day in Spain I plan to hang out in Cadiz (pronounced Ca-deeth, which I first thought was our professor’s unfortunate lisp).  Hopefully, I will obtain my art supplies there.  Then the next day, a group of us are going to take a bus to Madrid and stay a few nights in a hostel.  I’m basically just playing it by ear.  I’ve never done a trip like that before so we’ll see how it pans out.  After Spain we go straight to Morocco.  No definite plans for Morocco either, but quite excited all the same. 

I will write of my adventures upon my return. 

Until then,
H

*Whenever we see or talk about whales we sing this:

Last night, I sawr a whale
As I recall it was a blue whale

SNL skit anyone? Hilarious, I know

Zzzzzzzz

1/26/09
15:12

I was informed at lunch that today is Monday. Today is Monday.   That information was upsetting to me, I’m not exactly sure why.  Maybe because I had just risen from a three-hour nap.  I am sooooo tired today.  I am still in my pajamas if that gives you a clue of what kind of day it is, although come to think of it my regular clothes look like pj’s.  I didn’t sleep well (waking fitfully every hour), got up 5 minutes before breakfast ended, went to class, took notes, then went straight to bed after class.  I napped off and on until 1pm.  Then Jill, Caroline and I trudged up to lunch where Jill exclaimed, “What the heck?!” in a whiney, tired, confused tone.  She thought that they had closed down for the day and was distressed because she got out of bed for this. Instead lunch was being served on the other side.  I laughed at that for about an hour, in fact, I’m still chuckling while writing this.

I’m pretty sure every person is exhausted today.  It is like every lost hour caught up with us today.

This is a boring post, so I’m just going to stop here and nap some more.

The Unexamined Life...Not Me

1/25/09
22:15 …23:15 after I set my clock ahead


Tonight has been interesting.  I played scrabble with Jill, Caroline and Alicia.  Jill says she is the master (she did win), but she has never played with my mom.  She also claims that there are some two-letter word exceptions like QI. Sounds like cheating to me.  I cheated as well, however, by using the proper noun Eagan (as in Eagan, Minnesota) and made the words EAR and JON while in the process.  That’s my highlight of the game.  My big win, if you will.  I lost in the end.  By a lot.  I think I forgot to record my words once I was given VVEYCVT. Make something out of that, I dare you.

After that rousing game of Scrabble we all watched a documentary about a Cambodian woman, Marina, who was horribly disfigured after being doused with acid.  She was a beautiful girl, famous for singing karaoke and appearances in music videos in Cambodia. She piqued the undersecretary of state’s (I think that was his government position) interest and began to date.   Marina soon found out he was married and tried to end the relationship but he would not let her and threatened her life as well as her family’s lives.  Receiving threats from both this man and his angry wife, Marina was trapped.  Finally, the official’s wife and a group of men found Marina in a market and beat her and poured acid on her. 

Apparently these sorts of attacks are not uncommon around the world.  Marina went to the US to seek medical attention and her family never pressed charges for fear of their lives.  The perpetrators have never had any sort of consequence.

It was really hard to watch this film and extremely emotional.  Had a lump in my throat the whole time. It made me realize how truly lucky I am.  I complain when I get a blemish, while some women have to get their entire faces and bodies reconstructed and have numerous skin grafts, only to look scarred and broken.  And these attacks are basically the end to the victims’ lives for their face is their standing, their career, their whole being.  They lose face literally and figuratively in the community.  What a vain society we live in, myself included.  I mean just a couple sentences ago I exemplify my vanity.  I am lucky to have an unmarked face.  But what about my mind? My health? My family? Friends?  Freedoms?

It’s interesting that they showed this documentary tonight, because last night I was noticing how shallow I have become.  I think I have become a harsher judge of looks than of character in the last year or so.  Could be California. My awareness is a good sign, I think.  I can catch myself during the judging process and alter my mindset.  This voyage will undoubtedly give me a new perspective as well.  Thank God.  I need to be more grounded, more aware, more concerned about my surroundings and not myself.

Heavy.  Perhaps a little too heavy?  Let me lighten up the mood…..

(Insert fart joke here)

Did you laugh?  I did.

Deep thoughts,
H

P.S.
E-mail me.  If you read this blob you should e-mail me because you are the ones I miss the most. E-mail is my one form of communication that is not costly.  hepeterson@semesteratsea.net
I want to hear about your lives and I will most likely write you back.

Whaaaaaaaaale

1/26/09
10:43

Yesterday was the first day we did not set the clocks ahead in 3 days and it was glorious.  Today, however, we resumed the practice of subtracting precious hours from the day.  It was hard to get up this morning.  I debated staying in bed, but my stomach got the better of me (as it usually does) and I made it to breakfast 5 minutes before close.  The food on the ship is not that bad, in my opinion.  Some people don’t like it at all, but it’s not like I was expecting gourmet dinners or anything.  I’m getting my protein, fruit and veggies, carbs, etc.  They do not serve Ben & Jerry’s Coffee Heath Bar Crunch (of which I had a pint of almost every other night I was home over Christmas break) but you can buy fro yo (frozen yogurt for you non-Californians) on Deck 7.

After my toast, eggs, yogurt, and assorted fruit, I made my way to Global Studies Class (yeah we have class on Sundays….everyday on the ship is a class day), hoping that I would not be a head-bobber.  Instead of learning about photosynthesis and biomes (why are we learning about that, you ask? I know not), we were introduced to the rich and interesting history, culture and architecture of Spain.

I’m getting pretty excited for Spain.  The second day I’m there I plan to go to Madrid with some friends to sight-see and go clubbing.  Clubbing is all the rage in Spain.  Apparently they awake early and work hard all day, take a siesta in the evening, eat dinner at 10 pm and go dancing ‘til the wee hours of the morning.  Just a day in the life of a Spaniard.  I hope I can keep up.

I also plan to buy all my art supplies in Spain as my painting professor advised.  I introduced myself to her yesterday on my first day of class with her.  She was not pleased to find out that I had added the class.  In fact, she made me feel quite unwelcome and a bit like crying.  After scolding me for adding the class, despite the recent availability that was open to anyone, she began class.  All the art trivia she proceeded to ask the class was answered by none other than yours truly.  How do I check angles and accuracy? Take a pencil, set a certain length and scale it to your drawing.  What is this called? Foreshortening. Who should apologize for being mean to a great appreciator of art? You!

In other news, I have yet to see a whale or dolphin, but I have gotten several people to look when I shout, “Whale!”  My friends tell me that when I actually see a whale no one will look as I am the girl who cried whale, but if I actually see one…well I just got to see a whale, so why would I care?

Oh two nights ago we had an Open Mic night.  I was apprehensive about the performances because I get stressed when people are struggling on stage, but I ventured up nonetheless.  Well thank God I did.  It was incredible.  There is so much talent on this ship.  Many musicians, comedians, and poets.  Perhaps I will make an appearance at the next one.  I don’t know yet.

And now I am going to read Economic Facts and Fallacies, or more likely nap.

H

P.S.
I have 4 free internet minutes left, which is ridiculous since I have probably only used like 30 or 40.  I have been using the internet but only for free e-mail and free sites and now it says I’m practically done.  RIDICULOUS. Oh well, I’ll adapt.

Oh just checked my account…0 minutes left. Cool. Impossible.