Day 1
There are a few things Vietnam is known for and getting a lot of things at very low prices is one of them and I don’t really know the rest. Maybe being the only country to beat the US in a war or Ha Long bay or Agent Orange but I am not really sure. So against our better judgment (because Steph and I hate to shop) we decided to go to the market! We got off our ship got on a bus that took us out of the main road of traffic. You can easily get to the market on foot but if SAS wants to provide a bus for us I say why not!
On the walk to the market from the bus stop we got bombarded by many vendors haggling us to by their stuff. I was not going to buy the first rice hat I saw so we just kept on walking trying to get a feel on what are initial price of bargaining should be. When we got to the market the first thing we did was pick out material to get dresses made. We were getting dresses to our design made for only 20 dollars why not especially when the lowest price I heard any one else get them for was around 50. Steph and I are that good. We always choose the same stand for the stuff we want to buy because when you buy more stuff you can get a cheaper price!
So after picking out the fabric we liked the best we were fitted and told tem what we wanted. We then moved on to just looking around where we got various things from different stations stopping to have a spring roll every once in a while. I am learning that each country has their signature dish that I fall with it and only eat that for the next few days. VIETNAM = SPRING ROLLS! So after shopping for a little bit we were spent and could not do it any more. So we went back to the boat and ate dinner in order to conserve money and then got ready to go out. OH YEAH I forgot to mention our friends got married! ADAM AND CHEALSEA TIED THE KNOT! But it’s only legal in Vietnam! I personally could never do this but you know what ever they wanted. Even though we wanted to go to their wedding and they are some of our best friends on the ship they were charging 60 USD to go so we told them we did not have the money and they told us just to go to the reception and not to worry about the money they just wanted us there! So we put on some dresses and joined in the festivities!
Day 2
We woke up t 3am to catch a flight to Hanoi to stay on a junk boat! Our group consisted of 7 people 3 guys and 4 girls. When we got to Hanoi we met our guild who would be taking us around his name was Thang, which is actually pronounced Tong but I’m pretty sure my friend Bruno called him Trunk until the last day. Now let me just say Thang is CRAZY! Legitimately crazy! I never had a clue what he was talking about or why, and for some reason he decided to challenge my friend Bruno to a beer drinking competition when it is common knowledge that Asians cant drink. They lack some sort of enzyme in their liver that processes alcohol. I didn’t really get it but we just went along with it for whatever purpose!
So we made our way to Ha Long Bay stopping only once to use the bathroom. The whole way Thang talked. He talked about everything from his father in the war, about Agent Orange, and his personal life. Mind you its still pretty early and we are all having a little trouble understanding him not to mention we haven’t had the best night of sleep. He speaks abruptly and with a purpose but also pausing to make sure you understand so if you slipped and didn’t pay attention for a minute he caught you!
So we finally get to Ha Long Bay, which was super relaxing! We did not do much of anything while we were there! It was pretty cold so we did not lay out side much but just bundled up and played cards getting to know the people we were with a little better. The group kind of split up which we knew it might happen, Steph Bruno and me in one group and the other 4 in another group. Steph, Bruno, and I are best friends on the ship and we can’t help but to want to hang out together off the ship as well.
So that day we went to the caves first. Most thought the cave was going to be a dinky little cave but it was huge it could be fitted for a mega mansion if you wanted to. The minerals had dripped out of the rock for years hardening over time creating rocks jetting down from the ceiling. Thang showed us a bunch of cool formations that had been created in the cave over time; one being a turtle that people would leave donations to. The turtle is a sign of longevity and every one wants a long life!
Next we went to an island where there were teams playing soccer and a place where you could climb to the top and look out over a large span of Ha Long Bay. Unfortunately, it was kind of foggy and you couldn’t see much and at one point you couldn’t see anything!
By the way Ha Long bay is a beautiful bay where the plates shifted causing rock island to jet out of the water. There are over 3000 islands in the bay and 2 more bays like it in Vietnam. The scenery is amazing and if you want a relaxing holiday I highly suggest it!
So in between these visits to places we found out that we would be eating like kings!!! We were fed 9 course meals with every type of seafood imaginable. The greatest thing for me was a few of the people don’t really like sea food and I love it!!!! It’s my favorite! So I was able to get all the things they did not want to eat which was basically anything that had a face!
When we were playing cards I found out that one of the boys, Jo, was possibly the most intense cards player ever!!!!!! We were all just trying to have a good time playing Jin rummy and he would be get upset if he gave me a card or freak out when some one got out or if we were playing to slow! We said something one time and he took it so offensively I kind of got scared. This kid was deep took everything to heart I was a little nervous around him. So Steph and me decided it would be best if we just try and play by our selves but he would jump in any time some one took cards out!
So later in the night Steph Bruno and I just sat in our room and planned how one-day Steph and I would go to Brazil to visit Bruno for the college games in San Palo Brazil. We decided we just had to pay off our debt first haha!!!! Don’t worry mom I fully intend to pay it all off before I do anything else!
Day -3
This was another chill day. We woke up, ate, and played cards until we went to a fishing village where we used hand signs to communicated with the teachers from the school. When we got there they offered us sugar cane (the actual cane you bite and suck out the sugar!), mango and Gummy slurp snacks.
So I forgot to mention we though by shaving our heads we would get less attention but not we get more attention and people think we have cancer!
While at the fishing villages we had to have another guide, Ha, translate why our heads were shaved and while I told him the story he goes, “Wait you don’t have cancer?” That’s when it gets a little awkward! We have resorted to telling people that we shaved our heads so that we could donate it and a foundation will make wigs for kids with cancer. As that is one of the main reasons we did shave our heads but also for the fact that it’s a lot easier to say that than explain Neptune’s day!
Once we left the fishing village we went back on board and went to a beach where we took some pictures and went swimming and then jumped off the boat. Once again a pretty relaxing day except for when Ashton saw a rat and freaked out! Me and Steph being the boys that we are wanted to go follow it and see if there were others deemed that unsafe and ruled it out as a form of entertainment!
Day 4
We woke up ate breakfast and then went to a little oasis! We had to go through a little tunnel made by Mother Nature herself that went into a pool of water that was completely surrounded by rock formations. There were moneys swinging from branch to branch We got to feed them and watch them swing to come get the food that we were giving some of the monkeys would miss the next branch or the branch would break and they would fall into the water. It was all quite funny and left me wanting a pet monkey.
After that we went back to the main land and made our way back to Hanoi. This time looking at the architecture of the houses and buildings around and how they were all tall and skinny which I learned that was because oh the high price on a square meter of land which was up to 50,000 USD Which is a lot!!!!!
So we got to Hanoi and we were left to fend for ourselves for this meal. So we just went into town and while some of us went to a dinner a little bit nicer Steph, Bruno, Ashton, and I ate Pho on the side of the road ! Pho is the traditional Vietnamese food which is a noodle in a soup with beef!!!! So good!!! and then we got the best bread in the world a bun from Papa Roti’s! The bread melted in your mouth. You could get chocolate or cheese flavor and both were amazing!!! It makes me hungry just talking about it! We got that bread a few more times on the trip, as it was only 50 cents!
Later we met up with the others and Bruno and I walked away from the group for a second because we wanted to see the pagoda in the middle of the Lake. Instead we found something else we both got a dance lesson from 2 Vietnamese ladies! It was sand in my wine glass…… an experience!
Later that night Steph, Bruno, and I tried to find a place to have the snake ritual meal. Where they drain the blood of the snake into wine for you to drink and then you eat the cooked snake. Much to my dismay we weren’t to able to go to the snake village where they had this because they only had king cobras left and that would be 200$ we were not okay with that! So we settled with eating some snake that had been soaking in rice liquor that we also drank. It was the most disgusting shot of my life!!!!!!! Never again do I want to taste rice liquor.
Day 5
This is the day that we went around the city of Hanoi to see the sights! First we went to see everything of Ho chi Mins!! I mean everything I saw 2 of his houses where he slept, where he ate, and where he did business!!! EVERYTHING. So then we went into his mausoleum! We expected to see a lavishly painted tomb and pretty decorations; however, what we got was a building where you had to be 100% silent in stand up straight walk in line 2 by 2. The building was all in gray marble inside and a red mat that led your way and you were not to step off of this red mat. So we are walking in with good posture in 2 by 2 not even smiling and what do we see? Nothing other than Ho Chi Mins dead body lying in a glass casket. We were all shocked, Steph and I couldn’t help but to let out a little chuckle. When we got out 2 of the girls jokingly yelled at Thang for not preparing us for that!
After that we went to the Temple of Literature, which Thang went on and on about and I caught all of 2 words that he was saying. I know it is a place of learning but to what extent I have not clue because he gave the most in depth lecture I could not follow for to long. We walked around a little and then got more bread then made our way to the airport!
We flew back to Ho chi Min or Saigon, which it was previously known as. When we got there Steph and I had one mission; we needed to pick up our dresses that we had made. So we went and did that and got a few more spring roles before getting back onto the ship.
It had been a successful trip except when we got back on the boat and tried our dresses on, they look horrible! The lady did exactly what we said but we defiantly said it wrong because these dresses need some ones help to look good on us!!!
can you find me?
Monday, April 11, 2011
Friday, March 18, 2011
SINGAPORE
So I don’t have too much to say about Singapore. It’s cool if your into expensive food, expensive taxis, and expensive everything. It really is a futuristic place. I don’t mean to bash on Singapore, you would think that as an architecture student I would like it a lot more. What I mean is that Singapore has some of the most amazing architecture you will see, combining the new with the old the city, it really is its own master piece. So that aspect I loved. They also have really good food. I got Stephanie to eat frog! For all who know me I am a little more adventurous with what I eat while Stephanie is getting there, major accomplishments have been made on her part. We’re going to have fried scorpions in China next!!!! But no dog for us in Vietnam because yes they do eat dog!
Any way as I normally say, “you have to go to this country”, I will not say this about Singapore. While it is a very cool place, you can really see the whole city-state in a day. This is a place with 400 skyscrapers and is very much like the USA with a lot a lot of rules. You can get arrested for anything here. Chewing gum is illegal; spitting is illegal, j-walking (strictly enforced) and so many more rules!!!!! Stephanie and I were scared to breathe when we first got off the ship.
So in conclusion from my experience Singapore is a great place to get a job or have a layover or spend a lot of money.
Helpful tip: when traveling in Singapore never take the cable car it cost 24$ for a minute ride. You can take the tram car for free or the subway for 2 dollars.
Helpful tip 2: NEVER GO TO SENTOSA (It’s like Disney world except the most boring place in the universe)
Any way as I normally say, “you have to go to this country”, I will not say this about Singapore. While it is a very cool place, you can really see the whole city-state in a day. This is a place with 400 skyscrapers and is very much like the USA with a lot a lot of rules. You can get arrested for anything here. Chewing gum is illegal; spitting is illegal, j-walking (strictly enforced) and so many more rules!!!!! Stephanie and I were scared to breathe when we first got off the ship.
So in conclusion from my experience Singapore is a great place to get a job or have a layover or spend a lot of money.
Helpful tip: when traveling in Singapore never take the cable car it cost 24$ for a minute ride. You can take the tram car for free or the subway for 2 dollars.
Helpful tip 2: NEVER GO TO SENTOSA (It’s like Disney world except the most boring place in the universe)
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Neptune’s Day – The story behind the bald head
It all started the night before Neptune’s day when steph pointed out to me that we were running out of conditioner and we should probably conserve it so we didn’t have to buy a new bottle we were only going to need to use twice. I agreed and we went on with our lives.
The next morning: We woke up to Neptune’s court playing instruments banging walls doors and drums out in the hall way to wake us all up. We woke up and went to break fast as usual. When we were eating one of the lifelong learners came up to us and asked if we would be shaving our heads that day. We both immediately said NO WAY!!!! She was like why not both my nieces did they had a great time with it. Basically this went on for 15 minutes until she said well I’m not telling you what to do because if I had hair I don’t know if I would do it.
Well this left us in a dilemma! What were we to do now?
Me: are we gonna regret this if we don’t do it
Steph: probably
Both: O shoot
Steph: well we won’t have to buy more conditioner.
With very little debate after this we walked upstairs looked around and said were going to do it! We ran back down the stairs put on our bathing suits and ran back up the stairs got fish guts poured on us, jumped in the pool, kissed the hands of king Neptune and queen Minerva and then went to get our heads shaved. This is where we ran into problems. We had to go back down the stairs and blow dry our hair with fish guts in it. And go back up got our hair put into pig tails and the they started chopping off my hair then I sat down in the chair and buzzzzzzzz they buzzed it all off. And I hear mid way through this process “I have to go back to the room”. Steph had to go to our room in order to blow dry her hair more. Then come back up and shave her head it was devastating to hold our hair up for a picture but super funny.
NO REGRETS
The next morning: We woke up to Neptune’s court playing instruments banging walls doors and drums out in the hall way to wake us all up. We woke up and went to break fast as usual. When we were eating one of the lifelong learners came up to us and asked if we would be shaving our heads that day. We both immediately said NO WAY!!!! She was like why not both my nieces did they had a great time with it. Basically this went on for 15 minutes until she said well I’m not telling you what to do because if I had hair I don’t know if I would do it.
Well this left us in a dilemma! What were we to do now?
Me: are we gonna regret this if we don’t do it
Steph: probably
Both: O shoot
Steph: well we won’t have to buy more conditioner.
With very little debate after this we walked upstairs looked around and said were going to do it! We ran back down the stairs put on our bathing suits and ran back up the stairs got fish guts poured on us, jumped in the pool, kissed the hands of king Neptune and queen Minerva and then went to get our heads shaved. This is where we ran into problems. We had to go back down the stairs and blow dry our hair with fish guts in it. And go back up got our hair put into pig tails and the they started chopping off my hair then I sat down in the chair and buzzzzzzzz they buzzed it all off. And I hear mid way through this process “I have to go back to the room”. Steph had to go to our room in order to blow dry her hair more. Then come back up and shave her head it was devastating to hold our hair up for a picture but super funny.
NO REGRETS
INDIA – HEAVY ON THE GAS HEAVY ON THE BREAKS HEAVY ON THE HORN
I waited for the face to face and then got off the ship in a random group of people. We had to take a shuttle out of the port because we were not allowed to walk in it. So instead of waiting in the line to get checked out of the port we hopped in a rickshaw to get out quicker. My first impression of INDIA was from a tiny 3 wheeled car that 5 people are and they are weaving in and out of cars. In India there is no lane system on the road…….not that they do not have lanes because they do but they don’t follow them at all. The entire driving system is a free for all and you should expect nothing less than a heart attack. Your rickshaw will literally go head on to a car and then at the last minute swerve out of its way it’s crazy. This was the definition of a clown car.
What we wanted to do was get to the stadium because the cricket world cup was currently going on; however, every driver has a different plan for you. They want to take you to their “brother’s shop” that has “cheap prices” yeah not so much! They brought you to all the Americanized nice air conditioned stores that had nothing that was culturally relevant to India and if they did it was a giant wooden statue of a god that you would never be able to afford let alone carry out of the store.
Let me tell you, some semester at sea kids ruin it for everyone. I watched a girl try and bargain. The store owner asked her for 3000 rupees for 2 scarf (total rip off that about 60 USD). So she gave him 2500 she had in her pocket and as she went into her bag to get more money asks the shop owner can you do it for 2500. The guy obviously said no because she was willing to pay the high price from then on out people in this shops tried to rip us off and we couldn’t buy anything from them. Some people puzzle me. So instead of standing there watching people get ripped off I went over to a Shiva temple took off my shoes walked through the streets of India barefoot and into the temple. I was blessed with ashes which after I was blessed I learned the ashes were cow dung ashes. We walked around one of the shrines, as that is how you praise the gods, and found out where the cow poop comes from. There were 5 cows sitting in a pen just hanging out. Steph and I started cracking up while our friend Kevin and Miller had no clue why.
We finally got the guy to bring us to the stadium and he tried over charging us saying the price we agreed on earlier was not the same….ect….. ect. So we got to the stadium and started asking around for tickets. People just kept saying the same thing and pointing in a direction, so we kept proceeding in that direction finally running into Nitin, A man who led us in the right direction finding us tickets. We were offered tickets by many people, but then a man came up to me and said “my brothers not coming you can have his ticket” so I got in free!!!
Now cricket is like watching paint dry! Don’t get me wrong the atmosphere awesome but the actual sport very boring we left within 45 minutes after we could not bear the heat any more. Nitin, our new india friend, showed us a place to eat which was a little more expensive than I would have like but that’s on Indian standards. I could have never gotten that much food for that price in America.
After that we went to a mall, we wanted to go to a market, but when we went in there there was a Indian Gillette razor promotion. My friends Kevin and Miller got their beards (or faces) shaved I stayed and watched as the other girls went and shopped eventually when we walked away from the stand I see Stephanie hanging over the railing yelling where are you going…she couldn’t take what I avoided in the first place any more…..girls shopping. So we went to a stand that was giving free henna out and a woman gave me designs on the 4 of our hands. Its amazing how fast and good they can do these designs, it literally took her 30 seconds to do this design on my hand!!!!!
After that we left to go back to the port but Nitin wanted us to stop for more food!!! So he had us stop at this one place and bought us a bunch of really good Indian dishes. I LOVE INDIAN FOOD!!!!!!!!!
Day 2 - ARE WE THERE YET
We woke up at 330 in the morning all packed and ready to head out to the air port! This day was a day of mostly all traveling and layovers… we flew from Chennai to Delhi had lunch (more curry!!!!!) then flew to Varanasi. When we got out of that air port and went to our hotel. We put our stuff down and came back down to go to the River Ganges. When we came down we figured out that we would be going not by van but by bike rickshaws. I learned that this is the best way to see the city. You really get to experience the city this way, you get to experience the people, the smells (good and bad), the crowed roads…and so much more. I don’t really know how to describe the streets of India you can’t really understand unless you have been there (Thomas I need some help here). There is so much going on people selling stuff, to people preaching, to seeing old men with ash all over their faces because they have been blessed so much. On our way to the river Ganga (as the people from Varanasi call the ganges river) we heard the call to worship. I am not entirely sure what they were saying because it was in whichever language they speak. I know this sounds culturally unaware but they speak so many different languages in different parts of the country.
So we finally got to a point where we couldn’t ride on our bike rickshaws anymore because the streets were too crowded with all the people going to river for the ceremony. This happens every night not all the people who live in the city go every night mostly only on Sundays, but people from all around come to this city for the holiest of holy places. So we went to the river and I got a pile of flowers that you send into the river with the center candle lit. When you send the candle into the water you make a wish and Hindus believe that no matter what your wish it will come true. We then went to a balcony, where monkeys were crawling all over, and watched the ceremony of the 5 priests. It was quite the experience although I don’t really know how to describe everything and Im sorry. Their way of life is unrelatable to anything I know; however I can tell you it is very beautiful!
After having dinner and going to a hooka bar we went back to our hotel room and prepared to wake up early for the morning ceremony.
Day 3 –
We were down in the lobby at 5 ready to go. We are basically racing the other 2 groups because we don’t want to be traveling with so many people. You draw a lot of attention to yourself in bigger groups. So we got in our van and drove to a point where we couldn’t drive anymore so we got out and walked the rest of the way. When you are walking down these roads you see people sleeping on the side of the road. These people are homeless and most of them are missing some sort of limb or have a disease and this isn’t the half of it. This wasn’t anything for what was to come in the next few days.
So we walked to the river and our guide got us a boat so that we could go down the ganga river and see the burning of the bodies ceremony. In the Hindu religion they believe that when you die you soul immediately goes to nirvana or your next life and your body is just a body. So they burn it and throw it into the Ganges River. The river Ganges is the holiest of holy water, they believe that the gods created from the Himalayas, and that this is the proper way to dispose of the body. We saw a ceremony of this going on. Women are not allowed to be present at these ceremonies because they cry and the ceremony is not supposed to be like that it is supposed to be happy and joyous not sorrowful. When there are too many bodies to burn or if a family does not have the money to spend on the wood for the fire the body is simply thrown into the river. Because there are so many bodies lined up to burn some bodies are only burned half way then thrown into the river. After this we went back up the river and walked through the alleys of India with our guide we went and saw another temple, it is some time disappointing because you have these amazing temples that non Hindus are not permitted entry which really stinks but they do this because of attacks on some Hindu temples.
After this we took a breather and had the best chi tea ever made. (we didn’t know it at this point but we would search for “Street chi” the entire rest of the time we were here. We then made our way the van to go to the college and see the temple at the college. We went back to the hotel for breakfast collect our stuff as we had a jammed packed day and then a flight.
We went to Sarnath which was an awesome place for me to go because I have been studying it in class. We were able to see the Sarnath Stuppa and the Sarnath museum which held the Bala Buddha which I had a test on the last day in class. We went to a series of Buddhist temples here which were all beautiful in their own way. After all this we went to the airport for our decent to Delhi.
We got to the air port said good bye to Makesh, the best tour guide ever, and then waited for our plane. When we got to Delhi we went to our new hotel, which took us forever because of the outrageous traffic that occurs in India. We all wanted to go to the Ice lounge that was not 2 far away. None of us had a clue what it would be like, so we needed to go. It was a entire bar/ room made entirely of ice. It was so cool…haha excuse the pun. It was –10 degrees inside we had to wear parka jackets and gloves inside. Everything…I mean everything was made of ice, the chairs the cups the decorations. It was really cool we didn’t stay to long but it was awesome to experience.
Day 4 – The taj!!!!!!!......AGRA
We woke up early in the morning to go to the train station to Agra. When we got there was a bus waiting outside to take us to the TAJ MAHAL!!!!!!!!! There was a little confusion with our guides so we had to wait a little bit but then we finally got into the grand complex. It was incredible Like nothing I had ever seen before. Luckily we had gotten there in the morning so it was not as packed as it would normally be at mid day.
There is something that I am learning though this trip and it is that other countries do not run on the same time regulations that the US does. When they say 30 minutes they usually mean 45. When a rick shaw driver says you will be somewhere in 10 minutes you add an extra 30 minutes to stop at 3 of “his brother’s” shops. So if you go to the Taj Mahal early in the morning there won’t be as many Indians there because they are a half hour late.
So when our tour guide got there we went in and she told us the story of the Taj and how it was a monument build for Shaw Jahan’s , the fifth mogul, wife. When one of Shaw Jahan’s wives was about to die, after she gave birth to their 14th child, she asked for 4 wishes.
1) Never marry again
2) You will take care of our 14 children
3) You will take care of my parents
4) You will make a monument for me that will let generations to come know how much we loved each other.
He followed through on all these promises he made and there for we get the Taj Mahal. It is a remarkable structure everything about it is grand and breath taking (especially if you’re an architecture major and live for this kind of stuff)
After this we went to the red fort and a series of other temples that were remarkable to see the only thing about this day was it was so structured we were all worn down by the end so we went to a mall and had India McDonalds I only tried other peoples food but it was only chicken and veggies because they don’t eat beef. Then we went to an open market where we discovered that steph is a great bargainer and I am horrible at it. You can see straight throw me and steph nope just puts on a stern face and gets what she wants. I stuck with her for the rest of the time and she dealt with the people I just dished out the cash when I wanted something. I will never travel without her, we are each other’s side kick, it works!
Then we went to the Agra train station where I saw something’s I’ve never seen before. There was a man in a shopping cart outside our bus and he had elephantitus in his foot. When we were waiting at the station I ran into my friend Ben and started having a conversation with him. We could not look away from each other or else we would make eye contact with the beggers coming up to us. Ever other minute there was a new begger coming up to us and our train was delayed for 30 minutes. It is something I could not describe in full because the disabilities these people have are indescribable and most of their begging is fuelled by masters giving them drugs. A guide told us that when we give them money they are forced to bring the food or money back to their “masters” which may or may not be their parents. So even to give a small child food would just fuel a higher power. We went home on the train and just went straight to bed as we had not gotten more than 3 hours of sleep in the last few nights.
DAY 5 –
We woke up after a refreshing 5 hours of sleep ate breakfast and we were off to tour Delhi. We went to a Hindu temple first which was a temple like none of the others we had seen. The floors were made of marble and you had to take off your shoes as usual. There were different spots where you could be blessed by different gods. It was a remarkable temple made of red and yellow painted stones.
After that we went and saw the parliament house and the arch. The arch had all the names of war victims engraved on it.
After this we went to the air port so that we could get through security only for our plane to be delayed. We got on the plane and flew back to Chennai.
Day 6 –
This morning the intention was for Eric, Erin, Audrey, and myself to go to Mamallepotum which is about an hour and a half away. Well after being transferred from rickshaw to rickshaw 5 times with the driver saying my brother will take you and then changing the price we finally got out of that ricksaw in to another and off to spencers plaza. This was a day of shopping and relaxation as well as getting lost and shoved into different rickshaws.
India The End
Im sorry that this is the briefest blog I have as this was my favorite port yet. There are just some things that hard to explain and India is one of them.
What we wanted to do was get to the stadium because the cricket world cup was currently going on; however, every driver has a different plan for you. They want to take you to their “brother’s shop” that has “cheap prices” yeah not so much! They brought you to all the Americanized nice air conditioned stores that had nothing that was culturally relevant to India and if they did it was a giant wooden statue of a god that you would never be able to afford let alone carry out of the store.
Let me tell you, some semester at sea kids ruin it for everyone. I watched a girl try and bargain. The store owner asked her for 3000 rupees for 2 scarf (total rip off that about 60 USD). So she gave him 2500 she had in her pocket and as she went into her bag to get more money asks the shop owner can you do it for 2500. The guy obviously said no because she was willing to pay the high price from then on out people in this shops tried to rip us off and we couldn’t buy anything from them. Some people puzzle me. So instead of standing there watching people get ripped off I went over to a Shiva temple took off my shoes walked through the streets of India barefoot and into the temple. I was blessed with ashes which after I was blessed I learned the ashes were cow dung ashes. We walked around one of the shrines, as that is how you praise the gods, and found out where the cow poop comes from. There were 5 cows sitting in a pen just hanging out. Steph and I started cracking up while our friend Kevin and Miller had no clue why.
We finally got the guy to bring us to the stadium and he tried over charging us saying the price we agreed on earlier was not the same….ect….. ect. So we got to the stadium and started asking around for tickets. People just kept saying the same thing and pointing in a direction, so we kept proceeding in that direction finally running into Nitin, A man who led us in the right direction finding us tickets. We were offered tickets by many people, but then a man came up to me and said “my brothers not coming you can have his ticket” so I got in free!!!
Now cricket is like watching paint dry! Don’t get me wrong the atmosphere awesome but the actual sport very boring we left within 45 minutes after we could not bear the heat any more. Nitin, our new india friend, showed us a place to eat which was a little more expensive than I would have like but that’s on Indian standards. I could have never gotten that much food for that price in America.
After that we went to a mall, we wanted to go to a market, but when we went in there there was a Indian Gillette razor promotion. My friends Kevin and Miller got their beards (or faces) shaved I stayed and watched as the other girls went and shopped eventually when we walked away from the stand I see Stephanie hanging over the railing yelling where are you going…she couldn’t take what I avoided in the first place any more…..girls shopping. So we went to a stand that was giving free henna out and a woman gave me designs on the 4 of our hands. Its amazing how fast and good they can do these designs, it literally took her 30 seconds to do this design on my hand!!!!!
After that we left to go back to the port but Nitin wanted us to stop for more food!!! So he had us stop at this one place and bought us a bunch of really good Indian dishes. I LOVE INDIAN FOOD!!!!!!!!!
Day 2 - ARE WE THERE YET
We woke up at 330 in the morning all packed and ready to head out to the air port! This day was a day of mostly all traveling and layovers… we flew from Chennai to Delhi had lunch (more curry!!!!!) then flew to Varanasi. When we got out of that air port and went to our hotel. We put our stuff down and came back down to go to the River Ganges. When we came down we figured out that we would be going not by van but by bike rickshaws. I learned that this is the best way to see the city. You really get to experience the city this way, you get to experience the people, the smells (good and bad), the crowed roads…and so much more. I don’t really know how to describe the streets of India you can’t really understand unless you have been there (Thomas I need some help here). There is so much going on people selling stuff, to people preaching, to seeing old men with ash all over their faces because they have been blessed so much. On our way to the river Ganga (as the people from Varanasi call the ganges river) we heard the call to worship. I am not entirely sure what they were saying because it was in whichever language they speak. I know this sounds culturally unaware but they speak so many different languages in different parts of the country.
So we finally got to a point where we couldn’t ride on our bike rickshaws anymore because the streets were too crowded with all the people going to river for the ceremony. This happens every night not all the people who live in the city go every night mostly only on Sundays, but people from all around come to this city for the holiest of holy places. So we went to the river and I got a pile of flowers that you send into the river with the center candle lit. When you send the candle into the water you make a wish and Hindus believe that no matter what your wish it will come true. We then went to a balcony, where monkeys were crawling all over, and watched the ceremony of the 5 priests. It was quite the experience although I don’t really know how to describe everything and Im sorry. Their way of life is unrelatable to anything I know; however I can tell you it is very beautiful!
After having dinner and going to a hooka bar we went back to our hotel room and prepared to wake up early for the morning ceremony.
Day 3 –
We were down in the lobby at 5 ready to go. We are basically racing the other 2 groups because we don’t want to be traveling with so many people. You draw a lot of attention to yourself in bigger groups. So we got in our van and drove to a point where we couldn’t drive anymore so we got out and walked the rest of the way. When you are walking down these roads you see people sleeping on the side of the road. These people are homeless and most of them are missing some sort of limb or have a disease and this isn’t the half of it. This wasn’t anything for what was to come in the next few days.
So we walked to the river and our guide got us a boat so that we could go down the ganga river and see the burning of the bodies ceremony. In the Hindu religion they believe that when you die you soul immediately goes to nirvana or your next life and your body is just a body. So they burn it and throw it into the Ganges River. The river Ganges is the holiest of holy water, they believe that the gods created from the Himalayas, and that this is the proper way to dispose of the body. We saw a ceremony of this going on. Women are not allowed to be present at these ceremonies because they cry and the ceremony is not supposed to be like that it is supposed to be happy and joyous not sorrowful. When there are too many bodies to burn or if a family does not have the money to spend on the wood for the fire the body is simply thrown into the river. Because there are so many bodies lined up to burn some bodies are only burned half way then thrown into the river. After this we went back up the river and walked through the alleys of India with our guide we went and saw another temple, it is some time disappointing because you have these amazing temples that non Hindus are not permitted entry which really stinks but they do this because of attacks on some Hindu temples.
After this we took a breather and had the best chi tea ever made. (we didn’t know it at this point but we would search for “Street chi” the entire rest of the time we were here. We then made our way the van to go to the college and see the temple at the college. We went back to the hotel for breakfast collect our stuff as we had a jammed packed day and then a flight.
We went to Sarnath which was an awesome place for me to go because I have been studying it in class. We were able to see the Sarnath Stuppa and the Sarnath museum which held the Bala Buddha which I had a test on the last day in class. We went to a series of Buddhist temples here which were all beautiful in their own way. After all this we went to the airport for our decent to Delhi.
We got to the air port said good bye to Makesh, the best tour guide ever, and then waited for our plane. When we got to Delhi we went to our new hotel, which took us forever because of the outrageous traffic that occurs in India. We all wanted to go to the Ice lounge that was not 2 far away. None of us had a clue what it would be like, so we needed to go. It was a entire bar/ room made entirely of ice. It was so cool…haha excuse the pun. It was –10 degrees inside we had to wear parka jackets and gloves inside. Everything…I mean everything was made of ice, the chairs the cups the decorations. It was really cool we didn’t stay to long but it was awesome to experience.
Day 4 – The taj!!!!!!!......AGRA
We woke up early in the morning to go to the train station to Agra. When we got there was a bus waiting outside to take us to the TAJ MAHAL!!!!!!!!! There was a little confusion with our guides so we had to wait a little bit but then we finally got into the grand complex. It was incredible Like nothing I had ever seen before. Luckily we had gotten there in the morning so it was not as packed as it would normally be at mid day.
There is something that I am learning though this trip and it is that other countries do not run on the same time regulations that the US does. When they say 30 minutes they usually mean 45. When a rick shaw driver says you will be somewhere in 10 minutes you add an extra 30 minutes to stop at 3 of “his brother’s” shops. So if you go to the Taj Mahal early in the morning there won’t be as many Indians there because they are a half hour late.
So when our tour guide got there we went in and she told us the story of the Taj and how it was a monument build for Shaw Jahan’s , the fifth mogul, wife. When one of Shaw Jahan’s wives was about to die, after she gave birth to their 14th child, she asked for 4 wishes.
1) Never marry again
2) You will take care of our 14 children
3) You will take care of my parents
4) You will make a monument for me that will let generations to come know how much we loved each other.
He followed through on all these promises he made and there for we get the Taj Mahal. It is a remarkable structure everything about it is grand and breath taking (especially if you’re an architecture major and live for this kind of stuff)
After this we went to the red fort and a series of other temples that were remarkable to see the only thing about this day was it was so structured we were all worn down by the end so we went to a mall and had India McDonalds I only tried other peoples food but it was only chicken and veggies because they don’t eat beef. Then we went to an open market where we discovered that steph is a great bargainer and I am horrible at it. You can see straight throw me and steph nope just puts on a stern face and gets what she wants. I stuck with her for the rest of the time and she dealt with the people I just dished out the cash when I wanted something. I will never travel without her, we are each other’s side kick, it works!
Then we went to the Agra train station where I saw something’s I’ve never seen before. There was a man in a shopping cart outside our bus and he had elephantitus in his foot. When we were waiting at the station I ran into my friend Ben and started having a conversation with him. We could not look away from each other or else we would make eye contact with the beggers coming up to us. Ever other minute there was a new begger coming up to us and our train was delayed for 30 minutes. It is something I could not describe in full because the disabilities these people have are indescribable and most of their begging is fuelled by masters giving them drugs. A guide told us that when we give them money they are forced to bring the food or money back to their “masters” which may or may not be their parents. So even to give a small child food would just fuel a higher power. We went home on the train and just went straight to bed as we had not gotten more than 3 hours of sleep in the last few nights.
DAY 5 –
We woke up after a refreshing 5 hours of sleep ate breakfast and we were off to tour Delhi. We went to a Hindu temple first which was a temple like none of the others we had seen. The floors were made of marble and you had to take off your shoes as usual. There were different spots where you could be blessed by different gods. It was a remarkable temple made of red and yellow painted stones.
After that we went and saw the parliament house and the arch. The arch had all the names of war victims engraved on it.
After this we went to the air port so that we could get through security only for our plane to be delayed. We got on the plane and flew back to Chennai.
Day 6 –
This morning the intention was for Eric, Erin, Audrey, and myself to go to Mamallepotum which is about an hour and a half away. Well after being transferred from rickshaw to rickshaw 5 times with the driver saying my brother will take you and then changing the price we finally got out of that ricksaw in to another and off to spencers plaza. This was a day of shopping and relaxation as well as getting lost and shoved into different rickshaws.
India The End
Im sorry that this is the briefest blog I have as this was my favorite port yet. There are just some things that hard to explain and India is one of them.
Saturday, March 5, 2011
Mauritius - This is gonna be awesome!!!!!!
For most people this port was just a party island for everyone, most decided to get a catamaran which is just a big sail boat, a booze cruise. I was having none of that! Not only was this a really cool island but we were only here for one day and I was going to make the most of it! So a few friends and myself decided to go cannoning.
We got off the boat, late as usual….. security was having trouble clearing people, one of the computers shut down. It was a messed up process and we just went with the flow of things. However, I don’t think I will ever understand why id numbers 600 to 900 (meaning myself and Stephanie, I’'m number 724) had to go through face to face clearance but no one else did. Anyway, we got off the boat in clusters, met on the dock, found our bus and started driving. Well none of us knew that Carnival was in for 3 days and that everyone was making pilgrimages to the center of the city. So after we sit in 2 hours of traffic our guide from the cannoning place runs to us and starts directing traffic and us around it. So we finally get to our desired location but we are a little short on time now and can’'t go to the beach or the second water fall but it’s okay because we belayed down a 40 meter water fall!!! So amazing! We weren'’t allowed to get to close because there have been fatal accidents of people slipping off! Not the Ideal situation to say the least!
Walking up to the actual belaying spot is the most nerve racking out of all of it! You'’re walking sideways on this cliff with just a little piece of metal attaching to a rope that’s attached to a waterfall by another piece of metal…. Yeah! But it was awesome you go down and it barely takes any time to go down at all, the anticipation is what kills you! But I got down in one piece and then made my way over and cliff jumped, we jumped about 40 ft in to this giant pool that was the runoff from the water fall. Next we zip lined 120 feet into water which was also amazing.
The whole day was a success after all the traffic, which was a little annoying but it did allow me a chance to see this amazing Shiva temple that had crazy architecture and probably every color you could possibly conceive of!
On The Boat
So the other day the captain came on to the loud speaker in the morning before global studies (the worst class ever) and told us a few things. The only one you would care about is that we would be making an unexpected stop as a few passengers were really sick and we needed to get them better medical attention. Sad yes I know but there is a cool part that came out of it. We stopped for them at Diego Garcia which is a top secret CIA jail base… and military fort! No civilian has ever been on land… until now. Those 2 students and 1 crew member were the only civilians to ever be on that island since it became a base in the 60s.
Now what’s cool about this for me is that not only have those 3 people now been to Diego Garcia but technically I have been there now to. No one has even been in the lagoon here… - actually no one is allowed within 20 miles of this island or they would be approached with military force. So we are actually the first civilians ever to get this close to the island.. PRETTY COOL RIGHT!!!!..... THE THINGS YOU SEE ON SEMESTER AT SEA!
Next is India!!!!! Hope we can all keep up these next few countries there is max 3 days in between!
We got off the boat, late as usual….. security was having trouble clearing people, one of the computers shut down. It was a messed up process and we just went with the flow of things. However, I don’t think I will ever understand why id numbers 600 to 900 (meaning myself and Stephanie, I’'m number 724) had to go through face to face clearance but no one else did. Anyway, we got off the boat in clusters, met on the dock, found our bus and started driving. Well none of us knew that Carnival was in for 3 days and that everyone was making pilgrimages to the center of the city. So after we sit in 2 hours of traffic our guide from the cannoning place runs to us and starts directing traffic and us around it. So we finally get to our desired location but we are a little short on time now and can’'t go to the beach or the second water fall but it’s okay because we belayed down a 40 meter water fall!!! So amazing! We weren'’t allowed to get to close because there have been fatal accidents of people slipping off! Not the Ideal situation to say the least!
Walking up to the actual belaying spot is the most nerve racking out of all of it! You'’re walking sideways on this cliff with just a little piece of metal attaching to a rope that’s attached to a waterfall by another piece of metal…. Yeah! But it was awesome you go down and it barely takes any time to go down at all, the anticipation is what kills you! But I got down in one piece and then made my way over and cliff jumped, we jumped about 40 ft in to this giant pool that was the runoff from the water fall. Next we zip lined 120 feet into water which was also amazing.
The whole day was a success after all the traffic, which was a little annoying but it did allow me a chance to see this amazing Shiva temple that had crazy architecture and probably every color you could possibly conceive of!
On The Boat
So the other day the captain came on to the loud speaker in the morning before global studies (the worst class ever) and told us a few things. The only one you would care about is that we would be making an unexpected stop as a few passengers were really sick and we needed to get them better medical attention. Sad yes I know but there is a cool part that came out of it. We stopped for them at Diego Garcia which is a top secret CIA jail base… and military fort! No civilian has ever been on land… until now. Those 2 students and 1 crew member were the only civilians to ever be on that island since it became a base in the 60s.
Now what’s cool about this for me is that not only have those 3 people now been to Diego Garcia but technically I have been there now to. No one has even been in the lagoon here… - actually no one is allowed within 20 miles of this island or they would be approached with military force. So we are actually the first civilians ever to get this close to the island.. PRETTY COOL RIGHT!!!!..... THE THINGS YOU SEE ON SEMESTER AT SEA!
Next is India!!!!! Hope we can all keep up these next few countries there is max 3 days in between!
Monday, February 28, 2011
SOUTH AFRICA!
DAY 1 – THE WORST DAY EVER!!!!!!!!
I don’t know if many of you know the feeling of when you’re supposed to be somewhere and you’re not, that’s what I felt times a million. We woke up around 7:30 expecting to get off the boat by 8:30; however, that was not in the books. They first told us that the waters were too rough and we couldn’t get into the port -- this was at 8am. They said we should be in by 11am ….that didn’t happen. Then we had a lot of down time waiting and waiting and waiting. A life-long learner then told us that they were going to try and get in again at 11pm. That did not happen, we were then told that we would be trying to get in again until 1am and that we would be at port between those times. Stephanie and I along with every other student on this boat had every intention to get off the boat at that time no one care how late it was we were all waiting for so long just to be in South Africa and we were getting off this boat. When it was 1am and the boat still wasn’t at port Stephanie and I made an executive decision that it was time to go to bed.
DAY 2 – BUT WE NEED TO GO!
We woke up and still weren’t at port. Do you know how disappointing this was! I was mortified and this was at 6;45 - breakfast wasn’t even open yet. So I listened to the captains announcements and woke Steph up again and went to breakfast. We ate breakfast with our friends Jared and Kevin talking about how disappointed we were. I believe at one point I told the real truth and said I wasn’t mature enough for this. We kept on going right up to the port and then we would just turn around and the water didn’t even look rough!
Finally they make the announcement that we will be going into port!!!!!!!! Hallelujah!!!!! Praise be to God we made it. Now every passenger just has to do a face to face with the port agent and they were only letting the SAS trip out first. ahhhh. This was not good we had a 1:20 flight we had to make and it was already 11 we could not wait for everyone to clear! So we waited in line outside the teachers’ lounge where inside you had to talk to the port guards. Every chance there was Andy asked one of the people leading the whole operation if we could go now. If we could have our face to face, we needed to get off this SHIP!!! Finally, we get our face to face and we run to the gang way as an LLC told us we could get off. Well we get to the gangway and then we are told we have to wait for every passenger to get cleared to get off. Now this just won’t work by the time everyone is cleared we won’t make our flight. Finally, we get it through their heads and they make an exception for independent travelers and that’s how I became the first person off the boat followed by Stephanie then Bruno then Andy! We ran out of the port, which was quite shorter than the Ghana one, and found the first taxi out there. He drove us right to the airport. I ran into the airport because none of us had any Rand because we couldn’t get off the boat but we needed to pay the taxi now. Oh and when you take money out of the ATM it’s scary. Not because you are in any harm but because you have to take out so much Rand which actually converts 725 rand is 100 dollars, it’s weird! We went inside and realized that we were okay on time. So we had a quick snack and then made it to our plane. Our plane was awesome it had zebra stripes on it but then when we got on Stephanie and I were asked to move out of great seats, mine by the window and in the front of the plane, to the very last row which had no windows and right next to the engine -- all to accommodate a woman and her baby. Now maybe this is selfish of me but come on I have never been to South Africa I wanted to look out the window! How much room does a baby need and why is this woman in my seat….she wasn’t even pretending to be sorry for making us have the crappiest seats ever.
After the flight we got off the plane and met the guy who would be guiding us for the next day or 2. Vinard was his name. He was working at the hostel we were staying at helping out John the owner, who was a family friend. He told us all about himself and how he planned to come to America to farm in Wyoming. I guess they pay the best there! Anyway Vinard showed us one of the soccer stadiums the world cup was played in, just in passing on our way to Daniels Cheetah Sanctuary. When we got to the sanctuary we were able to jump right into a group and walk behind the fence to where the animals were raised. First we walked up and saw the meircats they were very cute and she had just had 2 little babies which were about the size of my hand. Next we walked on to a bridge and saw some of the older cheetahs, who at this point in the day were just lying around. Then we walked over to the cage of Olva, a 4 year old cheetah and the guide opened the gate and said go ahead in. A cheetah is the only large cat that you can fully domesticate. So we walk into the cage and walk over to her and the guide first walks up to her in order to show us how nice she really is. So we all took turns going up petting her and taking pictures. The whole time she was purring which is actually a little freaky because it was so loud it kind of sounded like a growl. Also when she licks you, yes she licks you, it feels like the roughest sand paper you will ever feel.
Next we walked into the cage of the lions. Lion cubs that is, they were only 2 months old and they would leave the sanctuary at 5 months in order to go to their next stage of their reintroduction to the wild. Because they are not trying to tame them they will still claw and bite at you but their reaction time is not the quickest yet so we were safe. We also saw a survival cat when we were in behind the fence he was just laying there but they can jump up to 3 meters and their legs are very very long.
We left and went to our hostel which was about a 45 minute drive away. Along the way Vinard would show us the town that literally if you did not look quick enough you would miss it. The town was about 200 feet long and then it was gone. We soon got to our hostel and we were in the 6 person dorm room which ended up being just the 4 of us in it any way which was nice because we all got a bottom bunk. It really doesn’t matter because when you’re at a hostel you spend virtually no time in your room. Oh yeah forgot to mention our hostel was spread out on a farm there was a building here and building there but it was really just like a family living on a big piece of property.
Once we put down our stuff we head right over to the pub as we didn’t eat all day and were pretty hungry. It was a great time and we didn’t leave there until late at night. We just sat around with the locals talking around the fire all night and playing the occasional game of pool. It was a great time because, besides for the accents, you couldn’t tell who was the employer, employee, or guests. It was like we had all known each other for the longest of time.
DAY 3 – THE ANIMALS
The next day we woke up at 7 and went out for a game drive. Our game drive was 5 hours long and we were able to see a bunch of different animals. There were so many elephants and kudu; there were an overwhelming amount of them. We also were able to see some buffalo, zebra, ostrich, and mush more. I don’t really know how to tell you about the game drive because it’s odd to explain.
After that we had lunch and then went to the Reptile and Bird sanctuary. Now if you don’t know me very well you don’t know that I’m am terrified of snakes! I just plain out don’t like them they scare me!!! Well now we are going to a place that saves snakes and they love them there! WHAT AM I THINKING!!!!!!!!!! We walk into a room and its dark and there are just snakes everywhere. First we hold a gecko, I’m fine it was cute and I kind of want one whatever! Now she starts taking the snakes out and they are wiggling everywhere and I am becoming less and less okay with this situation. But I just keep thinking I am going to overcome my fear I can do it!!!! Well then she hands it to me the thing was squirming around bringing its face close to me and I’m not okay now -- like I’m trying to smile but I can’t. They get a picture of me with it -- take it back and what happens? I hyperventilate! I can’t even describe this to you, I just couldn’t breathe and that’s what happened! I was trying to breathe and couldn’t so what do I do I start laughing!! Now I really can’t breathe. What is Stephanie doing during this time but laughing and taking pictures! Every time I tried to take a breath it became harder and I don’t even understand how I finally was able to breathe but I did and I’m alive to tell you about it!! But that was only the first snake there were so many more.
I did not hyperventilate again when holding any of the other snakes - I did pretty fine. I even liked one of them enough that I named it Salizar and they said they liked the name enough that we would try and remember it. haha. I figure out I am less okay with the small ones they squirm around too much. I decided I really hate when their heads come close to my body. Oh yeah did I mention that I held a poisonous snake! Yup the lady showing us around didn’t tell me until after like what the heck!!! Oh and when we first just went into the place this guy comes into the room with the most poisonous snake in the world and this snake is more poisonous than the Black Mamba (which I saw). It was really pretty and supposedly really really sweet but I don’t trust any snake -- they have a mind of their own. I believe it’s called the Bom snake and its bright green with lime green under its skin that you can see when it moves! By the way this guy was just handling it with ease he even gave it a kiss on its…..tongue? What the heck is this guy thinking!!! We held pythons and boa constrictors -- it was all craziness!!!
Finally we finished the stressful part of the day! So we then saw some meircats that just had babies - then we went looked at the crocodiles fight over food and then went to feed the birds. We saw some eagles, ostrich, owls and other sorts of birds. We went into the owls cage and the owls perched up on our arms. This owls name was jack and had very sharp claws! Their eyes were so pretty, a bright orange! It was really cool! And then we left and went back to the hostel! Waited for a little bit talking with our new friends and then we went to the bus stop as the bus would be our bed for the night!
DAY 4 – SWELLENDAM
Its 4:30 am and the bus driver calls Swellendam. Thats our exit we get off and go to our new hostel where we wait for the owner to help us! She finally shows up around 8 and points us back into the direction of town where we ask a hotel to get us a taxi. They fixed us up with a driver that would drive us to De Woop Nature Reserve and then to Gansbaai which is pronounced nothing like what it looks like!
De Woop is a beautiful reserve with sand dunes up to 300 feet tall. (When we left on the boat a few days later you could see them on the coast and everyone was envious when we said we were there!) We had a picnic lunch there and walked around the sand dune in awe. After a few hours there we hopped into the car again and went to Gansbaai, where the next day we would go shark diving! We Arrived around 8oclock got into our hostel and went to the local pub for dinner which was delicious. We stayed around talking to the locals for a while then went back to our hostel to go to bed. We had a little trouble getting in because the locks are a little different there!
DAY 5 – WE’RE JUST TRYING TO GO SHARK DIVING!
In the morning we woke up at 6:15 to go to the dock for shark diving. Half the other people we were supposed to meet us didn’t make it because the night before the times changed a little. We made it over to the dock ate a little breakfast and then went SHARK DIVING!!!! Let me tell you Steph and I had the greatest experience out of everyone. A shark came up with a fish in its mouth and rammed our cage 5 inches from our faces. It was sooooo cooool. We came up from the water screaming “did you see that, did you see that ahhhh” and then went right back down in the water. When we came up so many people were like you guys are so lucky to get to see that, even the dive masters told us that we were some of the lucky ones.
I must add to all this that before we dove the head guy told us that we were about to see something that our children will never see! There are less that 1000 great white sharks in the world left and only 300 in the area left. The sharks are going extinct because people are killing them solely for their jaws. On the black market these jaws can go for a lot of money. The other thing they are killed for is their fins in order to make shark fin soup. The only thing they use this massive animal for is its jaw and fin and throw the rest out. How sad is that! So unnecessary!!!
After shark diving we went back to the ship for the first time in days stopping at a beach quickly on the way back for a rest stop. These beaches are so cool they have about 6 levels of different waves it’s pretty amazing.
When we got back we quickly changed and Andy, Bruno, Steph, and I (our little family could not separate now) went and hiked Table Mountain. Table Mountain is amazing, on the way up we walked through a cloud. My hair was getting wet because all the perspiration that the cloud was holding, all the plants were dripping with water as well as I. Getting to the top was the coolest except we didn’t know which way to go, finally we figured it out and watched the sun set over the city. It was gorgeous. We met up with a few friends at the top and road the cable car down which was cool in itself because as it went down it spun around and you got a 360 view of the city and its surroundings!
When we got down we went to Mama Africa, a restaurant, with a bunch of people. I had ostrich, kudu, springbuck and crocodile! It was cool to try all of them I liked springbuck the best everyone should try this one day! So GOOD!!! We ate and drank South African wine and danced to the African music! We liked it so much we even bought the CD!
DAY 6 – BUT I HAVE SO MUCH MORE TO SEE!!!!
Katie, Eric, Bruno, Andy, Steph, and I started our day by going to bolder beach to see the penguins - the whole scene of it was awesome! But there is not much I can tell you about it so I will try and post some pictures of it up soon.
Next we went to the Cape of Good Hope. When we first got there we hiked up to the light house to see the view but because it was a little foggy we could not see much but when we were up there it was neat because when you went to the edge the wind would blow so hard that you thought you might blow away. Also on the side of the light house there was a post that told you how far everything was away from the point we were standing. We were able to see how far places such as New York that we live near are but also places such as Beijing which we are going to. You just felt so caught in the middle of everything. I found it really awesome to see how far we have come around the world. You could say it helped reality seep in a little deeper.
We walked back down and went to the actually point of the Cape of Good Hope which is the most southern tip of Africa. The furthest south you can possibly go! This is a very touristy spot and is somewhat frustrating to be at because if they say Americans are rude well then whoever they are never met any Europeans. We left the cape and went wine tasting. South Africa is known for their wine and now I know why. We tried 7 different types of South African wine and they all had very different taste. I have to apologize here mom - I attempted to send a bottle of red wine home to you as I knew you would have loved it but they do not ship to America because of labeling issues! Oh well!
The wine tasting left us all a little silly and as we made it back to the boat we chatted about the amazing time we had all had in South Africa! So pleased that we did so much! South Africa is definantly a place to go in your life time!
I don’t know if many of you know the feeling of when you’re supposed to be somewhere and you’re not, that’s what I felt times a million. We woke up around 7:30 expecting to get off the boat by 8:30; however, that was not in the books. They first told us that the waters were too rough and we couldn’t get into the port -- this was at 8am. They said we should be in by 11am ….that didn’t happen. Then we had a lot of down time waiting and waiting and waiting. A life-long learner then told us that they were going to try and get in again at 11pm. That did not happen, we were then told that we would be trying to get in again until 1am and that we would be at port between those times. Stephanie and I along with every other student on this boat had every intention to get off the boat at that time no one care how late it was we were all waiting for so long just to be in South Africa and we were getting off this boat. When it was 1am and the boat still wasn’t at port Stephanie and I made an executive decision that it was time to go to bed.
DAY 2 – BUT WE NEED TO GO!
We woke up and still weren’t at port. Do you know how disappointing this was! I was mortified and this was at 6;45 - breakfast wasn’t even open yet. So I listened to the captains announcements and woke Steph up again and went to breakfast. We ate breakfast with our friends Jared and Kevin talking about how disappointed we were. I believe at one point I told the real truth and said I wasn’t mature enough for this. We kept on going right up to the port and then we would just turn around and the water didn’t even look rough!
Finally they make the announcement that we will be going into port!!!!!!!! Hallelujah!!!!! Praise be to God we made it. Now every passenger just has to do a face to face with the port agent and they were only letting the SAS trip out first. ahhhh. This was not good we had a 1:20 flight we had to make and it was already 11 we could not wait for everyone to clear! So we waited in line outside the teachers’ lounge where inside you had to talk to the port guards. Every chance there was Andy asked one of the people leading the whole operation if we could go now. If we could have our face to face, we needed to get off this SHIP!!! Finally, we get our face to face and we run to the gang way as an LLC told us we could get off. Well we get to the gangway and then we are told we have to wait for every passenger to get cleared to get off. Now this just won’t work by the time everyone is cleared we won’t make our flight. Finally, we get it through their heads and they make an exception for independent travelers and that’s how I became the first person off the boat followed by Stephanie then Bruno then Andy! We ran out of the port, which was quite shorter than the Ghana one, and found the first taxi out there. He drove us right to the airport. I ran into the airport because none of us had any Rand because we couldn’t get off the boat but we needed to pay the taxi now. Oh and when you take money out of the ATM it’s scary. Not because you are in any harm but because you have to take out so much Rand which actually converts 725 rand is 100 dollars, it’s weird! We went inside and realized that we were okay on time. So we had a quick snack and then made it to our plane. Our plane was awesome it had zebra stripes on it but then when we got on Stephanie and I were asked to move out of great seats, mine by the window and in the front of the plane, to the very last row which had no windows and right next to the engine -- all to accommodate a woman and her baby. Now maybe this is selfish of me but come on I have never been to South Africa I wanted to look out the window! How much room does a baby need and why is this woman in my seat….she wasn’t even pretending to be sorry for making us have the crappiest seats ever.
After the flight we got off the plane and met the guy who would be guiding us for the next day or 2. Vinard was his name. He was working at the hostel we were staying at helping out John the owner, who was a family friend. He told us all about himself and how he planned to come to America to farm in Wyoming. I guess they pay the best there! Anyway Vinard showed us one of the soccer stadiums the world cup was played in, just in passing on our way to Daniels Cheetah Sanctuary. When we got to the sanctuary we were able to jump right into a group and walk behind the fence to where the animals were raised. First we walked up and saw the meircats they were very cute and she had just had 2 little babies which were about the size of my hand. Next we walked on to a bridge and saw some of the older cheetahs, who at this point in the day were just lying around. Then we walked over to the cage of Olva, a 4 year old cheetah and the guide opened the gate and said go ahead in. A cheetah is the only large cat that you can fully domesticate. So we walk into the cage and walk over to her and the guide first walks up to her in order to show us how nice she really is. So we all took turns going up petting her and taking pictures. The whole time she was purring which is actually a little freaky because it was so loud it kind of sounded like a growl. Also when she licks you, yes she licks you, it feels like the roughest sand paper you will ever feel.
Next we walked into the cage of the lions. Lion cubs that is, they were only 2 months old and they would leave the sanctuary at 5 months in order to go to their next stage of their reintroduction to the wild. Because they are not trying to tame them they will still claw and bite at you but their reaction time is not the quickest yet so we were safe. We also saw a survival cat when we were in behind the fence he was just laying there but they can jump up to 3 meters and their legs are very very long.
We left and went to our hostel which was about a 45 minute drive away. Along the way Vinard would show us the town that literally if you did not look quick enough you would miss it. The town was about 200 feet long and then it was gone. We soon got to our hostel and we were in the 6 person dorm room which ended up being just the 4 of us in it any way which was nice because we all got a bottom bunk. It really doesn’t matter because when you’re at a hostel you spend virtually no time in your room. Oh yeah forgot to mention our hostel was spread out on a farm there was a building here and building there but it was really just like a family living on a big piece of property.
Once we put down our stuff we head right over to the pub as we didn’t eat all day and were pretty hungry. It was a great time and we didn’t leave there until late at night. We just sat around with the locals talking around the fire all night and playing the occasional game of pool. It was a great time because, besides for the accents, you couldn’t tell who was the employer, employee, or guests. It was like we had all known each other for the longest of time.
DAY 3 – THE ANIMALS
The next day we woke up at 7 and went out for a game drive. Our game drive was 5 hours long and we were able to see a bunch of different animals. There were so many elephants and kudu; there were an overwhelming amount of them. We also were able to see some buffalo, zebra, ostrich, and mush more. I don’t really know how to tell you about the game drive because it’s odd to explain.
After that we had lunch and then went to the Reptile and Bird sanctuary. Now if you don’t know me very well you don’t know that I’m am terrified of snakes! I just plain out don’t like them they scare me!!! Well now we are going to a place that saves snakes and they love them there! WHAT AM I THINKING!!!!!!!!!! We walk into a room and its dark and there are just snakes everywhere. First we hold a gecko, I’m fine it was cute and I kind of want one whatever! Now she starts taking the snakes out and they are wiggling everywhere and I am becoming less and less okay with this situation. But I just keep thinking I am going to overcome my fear I can do it!!!! Well then she hands it to me the thing was squirming around bringing its face close to me and I’m not okay now -- like I’m trying to smile but I can’t. They get a picture of me with it -- take it back and what happens? I hyperventilate! I can’t even describe this to you, I just couldn’t breathe and that’s what happened! I was trying to breathe and couldn’t so what do I do I start laughing!! Now I really can’t breathe. What is Stephanie doing during this time but laughing and taking pictures! Every time I tried to take a breath it became harder and I don’t even understand how I finally was able to breathe but I did and I’m alive to tell you about it!! But that was only the first snake there were so many more.
I did not hyperventilate again when holding any of the other snakes - I did pretty fine. I even liked one of them enough that I named it Salizar and they said they liked the name enough that we would try and remember it. haha. I figure out I am less okay with the small ones they squirm around too much. I decided I really hate when their heads come close to my body. Oh yeah did I mention that I held a poisonous snake! Yup the lady showing us around didn’t tell me until after like what the heck!!! Oh and when we first just went into the place this guy comes into the room with the most poisonous snake in the world and this snake is more poisonous than the Black Mamba (which I saw). It was really pretty and supposedly really really sweet but I don’t trust any snake -- they have a mind of their own. I believe it’s called the Bom snake and its bright green with lime green under its skin that you can see when it moves! By the way this guy was just handling it with ease he even gave it a kiss on its…..tongue? What the heck is this guy thinking!!! We held pythons and boa constrictors -- it was all craziness!!!
Finally we finished the stressful part of the day! So we then saw some meircats that just had babies - then we went looked at the crocodiles fight over food and then went to feed the birds. We saw some eagles, ostrich, owls and other sorts of birds. We went into the owls cage and the owls perched up on our arms. This owls name was jack and had very sharp claws! Their eyes were so pretty, a bright orange! It was really cool! And then we left and went back to the hostel! Waited for a little bit talking with our new friends and then we went to the bus stop as the bus would be our bed for the night!
DAY 4 – SWELLENDAM
Its 4:30 am and the bus driver calls Swellendam. Thats our exit we get off and go to our new hostel where we wait for the owner to help us! She finally shows up around 8 and points us back into the direction of town where we ask a hotel to get us a taxi. They fixed us up with a driver that would drive us to De Woop Nature Reserve and then to Gansbaai which is pronounced nothing like what it looks like!
De Woop is a beautiful reserve with sand dunes up to 300 feet tall. (When we left on the boat a few days later you could see them on the coast and everyone was envious when we said we were there!) We had a picnic lunch there and walked around the sand dune in awe. After a few hours there we hopped into the car again and went to Gansbaai, where the next day we would go shark diving! We Arrived around 8oclock got into our hostel and went to the local pub for dinner which was delicious. We stayed around talking to the locals for a while then went back to our hostel to go to bed. We had a little trouble getting in because the locks are a little different there!
DAY 5 – WE’RE JUST TRYING TO GO SHARK DIVING!
In the morning we woke up at 6:15 to go to the dock for shark diving. Half the other people we were supposed to meet us didn’t make it because the night before the times changed a little. We made it over to the dock ate a little breakfast and then went SHARK DIVING!!!! Let me tell you Steph and I had the greatest experience out of everyone. A shark came up with a fish in its mouth and rammed our cage 5 inches from our faces. It was sooooo cooool. We came up from the water screaming “did you see that, did you see that ahhhh” and then went right back down in the water. When we came up so many people were like you guys are so lucky to get to see that, even the dive masters told us that we were some of the lucky ones.
I must add to all this that before we dove the head guy told us that we were about to see something that our children will never see! There are less that 1000 great white sharks in the world left and only 300 in the area left. The sharks are going extinct because people are killing them solely for their jaws. On the black market these jaws can go for a lot of money. The other thing they are killed for is their fins in order to make shark fin soup. The only thing they use this massive animal for is its jaw and fin and throw the rest out. How sad is that! So unnecessary!!!
After shark diving we went back to the ship for the first time in days stopping at a beach quickly on the way back for a rest stop. These beaches are so cool they have about 6 levels of different waves it’s pretty amazing.
When we got back we quickly changed and Andy, Bruno, Steph, and I (our little family could not separate now) went and hiked Table Mountain. Table Mountain is amazing, on the way up we walked through a cloud. My hair was getting wet because all the perspiration that the cloud was holding, all the plants were dripping with water as well as I. Getting to the top was the coolest except we didn’t know which way to go, finally we figured it out and watched the sun set over the city. It was gorgeous. We met up with a few friends at the top and road the cable car down which was cool in itself because as it went down it spun around and you got a 360 view of the city and its surroundings!
When we got down we went to Mama Africa, a restaurant, with a bunch of people. I had ostrich, kudu, springbuck and crocodile! It was cool to try all of them I liked springbuck the best everyone should try this one day! So GOOD!!! We ate and drank South African wine and danced to the African music! We liked it so much we even bought the CD!
DAY 6 – BUT I HAVE SO MUCH MORE TO SEE!!!!
Katie, Eric, Bruno, Andy, Steph, and I started our day by going to bolder beach to see the penguins - the whole scene of it was awesome! But there is not much I can tell you about it so I will try and post some pictures of it up soon.
Next we went to the Cape of Good Hope. When we first got there we hiked up to the light house to see the view but because it was a little foggy we could not see much but when we were up there it was neat because when you went to the edge the wind would blow so hard that you thought you might blow away. Also on the side of the light house there was a post that told you how far everything was away from the point we were standing. We were able to see how far places such as New York that we live near are but also places such as Beijing which we are going to. You just felt so caught in the middle of everything. I found it really awesome to see how far we have come around the world. You could say it helped reality seep in a little deeper.
We walked back down and went to the actually point of the Cape of Good Hope which is the most southern tip of Africa. The furthest south you can possibly go! This is a very touristy spot and is somewhat frustrating to be at because if they say Americans are rude well then whoever they are never met any Europeans. We left the cape and went wine tasting. South Africa is known for their wine and now I know why. We tried 7 different types of South African wine and they all had very different taste. I have to apologize here mom - I attempted to send a bottle of red wine home to you as I knew you would have loved it but they do not ship to America because of labeling issues! Oh well!
The wine tasting left us all a little silly and as we made it back to the boat we chatted about the amazing time we had all had in South Africa! So pleased that we did so much! South Africa is definantly a place to go in your life time!
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Ghana
Day 1 – Drumming and dance workshop
The first day in Ghana our ship was greeted by drummers, singers, and dancers outside on the port as the pilot was docking our boat. It was pretty cool, especially because that was what we were going to be doing that day. So we finished eating, got ready quick and made our way to the gangway which was off the 2nd floor and not the 5th floor. If you ask me they make a lot more work for the crew when the gang way is on the 5th floor. Anyways, I was one of the first people off…..3rd off actually, and I walked down the port a little, even though I was supposed to get right on a bus, but come on who steps off a ship in Ghana and the first thing they do is get on an air conditioned coach bus. So I walk down the dock a little and I was immediately bombarded with men trying to sell me things!!!! Being the first person to make it this far I was also the first to meet “Mr. Quality,” “Mr. Cheap”, and Joseph. They told me I needed to get their stuff it was better than the guys stand who was right next to his and selling the exact same thing. One of them gave me a bracelet for free, “because I was the first person he met and I was so nice,” so that I could be a human billboard for him.
So I walked back and got on to the bus and made my way into town. On this bus ride I realized how far the port actually was and OMG was it long! To get out of the port it was a mile walk (at least) and it wasn’t until the third day that they got us a shuttle to get out to where the taxis could go.
We arrived at a hotel where we first watched people drum and dance for a while. They would make us get up and dance with them in the morning and we were tired before lunch time. The heat in Ghana is almost unbearable it really dehydrates you and you don’t realize it is happening. One girl even got a little too dehydrated and was not able to continue with the second part of the day. After we danced to the drumming for a few hours we left on our bus and went to a hotel for lunch. The hotel was a completely different style hotel then we had just been at and it was sort of an oasis. We had a buffet lunch and this is where I first had Pepe sauce and Shitto sauce and there was one more that starts with an “M”. These sauces will change your approach to food. You can put them on anything and even if you don’t like spicy food you will still love this sauce! Something I am learning and I don’t understand it is; why does every other place in the world have Amazing fruit besides America. I mean every place!
Well after we re-hydrated we went back to the hotel. We learned how to do a traditional dance and play the drums and a song that would go with it all! We also learned that the hotel we were at was not really a hotel but a brothel, which we would see a lot more of as our stay in Ghana continued.
After the day was through we went back to the boat refueled and SHOWERED. I have never appreciated showers as much as I have since I been to Ghana!
Day 2 – Ghana – School and market visit
Day 2 was the first day me and Steph split apart on this trip. It was a sad day but we learned to manage. I got up ate breakfast and went to visit a school.
When we got there we were addressed by the head master who was a little old lady with a thick Twee accent ( the language of the Ashanti people).She told us that we would break up into groups and go to different class rooms. I asked to go to a class room of younger kids. I ended up in a class room with 3 year olds. They loved everything about my camera and all they wanted to do was play with it until they discovered my hair. Then my hair became the main attraction. I was swarmed by about 20 three year olds and that was only because all 50 touch my hair at 1 time. Their hands were all rubbing my head feeling my hair and I was on the floor not able to see anything. I couldn’t understand how it went from 2 little girls to playing with my hair to 20 kids all rubbing my head. After 10 minutes of this hilarious epidemic the teacher finally broke it up and I looked like I was straight out of the 70s. I don’t think a hair dresser would know how to give my hair that much body it literally stood 4 inches off my head! You never realize how different you are in another country until it is brought to your attention. Even the teachers wanted to feel my hair at one point because if being a white person in Ghana isn’t different enough having blond hair is jaw dropping.
As the day continued on, Melissa (the girl I was in the class room with) and I taught them the hokie pokie, opened countless water bottles, played countless games, help teach the ABC’s and much more. We left around lunch time and went back to the boat. We all quickly took showers because we were surrounded by coughing kids all day and then went to the market circle. Elizabeth and I broke away from the group because traveling in groups of 8 is just way too much. We were once again bombarded by the many vendors, one of them being Alex whom Elisabeth bought into a little too much. I don’t think she realized that all they wanted was her money not her friendship! Finally we were able to continue into town
The walk into town is not so pleasant; it is filled with open holes in the ground where you see sewage statically floating there, and you must watch your step because you could easily fall into one at any point. It smelt horrible for the most part (and people say New Jersey smells)! We got to the market and had no clue how to approach it, there was no feasible way to go about this strategically.
The market is a giant wooden circle that people have small shops built into them, then there are little stands in the center crammed together so that as many people as possible can have a stand. These stands are filled with raw fish that has just been caught, or that has been caught a few days ago and has not been refrigerated or kept cool in any fashion. There were also pig’s feet hanging from wooden bars ( I definitely thought they were human arms at first, they looked fleshy and dead and hey who knows what they do in other countries). We went to one stand in the market and met the people running it. One lady was older and more traditional and she was selling some form of drink that you drink from a bag.
(They drink everything out of bags I am not quite sure why but they do and its kind of cool. You cannot reseal these bags so you need to drink everything at the same time and the way you open it is by biting off one corner and suck.)
The drink was really good and she gave us a little sip out of a cup because we were not sure if we should drink it as it did not seem like the most sanitary of all things. But it was really good and I wish I got more. Anyway we stayed and talked with Mary and Ellen for a little, Ellen was younger, she asked me if I had a brother and if she could come home with me and marry him. I told Ellen that I did have a brother but I was sorry he had a girlfriend and I didn’t think Mary (Thomas’s girlfriend) would be happy with her marrying him (don’t worry Mary I got your back haha). Ellen also told me because I was born on a Sunday that in Ghanaian tradition my “fancy” name was ESI. However I don’t have a clue what it means because when I asked they just said it means you’re born on Sunday.
One thing that I must warn any woman that goes to Ghana and goes to the Takoradi Market Circle is that make sure you are wearing long short or pants. I felt awful when a woman started pinching my legs. At first I was like what the heck are you doing why are you pinching and slapping my legs? Then Ellen explained to me that the older woman do not like it when you can see your legs and that next time I should wear longer short but next time I should bring her back my short shorts because she wanted to be a sexy lady too.
We made our way out of the market circle and did a little more shopping and walked back to the boat. We did not buy too much but we got a lot of experience. It was quite a different experience and it was just the beginning! When we went out that night I was taught how to balance a large plate of Peanut bread on my head by Simon my new Ghanaian friend. I also became an African waitress!
Day 3 – Ghana – Cape Coast Castel
We get off the boat and make the same walk toward the market circle. I made sure to wear longer shorts this time. We do a few things that some of our group needs and while we are at the post office we meet up with Dorian and Dick, a professor and his wife, who also want to go to the Cape Coast Castle. So our group just got a little bigger which is actually perfect when you are trying to get on to a tro-tro. A tro-tro is a “private” bus system which really means a rundown van that 12 people can fit in. The reason it is better to have a larger group is because this van will not leave until the entire thing is filled. It only cost 3 Cedie (Ghana currency) so they have to make their moneys’ worth. Even when we already had 9 people it still took about a half hour to start moving.
Finally we set out on the hour bus ride, with the windows wide open and the breeze blowing in our faces taking plenty of pictures of the reoccurring country side. We finally made it toward the coast which was an amazing change of scenery. When we made it to Cape Coast Castle we got out and were in awe.
The castle was something to marvel at but something you also felt horrible calling a castle. It was a grand structure that had lasted so many years but terrible things happened here. The Portuguese originally designed the castle to hold gold, as Ghana is considered the Gold Coast. However, after realizing they needed more help then they could afford they started recruiting slaves and eventually just selling them. That is when they converted the castle into holding cells for slaves. The male dungeon was a series of 5 rooms. Each room was about 15 x 20 feet long and in total of these 5 rooms there were, at times, 1000 slaves. The amount in the holding cells all depended on how long it took the ships to make it there and back. For the most part the trip took 2 months but could be extended to 3 if brought off course or hit by a storm.
Each of the other the 5 rooms had barrel vaulted ceilings with 3 very small (1’ x1’) windows at the tops, this was the only light able to get into these room. There is 1 room that has a slightly bigger window but that is only so that the captors can see the slaves so that they could brand them. They said they had only found the floors a few years ago because the feces was so high that they could not get to the floor.
The female slave dungeon was a bit smaller as less females were captives. The females had 2 small room about 20 /20 that were to hold 400 women at a time. Also if any slave acted out of line or tried to escape they would put them in the suffocation room. It was a small room with no windows. They would not be given food or water just left there to die.
Lastly, there was the “Door of No Return”. Once the slaves passed through these doors they were to never return back through the doors or to Africa. This was the door to the beach where they would row out on small boat and row out to meet a large ship that they would be transported on to either Europe, the Americas or Brazil. 1/3rd of them going to Brazil alone.
This was a very hard place for me to be because I was not sure how to act. I knew you were not supposed to speak loudly or much at all but just listen to what was being said. I also did not feel right smiling, which I smile most of the time. There was so much that was hard to react to especially when you are among such a horrible place in such a beautiful setting.
After this I split off from the original group I was with and traveled about a half hour and went to Hans Cottage Hotel. This was a really cool restaurant and hotel, there were a bunch of bungalows that were on stilts above the water. The water was muddy and filled with crocodiles. We all had lunch and there were 7 girls and 1 guy (Ben ) aka protector haha. We had lunch and mine tasted like it was cooked over garbage although some how everyone else’s tasted great (not fair)! But here is the exciting part of lunch time! We got to pet a crocodile. My heart and adrenaline was racing as I walked up to a wild croc. This croc was pretty big and it had just strolled up out of the water and now this man was telling me it was safe to pet him. Personally I thought he was a little crazy, but of course I did it. When else can you pet a big croc and let me tell you this was no caiman!!!!
Then we got back, went in a taxi to the tro-tro station loosing Ben on the way and took the tro-tro back to Takoradi (which seemed to take forever). Hopped in another taxi then get on a port shuttle that would bring us back to the boat!! Longest process ever and to think I had to get up at 3 am to go to an orphanage.
Oh yeah when I saw Stephanie I jumped on her!!!! I missed her!!!!
PORT RULE: NO SLEEP!!!!!!!!
Day 4 – The Orphanage!
Me: Stephanie Stephanie Stephanie wake up I say at 245 am after she feel asleep for 2 minutes! WE HAVE TO GO!
Stephanie: IM UP!!!!!!!
We then race down to the gang way in order to meet our group. Our friend Jen organized the whole thing and it was a daunting task for her. Any way we get on the bus at 3 am and this bus is more like a van then a bus and has exactly 20 seats which is the amount we need. Steph tosses and turns in about 25 positions trying to get comfortable until we are all contorted (Staphanie, Ben and I) so in about 20 minutes we end up with Stephanie on the 3 seat sprawled out, Ben laying one way on the floor while I am laying in the opposite direction using his back as a pillow. Oh also mind you I met Ben about 13 hours ago. All 20 of us wake up in the middle of nowhere laughing hysterically over all the different positions that we have gotten ourselves into not knowing how it happened.
It took us a total of 7 hours to get to the orphanage after all the traffic and the driver got lost. We get off in the middle of nowhere with just one small house. This is where I am surprised and realize I might not have been paying as close of attention as I thought I was. The orphanage holds 21 kids, but in reality this orphanage was just really a house where a married couple had rescued 21 kids from Child slavery. Their names were Stacy and John and they were 2 of the most amazing people I have ever met. They have devoted their lives to helping, saving and feeding children. When we arrived, there was no sign of the children as we ate breakfast and helped prepare meals for the 1200 kids that we would be feeding at the fishing village. After a tour of the house and a little introduction we were brought to the school where the kids were learning. They were outside playing games when we walked up. We looked in the school for a little introduction to what they were learning and even though there were some 15 year olds they were still learning at an elementary stage because of the slavery they were put into at young ages instead of getting proper educations.
We split up into two groups. There was one group that played with parachutes and another who were playing futbol!! Of course I choose soccer! I haven’t played in 2 years and now all of a sudden I get to play with Ghanaian kids and their dad ( who played pro for Nigeria). How awesome is that? Well we played for about an hour and then we took a break and got some water.
During “halftime” I talked with John and he was telling me about a few of the things they are doing to help the people of Ghana along with everything they do for the kids. John told me that they were setting up an organization that they would give women 100 bags of water for free to sell. They could then go out and sell these waters to make money to buy more and continue this process. They then would teach these women how to finance their money and about banks and how to open accounts to save their money. He also told me that I should really rejoin my school team because I can beat all the boys. J We then continued the game playing for about another hour and a half having a great time. Although I cannot fully describe this to you I must say it will be one of the most memorable things. You can really gain some ones trust by being their teammate. Out of this game not only did I get a great time but I got some new friends, I gained some of the kids trust and they really opened up to me, telling me their stories and myths of Ghana.
Aron and Mesha won’t play on a team because they believe that other teams use prayers and make sacrifices to shrines in order to get magic. This magic can turn the ball to fire and kill or seriously injure the other team. Aron told me his story later when we went to the fishing village. He pointed at the boats and said that’s where he was a slave. His parents sold him and his brother into slavery as young boys. Their job was literally to catch fish. They were pushed into the water and could not get back onto the boat until they caught a fish. If they did not catch a fish they would tie a necklace around them that had a large rock on it so they would stay under the water longer. Aron watched his brother drown next to him. These kids all have stories ones that are way beyond anything we could have ever imagined. This may sound stupid but I didn’t know. I had no clue that there is more slavery today than ever before in the history of the world, and yes this includes the slave trade. Just because it doesn’t surround us doesn’t mean it’s not happening. We cannot hold our selves responsible for not knowing but we can hold our selves responsible for knowing and not doing anything. I have trouble writing this because I know these kids, I’ve looked into their eyes and talked to them hearing their story and they have changed me, informed me, and taught me. I hope that at one point I can be the turning point in some ones story, that I can help someone like Stacy and John help all these kids! So that one day I too can give someone a second chance!
We were later brought to see the new school they were building for not only their kids but also some kids of the village. We then went back to the house finished preparing the meals and went to the fishing village. We were feeding 1200 kids here and it was intense. We had to form a wall with our bodies and pass out all the meals we had prepared earlier that day. The meals consisted of Rice with Pepe sauce on top and a hardboiled egg. The kids were fighting to get the food pushing through each other and we figured out that some of the kids were trying to take seconds which we only had enough for every child to have one meal. There were women passing around 1 baby trying to get meals in front of the kids. It was like nothing I could compare it to, there was no order just everyone fending for themselves. When we finally ran out of food John brought the attention away from us and handed out the last 2 meals while we just watched so many kids not eat. There were some remarkable things that I did see. I saw some of the older kids giving their food away to some of the younger kids who did not get to eat. Also the kids who did not eat were not mad but they thanked us for doing what we could. I did not feel like we did that much. We did what any decent human being would do and it was rewarding but honestly I fell like it was not as much about the feeding as John and Stacy informing us. They could have handed out the food themselves but to bring us meant that we might join this battle they are fighting. After taking some pictures with the kids we went back to John and Stacy’s house hung out with the kids there a little more, ate dinner and made our way back to the ship, finally getting there at 3 am.
If anyone would like to see any more about the organization the John and Stacy run called City Of Refuge, please go to www.cityofrefugeoutreach.com
Day 5 – The Beach
We went to the beach the last day we were told it was a little bit of paradise which was exactly correct. We all needed a little detox from the heavy event from the prior days. Busua beach was gorgeous. Chelsea, Stephanie, and I walked the entire thing which we figured out was a lot longer than we expected. It was about 3 miles there and back. So we got back, I went in the water and then ate some lunch. It was amazing as always! We then made our way back to the boat making out taxi driver stop for fan ice. Fan Ice is Ghanaian ice cream it comes in a pouch which you bite the corner off and eat. It’s amazing!!!! Vanilla being the best flavor. I think I might make my wedding cake out of it someday. We got back to the port bought a few last minute things, got on the boat and said good bye to Ghana.
The first day in Ghana our ship was greeted by drummers, singers, and dancers outside on the port as the pilot was docking our boat. It was pretty cool, especially because that was what we were going to be doing that day. So we finished eating, got ready quick and made our way to the gangway which was off the 2nd floor and not the 5th floor. If you ask me they make a lot more work for the crew when the gang way is on the 5th floor. Anyways, I was one of the first people off…..3rd off actually, and I walked down the port a little, even though I was supposed to get right on a bus, but come on who steps off a ship in Ghana and the first thing they do is get on an air conditioned coach bus. So I walk down the dock a little and I was immediately bombarded with men trying to sell me things!!!! Being the first person to make it this far I was also the first to meet “Mr. Quality,” “Mr. Cheap”, and Joseph. They told me I needed to get their stuff it was better than the guys stand who was right next to his and selling the exact same thing. One of them gave me a bracelet for free, “because I was the first person he met and I was so nice,” so that I could be a human billboard for him.
So I walked back and got on to the bus and made my way into town. On this bus ride I realized how far the port actually was and OMG was it long! To get out of the port it was a mile walk (at least) and it wasn’t until the third day that they got us a shuttle to get out to where the taxis could go.
We arrived at a hotel where we first watched people drum and dance for a while. They would make us get up and dance with them in the morning and we were tired before lunch time. The heat in Ghana is almost unbearable it really dehydrates you and you don’t realize it is happening. One girl even got a little too dehydrated and was not able to continue with the second part of the day. After we danced to the drumming for a few hours we left on our bus and went to a hotel for lunch. The hotel was a completely different style hotel then we had just been at and it was sort of an oasis. We had a buffet lunch and this is where I first had Pepe sauce and Shitto sauce and there was one more that starts with an “M”. These sauces will change your approach to food. You can put them on anything and even if you don’t like spicy food you will still love this sauce! Something I am learning and I don’t understand it is; why does every other place in the world have Amazing fruit besides America. I mean every place!
Well after we re-hydrated we went back to the hotel. We learned how to do a traditional dance and play the drums and a song that would go with it all! We also learned that the hotel we were at was not really a hotel but a brothel, which we would see a lot more of as our stay in Ghana continued.
After the day was through we went back to the boat refueled and SHOWERED. I have never appreciated showers as much as I have since I been to Ghana!
Day 2 – Ghana – School and market visit
Day 2 was the first day me and Steph split apart on this trip. It was a sad day but we learned to manage. I got up ate breakfast and went to visit a school.
When we got there we were addressed by the head master who was a little old lady with a thick Twee accent ( the language of the Ashanti people).She told us that we would break up into groups and go to different class rooms. I asked to go to a class room of younger kids. I ended up in a class room with 3 year olds. They loved everything about my camera and all they wanted to do was play with it until they discovered my hair. Then my hair became the main attraction. I was swarmed by about 20 three year olds and that was only because all 50 touch my hair at 1 time. Their hands were all rubbing my head feeling my hair and I was on the floor not able to see anything. I couldn’t understand how it went from 2 little girls to playing with my hair to 20 kids all rubbing my head. After 10 minutes of this hilarious epidemic the teacher finally broke it up and I looked like I was straight out of the 70s. I don’t think a hair dresser would know how to give my hair that much body it literally stood 4 inches off my head! You never realize how different you are in another country until it is brought to your attention. Even the teachers wanted to feel my hair at one point because if being a white person in Ghana isn’t different enough having blond hair is jaw dropping.
As the day continued on, Melissa (the girl I was in the class room with) and I taught them the hokie pokie, opened countless water bottles, played countless games, help teach the ABC’s and much more. We left around lunch time and went back to the boat. We all quickly took showers because we were surrounded by coughing kids all day and then went to the market circle. Elizabeth and I broke away from the group because traveling in groups of 8 is just way too much. We were once again bombarded by the many vendors, one of them being Alex whom Elisabeth bought into a little too much. I don’t think she realized that all they wanted was her money not her friendship! Finally we were able to continue into town
The walk into town is not so pleasant; it is filled with open holes in the ground where you see sewage statically floating there, and you must watch your step because you could easily fall into one at any point. It smelt horrible for the most part (and people say New Jersey smells)! We got to the market and had no clue how to approach it, there was no feasible way to go about this strategically.
The market is a giant wooden circle that people have small shops built into them, then there are little stands in the center crammed together so that as many people as possible can have a stand. These stands are filled with raw fish that has just been caught, or that has been caught a few days ago and has not been refrigerated or kept cool in any fashion. There were also pig’s feet hanging from wooden bars ( I definitely thought they were human arms at first, they looked fleshy and dead and hey who knows what they do in other countries). We went to one stand in the market and met the people running it. One lady was older and more traditional and she was selling some form of drink that you drink from a bag.
(They drink everything out of bags I am not quite sure why but they do and its kind of cool. You cannot reseal these bags so you need to drink everything at the same time and the way you open it is by biting off one corner and suck.)
The drink was really good and she gave us a little sip out of a cup because we were not sure if we should drink it as it did not seem like the most sanitary of all things. But it was really good and I wish I got more. Anyway we stayed and talked with Mary and Ellen for a little, Ellen was younger, she asked me if I had a brother and if she could come home with me and marry him. I told Ellen that I did have a brother but I was sorry he had a girlfriend and I didn’t think Mary (Thomas’s girlfriend) would be happy with her marrying him (don’t worry Mary I got your back haha). Ellen also told me because I was born on a Sunday that in Ghanaian tradition my “fancy” name was ESI. However I don’t have a clue what it means because when I asked they just said it means you’re born on Sunday.
One thing that I must warn any woman that goes to Ghana and goes to the Takoradi Market Circle is that make sure you are wearing long short or pants. I felt awful when a woman started pinching my legs. At first I was like what the heck are you doing why are you pinching and slapping my legs? Then Ellen explained to me that the older woman do not like it when you can see your legs and that next time I should wear longer short but next time I should bring her back my short shorts because she wanted to be a sexy lady too.
We made our way out of the market circle and did a little more shopping and walked back to the boat. We did not buy too much but we got a lot of experience. It was quite a different experience and it was just the beginning! When we went out that night I was taught how to balance a large plate of Peanut bread on my head by Simon my new Ghanaian friend. I also became an African waitress!
Day 3 – Ghana – Cape Coast Castel
We get off the boat and make the same walk toward the market circle. I made sure to wear longer shorts this time. We do a few things that some of our group needs and while we are at the post office we meet up with Dorian and Dick, a professor and his wife, who also want to go to the Cape Coast Castle. So our group just got a little bigger which is actually perfect when you are trying to get on to a tro-tro. A tro-tro is a “private” bus system which really means a rundown van that 12 people can fit in. The reason it is better to have a larger group is because this van will not leave until the entire thing is filled. It only cost 3 Cedie (Ghana currency) so they have to make their moneys’ worth. Even when we already had 9 people it still took about a half hour to start moving.
Finally we set out on the hour bus ride, with the windows wide open and the breeze blowing in our faces taking plenty of pictures of the reoccurring country side. We finally made it toward the coast which was an amazing change of scenery. When we made it to Cape Coast Castle we got out and were in awe.
The castle was something to marvel at but something you also felt horrible calling a castle. It was a grand structure that had lasted so many years but terrible things happened here. The Portuguese originally designed the castle to hold gold, as Ghana is considered the Gold Coast. However, after realizing they needed more help then they could afford they started recruiting slaves and eventually just selling them. That is when they converted the castle into holding cells for slaves. The male dungeon was a series of 5 rooms. Each room was about 15 x 20 feet long and in total of these 5 rooms there were, at times, 1000 slaves. The amount in the holding cells all depended on how long it took the ships to make it there and back. For the most part the trip took 2 months but could be extended to 3 if brought off course or hit by a storm.
Each of the other the 5 rooms had barrel vaulted ceilings with 3 very small (1’ x1’) windows at the tops, this was the only light able to get into these room. There is 1 room that has a slightly bigger window but that is only so that the captors can see the slaves so that they could brand them. They said they had only found the floors a few years ago because the feces was so high that they could not get to the floor.
The female slave dungeon was a bit smaller as less females were captives. The females had 2 small room about 20 /20 that were to hold 400 women at a time. Also if any slave acted out of line or tried to escape they would put them in the suffocation room. It was a small room with no windows. They would not be given food or water just left there to die.
Lastly, there was the “Door of No Return”. Once the slaves passed through these doors they were to never return back through the doors or to Africa. This was the door to the beach where they would row out on small boat and row out to meet a large ship that they would be transported on to either Europe, the Americas or Brazil. 1/3rd of them going to Brazil alone.
This was a very hard place for me to be because I was not sure how to act. I knew you were not supposed to speak loudly or much at all but just listen to what was being said. I also did not feel right smiling, which I smile most of the time. There was so much that was hard to react to especially when you are among such a horrible place in such a beautiful setting.
After this I split off from the original group I was with and traveled about a half hour and went to Hans Cottage Hotel. This was a really cool restaurant and hotel, there were a bunch of bungalows that were on stilts above the water. The water was muddy and filled with crocodiles. We all had lunch and there were 7 girls and 1 guy (Ben ) aka protector haha. We had lunch and mine tasted like it was cooked over garbage although some how everyone else’s tasted great (not fair)! But here is the exciting part of lunch time! We got to pet a crocodile. My heart and adrenaline was racing as I walked up to a wild croc. This croc was pretty big and it had just strolled up out of the water and now this man was telling me it was safe to pet him. Personally I thought he was a little crazy, but of course I did it. When else can you pet a big croc and let me tell you this was no caiman!!!!
Then we got back, went in a taxi to the tro-tro station loosing Ben on the way and took the tro-tro back to Takoradi (which seemed to take forever). Hopped in another taxi then get on a port shuttle that would bring us back to the boat!! Longest process ever and to think I had to get up at 3 am to go to an orphanage.
Oh yeah when I saw Stephanie I jumped on her!!!! I missed her!!!!
PORT RULE: NO SLEEP!!!!!!!!
Day 4 – The Orphanage!
Me: Stephanie Stephanie Stephanie wake up I say at 245 am after she feel asleep for 2 minutes! WE HAVE TO GO!
Stephanie: IM UP!!!!!!!
We then race down to the gang way in order to meet our group. Our friend Jen organized the whole thing and it was a daunting task for her. Any way we get on the bus at 3 am and this bus is more like a van then a bus and has exactly 20 seats which is the amount we need. Steph tosses and turns in about 25 positions trying to get comfortable until we are all contorted (Staphanie, Ben and I) so in about 20 minutes we end up with Stephanie on the 3 seat sprawled out, Ben laying one way on the floor while I am laying in the opposite direction using his back as a pillow. Oh also mind you I met Ben about 13 hours ago. All 20 of us wake up in the middle of nowhere laughing hysterically over all the different positions that we have gotten ourselves into not knowing how it happened.
It took us a total of 7 hours to get to the orphanage after all the traffic and the driver got lost. We get off in the middle of nowhere with just one small house. This is where I am surprised and realize I might not have been paying as close of attention as I thought I was. The orphanage holds 21 kids, but in reality this orphanage was just really a house where a married couple had rescued 21 kids from Child slavery. Their names were Stacy and John and they were 2 of the most amazing people I have ever met. They have devoted their lives to helping, saving and feeding children. When we arrived, there was no sign of the children as we ate breakfast and helped prepare meals for the 1200 kids that we would be feeding at the fishing village. After a tour of the house and a little introduction we were brought to the school where the kids were learning. They were outside playing games when we walked up. We looked in the school for a little introduction to what they were learning and even though there were some 15 year olds they were still learning at an elementary stage because of the slavery they were put into at young ages instead of getting proper educations.
We split up into two groups. There was one group that played with parachutes and another who were playing futbol!! Of course I choose soccer! I haven’t played in 2 years and now all of a sudden I get to play with Ghanaian kids and their dad ( who played pro for Nigeria). How awesome is that? Well we played for about an hour and then we took a break and got some water.
During “halftime” I talked with John and he was telling me about a few of the things they are doing to help the people of Ghana along with everything they do for the kids. John told me that they were setting up an organization that they would give women 100 bags of water for free to sell. They could then go out and sell these waters to make money to buy more and continue this process. They then would teach these women how to finance their money and about banks and how to open accounts to save their money. He also told me that I should really rejoin my school team because I can beat all the boys. J We then continued the game playing for about another hour and a half having a great time. Although I cannot fully describe this to you I must say it will be one of the most memorable things. You can really gain some ones trust by being their teammate. Out of this game not only did I get a great time but I got some new friends, I gained some of the kids trust and they really opened up to me, telling me their stories and myths of Ghana.
Aron and Mesha won’t play on a team because they believe that other teams use prayers and make sacrifices to shrines in order to get magic. This magic can turn the ball to fire and kill or seriously injure the other team. Aron told me his story later when we went to the fishing village. He pointed at the boats and said that’s where he was a slave. His parents sold him and his brother into slavery as young boys. Their job was literally to catch fish. They were pushed into the water and could not get back onto the boat until they caught a fish. If they did not catch a fish they would tie a necklace around them that had a large rock on it so they would stay under the water longer. Aron watched his brother drown next to him. These kids all have stories ones that are way beyond anything we could have ever imagined. This may sound stupid but I didn’t know. I had no clue that there is more slavery today than ever before in the history of the world, and yes this includes the slave trade. Just because it doesn’t surround us doesn’t mean it’s not happening. We cannot hold our selves responsible for not knowing but we can hold our selves responsible for knowing and not doing anything. I have trouble writing this because I know these kids, I’ve looked into their eyes and talked to them hearing their story and they have changed me, informed me, and taught me. I hope that at one point I can be the turning point in some ones story, that I can help someone like Stacy and John help all these kids! So that one day I too can give someone a second chance!
We were later brought to see the new school they were building for not only their kids but also some kids of the village. We then went back to the house finished preparing the meals and went to the fishing village. We were feeding 1200 kids here and it was intense. We had to form a wall with our bodies and pass out all the meals we had prepared earlier that day. The meals consisted of Rice with Pepe sauce on top and a hardboiled egg. The kids were fighting to get the food pushing through each other and we figured out that some of the kids were trying to take seconds which we only had enough for every child to have one meal. There were women passing around 1 baby trying to get meals in front of the kids. It was like nothing I could compare it to, there was no order just everyone fending for themselves. When we finally ran out of food John brought the attention away from us and handed out the last 2 meals while we just watched so many kids not eat. There were some remarkable things that I did see. I saw some of the older kids giving their food away to some of the younger kids who did not get to eat. Also the kids who did not eat were not mad but they thanked us for doing what we could. I did not feel like we did that much. We did what any decent human being would do and it was rewarding but honestly I fell like it was not as much about the feeding as John and Stacy informing us. They could have handed out the food themselves but to bring us meant that we might join this battle they are fighting. After taking some pictures with the kids we went back to John and Stacy’s house hung out with the kids there a little more, ate dinner and made our way back to the ship, finally getting there at 3 am.
If anyone would like to see any more about the organization the John and Stacy run called City Of Refuge, please go to www.cityofrefugeoutreach.com
Day 5 – The Beach
We went to the beach the last day we were told it was a little bit of paradise which was exactly correct. We all needed a little detox from the heavy event from the prior days. Busua beach was gorgeous. Chelsea, Stephanie, and I walked the entire thing which we figured out was a lot longer than we expected. It was about 3 miles there and back. So we got back, I went in the water and then ate some lunch. It was amazing as always! We then made our way back to the boat making out taxi driver stop for fan ice. Fan Ice is Ghanaian ice cream it comes in a pouch which you bite the corner off and eat. It’s amazing!!!! Vanilla being the best flavor. I think I might make my wedding cake out of it someday. We got back to the port bought a few last minute things, got on the boat and said good bye to Ghana.
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