This is the dawning of the rest of our lives...on HOLIDAY!

Good Morning Dreamers and Sleepwalkers,
I have now departed Mauritius one year more mature than when I arrived. No longer considered a rookie of the drinking age in America, it’s only a matter of time before I can go crazy and rent a car. So what did we learn in this country? Not really a whole lot that you can’t learn in Hawaii unfortunately. I think Mauritius stands as a good introduction to the Indian culture before plunging head first in India. The people here were incredibly kind and the weather was incredibly more kind. I like to call Mauritius the land of magical rainbows because you always see one right before it rains. One appeared very and ended just over a fence. Unfortunately I am still traveling so you can assume safely no pot of gold was found. But we saw quite a few rainbows and they were quite common because the sun was always present as well.
I started my first day with my friend Nicki and we walked around the marketplace bartering with the locals and eating at tasty holes in the wall. I think I am turning religious cause it takes a lot of prayer to ward off Montezuma and his spiteful revenging meanace. Hmm I think Pepto Bismal is the new Crystal Meth on this ship. I’ve been ok since the Amazon but you never can be sure in these countries. After that we visited the village of Bambou which is like an organized orphanage. The first kids we saw weren’t too excited to see us and much preferred to watch Sylvester and Tweety Bird on TV. The next house we visited, we went all out to give out stickers and we soon won over the kids warmth which resulted in lots of running and around and small soccer games. What was a slumbering community, was now more awake than we usually are on the ship. It was about this time I stepped into a hole in the ground and felt my ankle bend in some not so friendly ways. I hobbled my way off the field and spent the night before my b-day with a bag of ice and watching movies on the ship.
The next we paid a visit to Adventure Park which is a basic ropes course, nothing too challenging but an enjoyable way to begin my 22nd. This ended up being a dangerous excursion because there was tons of man eating mosquitoes which happened to be carrying a chiknugyen virus which was just breaking out when we arrived. After this muddy excursion we visited the rest of the Semester at Sea party people at Flic en Flac beach and spent the next few hours staring off into the abyss of the Indian Ocean. I spent the rest of the night mingling with friends and playing games that are similar to ping pong and basketball meshed into one wonderful conglomerate. Most SAS kids rented bungalows or villas in these towns, I just visited these great houses and was glad for it because there was quite a few ransackings and robberies that occurred to some.

The third day involved some more exploring of the town of Port Louis. Unfortunately my ankle didn’t allow for me to golf on an a course that is built on an island. Also there’s quite a bit of hiking to do in these places that was left undone. Three days ended up being way too short after spending 7 days in South Africa. However Maurituis stands more as a spring break and not much for culture, but a good vacation before heading into the jungle that is South-east Asia.

Since this was one of the shorter ports I figured now is the time to say a thing or two about ship life. The food is ok, it’s just a variation of a pasta, meat, fish and a potato. So pretty standard cafeteria preserved food which doesn’t mix nicely with the local food in some places. Classes are sort of a mixed bag. Global Studies the core class of the ship, is good when the main instructor is teaching, but he often has guest lectures who could make a living off helping people fall asleep. The two main areas of congregation are the 7th floor pool area and the 6th floor piano lounge. You are required to attend the global studies class somewhere official, it’s on TV in all the classrooms and normally we hang out by the piano bar and watch it on TV there. It’s very strange having a steward to make your bed and clean your room. Lots of kids like to get hotels when we get into port but the ship is so nice that its almost not worth getting a hotel. The ship really is a floating Raddison. Most days I spend at least a couple hours a day hanging outside playing guitar and looking over the ocean. Every now and then you’ll see a school of dolphins go jumping by, still haven’t seen a whale yet which is disappointing but I am not worried.
I go through a coke and a bag of popcorn a day because the smell of popcorn is just too hard to resist. After some shenanigans last time, we aren’t allowed to drink and dance anymore on the same night. So there was lots of grumbling at the stoplight dance. Which is red if you are in a relationship, green if you are single, and yellow if you are unsure or as our announcement guy said, have become less committal with each time change.
They do a pretty good job of keeping our minds occupied between ports and most of the time they do a good job of accommodating everyone’s needs. Except my psych teacher when it comes to putting together a test that actually tests our knowledge and not our ability to remember random lists of symptoms. I think that’s all for now, we lose an hour and half to India, yes they are a half hour off from the rest of the world which I find fascinating. Have I learned anything so far? The main thing I’ve learned is how centralized everyone is around their jobs and money in the US and not everywhere else and this seems to be correlated with their happiness. Not implying the correlation equals causation, just an observation. I also met some people who were pro president bush in Mauritius which so far has been a nonexistent minority. We are a little nervous about the massive protest rallies in India for the president this week and with us coming next week, but we haven’t had any issues so far. Thanks Jen Onsum for the bday car, Hank, for another great letter, and for all the awesome facebook and blog bday wishes. I can’t it took so long to get to 21 and now I ‘m already at 22. To put things in perspective this trip is 100 days long, we are on Day 42, today is day 22/55 at sea, classes are officially half over, 20/45 days at port are over. This trip really is sailing by quickly, We have less than 2 months to go and I’ve barely just begun to understand the world.