Seven Days at Sea

This will just be a quick post to say hi, and that I’m doing fine. There are so many things to discuss from the past week at sea. I’m not sure how to begin. I suppose it’d be best to section it by topic...

The boat: The boat is perfect. There are 730 students aboard, 100 professors, and with staff and crew, it rounds out to be about 1100 people. It is a floating campus. We are a bit cramped for space (if you want a gym time, you have to go the day before and reserve a machine), but overall it functions quite nicely. The rooms aren’t too small. I am sharing a rather small closet, but so far it all fits. The dining rooms have decks that overlook water. It’s beautiful. There is also a deck high enough up and with minimal light that stars are very visible. Last night I saw my first shooting star from sea. There was a whale sighting when I was outside studying today, but I of course, did not look up in time.

Classes: I am taking four classes. Global Studies (required), Painting, Sp Topics: Diplomacy, The Arms Trade, and Human Security (that’s all one class), and Biology in the Modern world.  They’re all pretty interesting. My Sp Topics professor has actually never worked as in academia before. His wife was Desmond Tutu’s personal assistant for 20 years, and he has worked in international banking and for the Episcopal church in South Africa. He wrote a book that thoroughly rocked the South African government, exposing a corrupt arms deal between the ANC (African National Congress – a political party) and several foreign governments. My painting class is helping me learn patience. I’m enjoying it thus far. Biology in the Modern World is wonderful. I can’t believe I like a science class. The professor understands that his class is one for non-science majors. For every boring topic, he jokes and uses great examples. To teach us correlations he compared alcohol consumption to the number of Baptist churches in a given town. Great professor. The classroom has five huge windows that look out on the ocean. I have already lost perception of time. I never know what day it is. All I know is if it is an A or B day. We don't have weekends.

People: We’re all in the situation where we must quickly find a friend base, and thus everyone has been incredibly friendly. It’s an interesting group.  Nearly seventy students are from Colorado, but with 730 of us, there’s someone from just about everywhere.

Activities: On board, they try to keep us busy.  From Teach for America info sessions, to the 24 Hour Pirate Club, there are options.  I am a member of Students of Service, Extended Family (we get teamed up with faculty and staff and have a little boat family base), and am thrilled to participate in Vicarious Voyage. Vicarious Voyage pairs SAS students with either an elementary or middle school classroom.  They track our voyage, and we send them postcards and packages from around the world. The teachers integrate it into their curriculum. I am teaming up with a girl from Boone. We are responsible for a second grade classroom at Broadus Wood Elementary in Earlysville, VA.  The program asks that we choose a theme for our packages.  Ours is (of course) music and arts.  We’re going to upload videos of local musicians for them to watch online, and try to collect small street paintings that we can send as part of their packages. In return, the classrooms send us letters too. The program leaders also request that if we can, we visit the classroom upon return.  Dorothy and Lucy, yall may be getting a visit from me in May!

I’m sorry this isn’t the most interesting blog post.  It’ll be better once I get to Spain and have stories/pictures to share. I can’t upload pictures from the boat, but will upload some Bahamas/boat ones once at an internet cafe.  Feel free to email me at atmaxwell@semesteratsea.net or at my gmail address, which is forwarded to the SAS one. Internet on the boat is only free for certain sites, so I will most likely not be checking facebook.

Nine Days to Departure...

Well, this is my first blog post, and I'm still experimenting as to how I can/will use this. I am a bit concerned that if I blog I will not get as many email responses, which I loved receiving when I was writing from Italy. So please, please email me! I am attempting to stay connected while sailing and would love to hear about life back home. No matter how mundane, I'd love to be informed.
Don't have anything more to say on this post - expect more post departure. For now, I'll just post a link that will be helpful for those following this incredible journey:
http://www.semesteratsea.org/voyages/spring-2009/itinerary.php
That page gives our itinerary, and also gives port addresses for anyone who feels like making my day by sending me snail mail (really, I love it).
For anyone who prefers a PDF, below is our schedule and port addresses in that format.
https://www.ise.virginia.edu/asp/mydocuments/S09/S09_CalCom.pdf