Bloggin' By The Baltic!

Date: 26 August 2013

Place: Cabin 3053

Ship Location (as of the moment): Baltic Sea, headed to Russia

Greetings from the MV Explorer!

Yay, my email-to-blog system works!! Are you ready for a long read? You better, because here it comes! Oh my, where to start?! I've only been on the ship for three days, and yet there is already SO much to tell! 

·      The Ship – My new home for the next 112 days! The MV Explorer is actually a lot nicer than what I had imagined. Of course, I wasn't expecting it to be as grand as the Royal Caribbean cruise ships, but it's definitely up there! While it is smaller than the holiday cruise ships, the interior is just as fancy. It's like a hotel, a university, and a dorm all rolled into one big ship. And in many (if not all) ways, that's exactly what the MV Explorer is!

The Room/Roommate – Or the "cabin/cabin mate", as the SAS officials insist we call it. My cabin is on the outside third deck, meaning I get to have a window, hurray! Personally, I think the cabin size is just right for two people living on a ship for almost four months. It is plenty cozy and comfy, and has enough storage space for me and Jessica, my cabin mate from California! She is the bomb dot com slash awesome. We are basically like the same person, it's crazy. I am so, so, SO thankful we got paired to be roommates, err, cabin mates, because we get along really well. What I'm most grateful for (and this is such an answered prayer) is the fact that it almost seemed as if Jessica and I completely skipped the awkward stage most roommates have (or any two people in general) when they first meet each other! The moment I walked into our cabin (she got there first), we just clicked right away. It was awesome. We're liked attached to each other's hips now, except for today when we had to go separate ways because we had different classes. :( *sniff*

 

·      The Shipboard Life – Life on the MV Explorer is pretty chill. Very casual and laidback. The only dress code rule is to always wear footwear. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner are served everyday at designated times. There are two dining rooms, a library (the biggest one on any cruise ship! Holla), a computer lab, a gym, a spa place, an outside basketball court (surrounded by nets so the ball won't go flying out into the sea), a snack shack, a wellness center, a counseling center, nine classrooms, and a big student union room. All of these places are staffed by super friendly workers who are mostly Filipinos! It's so funny how they would always be so surprised when I greet them in Tagalog. I would say, "Hi Kuya/Ate!" or "Salamat po!" and they would take a step back and go, "Uy! Pilipino!" Haha! I would then converse with them some more, giving myself a taste of home again. And even just for that, I am so thankful!

 

·      The SAS Class System – We had our first day of class today! As a rule, each student can only take up to 12 credits, so I am only taking four classes this semester: Photography, Mixed Media Visual Journal, Women's Health in Developing Countries, and Global Business Ethics. This is how the SAS class system works: There are no weekends. Every time we are not in port, we have class. That means that every time we are at sea, sailing from one country to the next, that's when classes are held. While at port, there are no classes, so that kinda serves like our weekends, only a thousand times better because it will be spent in different countries every time!! Classes are categorized under either A day or B day. I have three of my classes on A day, and only one on B day. Tomorrow is B day, and I get to sleep in because my only class isn't until 2pm. Hurray!

 

·      The Field Labs/Field Programs – Field labs are the mandatory excursions, or field trips, tied up with each of our classes. For every class we have, there is a required field lab in a certain country on our voyage itinerary. For example, my field lab for Photography is in France, where we would be exploring the city of Le Havre while completing a task assigned to us in relation to our photography class. We are supposed to communicate what the city represents through a portfolio of our photos. For Women's Health in Developing Countries, our field lab will be in Accra, Ghana, where we will be interacting with some locals and studying the main issues women face in the country such as female genital cutting. Field programs, on the other hand, are the optional trips offered by SAS or that are planned independently.

 

·      The Internet – Ah, the Internet. How I miss it so. Although the ship is equipped with wireless internet service, it is very limited and extremely expensive. Each student is allotted only 120 minutes of internet for the whole semester. Yup, two freakin' hours for almost four months! However, we are granted access to our SAS email without having to use our minutes, which is good enough. I guess it would be sort of a refreshing experience to be off Facebook/Twitter/Instagram for a while. But today I got an email from Facebook saying I have pending notifications and that I might have missed some popular news event from my friends recently. Even Facebook misses me! Haha. It was so tempting to click on that link that says, "See all notifications". That was such a tease.

 

Phew. I think that's it for now! I really tried my best to keep it short and un-boring, but I did want to share more specific details about the whole SAS program and how it is now that I'm actually here living it! I am so incredibly thankful for this opportunity.

 

Papa and Mama, if you are reading this, I just want to thank you both again SO MUCH for letting me go on this experience of a lifetime! Also, thank you, Westminster!! I'm just so happy to be here right now. I do miss home, I do miss Westmo, but I know that what I will get out of this adventure will far outweigh any sadness that I might feel caused by homesickness. Thankfully, homesickness hasn't really hit that bad yet!

 

Good night! :)

 

P.S. Since I'm writing this blog via email and not on my actual blog site, I still have to find out if we can post photos to go with it. I'm afraid it'll cost me a lot of data transfer because it's sent through email, and I only have a limited amount of data I can download/upload! So as of now, no pictures yet. :(

P.P.S. I really am having social media withdrawals, so I would love to hear from you guys, too! Send me an email at laura.pastores.fa13@semesteratsea.org! I don't have access to my other emails' contact list, so I only know very few email addresses. Shoot me an email, even if it's literally just a "hello", just so I can save your email address on file! Now na.