Hello Pineapple, Hello Banana

Well, what do I say about Vietnam? One of the two overnight independent travel trips I planned. I went to Hanoi and Ha Long Bay with a group of ten. Very small and very awesome! We left the first day on a flight to Hanoi and we got into our hotel and went off on our to go shopping and see the city. Crossing the streets in Vietnam is something else. During one of our pre ports they had a demonstration of how to cross the street and that you just have to keep the same pace, don’t speed up or slow down or else they will hit you. If you stay the same pace they will move around you though. Hmm, they make it sound SOOOO EASY! I am not even good at crossing the street at home, and they want me to just walk in the middle of traffic and survive. So the first day I arrived in Vietnam I was leading a group of ten of us to Hanoi and Ha Long Bay for the next three days. Some of my close friends were going on the trip so I knew it would be a good one. We left for the airport as soon as the ship cleared to catch our flight. We get over to the airport and we are taking the largest plane for a two hour flight I have ever been on. It was the size of a plane you would take to Hawaii or to another country for that matter. We arrived in Hanoi in the afternoon and got to our hotel and had free time the rest of the night. Juliana and I went out on the streets to look at shops and just hang out. We ended up at a shop with handmade tablerunners, pillow cases, and other cute things. Then we proceeded to try to cross the streets several times, which was interesting and I got one on video. Woo! Trying to cross a round-about isn’t as easy as it should be. So after we were done roaming around Juliana and I got some dinner where it was al a carte and we got to make our own Pho (pronounced Fuh). It was really great then we went back to the hotel and met up with Gio and Steven to go out one the town. We asked the reception where we should go out and we ended up going to Nutz Bar at the Sheraton. It was definitely interesting being at a place where mostly locals are. We ran into lots of Vietnamese people having a great time and we ourselves had a great time and headed back to our hotel around 2am. When we got back Juliana let me use her skype and I called everyone I could possibly want to talk to one night, it was very productive.

The next morning we had breakfast and headed out on our journey to Ha Long Bay. We rode the bus for about four hours and finally got to Ha Long Bay. I was really excited to finally get to see the beauty of Ha Long Bay. We got off the bus and headed onto our private wooden junk. A wooden junk is a wooden boat and they are all over the bay and carry passengers. There are cruise ship style ones on a smaller scale, and then ones that hold anywhere from 8-36 people. Ours was a six bed room one so it was our own private wooden junk with a top deck to enjoy the view. They fed us wonderful food the whole time and it was a very peaceful adventure. Now mom and Anisha, you will be very impressed to find out some of the things I have eaten or tried on this ship. Because we were in a bay, the only food really to find was fish, and they brough out the whole fish, along with crab puffs, prawns, oysters and other fishy foods. I tried the fish, ate an oyster, ate a crab puff, then survived off the rice, I thought you guys would be proud. After lunch we ended up cruising through the bay until we reached Surprise Cave, which was HUGE! We walked around there for about an hour, and then got back on our wooden junk and headed to one of the cliff beach areas and hiked to the top to get a beautiful view of the bay and enjoy the beach in the afternoon. I thought I was going to die getting to the top of that peak, it was only 1000ft but it was  a straight shot up the stairs no easy gradual windy way up. I am glad I made it up there though. After that we got back on our wooden junk for the night had dinner, which included more great food with fries and chicken and stuff. We played a few card games and headed to bed early.

The next morning I woke up early with Barry to see the sunrise, which was taking a very long time and it was freezing so I didn’t wait for the sun to come all the way above the peaks. I headed back to sleep until breakfast was ready. We enjoyed some breakfast and then went on a smaller boat ride through a little cave to get on the other side to see some beautiful peaks. We got back on the ship and headed out to to the middle of the bay, where they let us jump off the top of the wooden junk into the water. It was about a 30ft or more drop, everyone kept going, and I stayed to take pictures since I know I am scared of heights. Eventually though I realized that I am supposed to be getting out of my comfort zone on this trip and conquering my fear of heights starting with 30 ft would have to be a start. So I didn’t have my bathing suit on and didn’t have time to do so, so I jumped in with my clothes on and it was awesome. We had lunch and headed back to where the wooden junk got us and got on the bus and headed for the airport early, because our guide’s father had died that morning and he found out that morning. We felt terrible as our guide was great and his father had died so we didn’t keep him from getting to his family and just went straight to the airport super early. When we got to the airport we had four hours before our flight was going to leave so we tried to figure out how much it would cost to get on an earlier flight. We went to the lady and we found out that we can switch onto the flight that was leaving in 45 minutes for free, so we did that and we got back to the ship early which made it easy for us to find out friends and go out for the night. When I got back to the ship I went to Kelly Rose’s room to let her know I was back so we could go out since I didn’t get to go out with everyone the first night for her birthday. We went out with some other people to Le Pub, an then headed over to Apocalypse and danced the night away. We got back to the ship and in the morning we woke up and headed out to go shopping and stuff but ended up at a coffee shop for a very long period of time where I skyped with my friends and then we finally made out to the market. Everything in Vietnam is way too cheap, which makes it really easy to go buy everything. That day wasn’t very productive I just got a North Face jacket because we knew the weather in China was supposed to be freezing. I also got a north face backpack and some other random stuff. We finished shopping and Kelly Rose took to me the place where her and Laura and Becca were getting their dresses made so I could get mine made. I picked out the material and they took the measurements and they said they would have it done within 20 hours, since we were leaving the next day. Julia stayed behind to get a massage and a manicure and pedicure and Kelly Rose and I after chatting with the ladies for a while, headed back to the ship where we knew there was free internet and hung out for a few hours until dinner time and got ready to go out and headed out for the night again.

The last day I had an FDP to a cooking class with my Interpersonal Communication professor. We went through the food market and we saw live fish being killed on the spot, frogs being slammed to their death and other really gross things, it was pretty disturbing. After that we headed to the culinary school where they taught us to make their chicken soup, spring rolls, and rice dumplings in bamboo leaves. I got to heat up the bamboo leaves…I thought it would be just like heating a tortilla but it wasn’t really. Then I was put in charge of stirring the coconut jam, then I kept getting yelled at by the lady who was translating so I gave up. They then taught us to make spring rolls and I was really excited. I was hanging out with Denim and her mom during this trip and her mom was awesome and made it a lot of fun. All of Denim’s spring rolls looked completely different but her moms and mine looked awesome. We made our own dipping sauces and put the spring rolls in to fry. After they we ate them I decided to leave early with some people because I really wanted to go to the war remnants museum and needed to go shopping too so I left early to go to museum with Kristen, Jeremy, and B-Payne. The museum was really intense and Kristen and I had a hard time digesting the whole thing. Especially because the quotes from our side were all stating how we needed to study this so we know what we did wrong and to not do it again, except we are doing the same thing and have done worse things like in Guantanamo Bay. After we were done at the museum we walked around and go to see some of the Asian Olympic Indoor Games, got some coffee and met up with Kelly Rose again. Then I headed out to go shop at the market by myself and got lots of ridiculous stuff until it was time to go get my dress at the place. After that I headed back to the ship and called it a night on the ship. We weren’t leaving until the next morning at 6am so we sat in the port and enjoyed our night with a BBQ and story telling. Overall Vietnam was an awesome experience and definitely made my top 3 port list. I really hope that one day you guys all get to go, the shopping, and the food, and the people and history are all a great reason to visit that country.
A-Ram

It's Like An Orgasm For Your Eyes

***Quote Above: From Lindsay Page during our cycle rickshaw ride to the Ganges River in Varanasi, for the ceremony where they put the river to sleep***

I would have to say that Lindsay put into words perfectly what India is like, and I am sure Kate would agree with me once I explain what she meant. She meant, that there is so much going on, so much chaos and so many people, that you don’t want to blink because you are scared you are going to miss out on something, and I must say, that was my entire experience in India. In fact, when I had to take out my contacts on the bus with particles flying everywhere, I was sure I missed at least 20 awesome things that happened.
India was my first of all future long independent over night trips to come. We left the first day to catch a flight to Dehli, me and 29 other people whom I didn’t know until I saw them, then realized I was fortunate to have such a great group of people that were on this trip, some of my closest friends on the ship and others that I loved to hang out with. We headed for the 15 minute walk outside the port to meet our guide and bus to take us to the airport. It was about an hour drive and we got to the airport and checked in with enough time to beat the SAS Taj and Varanasi trip there, thankfully. We were on the same flight as them, the constant theme through out this trip was 588-1400. We paid 588 for the same exact experience they had and they paid 1400. The boys were kind of obnoxious about it but whatever. So we got on our flight with the other group of 70 SASers on the SAS trip and headed to Dehli, where we were greeted by our next guide and led to our bus where they gave us lei’s and took us for a little night time city tour and to dinner. Our dinner was delicious, the bread they gave us was flat like a tortilla but a little thicker so I put everything in it for a burrito, can you tell I miss Mexican food much? We then proceeded to our hotel and sat up on the roof talking and then headed to bed as we had an early rise to catch our train to Agra to see the Taj Mahal.
We got on the train the next morning, also with the SAS trip again, and had two hours till Agra. There we met our next guide who took us to a palace that was beautifully built and I can’t honestly remember the name nor do I know where my notebook is where I wrote it down but it was BEAUTIFUL, and huge. We took some really cute group pictures and then proceeded off to the Agra Fort which had weird looking monkeys hanging around and it was just another palace that was built and it had a beautiful view of the Taj from a very far distance. Before we went there we definitely had to eat some lunch that was good, everything in India was a little sketchy as you never knew what you were eating because you didn’t know what the words meant, so you put it in your mouth and hope for the best. Luckily I didn’t get sick and my stomach didn’t start speaking another language as Becca (my friend from Minnesota on the ship, her and her sister are doing SAS together) said. After we were done at the fort we headed to Taj, and the anticipation was definitely built. I was definitely scared it was going to be like the statue of liberty …a huge disappointment but all the pictures and movies of it, just doesn’t do the thing justice at all! It was bigger than I though and more beautiful than pictures I had seen. I honestly started getting teary eyed because it finally hit me that I was traveling the world and seeing one of the wonder’s of the world. WE spent about an hour and a half there taking pictures with all our crazy ideas and getting group pictures, jumping for joy pictures and anything else. Sometimes I just sat and stared and really thought about where I was and lived in the moment. After we were done there we headed back for dinner and then prepared our selves for the sleeper train we were about to experience. I was definitely really nervous because a train in India is definitely much different than Amtrak, let alone a sleeper train. Let me tell you, it was quite the experience. We were in first class which could not even be considered economy in States. It was sketchtastic and awesome, the pictures really do tell the whole story and unfortunately I don’t have internet to put them up. We had a “corpse” across from my section of the six of us, just this body with full sheet over it that never moved even though we clearly were extremely loud getting on that they had to have been awake, so pictures were taken and people were dancing next to it, totally inappropriate, but what do you when there’s a weird situation? Just laugh, that’s what I’ve been learning. So finally the “corpse” got old and we went and traveled along visiting with our friends until we passed out. I was lucky enough to actually get some sleep compared to most people who stayed up paranoid all night. The bathroom was just a hole, like in many of these countries and you left your mark on the tracks in India. What was hilarious was how many people I saw going to the bathrrom on the side of the train tracks. I don’t think I will be able to hand anyone who complains about public bathrooms in the states ever again. I mean, public bathrooms in the states are definitely like the Marriot compared to public bathrooms in India. So we woke up the next morning to find out we were not even close to getting to Varanasi and had another three hours so we all went back to sleep after everyone ate some of my food I brought. See mom, you taught me well. I am always prepared with snacks and water and toilet paper and I am always the one feeding or giving toilet paper out…don’t worry I’ve always had enough for me! Haha. I usually save at least one persons hungry stomach or bladder every day, especially on this morning in India.
Once we finally got to Varanasi we got on the bus with our tour guide and headed straight to the hotel because we all felt disgusting and really needed a shower. Our hotel was super nice and we took showers and felt so much better then headed to lunch as we were all starving. After lunch we headed to a Buddhist monestary where Buddha was enlighted and saw the tree of wisdom and it was really cool to see some of the ceremonies going on. After that we headed to Sarnath, which is actually where a replica of the tree was but not the actual tree as not everyone can make it out to the actual tree. After all that we headed to a silk market where we bought some really cool silk scarves and I bought a silk hanging picture of the Taj, before we headed out on our rickshaw rides through Varanasi to get to the Ganges River (where the quote of this blog comes from). It was interesting for sure, and we got off and headed down the steps to watch the Buddhist priests put the Ganges river to sleep at night. Lindsay and I walked away from the group for a little ebit and we got to perform part of the ceremony and got paint on our foreheads by this old man and he gave us lei’s and flowers to throw in to the river and pray with him. It was a really cool experience, because he chanted what we were supposed to say and then apparently we were praying for a good married life, haha. I thought it was really funny.  The entire ceremony was just really cool and I really enjoyed it. That night we went to the SAS trip hotel and partied with them as they were having this really awkard 7th grade type dance the tour company put on for them, and Ken had come over to get us to go over there, so we hung out there and then left later back to our hotel as we had to be up really early again for our sunrise boat ride on the ganges river which was awesome and very peaceful at the same time. We learned a lot about all the crematories that were near the river. As we started off there was a dead body floating in the water that I spotted before everyone else, and then I kind of freaked out because it was right next to me floating in the water. So what they do is let the bodies float down the river and then they take them and cremate them and they throw the ashes into the river. It’s a really intense way for someone to be buried. After we were done we went back to the hotel for breakfast and then some of us decided to go watch some traditional Indian dancing and we got to drink some really good cinnamon tea which tasted very much like Canela. After we were done watching we got to dance together which was awesome and we learned some of the dancing she had performed for us. After that we headed back for lunch and prepared our way back to the airport where we ended our tour and made it back to the ship the night before we left Chennai.
The last day in Chennai I just went shopping, and I realized that Chennai was a lot crazier than Northern India. I was scared for my life at times with these motorized rickshaw drivers, we were followed by all of them they all would pull up next to you and tell you to get in and it became very frustrating it took us about 40 minutes to finally get one with our price and where we needed to go. So we went to the market mall place we were supposed to go called Spencer’s Plaza where I got some awesome quilts and scarves, dvd’s and groceries. Left and headed back to the ship…yay that was India, one huge mess but a lot of fun. Kate, I totally get why you chose to study there, and I honestly think it would be a great idea for everyone to go there.

Love,
A-Ram

Seven Rupee!?!? That?s Like a Penny?No, That?s Like a Quarter

*Preface* That is a drunken statement made by Mike Mastroni, about street dim sum in Flic en Flac outside our villa. Yes, we eat for a dollar in Mauritius. ***35 Mauritian Rupee = 1 USD***

Now, I hope you left your judgment elsewhere as Mauritius is nothing more than another United States with so many different ethnic groups and cultures….the only difference, it’s a tropical island and a hot spot for vacationers; therefore, what do we do? Have fun. So needless to say blogging about what I did in Mauritius really isn’t going to be as awesome as the previous countries. So I’ll make it short and say, the food was amazing, the snorkeling was grand, my friends rock, I went parasailing, and the Indian Ocean is my favorite. The End. Oh and dumbass named Miles bit my roommate when we tried to help his drunk ass not get arrested, needless to say we kicked him out. The private island I went on was awesome, best SAS trip ever…future SASers Ile De Deux Cocos, it’s the most expensive but TOTALLY worth the view, the snorkeling, the food, and relaxing day. 
Love,
A-Ram

Waterfront, Table Mountain And A Cute South African Boy (Among Other Things)

Well where do I even begin about this wonderful place called Capetown, South Africa? From townships to table mountain, this wonderful city was wonderful to me. Upon arrival I awoke to a bright sunshiny day on the water looking at Table Mountain from the ocean as we began to pull into port. Upon arrival, I was off first thing to attend a famous author’s house, name Deon Meyer. He wrote the novel I read for my Multicultural Detective Fiction class called Dead Before Dying. We were greeted by him and his wife and entered his beautiful home to have snacks and discuss the novel. After a few hours there we headed back to the ship and I ran off the bus onto another one for my Kayaleshita Township visit with my professor for my Interpersonal Communication class. During this visit it was very obvious  to me, that are definitely two different South Africas. There is the beautiful up and coming South Africa we see right off the ship in the V&A Waterfront and then there is the side that is still affected from apartheid. Their homes were made out of scraps of metal, and other sheets that didn’t really make sense to use as a home. We got to go to Vicky’s Bed and Breakfast in the township where you can get a real township experience and stay there, something I would definitely consider doing in the future. We went to one more bed and breakfast where we had snacks and talked with a lady who went to Pitt, and learned to run a business and now helps women start up their own businesses in the townships. We then strolled through the streets of the townships, and picked up many of the children along the way that wanted to hold our hands and walk us down the street. It was definitely an experience I will never forget (clearly since I just left Vietnam, and I am almost to China in less than 48 hours, and barely writing about this experience). The following day I had made plans with my wonderful roomie, and Carter and Minh to go to Robben Island in the early morning on the first ferry out there. I am definitely glad we did so because a lot of students were not able to make it due to weather conditions, and what not. So we head out to Robben Island, and take a tour on a bus first of the whole island, with our really funny tour guide, and other foreigners from all over the world. Once we finished the island we were taken to the prison section where we were then greeted by a former prisoner during the apartheid. I didn’t know until I got there that former prisoner’s were the ones that gave the tours of the prison and told their story along with Nelson Mandela’s story. We were shown around some of the different sectors and taken into a room where there were lockers, stools, and an example of what the bunk beds looked like, that they got after several years had passed and they were forced to do so. Our guide then proceeded to explain to us that they fit 80-100 people on the floor at night, on your own mat that wasn’t very comfortable and with one blanket. He rolled out the mat and lyed on it then showed us how you maneuvered to turn around and the process of everyone turning at the same time. It was weird to hear the way things were put into sentences though, from how they were fortunate enough to study with the books they were given, when most of us think it’s such a hassle and complain about it all the time, to they had the privilege of doing this or that because of good behavior. It was definitely hard to hear some of the torturous things that happened to them, you couldn’t help but get watery-eyed or even cry, or cover your mouth because it’s so out of control. After we did all of this we walked to Nelson Mandela’s section and saw the rock he stored his papers under, and his cell. Something that was more of a tourist attraction than it should have been for some people. Fortunately on my tour we all had our own moment to take a picture of it, and reflect on it. After the tour was over we proceeded to the gift shop where I bought a quote book and Nelson Mandela’s book Long Walk to Freedom, for my Dad. It’s cooler to buy it there because it gets a stamp that says “Bought at Robben Island”. So yay for you dad! We then headed back to the mainland of Capetown and headed to get some food at Mitchell’s (which was the local Pub that all the SASers went to, and has it’s own story that only some of you get to know). Liz and I were playing it by ear on heading up to Table Mountain because the Table Cloth was there for a long time so we ate lunch, with Carter and Minh, it still wasn’t gone so we proceeded to Greenpoint Market, and got some more souvenir and gift type items. After that we headed back to the ship and we decided it was as clear as it was going to get and ran straight for a cab to get to tram. We got up there and had a marvelous view of the waterfront and all of Capetown, but it was freezing and for some reason being from Calfironia and Florida, we wore shorts and took a light jacket…thinking we’d totally be okay though it was freezing at night in Capetown. We stayed up there for about an hour taking lots of photos and having our own photo shoots on the rocks, then headed back down and got back to the ship for a little R&R. If you are wondering if I ever did anything at night for the first two nights…I did, we went to dinner usually and then headed to Mitchell’s as previously stated, but this night at Mitchell’s set the tone for the rest of my trip where I met a wonderful local named Cristian Neagu, who ethnically is Romanian but has lived in Capetown all of his life. We met on his 28th birthday which was this night and hung out every night after that with friends and stuff. I definitely learned a lot from him and really enjoyed his company (family that reads this…please don’t freak out, nothing happened). The third day, after being out relatively late with Cristian and Anna I woke up early for my sandboarding experience with Collin, Mike, Anna, and Chris. Our sandboarding guide greeted us sans shoes so we knew he was going to be an interesting character and he definitely was. After learning about the most poisonous snake in the world that was out where we were and the parasites, and the animals that all were very bad for us we proceeded to slope down the sand dunes, well everyone else did except me I just kind of fell down them. Right around lunch time we headed to get some food and visited a lovely winery where we got some wine, headed to the beach close by where we ate our sandwiches and dessert and had our red wine with sandwiches and desserty wine with dessert. Then we headed back to the dunes and went to the biggest dune and some races down and more conversation with our guide who is definitely a character that I will never forget, in fact his e-mails are quite hilarious. That night when I was back I met up with Juliana for dinner and headed to meet Cristian yet again after he was off of work. The fourth day I had a service project to the Amy Biehl Foundation Trust, something Emily had told me I had to do. I am definitely glad I did it as well. It dealt more with the townships. Amy Biehl was a fullbright scholar who came to do her work in South Africa during the apartheid as she was a believer in Nelson Mandela and wanted to help. Two days before she was supposed to leave back home to the OC in California, she was caught up in a riot in a township and killed by local members of the township because she was white and it was an antiapartheid rally and they automatically put her in with the apartheid people, though she was fighting for them. For once in my life, I finally understand the meaning of reconciliation during Desmond Tutu’s TRC after the end of the apartheid. Amy’s mother and father came out to the trail for the men that murdered their daughter, and granted them reconciliation. They never wanted to speak to them, they just wanted to move on. A few years down the road two of four men that were granted reconciliation; through the use of a mediator contacted the Biehl’s and said that they wanted to meet with them to talk about a program they were starting in the townships in order to help at risk youth. Without hesitation the father said okay, solely because of the way they managed to contact them. With that the Biehl’s became regulars to Capetown helping the two men start up their program and businesses, and thus we have the Foundation Trust. It’s baffling to me that a mother and father could do such a thing, and all the videos we watched of interviews I could see why, and I could see for once, what it looks like for someone when they reconcile with such a terrible event. We got to see what foundation did, and met the two men who murdered Amy Biehl, it was such an amazing experience for me. You can see how much of a difference this foundation is making in these children’s lives that live in the townships. More of them are graduating high school and attending college because of the foundation, they are more educated and their involvement in gangs is becoming less and less. I am definitely excited to keep in contact with this foundation and I hope to be back there to volunteer in the future. The night ended with dinner at Mama Africa with Liz and Denim and another night with Cristian at Mitchell’s. The 5th day in South Africa I was supposed to be shark cage diving but it was cancelled due to weather so I was really bummed so instead I went shopping at the mall and had a relaxing day just shopping and eating at Cristian’s restaurant, then we had a casual dinner at a burger place and Denim went back to the ship because she wasn’t feeling well and Liz and I proceeded to the pirate ship that was next to our ship for the SAS party they held for us. I then later met up with Cristian for our last night our together, which was the best one. We met up and Mitchell’s and then once it started to close he drove us to long street and we went to dubliner’s, then after that closed we went to his friend’s house and hung out there and jumped into the swimming pool and then we headed back to the ship around 6am, and I went to sleep until I woke up the next morning to just enjoy the last bit of my day in South Africa hanging out with him which ended up being more difficult than we expected, but all in all South Africa was a great time, and I am sorry this is so long, it could be longer as South Africa is in the top 3 and it was one of the longer ports.

Again sorry this is pretty much like a month late, but better late than never…
A-Ram