Days 59 through 64
From now on, we have roughly 6 days between each port. While it is nice to have a longer break between countries than just two days, things on the ship can get rather boring. I have gotten the opportunity to read quite a few books since I have been here, which has been absolutely great, considering when I’m at USD I barely have time to breathe, let alone read something I actually want to read. Unlike the other 6 day passages on the water, this one would hold much more excitement because of one special day known as Neptune Day.
Neptune Day is the day the ship crosses the equator, and all of the passengers go from being “pollywogs” to “shellbacks”. This is how Neptune Day went down: I woke up early for breakfast, along with the rest of my friends. Around 7:30, I heard the rumor that people were getting woken up, so I ran down to deck 3 with my camera in hand. When I got down there, lo and behold, there were about 8 crew members with their faces painted going down the hall with whistles and drums, banging on all of the doors, and making a racket. They went through the halls twice, making sure everyone was wide awake and up for breakfast. The actual festivities didn’t start until 9 am up on the 7th deck. The group of us made our way up there, and King Neptune Rex himself was waiting for us. King Neptune was our executive dean, and he had on a white robe and his face was painted. He also had a royal court with him, who were going to administer the various tests to the students to see if they were worthy of becoming trusty shellbacks (and yes I am trying to make this as cheesy as possible so you understand how cheesy it was on the day it happened). We had to take an oath, and the testing began. It began with getting fish guts dumped on our heads, then jumping into the swimming pool, then getting out and kissing a fish and King Neptune’s ring. After, the really brave people shaved their heads. I considered it for about .25 seconds, then decided against it, as I know mom would have killed me when I got home. I was incredibly surprised at the amount of girls that shaved their heads or chopped their hair really short. There had to be at least 20, if not more. Some of the girls got mohawks, some donated their hair to locks of love before shaving their heads, and others went totally bald. There was even a little lifelong learner that shaved her head! If I ever come back on SAS, I am definitely shaving my head on Neptune Day, no matter what anyone says. After the excitement of the head-shaving and fish guts, it was time for lunch. It was one of the greatest days ever, as we got BBQ for lunch. It is such a welcome change to actually eat some really good food on the ship. After the events, a group of us caught some rays on the observation deck, as we didn’t have classes.
On a completely different note, we had our second global studies exam between India and Mauritius, and it was definitely more difficult than the first. I still know I did totally fine, so I’m not worried. I absolutely can’t believe we only have four countries left and then I am going to be home. Mauritius is like our “spring break”, as we get to spend two short days on a tropical island with no school and friends. During preport for Mauritius, we got the lecture about being respectable, as past SAS voyages basically got to the island and the proceeded to wreak havoc, which is why our stay in Mauritius was so short. Some people had even tried to book hotels and been denied because the hotels knew the students were from SAS. Essentially, Mauritius hates SAS, and I have a feeling that it may not be a port SAS stops at for much longer.
There isn’t much else to report about my in between time between ports, so I will just make this one short and sweet. I will be writing again soon after Mauritius!
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