The Challenge with Dreams

I really didn't think I would post on this blog after my Semester at Sea experience was over but after attending an event on campus tonight I have a lot of my mind and need an outlet to process and figured this was the best place to do it. Tonight we had The Dream Share Project back on campus to present their documentary to our students and host a workshop with them after the documentary to help them start thinking about their dreams, how their dreams relate to their careers, and what they can start doing today to accomplish those dreams. When they came to campus back in April I was really excited because in two short months I would be embarking on one of my career dreams by working for Semester at Sea so I was excited by their presentation and ready to follow one of my dreams. The experience I'm having tonight though is quite different than the one I had in April.

Adjusting back to my land campus had been incredibly difficult over the past two months. Going from having such a tight knit group of people that I was living, working, and playing with to all of a sudden not having the same community and people that I care so much being so far away was really hard. And not waking up seeing the ocean or knowing that I'm going to be exploring a new place soon was also really hard. I also didn't have the words or ways to explain to my co-workers, friends, and family why I was struggling so much. I don't think anyone but the people you spent time with on the MV Explorer can really understand what you go through both on the ship and once you get home. I can tell you there were a lot of tears, a little bit of anger, depression, and the constant feeling of wanting to run away...but would I trade having those emotions after I left for not ever going on the ship? Absolutely not. It has taken two months, but I think I'm finally figuring out how to walk on land again which is a good thing. There are less tears, less moments of wanting to run away, and I'm starting to figure out my place back at home again.

But what about my dreams? What are my dreams? What do I want out of my life? Those are some of the questions that myself and the students sitting in the presentation tonight were forced to think about. If you've read my blog before, or if you know me, you will be well aware of the fact that I am a planner. I like order, structure, and knowing what I'm going to be doing for the next week, month, or even year if I can figure that out. You would think that with me being such a planner, I would know exactly what I want to do with my life and you may even think that I have this perfect plan laid out with each step along the way figured out. Well, I hate to burst your bubble, but I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing with my life or where I might end up. I know that I love my job right now and love the university that I work for. I also know that I love student affairs and the moments of education and development that I get to have with the students I work with. The hard reality is though that there are some days when I think there is something missing and something more that I should be doing with my life, I just don't know what it is. Could I spend the rest of my life working in Student Affairs? Absolutely. Would I be happy? Probably. Is there the chance that I might always feel like something is missing? Yes.

If I stop and think about what my dreams are without looking at the path I've taken or thinking about where I am in my career right now, I'm a little scared. Why? Because I don't know if I will ever really be able to live out my dreams fully and because if I did it would mean a major life change and a potential career change. My dream is to travel. And yes, I know a lot of people say this is one of their life goals or dreams, but at 27 I know this isn't just some fleeting thought of I want to travel so I can be a tourist and go drink in a 100 different countries, I actually want to go out and see the world. I want to meet people who come from such different backgrounds from me. I want to go out and make a difference in the world and touch peoples lives. I want to be able to have educational moments with people in different countries and help people realize that no matter what their circumstance is or where they come from that they are loved, they are worthy, and they can follow any dream that they have. I just want to pack up my things, head out, and go make a difference. Maybe I could do this traveling from place to place, or maybe its by moving to another country and finding a job that I can make a difference in and immersing myself into that new country. I don't know I'm called to do, but I just have this feeling deep in my gut that at some point in my life, I'm meant to be somewhere else besides the United States building community elsewhere. Its a scary thought not knowing and to think that I might, at some point, just completely uproot and head somewhere else.

So what is holding me back? What is the challenge that so many of us face with dreams...and especially start facing when we start to get older. Life. Reality. Money. I've spent so much time on my education and getting myself to where I am right now in my career. I feel like I've invested so much into being a student affairs professional (which again I do really love) that right now I can't see my life without somehow being in higher ed. I also feel as though I still have lots to accomplish in my current job and I wouldn't want to leave things unfinished or before I'm ready to leave a community (I've done that enough throughout my career path that I don't want to do it again). I also am not spontaneous, so the reality of my situation is that I could never actually just pack up and leave. I'd need time to plan...though as we learned from Semester at Sea, not so much time that I start to obsess over all the little details. But the biggest factor of all is money. Right now, especially after this summer, I pretty much have none and it takes quite a bit of money to travel or to pick up and move somewhere very different and potentially far away. Student Affairs is also a field that isn't going to get you rich quick...or potentially ever, so that is also a hurdle if I were looking to save for my dream. And then there is the reality of the fact that like most Americans, I have debt. I'm sitting on $40,000 of school loans that even with my $500 payments a month, don't ever seem to move from being at $40,000 and I have a car loan and other responsibilities that I have to be able to pay for. If you took away my school debt, I could easily have the money saved in a year that I would need to at least get started on my dream, but again, the realistic situation is that my loans aren't going away anytime soon.

One thing we tend to be really good at, is making excuses. We are amazing at coming up with all the reasons why we can't do something. Hell, I just spent a large paragraph just hitting a few of the reasons why I can't even begin to think about pursuing my dreams (and I could probably give you 100 more if you wanted them). We set up barriers or walls so that we never actually have to make ourselves vulnerable by putting ourselves out there and following through on our dreams. Honestly, that is probably the reason why most people are unhappy with their lives and their jobs...they make the excuses so that they never have to go after the things they really want to. Why do we do this? I think it is because we are so afraid of failure. We have been raised in a culture that taught us not to fail and that everyone is a winner. With that type of environment failure becomes 1000 times worse and none of us want to experience that feeling or admit to ourselves and our loved ones that we didn't do what we said we would...that our dreams weren't achievable. Stop for a minute and just think about how different the world would be if we all put 100% into our dreams and broke down those walls? It would be an incredible place full of pretty happy people if I had to guess.

I know I'm not getting any younger so if I really want to pursue my dreams I need to start making some sort of plan now. It doesn't have to have all the details, but I need to make the first step and start taking down those walls and barriers that I've managed to put up to keep me from doing what I want to do with my life. And if I decide that I really can't go after my dreams, then I need to find a way to incorporate parts of my dreams into what I can do with my life. How, I don't know, but I know I have to in order to be happy. And if you haven't taken time to really sit down and think about your life and what your dreams are, then you really should because you do only live once and just like me, you aren't getting any younger :)

In the End is my Beginning

I've been avoiding writing this post. If I write it, it means that my time on the ship is really over and that there isn't another port waiting to be explored just around the corner. I'm writing this, sitting on my couch, watching netflix with regular internet, so clearly I know I'm not still on the ship but to be honest with you all a piece of me still is and will always be.

I knew that the experience I was going to have this summer would be incredible and life changing but I don't think I really anticipated the extent to which my life would be impacted or how challenging it would be. Just living on a ship for three months is a challenge in itself. You don't have a lot of space and you really can't ever escape (unless you are in port of course). If you don't plan out your laundry, you will either be stuck without clothes or you will be hand-washing things you really don't want to hand-wash. Walking on the ship can be a total disaster depending on how the sea or ocean decides to act that day. You get sick of pasta and potatoes at every meal. The internet is so slow that it can sometimes be hard to communicate with people back home, or even people on the ship with you. You don't have "your person" with you or a way to easily contact them when you are sad, upset, angry, or frustrated and just need a friend to talk to or hug. Sleep is never regular and you can walk around exhausted for days. But then you stop and have to think, I'm in the middle of the Mediterranean on a ship full of students who are here to study. With faculty who are so passionate about their subject areas that they go above and beyond just teaching in the classroom. I'm with staff who are so dedicated to their jobs that they miss out on time with their family on the ship and in port or who go literally days without sleep because they've been up talking to a student or looking after them when they were in a bad situation. I'm on this ship with people who care so much about making this a community, a home, and a family. And even though the internet is terrible, we have internet on a ship in the middle of the sea.

There is no community quite like the one on the MV Explorer. I'm never going to be in a setting again that brings together so many people from different walks of life. In higher education we talk about the need to bridge academic affairs and student affairs and a lot of time we struggle to do this on our home campuses. On the MV Explorer we walk over the bridge on a daily basis. This academical village creates ways for faculty and staff to interact that help to enhance the student experience. Faculty get to understand what it is like for student affairs staff to plan programs, handle emergencies, and live with our students. Staff get see the passion that faculty have and how what students learn in the classroom really matters when we start to teach about life outside the classroom. Students are pushed out of their comfort zones both on and off the ship and get to experience things and go places that many of their peers will never get the chance to. It is a community where faculty, staff, students, and even the crew become your best friends and your family and it is so hard to be home and not have them right there with you. Our voyage was quick and very intense so I can't imagine the amazing communities that are built on longer voyages where students have more time to get to know one another and don't just have to focus on their academics.

I spent a lot of time on the voyage learning about myself. This was not an easy summer for me at all. I was faced with really tough situations, some of which almost brought me to the point of packing up my stuff and coming home. If you know me though, you know that I am stubborn and don't give up easily. I might threaten to give up, but it isn't in my nature to throw in the towel. In those tough moments, I had to realize that sometimes you can't take care of yourself alone and you need others to support you and help you. I'm so glad that I had my student life family and other amazing faculty/staff members there for me when things go rough emotionally, mentally, and physically. I also struggled with my own identity this summer. For the first time in my life I was on a staff where both my race and my sexuality were in the minority. This was such an interesting experience for me because all of my life I've lived with my identity as being Scottish and have ignored my white identity. This summer my white identity stood out so much and it was something I had to deal with and better understand what it meant when interacting with others. This was also something that was not easy, but important and necessary to tackle. The other major thing I worked on this summer was trying to figure out my professional life and address some of the areas that I still need to grow in. I was very blessed to have a life coach in one of my coworkers who was willing to take the time to process with me and give me advice on how to be a better professional and how to handle certain situations when they come my way. WWJD now has a new meaning in my life and I'm happy to say that even after being back at work for only three days my coworkers here have already seen a new me and they are happy with what I've learned on the ship.

I feel so blessed after this summer. Despite the challenges and despite the many, many tears that I shed throughout the voyage, I had an amazing experience. I was able to travel to places I've never seen before and that so many other people will probably never get to in their lifetime. I was able to build a community in 66 days and make connections with students that I hope has made their lives a little better and has taught them something. I creatively found ways to communicate with people on the ship and used probably a million and one post it notes as ways to talk and leave messages. I pulled off large community events like sea olympics (with my partner in crime Tiffany) in about five days with hardly any resources. I am still amazed by the things we were able to accomplish on our tiny little ship.

I've also left the ship leaving some amazing people and I think that has been the hardest and will be what takes me the longest to recover from and stop getting randomly sad about. My students were incredible. I didn't lose any of them on the voyage and a lot of other seas can't say that. They cared about the experiences that they got, befriended each other right away, and made me feel like I did an amazing job as their RD. The Baltic Sea was incredible and I feel so lucky to have been able to help build the community amongst the students this summer.

This summer I got to work with the most amazing student life team and with 6 RDs who fought for me, challenged me, drove me crazy sometimes (I drove them crazy right back), laughed with me, cried with me, and made me a better person by the time I left the ship. We had two amazing leaders in Christy and Stacey who kept us grounded, made us laugh more than any supervisors have made me laugh before, and who kept us focused on the vision of building our community. These two women worked so hard and supported us in so many ways that it will be impossible to thank them. This team was incredible. As was the entire group of staff members on the ship. Dean John did an amazing job hiring everyone.

And then there were my group of friends on the ship. Now these weren't my only friends, but they were the core group that when I wasn't on duty or didn't need a day to myself, I wanted to spend time with. At first, I didn't think I would get to be part of their group but after an amazing field program in Morocco, I was welcomed and had an amazing time getting to know them and having many late nights talking, laughing, and playing hilarious games. Each person in this group brought so much to our voyage and are incredible people and professionals. If you only knew the amazing things that they do in their real lives you wouldn't believe they are my friends. I already miss them so much, but I feel so thankful that I got to spend three months getting to know them, having them support me, and laughing together. 

The crew were also an amazing group of people who I am going to miss so much as well. They work harder than anyone else on the ship and a lot of them have long contracts that keep them on the ship instead of with their families. They take the time to get to know us individually and get excited when they see us back on the ship after spending days in port. They want to hear about what we did and how we are doing. And occasionally, they give us a hard time when we are cursed by duty and cause them to have long nights alongside us. They are incredible people I feel so lucky to have gotten the chance to get to know them and spend time with them. I know I'm going to miss some of them a lot.

So now is my final farewell. The end of this journey marks a new beginning for me because I am not the same as when I left. I have seen too much, experienced too much, and cared too much to be the same person. I only sailed around part of the world, but it reminded me of how big the world is and how much of an impact we can have on it. We may be different, but we are all humans and should care for each other and love one another. Thank you to all the people who made this summer possible, for the amazing people who made this summer unforgettable, and to all of you who followed me on this incredible journey. This is not goodbye to the MV Explorer, to Semester at Sea, or to the people who have left an imprint on me, its a big see you soon :)

I've Fallen in Love

Over the past week and a half I feel head over heels in love....with
Spain. Someone had to force me to get back on the ship yesterday evening
because all I wanted to do was stay. I don't know any Spanish, or anyone
in Spain, but I wanted to stay. It is a beautiful, amazing country, and
I really think that I'm going to make a new life goal to learn Spanish
over the next few years and move back.

We started our time in Spain in Barcelona. Barcelona is a beautiful
large city with some pretty amazing sights and architecture. It is
however a large city and if you have been keeping up with my blog you
know that on this trip I've really enjoyed the smaller towns to large
cities. That is still the case, but Barcelona was great. I started the
first day there on a field program which was a city orientation. We
basically did a driving tour of the main touristic points in the center
of the city and then went on a bit of a walking tour through one of the
older districts in the city. We made a stop at the Barcelona cathedral
which was beautiful and was having a mass in one of the small chapels
while we were there. After the cathedral we headed up the mountain
passing the Olympic stadiums and headed to the Spanish Village. This was
one of the my absolute favorite places that we visited. The Spanish
Village was created as an outdoor museum representing the different
styles, architecture, and culture of the different regions of Spain.
Aside from beautiful buildings and a gorgeous view of the city, the
Spanish Village is filled with little restaurants and shops full of
different types of artisans from painters to jewelery makers and a whole
lot more in between. I wasn't feeling very well the first day so I
didn't get to explore as much as I wanted to. After the orientation I
went back to the ship to rest and then spent a couple hours before duty
over at the mall near where our ship was docked. Duty was a breeze the
first night in Barcelona which amazed me due to how close we were to the
city center and all the bars.

The second day I went on another field program to Montserrat which is
about an hour away from Barcelona. Montserrat is located on an amazing
mountain which is hard to explain so until I'm able to post pictures,
you should google image Montserrat to get an idea of what the mountain
looks like. On the top of Montserrat is a monastery which has between 30
and 60 monks who still live and worship there today. It is also the home
of a famous boys choir who sound amazing and were unfortunately on
vacation while we were there visiting. What Montserrat is most famous
for though is the black Madonna statue that was found in a cave near
where the monastery sits today. People from all over the world go on
pilgrimages to touch the hand of the Madonna. The line was way too long
to wait to touch the Madonna but we were able to see the shrine from
inside the church. We spent the majority of our time in Montserrat
exploring the different areas and going through an interactive
multimedia museum with the history of Montserrat which ended with a
video performance from the boys choir which was amazing. In my opinion,
we didn't really get enough time in Montserrat. There was so much more
that I wanted to do, like going to the top of the mountain, but our free
time just didn't allow us to do that. It was still great to be there and
explore what we were able to. The rest of the day I spent wandering
around Barcelona and doing more shopping. This was also the day that I
made the rash decision to chop all of my hair off at the Barcelona mall
near the ship. That was an interesting experience for sure. Luckily, at
this point my short hair is growing on me, but when I first got it done
I thought I had made a huge mistake.

The second night was our "big night out" in Barcelona, or rather it was
supposed to be our big night out of the trip, but we were all so
exhausted we only lasted until about midnight or so. We found a little
restaurant in the Gothic Quarter and had amazing tapas and homemade
sangria. Have I mentioned how much I love sangria?? After dinner we met
up with some other friends and started our night out. We found a tiny
little bar, had some drinks and then headed to the bar that Ernest
Hemingway used to frequent in Barcelona. It is this tiny little hole in
the wall that if you weren't looking for, you would walk right by. The
bar is very very old and you can tell by the cobwebs, dust, mold, and
bottles that are over 200 years old sitting behind the bar. The bar is
known for selling absinthe, so for the first time in my life I had some.
It was a very interesting process. They brought us the glass of absinthe
along with a small spoon, two sugar cubes, and a bottle of water with a
hole punched into the cap. We were shown the process of what we had to
do. Basically, you lay the tiny spoon across the top of the glass and
put the two sugar cubes on the spoon. Then you squirt the sugar cubes
with water and let them slowly dissolve into the absinthe. Once the
sugar cubes have dissolved you squirt a little more water down the side
of the glass and then the absinthe changes color. I had about two sips
and couldn't have anymore because I didn't like the taste. It was a
really neat experience and as a lit major, was pretty cool to be at the
same bar that Hemingway used to come to (even though he is not my
favorite writer at all). We headed back to the ship after the bar, so
our night ended much earlier than any of us originally thought it would.

The last day in Barcelona was probably my favorite day. I was signed up
to lead a field program to the chocolate museum. If you know me, you
know I LOVE chocolate. I currently have a huge stash in my cabin which
probably won't last until the end of the voyage. To start with, our
guide was very beautiful, young, and a lot of fun so that made the field
program even more enjoyable. We started our program with a walking tour
of the gothic quarter which was really nice since I hadn't spent much
time there during the day. After our walking tour, we headed to the
museum where we got to wander around and look at all the amazing
sculptures made from chocolate while learning about the history of
chocolate and the relationship that Spain has with the delicious sweet.
After our tour we had our own private chocolate lesson where we got to
make a chocolate animal (I picked an elephant) and then were given bags
of chocolate and was paper to draw on. Most of us drew the ship. And we
of course got to sample chocolate. I tried the hot chocolate and oh my
gosh, it was amazing. I bought a bag of their cocoa powder so that I can
make some of it when I get back home. It was a lot of fun and our group
only had 10 people which made it an even better experience. After the
museum I decided to do the hop on hop off bus around the city. I managed
to do two of the three lines and it was really nice to sit back, relax,
and see parts of the city that I hadn't seen before. I really wanted to
get off at the Gaudi park, but the line was so long to get back onto the
bus that I didn't want to risk getting off and then not making it to
other places I was hoping to see. I did get off at the Spanish Village
though because I wanted to spend more time there. It was really nice to
walk all of the property this time and go into more of the little craft
stores. I bought a few things that I'm excited to bring back. After the
Spanish Village it was back to the ship.

We had two days at sea between Barcelona and our next stop in Spain
which is when I should have written and posted this, but things have
been so busy with our last ports being so close together that I just
didn't get around to it. Our second stop in Spain was Cadiz. This is
where I officially fell in love with Spain. Andalusia is the southern
region of Spain and it is probably one of the most gorgeous places that
I have ever been to in my life and I seriously want to move to that
region at some point if I can. Our first day in port I was able to get a
ticket for the city orientation which was really nice because we walked
the entire city as it is only 3 miles long. It was great to learn the
history and get a feel for where things were. We also had the
opportunity to go into the cathedral and the crypt of the cathedral. In
the afternoon I went back out, without a map, and just walked around
town. It was so nice and relaxing wandering the little narrow streets
and not being worried about where I was going or what I was going to do.
I ran into a couple co-workers so had a sangria with them at a little
place that sold drinks in giant mugs for only a euro and had cute little
sandwiches that you could order to go along with your drinks. That night
was our girls night in Spain, so about six of us got together and went
out for tapas at a restaurant that had been recommended to us by one of
our friends who had been to Cadiz before. It was probably the most
delicious food that I have had the entire voyage. If any of your ever go
to Cadiz, let me know so I can tell you where this amazing place is!
After dinner, only one other girl stayed out with me but we went to the
main square to hang out and then found a tiny little bar down one of the
small side streets that was a Simpsons themed bar (it was very
interesting) and sat there, had a bottle of wine, and enjoyed chatting
and people watching. It was an awesome night. When I got back to the
ship I stayed up pretty late chatting with two of my favorite security
people which was really nice since we don't have much time left with
them at all.

My second day in Cadiz was actually spent on a field program to Sevilla.
Again, we had a gorgeous tour guide (Spain has some pretty attractive
men for sure). Sevilla is absolutely gorgeous and I really wish I had
been able to spend the night there to do more exploring. We started our
day at a bullring learning the history of bullfighting which was neat.
Then we did a walking tour of the city passing by several different
sites including the cathedral that was built on a mosque, we visited the
royal palace, and also saw the gorgeous Spanish Plaza that was built for
the Spanish exhibition back in the early 1900s as well as a few other
places. The buildings around the city that were built for the exhibition
are all gorgeous and I wish we had done a tour of those as well. We also
got tapas for lunch again and I have to say, I think I'm also in love
with tapas. It is just so good and the perfect portion size as well.
After we got back to Cadiz, I got together with another group of friends
and took them to the tapas restaurant I had gone to the night before so
I had even more delicious tapas. After dinner a few of us went out and
continued to have a great conversation and a fun night.

My last day in Cadiz was actually spent outside of Spanish territory in
Gibraltar. I had really been looking forward to this trip mainly because
I had grown up hearing about Gibraltar and used to have a crown coin
with Gibraltar on the back of it when I was younger. It was a pain
getting there thanks in part to the lovely relationship that Spain and
Britain have with each other over the territory, but we made it there
and had an amazing tour with a great guide named Karen. If you don't
know, the main road in Gibraltar is also its airport landing strip, so
on our walk to meet the buses we got stopped on the road and got to
watch a plane land and another take off. It was really neat because we
were so close to it. Our first stop in Gibraltar was to the World War II
tunnels that were dug out and had men (and women who were nurses)
staying in them for over 3 years. It was really neat to see the tunnels
and the pictures of the armed forces who stayed there. We also got to go
stand on a balcony that they made so that the men could take smoke
breaks when they were working and the balcony is literally cut out right
in the side of the rock. There are over 30 miles of tunnels in the rock
and we only got to see about a tenth of the tunnels which is crazy to me
with how much we did see. Our second stop was to tunnels that were dug
during a war with Spain back in the late 1700s. They were the
inspiration for the World War II tunnels (which by the way, Eisenhower
stayed in during the war) and had a really neat history for us to learn
about how the rock has been a defense system for years and how the rock
itself protects those inside of it from any harm such as bomb explosions
and such. After the tunnels we headed to St Michael's Cave and the top
of the rock. On our way up to the cave we drove the majority of
Gibraltar and it was really neat to see the different architecture which
showed the history of the rock and who had ownership of it at different
points in history. When we got to the top of the rock, we saw lots and
lots of monkeys, including one that jumped into our bus as soon as we go
there. It was really cool to see all the monkeys hanging around and
interacting with the tourists. There were also a ton of baby monkeys.
The neat thing is that every monkey on the rock is tracked and taken
care of. The cave was beautiful and I am looking forward to posting more
pictures so that you all can see it. After the cave we got about 30
minutes to walk around town, find lunch, and make it back to the bus.
During this time is when one of my favorite moments of the entire trip
happened.

On our walk back to the bus I had stopped and bought a bag of my
favorite British crisps and was eating them as we walked to the grocery
store to stock up on food. Most of the monkeys in Gibraltar live higher
up on the rock, but every once in a while, one or two will make their
way down to town. We turned a corner and all of a sudden I saw a group
of tourists looking at a monkey. I didn't think anything of it until the
monkey looked right at me, jumped off of the bridge it had been sitting
on and came to attack me. I panicked as most people would, but instead
of just dropping the bag of crisps, I handed it off to the assistant
librarian who was with me. I have no idea why I did this, I guess I
really just didn't want to lose my crisps. Well, the monkey saw me do
this and then literally jumped on the assistant librarian and wouldn't
get off. She finally had the sense to just drop the bag of crisps and
then luckily the monkey got off of her. So in short, I tried to
sacrifice our assistant librarian to the Gibraltar monkeys to save a bag
of monster munch crisps. It was hilarious and I really wish we had a
picture of video of the entire experience.

After Gibraltar it was back on the ship and we sailed to Portugal. We
had almost the entire next day on the ship since we weren't going to
arrive in Portugal until 4pm and none of the faculty or staff had any
responsibilities while we were sailing, so the faculty threw an RD
appreciation party for us in the Glazer Lounge. I won't go into details,
but it was an amazing night and we closed down the dance party around 3am.

Technically I'm already back on the ship from Portugal, but I'll wait
till my next entry to let you know about my time here. I'll be home
really soon and then I can post pictures of all the things I've been
telling you all about!!

Fabulous France

For those of you who read my blog about Malta, you know that I had a
pretty bad time. Luckily, France was amazing so this is a much more
positive blog than my last one :) I was really excited to be coming back
to France for the first time in about four years. I took French from 7th
grade till my freshman year in college and I have always wanted to
travel to more of France. For the record, my french skills are terrible,
I know enough to get by but not enough to really have conversations with
locals. The last time I was there was in 2009 and I only went to Paris
so to get to explore some of the south of France on this voyage was
something I was really looking forward to.

Our first day in France I was on a field program to a little town about
30 minutes away from our port Marseille called Aix-en-Provence. I've
found on this trip that I have really enjoyed when I get the opportunity
to go to little quaint villages/towns. Luckily for me, Aix-en-Provence
is just that, a quaint town with beautiful walkways, fountains,
balconies, and shopping. Our tour guide took us on a walking tour of the
town to begin with which was a really nice introduction to the area. We
got to see some of the different areas of the town, learn more about its
history, and visited a beautiful cathedral. You would think by now that
I would be sick of all the churches that we have visited, but I
absolutely love going into them and seeing how beautiful they are.
Churches for me are also a very peaceful place so its also nice to spend
some time reflecting when I visit different churches around Europe.
After the walking tour we were given about three hours of free time to
wander around. At first I was with a group of other staff members and a
few students but ended up breaking off from the group and wandering by
myself for about an hour and a half. There are really nice outdoor
markets in Aix-en-Provence so I spent some time walking through those,
shopping, and eating pretty much every single pastry I could get my
hands on. There was also a great tourist office where I was able to get
information and maps for the places I was planning to visit the rest of
my time in France. It was really nice to just stroll around, go down
random streets, and take in the sights of the town. There were also
several French men playing musical instruments such as accordions
throughout town which made it really feel as though you were in France.
After we got back in the late afternoon I spent the rest of my first day
relaxing on the ship since I was on duty. Luckily duty in Marseille was
not bad at all!

My second day I decided to travel to Avignon which is about an hour and
fifteen minutes by train north of Marseille. I was originally planning
to just go by myself, but a student was talking to me and mentioned how
they really wanted to go but didn't have anyone to go with. We decided
to go together and at first I was really worried about traveling with a
student but it ended up being an amazing day. The student and I are very
similar so I think that helped make the day really good. For those of
you who don't know, Avignon was the home to Roman Catholic Popes for
about 100 years when the French popes decided to move the holy seat out
of Rome. Avignon was also home to the two French popes who were elected
at the same time as Italian popes when there was a split in the church.
It has a really interesting history and the main site is the Papal
Palace. We started our morning there and took about two hours to walk
through the entire palace. It was a really interesting site and a great
start to the morning. Right next to the Papal Palace is a large
cathedral with nice gardens surrounding it. We went into the cathedral
and then spent time wandering around the gardens. There was a little
pond/lake in the middle of the gardens that had a cafe next to it so we
also decided to sit and relax for a little while enjoying the scenery
and the little ducklings that were swimming in the pond next to us. From
the gardens, we headed down to the second most famous sit in Avignon,
Pont d'Avignon which is the unfinished bridge that goes across most of
the Rhone river. I was really excited to visit the bridge because one of
the first songs I learned in French class back in middle school was Sur
le Pont d'Avignon. I felt as though Ms Harris would have been so proud
of me for going to Avignon. The entrance to the bridge included a free
audio guide so that was really nice to help learn more about Avignon,
the construction of the bridge, and other useful information. Our last
adventure of the day was taking a small shuttle boat from one side of
the Rhone river to the other and then walking throughout the island that
is surrounded by the river. After our off road adventure, we headed back
into Avignon found a coffee shop with wifi, got some dinner, and then
headed back to the train. It was a great day overall day :)

My last day was spent with a group of friends walking around Marseille.
We didn't really have a plan so we just wandered, spent most of our time
near the Vieux Port, ate lots of French bakery items, and enjoyed
several stops at little coffee shops. It was a nice ending to my time in
France, but I really wished I had more time so that I could have visited
Nice and other areas in the south of France. Last night we sailed from
Marseille to Barcelona and several of us had a very good night hanging
out, drinking wine, and playing fun games in the faculty/staff lounge. I
paid for our fun today in Barcelona, but already I really like the city
and can't wait to explore more. I'm on duty tonight and it looks like it
will be another rough night just based on how many students have left
the ship. Fingers crossed it goes well!

So Long, Farewell Malta

I have honestly been avoiding writing this blog but I figured since we
are pulling into a new port in about 9 hours, I couldn't put the blog
off any longer. I feel bad for Malta. Yes, I understand Malta is a
country so it doesn't actually have feelings, but I feel bad for Malta
because I had such an awful experience and am so glad that we are now
far away from the tiny little island. In my last post, I wrote about how
excited I was to go to Malta because I didn't know much about it and had
no expectations so I'm really disappointed that it wasn't as great as I
thought it would be. I know that it has to be a great place because one
of our ship security officer's really talked it up as being awesome and
a lot of fun, but that was not what I got out of the country.

My guess is that not many of you have heard of Malta before. It is a
tiny little island located in the Mediterranean off the coast of Sicily.
I believe its only about 50 miles from Sicily, so it is really close.
For a tiny island it has had quite a rough time and a lot of different
countries have occupied it or had influence over it. The capital city,
Valletta, where we docked was built by the Knights of St. John who were
basically given the island as their home when no other European nation
would host the Knights. It has a heavy Catholic population with 365
cathedrals spread throughout the island. There is a mixture of Arabic,
French, Italian, and English influence in Malta and recently they have
been hit with the issue of people from North Africa who are trying to
illegally immigrate to Europe ending up falling short of countries like
Italy or France and ending up in Malta. This has led to a lot of tension
between the Maltese and immigrant population as well as high amounts of
racism on the island. Malta became an independent country in the 1970s
when it broke off from Great Britain, though it does still belong to the
larger Commonwealth of Nations (so a similar type relationship to what
Australia, Jamaica, and Canada have). Basically, Malta is a little bit
of a lot of countries which I think has led to some of the issues they
are currently struggling with.

Malta was probably the hottest place that we have visited so far. It was
absolutely miserable and in the height of the daily heat you really
couldn't stay outside for more than 30 minutes. This general
uncomfortableness attributed to my bad time in the country. So now I
guess I should let you know a little more about my actual experiences in
Malta. The first day I slept in which was really nice. Well, technically
I got up at 6:30am to watch us come into port because I had been told
that it was beautiful. It really was and I am very glad I got up to
watch us come in. After watching us pull in and having breakfast, I did
go back to bed for about four hours. In the afternoon I led a field
program to the Three Cities which are part of the ancient area near
Valletta and where the Grand Inquisitors Palace is. We walked a lot,
everything was closed that we passed, there were literally no people out
and about, and we didn't see as much as we thought we were going to. The
Grand Inquisitors Palace was interesting, but a little hokey to be
honest with you. It was also way too hot to be walking so much and I had
several older lifelong learners on the tour who really needed to go back
to the ship after a few hours. I stayed in the rest of the night after
grabbing dinner at the Hard Rock because I was on back up duty from 8pm
to 8am.

I've been cursed with duty since I got on the ship. I pretty much never
sleep on duty and get to deal with a ton of incidents. In residence
life, duty is part of your job anywhere and you learn to deal with it.
It is probably the hardest part of my job on the ship, but for me it is
still part of my job so I do it thoroughly and to the best of my
ability. I thought that maybe because I was backup things would be
easier this port. Well unfortunately, the students also didn't love
Malta and felt a little bored, so they decided to go to a beer festival
on the island and to the area with lots of nightclubs that have very
cheap drinks. I didn't sleep that night at all which was really
frustrating and pretty much ruined my original plans for the next day
and made me just overall super grumpypants the rest of the time in
Malta. We also had several students injured cliff jumping (even though
we warned them multiple times not to go) so a lot of our other staff
spent their entire time in Malta helping those students. I have four
more port duty nights left and I'm going to try my best to go into them
with a better attitude and then hopefully if I have rough nights they
won't affect me as much. I'm also on duty the very last night in port of
the voyage (in Lisbon) so that may be a rough night. We do have two
extra days in Lisbon that are class/study days where the students can't
get off the ship so I'm already planning to book a hotel or bed and
breakfast the night after my last duty for my own mental health and
well-being. If you would like to contribute to the Lynsey is going to
need to get the heck away from the ship for a night after being on duty
in Lisbon fund, please let me know :)

After getting a few hours of sleep on day two, I headed out to Valletta
which again is the capital of Malta but is situated on the top of a very
large hill. Luckily, they have built an elevator that only costs a euro
that takes you up 27 stories to the top of Valletta so that you don't
have to climb the stairs/hill if you are lazy like I was. Valletta is
actually really nice with some historic sites, beautiful cathedrals, and
lots of shopping aka my weakness. I just wandered around town and then
happened across a movie theatre that was playing Monsters University
which was the movie I was most upset about missing this summer, so I
decided to go see it and luckily walked in right after a showing had
started. It was also a nice way to escape the heat and the movie was
awesome. I walked around town a little more after the movie, picked up
some things in the shops and then decided to go to the nice waterfront
area by the ship for dinner. It was really nice to just sit by myself,
have a delicious pizza, and a pint of cider. I was also able to meet up
with some friends that night and go out for some drinks for a few hours
which was another nice way to unwind.

My last day was actually my favorite day in Malta. One of my co-workers
was supposed to lead a field program but because of having to help an
injured student he could no longer lead it. I volunteered to give up my
spot on the trip I was scheduled to be on and lead his instead and I'm
really glad I did. The trip was called "The Local Experience" so it was
supposed to give participants a glimpse into life in Malta. We had a
really small group, only 6 people in total. We started the day going out
to a market in Malta where locals were shopping for produce, meat,
household items, and other interesting items ranging from clothes to
touristy things. It was really neat to watch the Maltese interacting
with each other as they were going about their shopping. After that stop
we headed to what is called a "band club" which is essentially just a
bar that is open all day but it has bingo, pool, and mostly just old men
that are patrons. We were able to sample two local pastries and the
local soft drink while we were in the band club. The pastries were
delicious but the local soft drink was yucky. There was a cathedral
across the street so we ran over there and got to look inside which was
really nice. Every church and town in Malta has its own Saint and on the
Saint Feast Day they have huge parades and celebrations. During the
parade large, heavy statues are carried that either show some sort of
image of Christ or the Saint and this church had one of the statues on
display so that was nice to see after having talked about the festivals
and parades on an earlier field program. Our next stop was to the
Limestone Heritage Center which talked us through the history of
limestone in Malta and the progression that the industry experience.
There was actually a really neat display with and audio guide that was
very informative. Then there was a little petting zoo in the back with a
few animals including the cutest little baby donkeys. Our last stop was
to the cliffs on the west side of the island, so yet again I stood on
the edge of a country! It was a beautiful view and I'll post pictures
once the internet gets a little better. We then drove through parts of
the island that I hadn't seen yet including the ancient Medina and
Rabat. I really appreciated having the opportunity to see more of Malta
even if it was through the window of our minibus. I spent the rest of
the afternoon napping on the ship since I was still pretty tired.

If it hadn't been for all the incidents, my lack of sleep, and the crazy
heat I really think I could have liked Malta. I think I'm going to put
it on my list of places to come back on my own without students if I
ever win the lottery and have the money to travel. Malta is my least
favorite port up until this point, but maybe that means things can only
bounce back up and get better from here! I've spent the past couple days
having really important and productive general life/professional life
conversations with some folks on the ship so I think I'm at a really
good point to move forward for our last three weeks and have a great
ending to this voyage. Positivity and living in the moment are going to
be my mantras for the next 19 days. We get to France tomorrow and I have
plans all three days that I am excited about (though I'm not excited
about how much trains cost in France) and then we are off to Spain.
Voyagers have the choice to sail with the ship to Spain or travel on
their own similar to what we did in Italy, but I've decided to stay on
the ship for the journey. I'm super super excited about Spain so I'm
anticipating getting their like a little kid on Christmas Eve :) Even
with bumps in the road, and not really enjoying Malta, life is good and
I am so lucky to be on this ship right now.

Oh, on another note, we had the ship auction last night which raises
money for the Semester at Sea Annual Fund (the fund provides money for
scholarships etc) and I wasn't planning on buying anything, but somehow
I ended up coming away with a hairdo done by one of the shipkids. It is
my favorite shipkid who is either 6 or 7 and she is going to be styling
my hair for me and is so serious about it. She came up to me first thing
this morning and made me schedule my hair appointment with her and gave
me strict instructions about what I need to do with my hair that day so
that she can style it best. My hair will probably be super funny
looking, but I'm excited. She is going to style it on Taco Night on the
ship so I will reveal my awesome hairdo to everyone at Taco Night and of
course take a picture, with my stylist, to share with all of you on
facebook!

Pizza, Pasta, Gelato, Oh My!

Even though we only left Italy yesterday, it feels as though it was
forever ago that we were there. Maybe its because we spent 6 days in the
country which is the longest time we've spent in any place so far. Our
time in Italy was divided between two ports, one outside of Florence and
one outside of Rome, with the option to travel overland which meant that
we didn't need to get back on the ship between the two ports. I've been
to Italy before, specifically to Florence, Rome and Venice, so I wanted
to make sure that my experience this time was different and that I saw
new places that I hadn't been before.

Our first three days we were based out of the port of Livorno. Livorno
is actually a really nice town which was pretty much destroyed during
World War II and has rebuilt itself since then. Most people left the
ship right away to start their adventures throughout Italy and didn't
return to the ship until our last day in our second port. For the first
day, I decided to stay close by and head to Pisa which was only about a
15 minute train ride from Livorno. What I didn't know was that the walk
from the port to the train station was an hour. I went to Pisa with two
other staff members on the ship and we decided to have a really relaxed
day with no specific plans. We arrived in Italy on a Sunday so a lot of
things were closed but we still managed to have a great time. We
wandered around Pisa, stopped for a slice of pizza, stopped a second
time for large beers, and then we finally ended up at The Leaning Tower
(we also managed to pick up a fourth staff member on our way to the
tower). The area around the tower was nice, but was filled with lots of
tourists. It was still really neat to see, but I honestly thought it
would be a lot taller than it was. We took pictures, but none of the
stereotypical tourist pictures and then headed back into town stopping
for gelato and then finding a nice, off the main road, family restaurant
where we shared multiple pizzas amongst the group and drank homemade
wine that was cheaper than water. That night several of us went out for
my birthday and ended up at a little cafe outside the port talking,
eating, and drinking more wine (we were in Italy, so its totally ok). It
was really nice to spend time with some of my friends on the ship for a
pre birthday celebration.

The second day, my birthday, I spent my day leading a field program to
Sienna and San Gimignano. My last semester at UT, I took a Renaissance
history class as an elective that pretty much only talked about these
two places so when I saw this was a field program I could go on, I knew
I needed to sign up for it. Sienna is absolutely beautiful and I wish I
had been able to spend a couple days there. The city was built on three
hills and is divided into 17 districts (kind of like the Hunger Games).
Each district has there own crest and when you walk around the city you
can tell what district you are in because each of the roads have little
crests. I really wish I had been on a tour of all 17 districts. I think
we ended up walking through about four. I also ended up having a
delicious birthday lunch with five of my co-workers at a restaurant that
we just happened upon. We had three bottles of house wine, two appetizer
plates with different local meats, and then for my entree I had a
ravioli pasta with pear and cheese inside with a Gorgonzola cheese cream
sauce and walnuts on top. If your mouth isn't watering right now, then
we can no longer be friends. San Gimignano was our second stop of the
day and it is a city that used to be full of lots of towers. Today only
a few remain. It was a neat town, but far more touristy that Sienna had
been. We had free time to walk around, so I got more gelato and shopped.
It was a great day which was then topped off by my actual birthday
celebration where about eight of us went back out to the port cafes and
hung out for several hours.

The third day began my independent travel in Italy where myself and one
other RD headed off to explore two other places while the ship sailed on
to Rome. Our first stop was Milan which is really just an urban city
with lots of shopping. I got a little lost going to our hotel, but we
finally found it and were able to get settled and then head off to the
city. We went down to the main cathedral where we quickly realized
neither of us would be getting int because we didn't have appropriate
clothing on. This was really disappointing, but it was still spectacular
to see from the outside. The rest of our day was spent consuming Italian
food, shopping, and wandering the city with an early night in at the
hotel. Milan was nice, but it isn't somewhere I feel the need to go back
to unlike the place we visited on our fourth day.

My fourth day in Italy I absolutely fell in love. We visited Verona
which was about an hour and a half away from Milan by train. I didn't
know this, but the entire city of Verona is a UNESCO World Heritage
Site. It is absolutely beautiful and so picturesque that I could see
myself living there at some point. Maybe I'll end up having a house in
Santorini and another one in Verona :) We spent some time in the main
Piazza looking at memorials, the fountains, and the super impressive
Roman Arena which is second in size to the Colosseum. After that we
headed in the direction of Casa de Guilette and on the way stopped for
some coffee and to do some shopping. Casa de Guilette, which is where
Juliet's balcony is and if you have seen Letters to Juliet is where the
start of that movie takes place, is just incredible. As an English major
it was really cool to see that area that may have inspired the play.
When you walk in, the tunnel walkway walls are covered with large boards
that you can sign and write messages on. These are up nowadays to
encourage visitors to write on them instead of putting gum on the walls
to tack up letters and notes. When you walk through the tunneled walkway
you come to the small courtyard which houses the balcony and the statue
of Juliet. Legend says that if you rub the right breast of Juliet's
statue that you will be lucky in love, so you better believe I rubbed
Juliet :) The other cool thing that was in the courtyard were large
gates where you could take a lock, write note on it, and then attach
your lock to the gate. The gift shop sold locks, so of course we decided
to buy the locks and put them up. It was a really neat experience. After
that we went to another piazza for lunch and then continued our walk
around the city finding the old castle and bridge. We then headed back
to the main piazza, shopping more and getting more snacks. We ended our
day taking a little train that went around town in about 30 minutes
which was really nice to sit back, enjoy the sites, and learn more about
the city from our audio guide. We had a long trek back to Rome, the
port, and the ship after that but the day was worth all of the traveling
we ended up doing.

My fifth day was my no fun day where I was on duty and per usual got
less than three hours of sleep. I have officially been cursed on this
ship with duty and am not looking forward to my last two 24 hours duty
days which happen on 2 of the 3 last days of the voyage in Lisbon. I'm
really looking forward to being back at UWF with my normal duty and not
getting as many calls, or having to spend the night in the observation
room with students. Because I hardly slept, I almost cancelled my plans
for day six which were to just go into Rome by myself for a few hours.
I'm glad I decided to push through and go because I needed a day just to
be alone wandering the city. I went over to the Vatican but the line to
get into St. Peters was too long and it was way too hot to stand outside
waiting. I did end up doing a lot of shopping and then I ended up at the
church of the Caupchin monks whose crypt has the bones of over 4000
monks arranged in different patterns (including mummified monks) in five
rooms. It was a really neat experience going there and was somewhere
different than most tourists go to. In the first room there was a sign
that said "what you are, we once were. what we are, you will be." The
sign made me really think about life and death and how it was absolutely
true, one day, hopefully a long time from now, I will be just like the
monks on those walls- all that will remain of me will be my bones. This
experience also reminded me how important life is though and it cherish
every moment that you have.

Our final day in Italy was a class/port day. What this means is that we
are still in port, but students have classes throughout the day. Between
classes, students are allowed to leave the ship but have to stay in our
port city. Faculty and staff are permitted to leave the ship anytime
throughout the day so I got off the ship around mid day and headed into
town to explore which turned into me shopping more. I ended up getting a
new purse, several pairs of earrings, four new dresses, and souvenirs
will I was in Italy. It was a little ridiculous to tell you the truth.
The port city was actually nice and I decided to have my last Italian
meal in a little pizza restaurant that I found. I was by myself and when
I told the waiter I needed a table for one you would have thought i was
asking for the world. It took them five minutes to figure out where to
put me and then I ended up in a corner by myself next to the kitchen. I
felt really awkward but stayed and ordered food which turned out the be
the largest pizza I have probably ever seen for one person. I didn't eat
the whole thing because I had to save room for gelato which was great
because my last gelato was my favorite for my entire stay- half coconut,
half pineapple. Italy was great, but my bank account is probably not
happy with me right now.

We spent last night and all day today at sea and tomorrow morning we
arrive in the very small island of Malta. I'm excited to visit because I
really don't have any expectations about Malta and what my experience
will be. I'm taking it easy tomorrow with an afternoon field program and
then duty tomorrow night. It should be a good three days, but I'm
starting to get sad about it being the end of the voyage so soon. Five
ports to go.

A Much Needed Vacation

Some of you who think that this entire trip is a vacation will probably
be laughing at the title of this blog post. Parts of this trip are a
vacation, but there is a lot more work that goes into being an RD on
Semester at Sea than many of you probably think and honestly, I can't
adequately describe all the work that goes into it to make you all
understand what we've been going through every day on the ship. Right
now I am sitting on our top deck, eating an ice cream, and enjoying the
view so clearly today isn't that busy of a work day, but most days are.

Four years ago I took a vacation that was my first ever cruise. We went
around the Greek Islands and Turkey. On that trip I discovered that I
really did not like Athens, but loved the islands-especially Santorini.
When I looked at our itinerary for this voyage and saw that we would be
docking in Piraeus which is right outside Athens, I immediately knew I
wanted to spend any time I had available in Santorini. I was really
blessed to have my parents contribute funds to me getting to Santorini
so I have them to thank for my perfect vacation days.

Our first day in Athens I was on 24 hour duty which meant I was confined
to the ship. If you recall from an earlier post, my first 24 hour duty
experience was terrible and resulted in me not sleeping for over 24
hours. This duty experience was different, not quite as awful as the
last one, but yet again I was up all night and only managed to sleep
from about 8am to 11am the next morning. Security on the ship informed
me that they do not want me to be on duty again because I seem to be
cursed. Unfortunately for them I am on duty again when we are in Rome,
which also happens to be my favorite security officers birthdays (maybe
I should get them an ice cream cake in advance of another Lynsey cursed
duty night??). I also found out that night right after I was called down
to the gangway to start dealing with the first of several incidents that
the chief security officer, who I have given a nickname to and called my
BFF, was leaving the next morning. This came as a huge shock to me (and
I don't deal well with surprises) and I was really really upset.
Basically, had I not had so many issues that night he wouldn't have told
me he was leaving and I would have been even more upset. The ship crew
are on different lengths of contracts so we've had several people come
and go already, but to have one of my favorites leave made me really
sad. I made my other favorite security officer promise me that if he is
going to leave mid voyage (which he isn't supposed to) that he would
give me more notice than Vladdy did. He laughed at me, but agreed to do
it. I was also on duty our last day in Athens, but luckily nothing major
happened that day since everyone was really just coming back to the ship.

My middle 2 days, plus part of the morning on the last day, was spent in
Santorini. One of the other RDs, Tiffany, traveled with me and we had an
amazing time. After everything that had been going on, it was nice to
have a mini vacation away from the ship and students. We did run into a
few students while we were on the island but they didn't bother us and
everything was great. We took an afternoon flight to Santorini and it
might have been my worst flying experience ever. The flight was delayed,
the plane kept starting and stopping as we were traveling on the
gangway, and then a part of the wing literally was falling apart while
we were in mid air. The Santorini airport is also ridiculous. There is
not good way to describe it, so you all should just google images of it
and then you will understand how we felt when we saw it. We were staying
in a hotel that was about a 10 minute walk from Fira (which is the
capital of the island) which was absolutely gorgeous, had an amazing
pool, and a great owner named George who was really helpful in giving us
directions and suggestions of what we should do for our time on the
island. After throwing our stuff down, we immediately went into town to
find a cocktail and explore.

We ended up at this tiny little bar called 2brothers which had great
drink specials and had our first cocktail of the trip and a toast to
Vladdy. Supposedly the bar is a pretty big place for people to go to at
night, but when we were there it was only us and three other people
which was nice. We then spent some time venturing around Fira and
stopping in about a million different shops. We made a friend in a
pastry shop where we had baklava and bougasta while we watched the
sunset which was incredible. After the sunset we ran into some students,
said hello to them, took some pictures for them, and decided where we
were going to go for dinner. We went back to our hotel before going out
to dinner so that we could change and get ready for the night. When we
went back to the hotel we met two local guys who worked at one of the
other hotels in our complex, Thomas and Nico. They were both super
sweet, though Thomas didn't speak much English and claimed that his best
friend was a bird that had its cage over the bar. They recommended
somewhere for us to go that night after dinner and we managed to
convince them to come out with us, though when we left for dinner we
still weren't 100% sure that they would actually show up.

That first night was fantastic. We went to a restaurant for dinner that
had a beautiful view of the city and Caldera and between the two of us
we had five different plates in front of us. We tried a lot of local
Greek specialty dishes including an amazing white eggplant dip with
pita. I could literally eat that every single day and be happy. We also
got Moussaka which we both love, but it was really disappointing. After
dinner we ran into two other staff members, did a little shopping with
them (I bought a new dress that hopefully I will get to wear this week
for my birthday) and then we went to Tango to meet up with Thomas and
Nico. Tango was a really nice lounge, but it was clearly full of locals,
not tourists and we looked a little out of place. The boys did show up
and we probably stayed there for about an hour or so before deciding
that we were super tired and needed to go back and sleep. One thing that
drives me crazy about Europe is the amount of people that smoke. I don't
care if people chose to smoke, but it is just so disappointing and
everyone was smoking where we were. I think thanks to the laws that the
US has now about smoking in bars/restaurants in different places that
I've become a bit of a snob when it comes to smoking. I guess I just
need to get used to it for the next month.

Our second day in Santorini was absolutely jam packed. I had found a
tour company that had a day tour of the entire island which sounded
really great and was a wonderful price. We started the day going up to
the highest point in Santorini where a monastery used to be and a
military base is now. From this point we were able to see the entire
island (which is actually comprised of 5 different islands) and look at
the small crazy runway we had come into the day before. It was a
beautiful view and a great start to our day. From there we headed to a
local village where we got to climb a bunch of stairs (there is a lot of
climbing in Santorini) see beautiful blue domed churches, and more
spectacular views of the island. Our next stop was down to the old port
where we boarded a wooden boat to continue our tour. We headed over the
caldera, which is an active volcano which last erupted in the 1950s. We
had to hike up the caldera, and if you know me, you know that outdoor,
physical activities are not my strong point or my favorite. The caldera
was absolutely beautiful though and I will try to post some pictures of
it on facebook so that you can see hat the volcanic island looks like. I
was really proud of myself for climbing all the way up and down without
dying.

Our boat then took us over to the hot springs. I thought it would be
pretty cool to swim in the volcanic hot springs, but it was not. This is
something that I would recommend you skip doing if you are in Santorini.
When you get to the area of the hot springs instead of it being the
beautiful blue water you see everywhere else, it is orange, nasty, and
smells like rust because essentially everything under the water is rust.
The waves were also pretty strong so swimming was not easy. We probably
stayed in the water for about ten minutes or so before giving up and
going back to the boat. For the remainder of the day I felt yucky and
continually had to scrap large amounts of salt off of my skin from
swimming in the hot springs. So, in short, if you ever go to Santorini
there is no need for you to go swimming in the hot springs. After that
disaster the boat continued on to another island that makes up
Santorini, Thirssa. This is a tiny little island that is the home to
about 300 people. The bottom of the island is the port with little shops
and restaurants and the village itself is on the top. You can either
climb 198 very long and steep steps to get to the top of pay to ride a
donkey. We tried to walk up, but gave up pretty quickly and decided to
stay in the port area. We could have taken the donkeys, but after my
last donkey ride in Santorini where my donkey Fred tried to run me off
the island, I had no desire to pay for a donkey ride again. We had lunch
at a delicious gyro restaurant and spent the rest of the time wandering
the port area and doing a little shopping.

The last stop on our tour was to Oia which is one of the end points of
the main island of Thira (which is what most people just refer to as
Santorini itself if they don't know there are actually five islands that
make up Santorini). Oia is the picturesque Santorini village where you
see the windmill, lots of blue domed churches, the white houses, and the
iconic sunset. We had about two hours to wander before sunset so we
pretty much walked the entire town going into about 1000 different
shops. We found some really neat places though were there were hand
painted crafts and I treated myself to two things for my birthday. We
walked to the edge of the village for sunset and it was the most
beautiful thing that I have seen in a very long time. I took lots of
pictures, so eventually I should be able to post those on facebook for
you all. All in all, even though the day was long it was perfect. We
topped the night off by going to a restaurant that we had made
reservations at the night before and Tiffany had told that it was my
birthday. We were treated like royalty and they had even made a special
cake for me and then brought us Santorini dessert wine which tasted just
like ice wine and I wanted to take a whole bottle home with me but
didn't. It technically wasn't my birthday, but Tiffany and I won't be
together for my birthday and she wanted to celebrate it when we had a
chance. Santorini was incredible and I can't wait to go back there
again, hopefully for an even longer period of time. I honestly wouldn't
mind living there at all so maybe I need to start learning Greek :) I'm
pretty sure my mum and dad wouldn't object to me living there because
then they'd have a place to visit!

The past few days we have been back on the ship and I've been
celebrating the week of Lynsey which includes the time in Santorini, a
hot stone massage in the ship spa, going to an awesome reception with
Mexican food tonight, having a four course meal on the ship tomorrow,
and then two nights of going out in Italy. I've never made a week out of
my birthday before, but I'm kind of enjoying it and may need to make
this happen in the future. It is beverage service now (earlier when I
started writing this it was the afternoon and I was eating ice cream but
I had to go back to work and take a break from writing) and so far the
students are behaving. I'm especially missing my bff Vladdy right now as
security plays a large role in beverage service, but the good news is
that my other favorite will be up here in about 30 minutes so it will
make me missing Vladdy a little better. Just so you all know, we have 6
days in Italy so it will probably be a week or so before I'm able to
write again. I'm spending the first day in Pisa/Florence, the second day
in Sienna, the third day in Milan, the fourth day in Verona, the fifth
day on the ship for duty, and the 6th day in Rome. As you can see, it is
going to be a pretty busy week. I know this was a long post, so if you
made it all the way to the end I'm grateful :) Till next time!

Ice Cream, White Pants, and a Santorini Viewing

Phew. I feel like so much has happened since I wrote last. We've been to
two ports and will be arriving at a third tomorrow, so I figured it was
time I finally wrote again. The title of the blog today has a funny
story to it, but basically I was having an awful day and the three
things that made it better were ice cream with a good friend, seeing
people in white pants, and then a gorgeous viewing of Santorini as we
were sailing from Crete to Kusadasi. Clearly it is little things that
can make me smile :)

I'm really not sure where to begin since I did a terrible job writing
after each port like I have been intending to do. I have a cold right
now which is not making things fun and the ship is super rocky, so I
wouldn't be surprised if we have some sea sick students tonight.
Buuuuuttt, we get an ice cream cake tonight for being awesome so I am
SOOOO excited for that! Okay, back to what I've been doing for the last
couple of ports.

As some of you know, our original itinerary included a stop in Istanbul.
With everything that has been going on there, ISE had to make the quick
decision to change our voyage. In rerouting us, we got two ports for one
and even though I was really disappointed not to be going to Istanbul, I
was excited to be headed back to Crete and Kusadasi (I visited both
ports in 2009). Because of everything that had been going on
personally/professionally which i vaguely wrote about in my last post, I
decided to use Crete to relax and spend time with my other friends on
the ship who aren't RDs so that I could really separate myself from work
as much as possible. Crete was AMAZING. The first day we spent walking
around Heraklion which was the part of Crete that we docked in. The town
was really nice and we did a lot of walking. We ate lunch at a delicious
Greek restaurant that one of my friends found in Lonely Planet and I had
Moussaka which was absolutely amazing and I could literally eat every
single day. I'm so excited that we are headed back to Greece tomorrow so
that I can have even more yummy Greek food. After lunch we took a public
bus up to Knossos Palace which was nice, but pretty disappointing
compared to other places I've been to. It was still nice to journey a
little bit out of the main port area and do something "cultural." The
rest of the day was spent wandering the city center some more, doing a
little shopping, and then having a happy hour drink. We went looking for
dinner after happy hour, but ended up finding a rooftop bar with a
gorgeous view and had another drink instead of eating. I was with such a
great group of people who kept me smiling and laughing all day which was
exactly what I needed.

The second day in Crete four of us decided to head out of Heraklion and
go visit another part of the island. Our main goal was to eat more
delicious Greek food and find a beach to relax. We made a last minute
decision to head to Agios Nikolas which was on a postcard that someone
had bought the day before and looked really pretty so again we braved
the public bus (which was actually a very organized, easy to use system)
and headed on about an hour and a half journey across the island. When
we got to Agios Nikolas, I looked around and realized that this was the
port my ship had docked at in 2009. I was excited to be back because I
really loved the town. We took a walk down to the lake area in the town
and then found a great restaurant for lunch where we did indeed have
even more delicious Greek food. The funny thing about any SAS
participant is that when we find restaurants and cafes that have good
wifi we will sit there and not talk to each other because good wifi just
doesn't exist on the ship and that was the case with where we went to
lunch. Our waiter was super nice and talked to us about his life and
what he does before work every day and even recommended a beach for us
to go to. We were hoping for a sandy beach, but it ended up being a
pebble beach. That was okay with me though because nothing will compare
to the white sand beaches in Pensacola and the water was so clear,
beautiful, and absolutely wonderful to go swimming in. I even wore my
bathing suit and didn't care who saw me in it or what they thought (yay
for me!). It was seriously the perfect day and just what I needed after
all the craziness that was going on.

We had one day at sea between Crete and Kusadasi which was my super
crappy day on the ship. I will say this, in the past two weeks I have
learned that I have absolutely amazing and caring people on the ship
with me who are ready to literally fight for me if they needed to. It
has been wonderful to be surrounded by such a caring family while I work
through everything. When I was super upset I had a co-worker come find
me and just chat, and then after that I had another one take a break
from work and buy me ice cream on the 7th deck which was amazing (hence
the ice cream in the title) and then another who yelled at me to make
sure I got a white pant sighting to make me smile :) Our captain made
the decision to sail through Santorini so that we could all see the
island that evening and I appreciated that so much. It was what I needed
and to see students looking at the amazing island for the very first
time brought a huge smile to my face. I'm so much more excited to go
back to Santorini this week now!

We arrived in Kusadasi on Thursday and spent two days in that port.
Because I had been to Kusadasi before, I decided to add another field
program and served as the liaison for it. The field program went to
Ephesus, Pergamum, Gallipoli and Troy over the course of the two days.
It was a lot of driving, but was well worth it to see different places
and to go from one continent to another twice in one day!! I had been to
Ephesus before, but it is such an incredible place and somewhere I think
if you get the chance to go to, you need to go. The layout of the city
is incredible and there is just so much history there. Pergamum was also
an interesting city to visit and we had a great view of the acropolis
from the city ruins. We spent the night in an AMAZING hotel in Cannakale
which is where the horse that was used in the movie Troy is currently on
display. A student didn't show up for the trip, so I ended up getting my
own room which was nice because I had another chance to just be by
myself and relax. During the trip we also got to eat a lot of different
Turkish food which was a really nice bonus.

The second day we got up and took a ferry over to Gallipoli. I literally
could have spent both days just going around Gallipoli. It is such an
incredible place and to think about what happened there is unbelievable.
For those of you who don't know, Gallipoli was an eight month campaign
during World War I that resulted in over 500,000 casualties. Throughout
the peninsula you can see many monuments, memorials, battlefields and
trenches. I really do not think we spent enough time there, but I am so
thankful to have had the opportunity to go to a place where so many
people gave their lives. We also got to go to a new museum about
Gallipoli that was a simulation center where we through about 12
different rooms to learn the history of the campaign (of course it was
told through the lens of the Turkish). I am really glad that we went to
this before we headed out into the battlefields so that the students on
the trip could really understand where we were going. After Gallipoli we
went to Troy which was really disappointing, but still neat to see
especially with all of the stories that surround Troy. We arrived back
to ship very late last night and due to my cold I went to bed almost
immediately.

Tomorrow we arrive in Athens (technically Piraeaus) and will be here for
the next four days. I'm on duty the first and last days, but I get to
spend time in Santorini in between and I cannot wait to be back in
Santorini :) There are some concerns about a strike happening on the
16th, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that everything goes smoothly
getting to and from Santorini.

I'm sorry this post has been kind of all over the place, but with the
cold medicine, rush to get something posted before we get to the next
port, and my putting two ports in one post made for a scatterbrained
Lynsey. I'll be coming to you from Greece again tomorrow :)

Mixed Emotions

There is a lot that I would really like to talk about in this post that
I just won't be able to. The title of this post is pretty much the best
way to describe how I'm feeling right now after my experience in
Antalya. This job is absolutely amazing as I've said before and is
offering me opportunities that I have never experienced, but it is hard.
Really hard. When you live in such a small community, and especially one
that when you are at sea, you can't escape from, things become much more
intense than they would in any other situation or community. For student
affairs professionals, this is a great learning environment and
professional growth environment, but any one out there who wants to
apply for this job just based on the fact that you get to travel around
the world, also needs to be prepared to work hard, work long hours, and
deal with many situations you wouldn't be faced with on a land campus.

For those of you who have never heard of Antalya, Turkey before (which I
hadn't until it became a port after we took of Egypt and Tunsia),
Antalya is located in south Turkey right on the Mediterranean Sea. The
port city has a very long history dating back to around 150 BC and is an
area with several incredible ruins from the ancient Roman and Greek
periods. Today, Antalya has turned itself into a resort city. There are
just over a million people who live in Antalya, but the city has over
500,000 hotel beds. It is a top vacation destination from Germans and
Russians and if you ever get the chance to see Antalya, you will
immediately understand why- it is absolutely beautiful. The mountains in
the area are gorgeous and are more like the Rocky Mountains than the
Smokies, and the harbor/general landscape reminds me a lot of a scene
out of Tuscany. The weather was great while we were here, though very
very hot and the old town was a great area to spend time during the
night and at night to explore, shop, and eat delicious food.

The first day in Antalya, I was schedule to go on two field programs.
Immigration was running late again, so we left about half an hour after
we were supposed to, but luckily I made it back in time from the first
field program to eat lunch and make it onto the second. The first field
program was supposed to be a city orientation but it ended up being an
hour and a half in the Antalya museum and then about 20 minutes quickly
walking through old town. I did not feel oriented with the city at all
at the end of the program. As a history nerd though, the museum was
really cool as it was filled with all kinds of ancient artifacts and
statues. My second trip was much better and was to two ancient sites,
Aspendos and Perge. Our first stop was Aspendos which is an ancient
amphitheater. They still use this amphitheater from performances today,
though it is currently under some renovations and is not being used this
summer. A lot of you won't know this, but I love ruins and ancient sites
so I was pretty impressed by the state of the ampitheatre and we were
given time to walk around, explore, climb up the steps and pictures.
During my time at Aspendos, I was approached by a Turkish man dressed in
a gladiator costume who attempted to seduce me and would not let me
leave until I took pictures with him (which of course I could purchase
at the gift shop). It was a funny experience for sure. Perge is a city
about 40 or so minutes from Antalya that is in ruins but still fairly
complete. It was amazing to walk through the ancient city ruins and
learn about the history and what each piece of the ruins was and how it
connected to every day life back in the time when the city thrived. It
reminded me a lot of Ephesus, though on a much smaller scale. I'll
hopefully get some pictures posted on facebook soon so you can see the
city. That night, I decided to go back in Antalya with a group of
friends for dinner and drinks. We walked around old town and ended up
finding a hole in the wall place with all outdoor seating and a Turkish
musician singing and playing guitar. No one in the restaurant spoke
English so we were only able to order beer not food but it was a great
place to unwind and spend time with friends. After that we went back to
the main square and had delicious lamb and chicken donner sandwiches and
watched some fire throwers down below. Overall the first day was great!

The second day I was confined to the ship and was on duty. Luckily this
port had a little cafe off the ship, so I was able to leave the ship
twice and go down there for lunch and then for a snack later on in the
evening. I also spent some time in the pool while on duty which was
really nice because usually when the students are on board, I would
never get time in the pool because it is pretty small. Duty went pretty
well until about 3am when I was called down and got to spend 3 hours
with a student in our observation room. This is the part that I want to
talk to you all about and want to share my experience, but I just can't.
One because it is still fresh/I'm still trying to process everything and
two because even though I would be sharing from my perspective and what
I went through for three hours, it is still about a student and I just
don't think I should talk about it. I will say that it was one of the
worst experiences of my life and there is going to be quite a lot of
healing that needs to happen that might take a while both for me and for
the student. If you saw my status on facebook the other day, it was
about my experience that night and if you really want to check in and
know more, just email me. I have a great support system on the ship so
I'm being taken care of so try not to worry (though I know some of
you....mum...will worry anyway). And this experience made me love our
ship security staff even more than I already did...they are pretty
amazing and I'm thankful to have them around! Also, for those of you who
have read about my "love" of beverage service on facebook, there is
something I like even less than that now and I will stop complaining
about beverage service :)

The third day (which was when I got off duty at 8am) I had only slept
for an hour but I really needed to get off the ship so two RDs and
myself went into town and went shopping. Shopping is a great cure for a
rough night. And we had dessert for breakfast/lunch which was also a
good life choice. I bought waaayyyy too much in Turkey and went super
over my budget that I had for this port, but it was such a great port
that I can't complain. I also had gangway duty last night which wasn't
bad because we didn't have as many large groups coming in at once and
all our students made it back on time again! After gangway duty a few of
us went down to the port cafe for a drink and to relax so that was nice.
And we got to see a lot of the crew in regular clothes, relaxing which
was also great because they deserve time off the ship any time they can
because they work so so hard!

Today was our last day in port and it was actually a bonus day for us.
The students had class and could leave the ship between classes (but
would have a huge penalty if they missed class) but as staff our boss
gave us the day to go into port if we wanted to. Six of us headed back
into town and went to a Hamam, Turkish Bath, that I had found because we
didn't want to leave Turkey without that experience. Some folks on the
ship had really bad experiences at Hamams earlier in our stay so I was
really worried that the place I had researched and found wouldn't be
good and then everyone would be made at me, but luckily it was amazing!
There were 5 women and 1 man so we were separated by gender into our own
bath areas. We all paid for the full package which included a "sauna",
exfoliating rub, what I'm calling the bubble pillow bath, and then an
oil massage. The experience was amazing, so relaxing, and I will never
feel as clean again in my life. I'm going to take a shower after I
finish this post and I know I'm going to be so disappointed with the
ship shower after having the Turkish Bath experience today. If you are
ever in Turkey, this is something you need to do...just do a little
research before to make sure you end up somewhere good. Before heading
back to the ship, we had lunch at a little cafe in town that we have
grown to love and it was delicious. On ship tonight was our belated 4th
of July BBQ which was great! I am so exhausted now though and can't wait
to go to sleep soon and sleep in tomorrow because my body needs to catch
up on sleep so badly after the past few days!

We have one day at sea and then we will be in Crete where I have made
absolutely no plans and haven't done much research at all (I am sure you
are all shocked right now!). I'm looking forward to it because I'm going
to spend time with my non RD friends so it will be a different
experience than I've had in port so far :)