Well…here I am..behind again!! I seriously just have soo much to do!!
It is hard to try to study for classes, get papers done, etc in
between ports. If I don't, I will be writing papers and studying
while in port (yeah, right)!! My classes are stressing me out—well
one of them more than the others. But now for what has been happening
on and off the ship. It is another long one, so I will break it up a
bit for ya!!

OK, so between Mauritius and India were the Sea Olympics. We did not
have class that day…it was a day of games!! Each hall is broken up
into seas. There are like 9 of them or something?? The lifelong
learners, children, faculty/staff even had a sea. We competed in
things such as tug of war, juice pong, flip cup, relay races,
basketball tournaments, synchronized swimming, lip synch, etc. So
much fun!! The grand prize at the end is getting off the ship first
in San Diego. Getting off the ship in any port is a long process. We
usually port between 7-8am and don't end up getting off the ship until
sometime between 10-12, depending on the countries policies.
Sometimes every single person on this ship has to meet with an
immigration official face-to-face and get their passport stamped,
other times the officials are more lenient. In India we had to carry
around immigration papers to get checked every time we went into the
harbor and left the harbor. They are pretty gnarly there.
Annnyyywayyysss…we are going to have to go through customs in San
Diego…all 1,000+ people on this ship. Ugh. It is going to be a long
day!!! So the winners of the sea Olympics get off the ship first.
Good deal. Our sea came in 3rd. Yay, go Baltic!!



India—where to begin. India was an interesting experience to say the
least. I don't even know how to describe India to you. I need to
explain a few things first just to paint the picture for you before I
tell you what I did there.



Atmosphere
It was filthy and smelly just as I heard, but worse than I had ever
imagined. EVERY WHERE. I visited 3cities and they were all terrible.
It is so sad that people actually have to live in that filth.
Garbage is just thrown on the street. I looked for trash cans…I swear
they don't exist!! No lie...garbage all over the sidewalks and street.
Sometimes it is swept into a neat pile in middle of the sidewalk.
And there is just so much pollution in the air. I am not exaggerating
at all when I tell you this next part. It is kind of gross, but you
need to understand India. I would come inside and wipe off my face
with face wipes. I had no make-up on, yet my face was covered. My
wipes would seriously be black. I would just walk around the city and
my face would get dirty. Needless to say we all broke out in India!!
Now for the gross parts…ears and nose! We would clean out of ears
everyday and our q-tips would be sooo dirty. Inner and outer ear!!
And then we would blow our noses…just as bad!! The day after India I
blew my nose and it was the worst. Completely black. No joke. I
didn't know that could even happen. I had huge black boogers! Haha. I
don't even wanna know what my lungs look like after that. Yuck. Can
you imagine living there?? Our clothes were filthy and smelled so
bad. And it was so hot to add to it!
Poverty
EVERYONE WAS POOR. I thought maybe it would be like South Africa—rich
areas and poor areas. NO. And poverty was way worse in India than I
saw in South Africa. I could not believe the number of homeless I
saw. They would line the sidewalks at night. It was unreal. Yeah,
there were homeless people in South Africa, but not like I saw in
India. The homes I saw (from a distance) in India were worse than
what I saw in South Africa too. There were just rows and rows of
homeless on the sidewalks. Some people naked. It was just unreal.
All three cities I visited were just the same.



Beggars
Beggars were everywhere asking us for money as you could imagine with
the amount of poverty and homelessness. We were obviously targets.
Esp. since one of the vans I rode in had "tourist" written on the
side. We got mobbed. Now only would they come up to us while we were
walking, but in traffic also. They just knocked on our van windows!!
We did give children all the power-bars and crackers we had. We
actually had a lot of them since we were scared of India food (b/c of
the spice and diarrhea). So we fed many children with them. Couple
funny stories about people knocking on our windows. First of all, our
driver kept getting out of the van for some reason. Once, we were in
traffic and saw monkeys on leashes! So of course we started taking
pictures and the guy brings them over and we roll down the window and
they start doing tricks. We are taking videos and pictures and we
know he is going to want money. So after all the cool monkey tricks
he brings the money to the window and the monkey climbed part way in
(I got videos of it!!) and some people started touching it (big no-no
because they have rabies) and the guy asked us for 100 rupees each.
There were 9 of us so he wanted 900 rupees for doing monkey tricks.
LOL. The conversion rate was only like 45:1 but still that's like
$20! Haha we gave him a few rupees…like $1 worth. He kept begging for
more and wouldn't go away. We tried putting the window up in him
haha. We were nice at first then we just had to tell him to go away.
Finally, he asked us where we were from and my roomie said Canada He
just said oh ok ok and walked away. haha Canada!! It works every
time!! If you tell people you are from Canada they are more likely to
leave you alone. It worked every time!!!



Rickshaws
Rickshaws are the means of transportation in India. Little motorized
vehicles that carry 2-3 people in them (or 7 like the Indians like to
do…handing on the back, etc) They had tops on them but were
completely open on the sides. This is how we got everywhere. They
were loud and weaved in and out of traffic. Ohhhh the traffic in
India. There were no lanes and bikes, motorcycles, and rickshaws just
weaved in and out…went on the other side of the road or shoulder if
necessary. They use their horns every 5 seconds. It is sooo loud and
annoying. There are many different uses for the horn. They beep the
horn EVERYTIME they pass someone, which is so often. So its constant
horns. The horn means: "Hey, I am coming up on your side," "You are
going to slow, speed up or let me pass you," or they use when they are
mad at someone…kinda like we do!! It is insanely annoying. There is
so much traffic but it isn't stop and go it is GOOOOOO traffic.
Rickshaws are nuts!! Like steer with a bar not a wheel…they are just
nuts. Now motorcycles are used as cars in India…we saw up to 4people
on one motorcycle. Every where they had 2-4 people on them. The guy
would drive and the lady would sit sideways. Ladies would ride on the
back sitting sideways holding a baby in her arms. Or a couple would
have 2 children on with them. No helmets of course and in the
weirdest position.
Oh—did I mention the greatest part of the rickshaws…how they take you
every where you DON'T wanna go because they get commission. Yeah—you
will say I wanna go to the market or to the grocery store and they
will take you to some store you didn't wanna go to. Then they lie to
you and tell you things like "market is closed today—holy day!!" and
you just have to say things like "I am not getting out and if you
don't take me now I won't pay you." Usually, they will just leave and
take you to another place you don't want to go. I had about 8
rickshaw rides and with the exception of the ones to the airport and
back, every one took me somewhere I didn't want to go. One driver
even admitted to us he got free uniforms when we went there. He said
"Pllleeasee just two more!" All the shops they take you to are the
same and waste your time so you have to be firm with them.



Animals
There were random animals everywhere. Of course my favorites were the
cows that walk down the street. Yes, just walk down the street. They
walk in the road and everything. Cows are sacred there so they don't
eat them…they just let them roam. Let me just name some of the other
animals I saw. And when I saw I saw them I mean these are the animals
I saw just walking down the road or on the side of the road. Not in a
farm, not in a cage, but all of these I saw just running around like
we would have wild cats or dogs running around. So I saw dogs, cats,
cows, goats, pigs, chicken, camels (most had people riding on them),
monkeys (lots of them—ones that were trained and wild ones too),
donkeys and horses. All just roaming around like India is a huge
farm.



Toilets
My favorite!! India's toilets (or lack of)! Let me just give you a
little lesson on toilets! Some places did have regular toilets. Some
had European toilets. Most had Indian squatters. I wish I could show
you my pics of squatters…you will see my pics soon enough!! Squatters
are pretty much holes in the ground. When I heard this, I didn't
think I would actually have to go to the bathroom in a hole in the
ground…if I was even that lucky!! If they are nice squatters they are
porcelain holes in the ground. Some nice squatters even flush!! Some
squatters don't flush. Just imagine how hard it is to squat down that
low and aim…especially in the Indian clothes I had on!! My shirt was
to my knees and my pants were very baggy. I was trying to hold my
pants up so they wouldn't touch the nasty ground and also hold my
shirt up too. I had to do all of this while trying to keep my balance
and aim in the hole and not on my clothes. I am a pro-squatter now!!
Oh—and squatters don't have toilet paper!! If they are nice squatters,
they have a hose to wash off with. If not they just have a bucket of
water…like to just rinse your hand in! ew!! I went to the nastiest
squatter…I mean it was like a hole in the mud with a bucket of water
they clean with. Don't worry!! We carried toilet paper with us at all
times. Sometimes we even had to just go on the side of the road like
behind bushes or something. Oh, and by the way, they don't have
toilet paper because they either use the hose thing (I forget what it
is called) or their hand. Yeah, it is true. Anyways, as we would be
driving down the road we saw people just going to the bathroom in
middle of the sidewalks. Men just stop wherever they want to take a
pee…or more!! We saw guys just taking a crap where we could see them.
That's how dirty India was. And this leads me to one more thing…



Table Etiquette
They eat with their hands!! How fun!! And difficult. They also would
give us silverware in nice restaurants, but not everywhere I went!!
It is not easy to always use your hand…especially with rice. Oh—and
you can only use your RIGHT hand because the left hand is used for the
bathroom!!! How gross. Usually there is a bowl of food you share
with the entire table and your right hand is considered clean. But I
highly doubt their right hands are even clean. But they know for sure
that their left hand was used in the bathroom. Ew. I think I will
stick with silverware. But I have to admit it was definitely fun
being able to eat with my hands (after washing them with soap and
using hand sanitizer). Oh—and just like many other countries we
couldn't drink the water there or eat anything that was washed in
water. And no ice. No pork. And lots of other things!! This would
cause diarrhea. Too bad everyone got it anyways.



So Day 1—Chennai (Madras), India
-Whit and I woke up and ate on the ship then went out to buy some
Indian clothes!! We found a rickshaw that of course took us places we
did not want to go but we did each buy an outfit. Mine is SOOO cute!!
The tops are all long and I think I am going to get mine made into a
dress when I get home…its that cute. Next, we went to the grocery
store. We like to buy snacks for the ship, gum, any toiletries we are
out of, etc. So we told our driver grocery store, but he didn't
understand. We tried sooo hard. I mean we were trying everything we
could imagine to get him to understand. We said food store and he
took us to a restaurant. I tried saying things like cereal, fruit,
food shopping, soap…everything. Haha it was so funny. Finally, he
stops and talks to a lady in Indian. They she says "Where do you
wanna go??" and we tell her "grocery store." So she speaks to him in
their tongue and then the driver shouts of "SUPERMARKET!!!" and we are
shouting back "YYEAHH! SUPERMARKET!!" HAHA Maybe you had to be there
but we were trying so hard to explain grocery store to him and he just
couldn't get it…and we never once thought to say supermarket. DUH.
That night we went to the Welcome Reception at a local university. It
was nice. They put the dots on our foreheads as we walked in and
everything. They also gave us henna tattoos and we got to try Indian
foods. They also had an Indian dancer perform. Pretty cool!



Day 2: My friends and I met at 6:15 to leave for the airport. We
arrived in Delhi at 12:30 and went to our hotel to check in. The
hotel was a 3star hotel and it was pretty nice. The bathrooms were
interesting though. We had a toilet!!! We also had the hose next to
the toilet to clean ourselves. But they gave us toilet paper too!!
Now the showers were interesting. They were pretty much just a
showerhead on the wall in middle of our bathroom. The drain was on
the other side of the bathroom. There was a bucket with a little
bucket inside underneath the showerhead. Apparently this is because
many Indians like to shower by bucket?? Maybe they don't like to, but
have to. Anyways, I showered normal—kind of. If showering in middle
of your open bathroom is normal then yeah. But it wasn't bad!! Thank
god we had a shower!! Some places didn't. Our bathroom got entirely
soaked. It kind of sucked because then the bathroom floor was soaking
wet the rest of the night. But what does that matter? I was lucky to
have a shower! After check in, we went to an Indian restaurant and
shopping. Of course the rickshaw drivers took us everywhere we didn't
want to go and we fought with them, but we got there! There were 9 of
us—7 girls and 2 guys. We got to go to the street market at night.
It was a fun time. We went to McDonalds that night for some fries and
ice cream!! Haha! Gotta love having McDonalds and Pizza Hut in every
freakin country. I haven't decided if that's a good or bad thing.



Day 3: We woke up bright and early and headed to the Taj. We had a
3hr drive from Dehli to Agra ahead of us…in a 7 passenger van.
Yeah...we had to squeeze 9 of us in there! It was not comfy. 4
people across in a seat that was even tight for 3 people. We were all
on top of each other for hours. We left at 630am and it was hard to
sleep in these conditions. But I saw so many sites on the way.
Beautiful scenery and many many interesting sites on the way. This is
also when we got a flat tire in middle of the road and where the
monkey situation happened. It was an interesting ride that ended up
taking us about 5hrs. So, we saw the Taj Mahal!! Beautiful!! And we
had a guide that taught us all about it. Pretty much a king built it
for his 3rd wife and his true-love. She was dying and she told him
not to remarry and to build a memorial to remember their love and he
built the Taj!! We went in our Indian outfits and Indian people kept
taking pictures with and of us. We got to go inside the Taj and enjoy
it for awhile outside on the lawn and taking pictures, then shop a
little, see the Agra fort, then 3hrs back to Delhi for the night.



Day 4: We set out again in the tiny van and got to do some site
seeing. I wanted to see where Gandhi was creamated. The place is
called the rahjhat ?? Something like that. But it was closed. We
also got to see the red fort and lotus temple. Both pretty cool. The
Lotus Temple is where the Baha i faith worships. This is a faith that
brings all religions together. It was beautiful and once again so
intriguing. They believe in: abandonment of all prejudices, the
agreement of science and religion, promotion of universal education,
elimination of extremes of wealth and poverty, independent
investigation of truth, equality of men and women, oneness of
humanity, oneness of religion, and the oneness of God. I thought it
was pretty cool that anyone could worship there and there is actually
a faith that brings all religions together. Because like I said in my
South African blog…who is to say we are right and someone else is
wrong when it comes to religion, ya know?? Everyone should be able to
worship however they want and Baha i is all about freedoms. Wow, the
things I am learning!! Ok, so then we headed back to the airport and
back to Chennai!



Day 5: The last day in India I went to a disabled children's home.
First, I toured the home. They have all ages learning there. They
also have an Orthopedic Center and Rehab place and take outpatients.
So, the older students there (15-22) went to like vo-tech as we know
it, and the younger children were learning normal subjects like we do.
Many of the patients were physically disabled. Some mentally. Most
of their leg's were immobilized. Much of this was due to polio. It
is hard to believe so many children still have polio. We get a polio
vaccination when we are babies and never have to worry about it again,
ya know?? So anyways, I saw some older girls doing things such as
sewing. This is a good thing!! They learn how to sew and can make a
career out of it, and sell their products to raise money for the
school. Most live at the school, some go home. Another example are
the mentally disabled who live there. They make cups!! Like paper
Dixie cups and sell them. It was cute. They had like an assembly
line thing going and some had the job of like flicking the bottom at
the end to make sure they were OK before packaging. I saw other
students learning how to use computers. There were like middle school
aged children and they made us a cute little welcome power-point.
Then it was on to the rehabilitation part. They had things like a
little old trampoline for the kids to strengthen their legs.
Everything was so old and out of date. It made me sad and happy at
the same time. Sad that everything was so old. I have things in my
home that were better than what they were using to rehabilitate these
kids. But it made me happy that someone cares about them enough (150
of them) to try and enhance their lives. After the tour, we did
service projects. Some painted and others did garden work. I got
down and dirty baby! So dirty and sweaty. I had to rake leaves…tons
of leaves…with a broom. Not even an ordinary broom. I saw these
brooms used by ladies sweeping dirt on the streets. I also so ladies
using them in the yard. I thought they were funny looking and
useless. They were about 3ft long and pretty much branches all
bunches together. I saw them everywhere, but didn't think I would be
using them!! They were sooooo hard to rake with and my back was sore
after!! 3ft long means lots of bending over!! After, we ate
lunch…with our hands. Our plate was a leaf. That's what many Indians
use for plates. Giant leaves. Haha. Then we got to play with the
kids for a few hours. That was fun. They are so amazing the way they
get around. They are so independent. Many don't have wheelchairs and
have to crawl around. I also saw this on the streets. Grown men
crawling…it was weird/creepy at first. Its not even a crawl…its like
a monkey walk. Imagine grown men walking like monkies down the
street. I didn't really get it until I went to the home and realized
that it is from polio and other diseases. They just can't afford
wheelchairs or braces or anything!! Other children scooted around on
little skateboards and stuff. Very few had wheelchairs. They didn't
even have an elevator and these children would scoot on their butts up
the steps!! After, we got to take 12 children back to the ship with
us. What a challenge. Our ship is not handicap accessible!! The
gangway was on the 5th floor…about 50 STEEP steps. Some of the
children refused help and got up by themselves. Others we had to
carry. But we got them all on and took them around. They were SO
amazed. Hell, I was amazed by our ship so I can't even imagine how
they felt!! OK OK, so that was India in a nutshell!!!




So since India I have also gone to Malaysia…which I am not going to
update now although I don't have all that much to say about it. Since
then I have been busy with tests, winning singled-out: shipmate style
(a dating game haha), and stuff like that!! We are currently in a
pirate danger zone and have been for a little while, so out ship is
going pretty fast haha. We are actually the fastest ship in the
world!! That is no joke!! We can go up to 30knots!! I think we have
like a sister ship or somethign that can do the same but no passenger
ship can go over 30. Also, today is Easter!! I got up and went to the
sunrise service given by Archbishop Desmond TuTu! Cool, huh?? Then we
all threw carnations into the ocean. It was a good morning. Butttt
we still have classes today. Bummer. Tomorrow I will be in Vietnam!!
And I will be 21 in 3 days!! Yay!! Happy Easter!!