Today, it was pretty difficult to wake up so early for classes. It’s pretty strange to just have to jump right back into student-mode, rather than travel-mode. The good thing about the ship though, is that it is so casual. Wearing sweatpants or pajamas to class at 8 AM is totally acceptable. Ahh…it takes me back to my early days at Penn State!
Today was AWESOME because I felt NO seasickness whatsoever! I didn’t have to take any medicine so I actually felt like a normal person with lots of energy!
Right after lunch, there was a “man-overboard drill” (which I don’t feel is sensitive to “women” who might fall overboard! But whatever…I guess women are too smart to fall overboard?? Haha I don’t know!). It was cool, though. The captain made an announcement on the intercom that the drill was in fact a drill and then they sounded the alarm. As soon as that happened, the entire ship took a hard right turn – I was standing at the time and almost fell over (yes, despite the warning!). The entire drill took less than 20 minutes and I watched it from the seventh deck. They actually threw a dummy overboard and rescued it. After they threw it overboard, the crew first turned the ship all the way around and headed back to the site where the dummy was thrown over. From there, they lowered a rescue boat and then that boat gathered up the victim. As soon as they pulled the dummy on to the boat, spontaneous cheering broke out from all of the people on the deck who were watching the rescue. It was really funny.
In the afternoon, I helped Kathy (my professor) in her Race and Gender class. She was doing an exercise called Archy Bunker’s Neighborhood, which is a stimulation that highlights the differences in socioeconomic status. It was pretty interesting to see how the system is oppressive to some people (the poor) and beneficial to others (the wealthy). It was an interesting discussion and her students were really receptive and reflective about the experience.
In the evening, I went to a Real Talk session – which was a seminar on race and inclusive language. On the ship, I hear a lot of pretty shocking language from students who are unaware of their position and privilege. This session was a chance for students to express their concern over this type of inappropriate language. The coordinators had a great turn out – the classroom was packed and people were sitting all over the floor. It was a breath of fresh air to hear these students’ concerns and brainstorm ways to cope with language or phrases which alienate or offend people.
After Real Talk, I helped judge a contest called “The Quest.” It is a cruise game and is sort of a mix of a scavenger hunt and silly tasks. Three different “Seas” or resident area groups played against each other. For example, one task was to collect three different kinds of currency and the first team to get it together would win that round. There was also a human pyramid task as well – no one got seriously hurt, so that was good. Afterward, I was feeling too wound up to get any work done, so I watched Eclipse with some friends on the big screen in one of the classrooms. Greg got a bootleg copy on the street in Montenegro for like 3 euro (about 4 bucks). It was funny because the entire thing was dubbed with Croatian/Montenegran subtitles and there were definitely some fuzzy moments. : ) Oh dear…
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