Welcome to the MV Explorer

        I feel that I have not blogged lately, so I decided to write a little about what a day on the ship is like. The MV Explorer is a beautiful home. She is always shining and more importantly always welcoming us home after being away for several days.  On the ship there are 7 decks. The top deck, is one of my favorite, it is the pool deck. On beautiful days like today, we live out there in our swimsuits and try to soak up all those beautiful late-October rays. Today, we crossed back over the equator on our way to India and it is in the mid-80’s and gorgeous. While I love this very long extended summer, I am sort of missing fall football weather. There is no Friday night football, shorts and sweatshirt days, and crunching of leaves. On the bright side I am tanner than when I left the wonderful mid-west. So back to the ship, also on the 7th deck is the pool bar, a place for us to grab snacks outside of mealtime. More and more people are eating their meals up there, because one can only eat so much pasta and potatoes. Upstairs is also the gym. It is a small gym, but it will suffice. It is weird because you have to sign up for a time the day before, due to limited resources. Working out also poses it challenges, trying to run on a treadmill as the boat rocks, is a sight in its self. It has become much easier with time, but at the beginning there were a few instances where I feared my life.
        Down a flight of stairs on the 6th deck you will find one of the main dining halls. Here we are graced with pasta, potatoes, and PB&J for every meal. At first the food was very good, but now it has become rather monotonous. I have become a huge advocate for peanut butter banana and honey toast. In this dining hall we can eat outside and watch the sunrise and set. Also many students convene in here at night to play board games or cards.  As we venture down the hall you are surrounded by classrooms, there are 9 in total. I have really taking a liking to all of my classes. I could get used to taking only 12 hours per semester.  I have 2 classes a day, on A day I take disease and healing a class about Eastern medicine, parasites, and immunology. This class is very different than any other biology class I have ever taken, but very applicable to the places we are visiting. Also on A days I have an English class called World Short Stories. This is my favorite class, the professor is amazing and I love going to class everyday. We read a short story for class each day and pick a passage to discuss with the class, once in class he calls on someone and we begin the discussion that carries on for the entire period. It is so nice not to have a teacher lecture or write on the board, it is all discussion based. On the other days, B days, I take Global Studies, a class the entire ship takes. Here we cover issues in a global sense such as education, crime, and human rights. We also take time to look in depth at each country we will visit, to grasp a sense of where they stand globally. In the afternoon I attend a class entitled Service Leadership. This class was one that I was very excited for, but has ended up causing much confusion. We are required to all carry out a service project while in a port. This concept is a great one, but the teacher’s expectations are not very clear. The articles we read are so informative and I know that I will use them as references in the future. They discuss the skills needed to be an effective leader in the work place and various tactics to creating a strong working environment. Back to the ship, also on the 6th deck is the computer lab and library. Both of these places have many resources for students to use.  In the front of the ship, is the Union, the large meeting space. Here is where we have global studies, but also pre-ports and explorer seminars. These various meetings cover many different topics from service in the Peace Corps to Child Slavery in Ghana. There is one or two of these meetings a night. They are very informal, but also informative. I have gained a great deal of knowledge from my peers and teachers on this trip. One funny thing about the ship is you can never escape your teachers. You go to class with them, eat with them, run on the treadmill with them and even drink a beer with them. Overall, I have made relationships with my professors like I have never done before. It is almost like I consider them to be part of my family.
        Down below these 2 floors there is not much going on. On the 5th floor is the main dining hall. It is just a bigger version of the one upstairs. From the 5th floor down are where all the cabins are located. My room is located on the 2nd floor outside. I am fortunate enough to have a window. If you are not on the outside you have no sense of time in your room when the lights are off, it is literally a cave.  My roommates name is Karli, she is from outside of Chicago, but goes to school at DePaul in downtown Chicago. We get along great. We do not travel much together, but when we are on the ship we hang out quite a bit.  As far as friends go, I have made so many from all over the United States. I have become involved in so many aspects of the ship it has given me a great base for various groups of friends. I have not found one solid traveling group, I have traveled with different people in every country. I love it that way! On the ship though, I have a group that I hang out with most of the time. We all eat at the same time, work out together, lay out together and rarely are apart. One thing you don’t have on the ship is a lot of alone time. Wherever you go there are people. It is nice to always know a familiar face and have someone to talk to, but it is very difficult to find that “you time”.
        This blog could go on forever because there is so much to say about our little home. I am going to try and make this a more regular occurrence so you can see a glimpse of my daily life, cool things on the ship, and things that I miss while being on the ship. I will write soon. Love and miss you all!