Malaysia

After our experiences in India, I’m not quite sure anyone really knew what to expect from Malaysia. We had heard it was a land of beautiful white-sand beaches, amazing cuisine, pristine temples, and of course the Petronas Twin Towers – the largest twin towers in the world.

But the culture shock we had all experienced three days earlier was enough to turn any expectations we had right on their heads. Needing desperately to find another picture for my Cambodian visa after my China debacle, I got off the ship and headed to the nearest mall with Flynn to find a camera store. My god it was one of the largest, most beautiful malls I had ever seen. It was eight floors high, with every single type of electronics store known to mankind. They also had a complete food court – McDonalds, Famous Amos – the whole deal. After getting my passport pictures taken, and getting lost numerous times, we grabbed Brad from a nearby bookstore and headed out to grab some Malay cuisine, the specialty of Penang state. Our taxi driver took us to a tiny local restaurant where there was not another tourist for miles. Confused about the whole process initially, we hand-signaled our way to getting a meal of rice, chicken and vegetables, which we soon realized we were meant to eat without silverware. Interesting. Malaysia is a country of diverse religious and cultural background, with a population comprised mostly of Muslims, but with large Buddhist and Hindu contingents as well. Many of the people are of Chinese and Indian descent; so naturally, Malay food has quite the interesting mix of everything. But it was really delicious, just like we had been told it would be. After lunch we grabbed a cab to Kek Lok Si Temple, a Buddhist temple that sits high up on Penang Hill, and one of the most famous religious sites in Penang.

The name, meaning “Temple of Supreme Bliss”, is really fitting since the temple sits high above Penang’s capital city of Georgetown nestled between blue sky and lush forests. It’s pretty hard to miss considering the lavish and bright red, gold, blue, and green external decoration. Inside the temple the walls were lined floor to ceiling with thousands of miniature golden Buddhas, and the smell of incense filled the air. There were large alters with candles, flowers, and giant golden Buddha statues, complete with even more ornate carving and gilding. Purty.

On the way from the Temple of Supreme Bliss to the Temple of the Thousand Faces of Buddha we ran into some Chinese women, who decided that I would be a really good prop for their pictures. Without asking, they grabbed me and threw me into the pictures while Brad and Laura Flynn just stood there and laughed – typical. This always happens to me! On the way down from the lighthouse at Cape Point some random room accosted me, took my sunglasses off my face and kept yelling “Jamie!” until she realized after about ten minutes that no, I actually was not Jamie. My awkward laugh got me through both interesting experiences, not to worry.

So in this next temple we find that Buddha has multiple personality disorder. There is literally a Buddha for every single mood. Happy Buddha, sad Buddha, angry Buddha, hungry Buddha, hungry-for-revenge Buddha; he’s moody. So the temples were all well and good and beautiful and I got to put my Asian art knowledge to use – score.

We left to ride back to Georgetown and catch the tender to the boat to change and get ready before dinner.
Oh yeah, tendering. I forgot to explain the most annoying and frustrating experience of boat life. Apparently in some ports, like Penang, our little floating campus is too big to actually pull up to the dock, and when we saw the actual wooden planks Malaysia calls “docks” we understood why. Anyway, we have to sit out in the harbor and use our lifeboats to shuttle people back and forth to shore. The ride across the water takes only about fifteen minutes, and so you ask why is that so annoying? The process, my dears, is not fun. You have to arrive at the gangway 15 minutes before the tender leaves, and they leave from the boat on the hour and from the shore on the half-hour, so if you miss one and you need to be somewhere at a certain time, you’re in a little bit of bind.

Then you wait for the tender, wait for everyone to unload, load everyone on, sit in the hot boat until it gets cleared, then cross, and unload, etc. We did learn that our lifeboats do work nicely though, in case of emergency, which I suppose is a good thing. Anywho the tenders don’t run all day every day, and coming back from shore they stop at 1:00am…so if you miss that one, you sleep at the marina. Not so fun. Luckily I have responsible friends who get me places on time; my perpetual late tendency doesn’t work out so well.
Okay so that’s tendering in case anyone asks. We got back to the boat, showered, changed, and got ready to go out for a girls’ night since I wasn’t going to be with any of my girl friends for the next five days – I’ll explain. So apparently every Wednesday everywhere in Malaysia is ladies’ night. That is neat. I’m quite sure that Semester at Sea took over Georgetown’s central bar area as people held dance competitions on stage for free prizes, us included. That was fun.
The next morning I woke up to enjoy the fabulous life of tendering over to my 8:30am FDP – Prime Commodities of Malaysia. The plan was to visit a palm oil factory, rice paddy museum, and rubber tree plantation, and be back by 3pm. Perfect really, because my bus for Kuala Lumpur left at 4:30pm. Since I was traveling with my 3 best guy friends, Brad, Josh, and Jesse, and they seem to think that I’m responsible, I was put in charge of holding on to the bus tickets (this part of the story comes into play later). So first we’re off to visit the palm oil plantation, the commodity that is Malaysia’s largest export.

Along with Indonesia, the two countries produce 90% of the world’s palm oil. Which is a lot. Oh, and if you like eating palm oil, I would stop. It’s 51% saturated fat, and perhaps one of the worst oils you could eat! Good thing the US soybean lobbyists prevent mass import of palm oil to protect the soybean industry, or we’d all be super fat. So palm oil smells foul and has no taste whatsoever, but its greatly redeeming quality is that it can be used for biodiesel, and so people are hoping that it will be able to help with our energy crisis…I guess we shall see.

So we left the palm oil factory, drove 2 hours to get lunch at hawker stalls, then another half hour to a rice paddy museum. Yes, you can reread that to make sure I said what I meant – a museum about rice paddies. Doesn’t it sound thrilling?
Well I was all super excited about the rice when I found out that our FDP wasn’t going to get back until 6pm. That was not okay. So our guide had to arrange for me to take a cab back from Kedah, two hours away from Georgetown, by myself, in order to make my bus. So he calls a cab, the guy speaks not a single word of English, he puts me inside, assures me that he has told him the right place to go, and sends me on my way.

In retrospect, probably not a great idea. So we’re riding along and the guys pulls up to the ferry port and points to the ferry to Langkawi, a island about 2 hours north of Penang. I frantically try to tell him that I need to go to Penang, to Georgetown, to the pier, but he does not understand. I commence freak out stage. I finally say Georgetown enough times that he says he understands, so I get back in the cab, at this point around 2:30pm, still thinking that I had enough time to meet my friends on the pier at 3:45pm. He assures me it will only take an hour – I think “one hour” and “thank you” were about the only English phrases he knew, and clearly my Malay wasn’t too hot either. So we get back in the cab and he is moving a snails pace, I try to tell him to go faster, he doesn’t understand. I try every hand motion I possibly can, sign language, anything I can think of, it’s not working. 4:00pm rolls around and I am still 15 minutes away from pier, our bus leaves at 4:30pm, I have all the tickets, the driver won’t go faster, I am hysterically sobbing in the back because I think my friends will have left for Kuala Lumpur without me, I’m by myself with no cell phone, all in all not a great situation. Finally I make him stop, sprint from the cab to the pier where people sitting under the tent tell me the boys have already left. The tears pour a little bit harder, but some nice girl tells me they went to the bus station and to meet them there. I careened out of the tent yelling frantically for a cab, luckily a driver who speaks English speeds his butt off to get me to the station. I get there, tears coming down my face, and race over to the bus were Brad and Jesse are waiting there with a new addition to our trip, Amanda. You know when you’re sick or something goes wrong and you pick up the phone to talk to your mom and you cry even harder? Well this was sort of like that. Just seeing them standing there with bewildered expressions on their faces (I looked like a hot mess that’s for sure), and Brad coming over to give me a hug, made me cry a little bit harder. I knew that some point along this journey I would run into some problems somewhere, needless to say I thought my lost credit card and messed up Chinese visa would be the big issues, so I guess it’s all well and good that I had 7 minor heart attacks in a cab in Malaysia.
So after I calm down, we meet up with Josh and Jeff, who added on to our trip at the last minute as well. We hop into our “Super VIP” ($6 a ticket) bus, and settle in for our fun five-hour bus ride.

Jeff and I had some epic games of hangman, let me just tell you that.
We get into Kuala Lumpur, grab our packs from beneath the bus, and start to look for something to eat, and then somewhere to stay. After a VERY spicy meal (Frank you would have enjoyed it), we started traipsing around town looking for a hostel or hotel with open rooms. We end up at the Swiss Garden Hotel, where we get a 6-person room for $25 a night. Nice. I take my usual 20 minutes to get ready, finishing before the boys, a new claim to fame I have perfected on Semester at Sea for those of you doubting that ability, and we headed out to explore KL’s nightlife.

The next morning we got up early to go to the needle, a fairly new addition to Kuala Lumpur’s skyline. We rode up the 270 meters to the 360 degree viewing veranda and got to see over all of beautiful Kuala Lumpur. And yes, the towers as well (they were even more awesome at night! The needle lights up like the Eiffel Tower, too. It’s pretty sweet).

We left the needle to make a quick stop at the actual Petronas Towers before we had to board our bus to Tanah Rata, in the Cameron Highlands. The towers are HUGE and awesome, and my friend Jesse, who is an architecture freak and civil engineer, was just in his element the entire time, which was fun to watch. I’ve never seen someone get so excited about buildings before in my life.
So after a quick stop there, we grabbed out bags, checked out of the hotel, and made our way to the Cameron Highlands, about a 5-hour drive from KL. That actually happened to be a fun bus ride with a little more competitive hangman, and a very competitive game of euchre. It’s a four-person card game that Josh, my friend who grew up in Indiana, and Brad, from Kansas City, say is a must-learn Midwestern tradition…five hours later we landed in the highlands, a breezy 15 degrees cooler than sweltering KL and Georgetown. So refreshing! We made our way to our hostel, Daniel’s Lodge, which ended up being a very interesting and fun experience within itself. 6 of us shared a 4-bed sardine can of a room, less than ½ the size of our ship cabins, and those are small.

We asked Box, the elderly Malaysian man who ran the lodge, where a good place to get Chinese food would be, and he took us to his favorite restaurant, the Mayflower (interesting), ordered us a Steamboat, and essentially commenced what would be the death of me for the next 3 days. A steamboat is made up of a huge pan with a divider – one side filled with spicy broth, the other with chicken broth. Then they brought out raw jellyfish, squid, chicken, beef, crab, egg noodles, rice noodles, oysters, eggs, and a couple other things I probably blocked out. It’s kind of like a Melting Pot type deal where you throw things in, let them cook, and then eat them…but then again you are eating jellyfish (bad consistency if you’re wondering). Since we really had no idea what we were doing, made clear by the fact that three of the boys thought it would be a good idea to eat chili peppers (it was not), it took us about 2 hours to eat dinner.

We then went in a mad search for ice cream to cool off the boys tongues before heading back to inviting bungalow bar and bonfire at Daniel’s Lodge.

Hostels are super fun because not only are they a unique experience (toilets = holes in the ground with a hose to wipe in Malaysia; showers = spickett over said toilet; all are communal), you get to meet so many cool people from all over the world. We met some American kids from Loyola who had been studying abroad in Bangkok, lots of Australians, and some British as well.
The next morning, after having spent the night crammed into a tiny twin bed with Brad (that was not comfy), I awoke feeling very sick to my stomach – a feeling that lasted until today. That was unfortunate considering what goes in, must come out, in either direction, and like I said, the toilets were holes in the ground. Fun. Not to mention, Malaysia, and apparently Southeast Asia in general, don’t believe in toilet paper, so I was glad that when we ventured out on our jungle trek at 8am the next morning, Jesse thought to pack some for me, lest I should need it in the woods. By the time we reached the jungle I actually felt a lot better, and was super excited for what we were about to do. We were starting our three-hour trek into the highland jungle to see the world’s largest flower, and swim in some waterfalls – no way was I letting myself be sick for that.

So we started out in these badass old school hummers, off-roaded for a bit, walked up some steep mud slides the hummer could handle with all of us inside, and finally arrived at the start of the trail. We crossed bamboo bridges, ducked under and hopped over giant fallen trees, fell in the mud, sweated a lot, but overall, I really enjoyed be out and active in nature.

(Side note: this picture is me drinking out of a bamboo cup that our guides made for us. The stalks are divided into sections with fresh rain water trapped inside and the cut down some of them so we could drink!) It was so calm and beautiful, with just the seemingly far-off sounds of rushing water behind you. When we got to the flower, I must admit I was a little disappointed – it was ugly. And I mean UG-LY. And since I know you all are dying to see what it looks like, and since the picture of me with the flower was even uglier than the flower itself, here’s one of Josh and the world’s ugliest, biggest flower (If you can’t tell from the picture it’s a burnt-orange-esque color with lots of weird tumor type things on it).

After trekking a little bit more we arrived at a beautiful, serene waterfall with built-in caves (almost the near-death of Jesse, but that’s another story). We got to swim and relax for a while in the cool water, a nice refreshing contrast to the sweaty heat of the hike. The boys found some caves, decided it would be a good idea to army-crawl up them, and wiggled their way onto the top of the waterfall.

Josh and Jeff jumped off into the rocky/water abyss below, miraculously surviving, but Brad and Jesse decided it would probably be a better idea to go back down through the cave. Ha. So Brad comes down, and all is fine, but when Jesse goes, he by accident knocks a small rock out of place, that in turn causes a giant boulder to fall on top of him, inside a tiny cave. Luckily he had the quick idea to try to go underneath the boulder and swim out before he got totally crushed. Since he didn’t come out for a while the boys got a little nervous, calling his name, but there was no response. Finally he emerged, scraped down his whole back, arms bleeding, but okay. I don’t think his heart stopped palpitating for a couple hours afterwards. Scary.
After Jesse’s near-death experience we hiked back down the mountain, got back into the hummers, and went to visit a nearby aborigine village. The village visit was really interesting, and we learned all about how the government and local NGO’s help provide them with education, healthcare, and housing. The coolest part though, was that we got to use the chief of the village’s blowgun to try to hit a faraway target (I did)! I lobby that we replace darts with blowguns, much more fun. We left the village, and stopped for lunch before visiting BOH tea plantation (short for best of the highlands). And it was beautiful!

Honestly the view of sprawling hills and valleys covered with lush fields of bright green tea leaves splashed here and there with the occasional house was just breath taking. The dark green hills reached up to the deep blue sky, and were settled over with a light blanket of fog; it looked surreal. We took a tour of the factory and got to see the entire process from tea leaves being picked right up until packaging. We went onto the veranda, and sat looking out over the hills while sipping mugs of hot, freshly brewed tea.

Then our guide Spencer took us all down to the fields themselves, talked a little bit about the plantation and the tea-producing industry in the Cameron Highlands, and let us wander around and explore for a bit before heading off once again. This time we drove to a butterfly farm some ways off the main road. It wasn’t really just a butterfly farm though. I got to see some GIANT bugs – giant leaf bugs, giant grasshoppers, giant rhinoceros beetles – weird stuff. I got to hold a gecko, a scorpion, a turtle, and some butterflies.

But that kind of stuff, especially the scorpion, gives me the heebie jeebies so I was itching to get out of there fast! We made our last stop of the day at a strawberry farm outside town at sunset. Unfortunately we couldn’t pick strawberries that late, but they had homemade strawberry ice cream we got to eat while watching the sunset, and it was really good! Being on Semester at Sea really has made me appreciate sunrise and sunset more and more. I have never been surrounded by such beautiful scenery all the time.

It truly is amazing, and I find myself thinking every day how lucky I am that I get to be living this on a day-to-day basis.
After an extremely long and full day of hiking, swimming, eating and sightseeing, we headed back to the lodge, grabbed dinner, enjoyed the bonfire for a little bit, and then went to bed. The next morning we woke up early for our drive back to Georgetown, and we prepared to leave Malaysia. It truly was a beautiful country with tons to offer. I enjoyed all the people, the places, the food (except the steamboat, which was the death of me), and the amazing scenery.
So we pull into Ho Chi Minh city tomorrow…how cool is that I can wake up and actually say “Gooooooooood morning Vietnam!”

Yeah, I’m that big of a dork.

India

After decompressing for a couple days post-India, I am still at a loss of what to write. I don’t really know if there is any way that I can convey what I am feeling, thinking, and processing right now. I don’t know if there’s a way I can communicate the devastation, poverty, oppression, and disease that I saw almost all day, every day. Before I arrived, I was told that if you come to India, you leave either loving it or hating it. On the ship right now there are a lot of mixed emotions about that. And I can tell you that after the first day of being in India I thought I would hate it. I can’t explain the transformation I have gone through. I now know that not only will make it a point to come back to India sometime in my life, but that I feel some sort of weird obligation to do so. There is so much sadness there, but all the people, especially the children, seem so happy. Happy to be living, learning, and most of all, happy to be able to interact with Americans. This trip was one of the most rewarding that I have had on Semester at Sea and as corny as it sounds I really do feel changed. Hopefully detailing my experience there will help to understand that.
The first day we arrived in Chennai, Laura Flynn, Brad, Josh, Dan and I rode into town to grab some lunch and do some quick shopping before we all headed in our separate directions. It’s funny how in these countries you can go to the ATM, pull out a hundred bucks, and actually have thousands in local currency. I get overwhelmed sometimes! Anyway, back on track. Everything in this country is so cheap. I swear I am going to be the best Santa that ever lived when I get home. The boys left the shop with some interesting outfits – they all bought tunics and Indian pants to go along with them. However, they weren’t the only ones, and when I got back to the ship to depart for my 4 day trip to the Taj Mahal and Varanasi, many of my other guy friends had the full ensemble – turbans of some sort, tunics, pashminas, pants, and Indian shoes. They wore them everywhere! One of my friends Chris even said that while we were laughing at him, he noticed a lot of “Indian chicks checking him out”…nice. Anyway, we went to lunch and I had my new favorite food – naan. I’m sure it’s common in the states, but I had never had it before coming to India and it is up there with my top five foods. I mean, up there with sushi and cheese, and that’s pretty high. Naan is this amazingly wonderful buttered flatbread that is warm and delicious and if you haven’t tried it, do so immediately. I think it’s what sustained me this whole trip. That, and my constant diet of Pepto Bismal, because everyone was insanely worried about getting traveler’s diarrhea from the food. Contrary to what most people think, not all Indian food is curry. Surprising, huh? There’s actually lots of good chicken dishes, lamb, potatoes, rice, etc. Yumminess.
So after our amazing lunch we raced back to the boat because I was late, per usual, for my trip departure. I made it, thank God, and I was off on what were some of the most interesting, exhausting, exhilarating days of my life. The first night we flew from Chennai to Delhi, checked into our hotel late and hopped into bed because our 4:30am wake up did not sound too appealing. The next morning Christine, my roommate, and I were of course the last people on the bus because I woke up at 4:45am, exactly when we were supposed to be on the bus, awesome. We drove to the train station to get on the train that would take us to Agra for the day.

On the way I saw probably hundreds of people sleeping the filthy streets, with either little or no blankets to cover them. Not that being cold was a problem – India was HOT – but still. There were infants, pregnant mothers, deformed children, and the elderly all lying somewhere along the road trying to shield themselves from the lights and awful stench of cow manure and pee that haunted the streets. I swear I have never seen a dirtier country in my life. In the train station I was continually plagued with sights of children and no limbs, extremely malnourished, or with some awful disease like elephantiasis.
They would pull on our clothes pleading for something to eat, not even money, just food. They were grateful even to have water. Finally the train came and I passed out for the two-hour ride to Agra.
Once we arrived, we got on a bus and drove another hour or so to Fatehpur Sikri, the abandoned city built by Emperor Akbar, the third Moghul emperor of India. The entire palace complex, which served as the capital of India for twelve years, was made out of red sandstone, and was gigantic!

There were beautiful gardens, pools, fountains, multi-level housing complexes, and many open courtyards where the emperor, his three wives and his hundreds of concubines used to live. Emperor Akbar built the city in honor of a Muslim saint who had prophesized that after years and years of only having girls, that he would finally have a son. When that came true, he built the palace in this saint’s honor.

After being accosted by hawkers and frustratingly annoying salespeople, one of whom decided that he liked my ring and demanded that I give it to him, we got back into the bus and headed out for lunch and then to Agra Fort.

It was here that I had my first view of the fabled Taj Mahal. The fort was built earlier than the Taj, but by the same emperor, in order to protect the Moghul kingdom from invasion. This emperor, Emperor Shah Jahan, after the death of his wife Mumtaz Mahal, for whom the Taj Mahal was built, was overthrown by his own son, imprisoned in the fort, and died after 8 years of captivity there. Sadly his plans for an even more glorious black Taj Mahal across the river from the one he did build were thwarted because of his son. Frustrating. A black one would have been so cool. After waiting the entire day to see the Taj, we left the fort and geared up the see the monument we had all been waiting for.
How do I describe this? I looked like I walked into a postcard. Or better yet – one of those awesome pictures you see in National Geographic or on Google image search. It honestly did not look real.

After tons and tons and tons of pictures, we walked down the long reflecting pool, getting closer to the marble wonder. Again, contrary to belief, the Taj is not a temple, but rather a mausoleum for Mumtaz, Shah Jahan’s wife. He created this perfectly symmetrical, marble building as a testament to the permanence of their love, and after hundreds of years it’s still standing, so it looks like she was one awesome wife. Luckily the sun was going down as we were on our visit, and we got to see the building with the sunset as a backdrop, it truly was amazing. When you get up to the upper level of the Taj you have to either remove your shoes (seemed to me to be a common theme in India – no one wears shoes! It’s the most bizarre thing), or put on some super-sweet booties. Needless to say, I opted for the booties. Brad and I snaked through the long line to enter, and finally got to see the marble-encased caskets of the Emperor and his beloved inside.

The marble detailing was so incredible and intricate that I have no doubt the decades it took to construct this building were spent hard at work. After lots more pictures and awe-struck facial expressions, we boarded the buses again to get dinner and get back on the train for trip back to Delhi.

The day was exhausting and everywhere I went I was being hawked by vendors and beggars right and left. There were dirty, deathly skinny animals at every turn (another weird thing about India – the cows are sacred, and everywhere, even in the middle of the road, but they do not look to be treated so nicely. Not so fat these heifers), tons of trash lining the streets, people relieving themselves out in the open, and malnourished children tugging at my sleeve, and my heartstrings, hoping to survive another day off my discarded food. At that point, I really didn’t know what to think at all.
We got to sleep in the next morning…till 5:30am. Awesome. For those of you who know my morning patterns, let’s just put it this way, I am not a morning person. But after this trip I have no doubt that I will be able to fall asleep anywhere, at any time, in any position, and be perfectly content. I’m quite certain I got 12 hours of sleep for 5 whole days. So we got up early, drove to the airport and caught a flight to Varanasi, the holy city of the Hindus. On the way from the airport to the actual city, we stopped at Sarnath, the site where Buddha preached his first sermon after achieving enlightenment.
This ancient city, now in ruins except for the giant stupa (which supposedly hold’s some of the Buddha’s possessions), is as holy to Buddhists as Varanasi is to the Hindus. Along with the Buddha’s birthplace and death place, Sarnath is one of the three places that Buddhists make pilgrimages to during their lifetime.

We left Sarnath, boarded what I felt was my new home, our bus, and drove a while to Varanasi. After settling into the hotel we left for our nighttime activity: seeing the holy rituals performed on the banks of the Ganges River. For Hindus, Mother Ganga is worshipped as a goddess who has to power to cleanse a person of their sins and hopefully relieve the dead from the cycle of rebirth so central to the Hindu faith. Every evening at dusk hundreds of people gather on the banks of the river to partake in an hour-long ritual ceremony complete with Brahmin priests waving around incense, beating drums, and lighting things on fire. It was an awesome thing to watch. It was just like going to church for them.
To and from the river we went two-by-two, very Noah’s Ark style, in rickshaws pulled by tiny Indian men. Our rickshaw driver, Michael (no joke), explained to us how he had two wives, and that he only had to pay 100 rupees for each of them – that amounts to 2 dollars a wife. Absurd isn’t it? A member of the lowest Indian caste, Michael was a sudra, those whose traditional duty it is to serve the other three castes. He was extremely poor, very thin, and could not afford a home for his wives and three children so he had to live with his parents and his brother and his brother’s family as well. He explained that he already had three children, all girls, but that he was going to wait until he had at least a few boys to stop having children.

For poor Indians large families are their source of income, of security. Children mean revenue – for the farmers, they can help with daily chores, or can become laborers for other farmers and earn money, for the urban poor children mean more people to beg, or to work menial jobs for some source of income. It is also common that children in some families will die because of malnutrition, so families compensate by having more. This is why India is so overpopulated, or so I learned in my Globalization and Development class. People aren’t poor because they have large families; they have large families because they’re poor. Interesting, I think. Our guide throughout the trip, Harsh Sawhney, attempted to explain to me why family planning doesn’t work in India. It’s because a) people aren’t educated about birth control and how it works, so they either refuse to use it, or use it improperly, thus it fails to work, and they spread amongst other women that it doesn’t work; b) women’s husbands refuse to allow it; c) culturally boys are worth more, so couples will have kids until they have multiple boys; d) most women don’t even have access to birth control in the first place; e) it is frowned upon in rural communities because large families are the way of life, the key to survival. All in all, India’s population, which is mostly extremely poor, living on less than one dollar a day, will continue to grow because more children seem to by the key to survival. Okay sorry for the educational side-note, I just think it’s so interesting because the West has common misconceptions about why things are the way they are in India, and I like to find out the truth. Anyway, back to the rickshaw ride. It was so awesome. Everything in India is so colorful! Right down to the saris worn by women and young girls as they walk down the street. It was awesome to pass through a huge outdoor Indian street market at night, see women buying fabrics for their saris, see men bartering for fruits and vegetables, and pass by the not-so-occasional cow sitting in the middle of a busy road.

As we were riding back, my friend Nea, who was with me in the rickshaw, turns to me and goes, “Oh my god, we just got hit by a car!” It was so slight that I hadn’t noticed, but she was definitely right; our rickshaw had gotten tapped by a silver Mercedes. What ensued happened in mere seconds that I can’t really recall all the details, but I just remember a staredown between our driver and the driver of the car, the car pulling off the side of the road, the driver getting out, coming over to our rickshaw and punching our rickshaw driver in the face and knocking him onto the ground! I was petrified because the huge, angry Indian man looked like the rickshaw driver wouldn’t be the only one getting hit, but luckily our driver hopped back onto the bike and pedaled away as fast as he could. I later asked our driver if this kind of street violence was rare, and he said sadly no, people from upper castes treat people from lower castes with absolutely no respect, with no regard for the laws. Poor Michael.
Early the next morning, 4:30am early, we got back on the bus to go down to the Ganges for another ceremony. At dawn, all the local Hindus come down to the river to bathe because they believe that the river has the power to cleanse a person of their sins. The water, perhaps the most disgusting water I have ever seen, is a filthy brown color with all types of gross things mixed in.
3 sewage plants from Varanasi pump into the river, all the trash from the banks is swept into the river, and not to mention – there are dead animal and human bodies in there too (I’ll get back to that later). So, it’s nasty and these people submerge themselves in it, wash their whole bodies with it, and drink it. Foul. So anyway, we get to the river before sunrise, board large river canoes and row out into the river to watch the ritual from the water, and see the beautiful sunrise. Actually, perhaps the most beautiful sunrise I have ever seen.
We also each bought a small flower candle to light, make a wish with, and set afloat in the river. It was really cool to see a sea of floating flowers going down the banks of the river.

So back to the dead bodies thing. Varanasi is one of the holiest cities to Hindus, and those who are lucky enough, go there to die. They are cremated on giant funeral pyres, and their ashes are spread into the river in hopes that the river will relieve them from the cycle of rebirth. However, only those people with sons are allowed to be cremated because it requires a son to perform the last rites. Therefore, pregnant women, infants, children, or anyone without a son who wants to free themselves from the karmic cycle is simply dumped into the river. This was perhaps one of the most disturbing parts of the trip for me because as we approached the bank to get off the boat, the body of a toddler boy, probably no more than 3, floated dangerously close to our boat.

I had so many physical and emotional reactions to that scene that it’s hard to describe. Even now when I think about it, I gag. Everyone was pretty shaken up afterwards, and the winding walk through markets and small alleyways was spent in a pretty solemn silence. We boarded the buses to start our long day home of two flights, multiple bus rides, long lines, and finally sleep. Back in Delhi, before boarding our flight to Varanasi, we took a small city tour, seeing all the embassies, the Presidential Palace, the Parliament, and then a Sikh temple. This was one of my favorite parts of the whole trip. Before entering the temple we had to enter a small room where we removed our shoes – not something I was exactly thrilled about in India. As we entered the beautiful gold-domed building, the sound of chants and drumming grew louder. As we approached the alter, men and women were prostrating themselves to the Holy Scriptures (the basis of their religion, there is no god). Sikh temples are open daily from 5:00am to 10:00pm because the full book of scriptures must be read from beginning to end every day, and that is how long it takes to do so. We visited the temple around sundown, which was gorgeous.

Outside the temple was a large reflecting pool with white-stone buildings around it. Men and women, all with their heads covered (I had to cover mine, too), we walking around, washing themselves in the pool, and blessing themselves with the holy water.

Afterward, we left the temple, boarded the buses, and started the long journey back to the ship.
We arrived at the ship around 2am, so I was not thrilled when my alarm sounded at 6am the next morning…FDP time. I put on my conservative clothing (pants) and prepared to walk out into the smelly sauna that is India. We arrived at the Sri Sayee Vivekananda Vidyalaya School, a secondary school that serves the poor communities of Chennai, is built entirely upon donations, and provides very cheap, but well-rounded educations to children who otherwise would not have the opportunity to learn. The second we stepped inside and a little girl in a pink dress handed me a rose, my smile did not disappear once from my face. It was by far the best experience I had in India. These little kids were so cute and funny, interested and curious, wanting to learn about America, taking pictures with us, giving us gifts. I have never been so overwhelmed with unprompted kindness and generosity, especially from those that come from so little. The school itself could have used some work, but since it runs totally on donations, sacrifices must be made. Overall there are 690 students, ranging in age from 3 to 18. My interesting experience started with the lower kindergarten classroom, mostly three-year-olds, who did not speak at all, let alone a word of English. Getting them to understand why we were there and what we trying to do with our mounds of play dough and hundreds of crayons was interesting, but as we moved up in age amongst the classrooms, the students understood more and our efforts were fully validated. My friend Kelly and I taught the students the Hokey Pokey, the US national anthem, the Macarena, head, shoulders, knees, and toes, and essentially anything from our childhoods we could remember. The Hokey Pokey was a HUGE hit! They in turn shared some of what they knew with us – karate, gymnastics, nursery rhymes in Hindi, songs, etc. Every time a little 5-year-old Hindi girl sang the Itsy Bitsy Spider to me in broken English, my grin just widened. It’s hard to explain how this experience changed my whole view about India, but it did. It was so eye opening in so many ways, and it made me think about all we have to be thankful for as Americans, and what we can do to help other peoples around the world. So, that being said, I am canvassing for donations for the school, really of any kind. If you decide that you want to donate, and any amount is greatly appreciated, please write me an email and I will give you more information about the school, the children, how to donate, etc. If you would like to send school supplies I will give information on how to do that as well. It really is a wonderful program and every little bit, every small donation helps to send another child to school, to give another child a future.So all in all I wouldn’t really say India was fun, I’d say it was a great cultural experience. Going into it I sort of assumed it would be like that, but I was unprepared for how I would be changed in the end. So this was kind of a sappy one, but I guess it had to come from India…now onto Malaysia tomorrow! Temples, and beaches, and jungle…can’t wait!

South Africa

So, Cape Town. Whoa. Long story short – it was awesome! I had been looking forward to going there since I heard it was on the itinerary because Amy had spent 6 months at University of Stellanbosch, only 45 minutes away. I decided to most everything independently with a small group of boys and girls since Amy had given me a list a year long of stuff to do there. No safari for me, but I had an action-packed, culturally rich experience, that’s for sure. So let’s see, where do I start? We got into Cape Town last Friday morning, all of which I spent at the Chinese consulate in Cape Town getting a new visa for China since mine had the wrong dates on it…typical. The consulate was by far the weirdest place I went in Cape Town. It was in this residential area, but it was literally a shack made of plywood, with no walls and serious mushroom problems growing up from the floor haha…nasty! Anyway, after leaving my passport in the hands of some random, questionable consulate, I made my way back to the boat to meet up with our group hiking Table Mountain. And let me just tell you, when I say hike, I mean HIKE. That was by far one of the harder physical activities I’ve done on this trip. As we approached the mountain, me in my very minimal hiking gear, our taxi driver asked us if we were taking the funicular up the mountain or if we were hiking. When we said hiking, he laughed in our faces – awesome. So we started the two and a half hour ascent, with me surprisingly in the lead. Don’t worry I didn’t stay there the whole time…I was hiking with Brad and Jesse, two boys who go to school in Boulder, they quickly took over. Super intense does not begin to describe this “little hike” I had gotten myself into.

It was pretty much straight up into some craggy mountains, but boy was it beautiful! Next to Cape Point, Table Mountain is one of the most beautiful places I’ve been. But more of that later. So we’re hiking up this deep crevasse and water, apparently from melting snow, as I was told, is coming down all over the place.

But not to worry, after only one hour of what was meant to be a two and a half hour hike, we made it to the top! AND IT WAS AWESOME!

View of all of Cape Town, we could even see our ship from there. But it was freezing and I was sweaty – not a good combination!

So I took donations for extra clothes as the six of us spent one and a half hours up on the top of the mountain with a couple bottles of great South African wine.
As the sun went in, we decided to take the funicular on the way back down the mountain and headed back to the ship. We changed super quick, and Brad, Jesse, Josh and I headed out to Long Street to grab dinner. Long Street is a “hoot” as some would say, super hippie and awesome, I loved it! Lots of cool shops, little hotels, backpackers, restaurants, and bars.
The next day we got up, walked around the Waterfront a little bit, which was two minutes from where our ship was docked. We had such a great location! The Waterfront was really nice – much better than Walvis Bay or Salvador, which both reeked! After putzing around for a while, we made our way 45 minutes out of Cape Town to Skydive Cape Town, and I prepared myself to jump out of a plane at 9,000ft. I pulled on my orange jumpsuit, got strapped into my harness, and waited to meet my tandem master.

Julian, a native of Johannesburg, had actually spent a good deal of time in the US, skydiving in Boulder. He was so cool! He had super long blond dreads, and a great accent, not to mention he was very reassuring about my soon-to-come free fall. We went up into the tiniest plane I’ve ever seen and I was attached to Julian when we approached our jumping height.

Kierstin went first, and after watching her and Laura Flynn get sucked out into the sky, it was my turn! We were poised on the edge of the plane, and with no warning we just….dropped! I SCREAMED MY HEAD OFF BUT IT WAS SO MUCH FUN!!! Julian had a camera, so I’m pretty sure I’ve got it on video, but free falling for 35 seconds over Table Mountain was the sickest thing I’ve ever done. Julian then pulled the parachute, and I floated for about 5 minutes, seeing Table Mountain, Cape Point, the ocean, just everything!

I cannot even begin to describe the adrenaline rush of that fall, or the high of simply floating above the world. I’m addicted!
Okay, so adrenaline rushes were key on this trip. The next day we got up at 5:30am to take a 2-hour bus ride to Gaansbai, the whale watching and shark diving spot of the Western Cape. After seeing a few blue whales next to our boat, we waited until the water was sufficiently chummed, and baited some great white sharks!! I was in the first group to get into the cage, along with Jen, Kierstin, and Laura Flynn. I think I started hyperventilating I was so nervous! We got into the freezing water, wet-suited from head to foot.

I came within 6 INCHES OF A GREAT WHITE SHARK! Isn’t that NUTS?? I think so. We got some great shots. They would come up and ram the cage and sometimes our limbs would occasionally just float out into serious shark territory!
One of them got his fin caught in the cage next to my friend Kelly and was thrashing about at her face! But luckily, no accidents!
We then went to a small island in the bay, one that is apparently home to 60,000 cape fur seals. And yes, they were super cute and adorable BUT THEY SMELLED SO BAD!! Haha I am not even kidding, it was actually sort of foul. But tons of them were playing in the water next to the boat and they were just so awesome and jumpy!

So we thought the exciting part of our day was over when the boat docked and we boarded our van to come back to Cape Town. But oh no, no, no – we were wrong! So we’re on the highway, about 5 minutes outside of Cape Town, and in the middle of rush hour, on a six-lane highway, our van just BREAKS DOWN. Hahaha I’m sorry I know it’s not funny, but it really kind of is, and I could not stop laughing. I mean, it was really scary, but all turned out okay, AND as we were staring across the street at I guess was some sort of nature reserve, we saw a zebra and wildebeasts! So, all in all, great day full of wonderful animal encounters!
The next day we headed out to Stellanbosch to meet Francie, for those of you who don’t know her, she’s a friend from UVA, studying abroad at the University of Stellanbosch.

We went wine tasting at a couple just beautiful vineyards, went out to dinner in town, spent some time in her dorms, (where Amy was!), and then went out to a local pub, called Tollies. It was so much fun! It’s a great college town, it was SO nice to see a friend from home, and to be able to picture where my sister spent so much of her time.
Hm…so now getting to the most beautiful day of my trip. We went to the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Point. On the way there it was slightly uncomfortable, considering I was squished in the back of a tiny, tiny car with 4 other boys. But who cares, I got to see baboons, whales, and penguins!! So after walking up and around the lighthouse, we went out to the actual point, the southernmost tip of Africa.

We saw the line where the Indian and the Atlantic Oceans merge, lots of whales along the sides of the point, and just the most beautiful sights you could ever hope to see in your life. It honestly made me appreciate nature so much more, I am too lucky to have been able to experience this.

After the point, the 10 of us that went up to Cape Point were leaving the park and ran into a large family of baboons on the side of the road! There were a couple babies, who were adorable!! They were just sitting there, eating grass, chilling on the side of the road…very neat! So we left the park and headed to Boulders Beach, the home of many African penguins, also called Jackass penguins…best name ever. They were SO CUTE!! Just waddling around, making weird noises, and definitely posing for the cameras…they are now one of my top favorite animals, along with the toco toucan (as I’m sure you remember from Brazil).

I awoke the next morning with an early start – I had not yet been to Robben Island and I was determined to make it there before leaving Cape Town. A few days before I had gone to find tickets, and left heartbroken because they were sold out until the day after our ship was leaving. I could have cried. I just had my mom’s words ringing in my ears, “When you go to Cape Town, you cannot miss Robben Island”. So at around 8:15am, Josh and I made our way over to Nelson Mandela gateway to stand in line and wait (with fingers crossed) for cancellations. After waiting and waiting and waiting, we got up to the window and got the last two tickets sold!! We sprinted from the ticket office, through security, down the gangway and hopped onto the ship as they were pulling the walkway away from the dock!

I could not wipe the smile off my face for about 20 minutes. Robben Island was the #1 thing I wanted to see in Cape Town and I had made it! The tour of the island itself was really interesting, we got to meet a former prisoner who is friends with Nelson Mandela, go into Nelson Mandela’s cell, see where he buried his manuscript of his book, Long Walk to Freedom, and go into the quarry where he spent his days working. There was a small cave in the back of the quarry, which they told us served as the “University of Robben Island” and the first Parliament of the new South Africa. This cave was the one place where the prisoners could gather without being seen by the guards, and they could discuss politics, share their knowledge, and educate one another. Overall, it was a very educational and interesting experience, and I’m so glad I got to see it. After Robben Island, Josh and I grabbed a quick lunch, met up with some friends, and went back out to Stellanbosch to do a little bit more wine tasting.

This time it was definitely more legitimate, with people telling us how to progress from wine to wine, what to look for in each wine in terms of taste, legs, aroma, etc. The first vineyard, Beyerskloof, had a bomb cheese platter that to me, a cheese fiend and addict, tasted like a small piece of heaven. Long story short, the cheese on the boat is not so great. The second vineyard we went to, Spier, was part vineyard, part cheetah conservation reserve – so random, right? Well yeah, except it was awesome! I got to go into an open area with 5 BABY CHEETAHS and pet them!!! IT WAS AWESOME! They were the cutest little cats and purred like maniacs, one even rolled over when I petted him! I believe his name was Disney, another one was Belle, another Abu…you get the idea (cheetahs after my own Disney-lover’s heart).

We left the cheetah reserve in a hurry, told the cab to drive like wild to make it back to the ship because we had a special speech to go to. Just another day on Semester at Sea but Desmond Tutu came to speak to us…no big deal or anything. False – it was unbelievable! He is actually really cute and funny in real life, and gave a super inspirational speech about how we as young Americans have a duty to make the right decision in the elections, get out of the war, and start to further aid the international community, but it came out way more elegantly than that.

I even got a picture with him! And, as I’m sure you can tell, I was quite an afterthought in this picture, but I could care less because I was in a picture with Archbishop Desmond Tutu! One of the leaders of the Truth and Reconciliation Committee for reparations of human rights violations in apartheid, a pioneer along with Nelson Mandela for black equality in South Africa.
After Desmond Tutu’s speech, I had another very interesting lecture. Amy Biehl, who was a Fulbright Scholar in South Africa, was stoned to death in Guguletu Township in 1993 during a student uprising. Four men were arrested and convicted, and spent 5 years or more in jail before asking for amnesty from the TRC in 1998 with the support of Amy Biehl’s parents. 2 of her murderers, who now work for the Amy Biehl Foundation, and have a great relationship with her family, came aboard the ship to speak to us about apartheid, her murder, their attempts at reconciliation and self-forgiveness, and what they are doing now to help her foundation. It was by far one of the most interesting speeches I have ever heard in my life.
Our last day in Cape Town was spent in and around the Waterfront, since we had to be on the boat by 1:30pm. It was a beautiful day, and the views of Table Mountain were breath-taking. I was so sad to leave Cape Town, and I can only hope that I will get to go back one day! Amy – let’s move there together, okay?