Saturday, May 3, 2008
Hola from Costa Rica!
I found an internet cafe right next to the ship so I thought I would give a quick update on my time so far in Costa Rica....the last port before home....because I ran out of internet time on the ship and I´m not sure if it´s worth it to buy more minutes. So anyway this morning I went on my canopy adventure trip which was amazing. We drove about an hour to this place that was in a beautiful forrest and we got in line to get harnesses which ended up taking like two hours because they booked almost 150 people on this trip. So we finally got strapped in and put on our helmets and gloves and headed to the first zip line. I was really nervous at first because I have never been on a zip line before, but it was so much fun!! After the first one it was one after another and the final one was almost half a mile long and by far the most fun. Once it was done we took a gondola back to where we started and they had fresh fruit for us that was really good and then we took the bus back to the ship. Megan and I grabbed a quick bite to eat and then headed out into town and did soem shopping and found this little internet cafe for $2 an hour which isn´t bad. We´re hopefully going to find a nice place to eat for dinner and then I´m not sure what else I will do here. We have until 8 tomorrow and then we will be on our way to Miami! I can´t believe the trip is already over and I´m actually kind of nervous to be back home. But most of all I just can´t wait to see my family! I guess that´s all I have to say for now :)
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Good news!
I just got amazing news so I thought I would post a blog about it. I got invited to have ice cream cake with a group of friends because my friend Mason finished her last college class today and wanted to celebrate. This by itself was awesome, but while we were eating Megan handed me the Dean’s Memo to read. The Dean’s memo has the announcements of what’s going on each day on the ship. So anyway there was a little message at the bottom that said they had originally announced that students with straight A’s would be the first off the ship, but because they wouldn’t be able to calculate grades soon enough they are now switching it so that anyone who got A’s on the first three global studies tests will be the first off the ship. And guess who got a 90, 92 and 96 on the first three global studies tests? Me!! So this means I get off first and get to see my Mom and Bill extra early!! So that’s my exciting news, other than that I took my geology final today and I think I did pretty well. Now I just have to study my butt off for my finance final. Woohoo!
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Aloha!!
I set my alarm for six but I woke up at 5:45 and looked at the clock and figured there was no reason to go back to sleep and I was really excited to be in Hawaii so I got up and got ready. They started making announcements over the intercom at 6 for people to come up to the faculty and staff lounge to meet with immigration and customs. They got to my number by 6:20 and surprisingly it only took me 5 minutes to get through. All they did was check our face with our passport and then told us to have a nice day. After this I went to grab a quick breakfast at 6:30 and the line was out the door. They had gotten through all the students by the time we got done eating and had moved onto the crew, so Megan and I hurried to our rooms to grab our stuff and then we went to camp out at the gangway early in hopes of being the first ones of the ship because her Mom and Aunt were waiting just outside! There were only about 10 people down there and I was pretty sure we were going to get yelled at but then a lady walked in and said those of you waiting to get off we’re ready for you. So we all got in line real quick and then she changed her mind and said she had to wait for the official word or something. Then about 5 minutes later assistant dean Craig, aka “The Voice”, came down and we were able to get off before they made the announcement to rest of the ship that the ship was cleared and everyone could begin to get off.
So for the first time ever we were the first people to get off the ship. Which reminds me… at pre-port the night before we got to
Once we got back to the condo we hung out a little longer and then piled back into the mini van to head to the north shore. Megan and I have wanted to find Mexican food for as long as I can remember and there is a place called Cholo’s on the north shore that we decided to go to for lunch. It was about a 45 minute drive so we talked about the trip and tried to search the radio for new music that has come out since we had left. We got there and enjoyed our wonderful food and then walked around some of the shops. From here we drove up to a beach where we could see the honu, which are Hawaiian green sea turtles! There weren’t any on the beach but we could see them poke there heads out of the water. After this we went to a grocery store to get some water and I also picked up some snacks for the next stretch of sea. Then we got back in the car to go to a different beach where we could spend sometime in the water. We went to pipeline but we weren’t aloud to swim so we ended up going back to the turtle beach because we would be able to go in the water there, we just had to watch out for the turtles! I was standing in the water next to this couple and then this lady tells us to watch out because a turtle was coming up right behind us! It was literally a couple feet away from me so I scooted back and just watched it. I never thought I would be that close to a sea turtle in
Once we were back on the ship I said goodbye and thanked them for showing me around
After
I have now been at sea for five days since we left
Friday, April 18, 2008
Japan
Day 1: A day full on lines and trains/subways…
I got up and went to breakfast and then at 8am they called everyone up to the faculty lounge for the temperature screening that was required before getting off the ship. I was expecting to get stuck in a long line, but the way the measure our temperature was to just have us walk in front of a video camera so I was in and out in less than a minute including the time I waited in line. After this I thought well maybe it really won’t take that long to get off the ship, and this of course was wrong. The rest would be done off the ship so we had to wait to be called by our ID number. Originally just Megan and I were going to travel alone but Andi and Amy’s plans fell through so they ended up coming with us. I had packed everything the night before so I just sat in my room and waited until they finally called my number just after 11. So I got off the ship went and picked up my passport and waited in line to meet with immigration and customs. The line only took about 20 minutes and then I met with immigration where I had my fingerprints and picture taken and then went to customs where they asked me some questions and then let me go. Megan and I were ready to go but Andi’s number was in the last group called so we didn’t end up getting out of there until 1pm.
Just when we thought the waiting was over we went up to get tickets for the portliner which took us to the station where we would validate our rail pass and there was a long line to get those tickets. So we waited another twenty minutes and hopped on the portliner for two stops and ended up getting there the same time as people who walked got there. We wandered around the station trying to find where to validate our rail passes and then we saw another huge line of SASers and knew we where in the right spot. This line took closer to an hour but we got our actual rail pass which was really cool! So we ended up reserving seats on the 3:25 train and at that point they only had smoking seats left but we took them anyway because it was better than waiting an hour for the next train. Finally we got on the subway to the Shin-Kobe station where the bullet train left from and got to the track with about ten minutes to spare.
The train finally pulled up and we were so excited to get on. We found our seats and it was no joke about being a smoking car, it was like being in a car with someone smoking and all the windows are up and this was continuous for the whole three hour plus ride. Megan escaped to another car but I just stayed and slept for most of the way and listened to my ipod. I was awake for about the last 45 minutes before Tokyo and then we were finally there…well almost. Once we got to the Tokyo station we had to take another JR (Japan Rail) line to where Disneyland/our hotel was. Luckily Megan looked up the name of the line ahead of time so we followed the path to where this line was suppose to be and it seemed like a mile walk through this train station! Luckily they had those moving pathways that sped up the process. We eventually got to the right line but didn’t know which subway to get on so we tried to ask some Japanese people and they were really helpful! There were like four guys helping us and they pulled out schedules and the one we needed to get on was actually on the other side of the track so we had to go back up the stairs and down the other side and it was already there so we quickly said thank you and ran up and down the stairs and got on just in time.
There was standing room only so we hung on to the little bars and paid close attention to the signs and announcements so we didn’t miss the stop. The ride only took about 15 minutes and when we got off and walked up the stairs we were literally right at Disneyland. The area we were in was a little bit like downtown Disney. From here we got on the Disney Resort Monorail that took us right to our hotel. We went to check in and because there was four of us instead of two they upgraded us to a room with four beds for $60 more which I think was a pretty good deal. We headed up to the room and two of the beds were queens and the other two were twins. I got a queen bed and I laid down for a second and it was so comfortable! We were all hungry and the restaurants in the Sheraton where all super expensive so we decided to head back to the downtown Disney area because we saw a burger place there on the way in the looked pretty good. The place was called Becker’s Burgers, I’m nit sure if it’s from the US but the food was really good and I think we paid about $7 for a burger fries and a drink which seemed pretty good to me after everyone obsessed over how expensive Japan was going to be. We went back to the hotel and we saw a business center with computers and we just stopped in to see how much it was and it ended up being free! So I spent a couple hours there when I probably should have been sleeping, but I applied for community college and got accepted all in this time which was awesome! I have to take a class this summer when I get home to make up for the credits I am missing by being here on SAS. I think I finally went up to the room to go to bed around 12:30.
Day 2: Disneyland!!!
I woke up at seven and got ready because we planned to head to the park by eight. I was ready pretty early so I went back down to the computers and used the internet until everyone else was ready to go. Megan checked us out of the hotel and then we went over and checked in our luggage for the day so we wouldn’t have to lug it around Disneyland. We got back on the monorail and got to the entrance at about 8:15 and the park opened at 8:30. There were huge lines when we got there and I think we actually got into the park around 8:45 or 9. The first place we ran to was Space Mountain. We grabbed fast pass tickets for later and then got in line which surprisingly only took 15 minutes. It was very similar to the one in California as far as where you get on the ride but the inside seemed a lot different. There was no music and the stars and everything didn’t look as cool, so I think California definitely has them beat on this ride. It was still really cool though! Our fast passes were already going to be good in like thirty minutes so we walked over to the other side of the park and got fastpasses for thunder mountain and then came back to ride Space Mountain again. Once we were done on Space Mountain we still had a while before our Thunder Mountain tickets were good so we got in line for Pirates of the Caribbean. This had a little bit of a longer wait, but it wasn’t too bad. We got inside and they had the Blue Bayou restaurant just like California and the ride was very similar too. They even put Johnny Dep in three places just like back home.
After Pirates we were ready for some food because the only breakfast we had were the little boxes of cereal we smuggled off the ship. We found this hot dog place with a foot long hot dog fries and a drink for about $8, which I don’t even think you can get in the US for that cheap. Next we got on Thunder Mountain, which I think might not be opened back home anymore because someone died on it or something, but it is such a fun ride! Then we went and got fast passes for Splash Mountain which weren’t going to be good until 4 so we had some time to kill. Without fast passes most of the lines were 2 hours long so we tried to find some that weren’t that bad. We made our way to toon town and rode the roller coaster there which only lasts for about 45 seconds but it was still fun. Then we went on Star Tours which didn’t have any wait and it was really funny because it was exactly the same as California’s but it was all in Japanese, except for when they said light speed! We took a break and got some green tea soft serve ice cream which was really good and then sat down to watch the 25th anniversary parade which was really cool. Once the parade was over we still had a little time until we could get on Splash Mountain so we tried to find this fresh fruit place that was on the map and it took a while but we finally found it and I got some really good pineapple and a banana.
After this we headed to Splash Mountain which I think was actually better than the one in California. The logs were a lot nicer and you sat two people side my side. All the songs were in Japanese which was kind of funny. Once we got off we were ready to head back because we wanted to make sure we got to the train in time. We went back to the hotel and got our stuff and used the internet for another 15 minutes. We got back to the monorail and when we were about to get on Megan realized she didn’t have her Rail Pass so she went back to see if it was in the room but they weren’t able to find it. Luckily we allowed plenty of time to make it to the train so we still had a chance to go back to Becker’s Burgers for dinner. I wanted to go to this huge Disney Store they had and get a Tokyo Disneyland T-shirt and some postcards but we didn’t have time for this so we hurried to the subway that took us to the Tokyo Station. Megan was able to just buy a ticket back to Kobe and we all reserved seats thankfully in the non-smoking car this time. We got to the track about 15 minutes early which was a relief because this was the last train of the night. I thought I would be able to sleep all the way back but I couldn’t so I just listened to my Ipod most of the way. We eventually made it to the Shin-Kobe station and then we thought it would be cheaper to just take a cab to the dock instead of paying for the two different subways for 4 people, but I think it only ended up being a dollar cheaper. I was happy to be back on the ship again and just showered and went to bed.
Day 3: Hiroshima
Megan, Amy, Andi and I met for breakfast at 7:30 and then headed back to the train station to go to Hiroshima. This train ride was only about an hour so we sat in the unreserved car and we all got seats but had to split up. Once we to the Hiroshima station we found a map of the city and figured we would walk to the different places we wanted to go to. It took us about 20 minutes to figure out how to get to the other side of the station, but eventually we were on our way. The sign said it was a ten minute walk to the Hiroshima castle which is where we went first, but it definitely took us a lot longer. As we were walking up to the castle we came across this big Kendo tournament, at least I think that’s what it was called because the back of someone’s jacket said it. It was kids of all different ages fighting with sticks and they had full metal face masks on and all types of padding and they would yell as they were fighting which was a little scary. There were boys and girls and some of them were really young. We watched this for a while and then walked up to see the castle, which was really beautiful. We didn’t end up going inside of it though because you had to pay.
Once we left the castle we wanted to make our way to Hiroshima Peace Memorial park and hopefully find some food along the way. On our way there we passed this recreational sports building and saw some kids playing water polo which was really exciting for Megan because she plays for CLU and really misses it. Then we saw a bunch of people lined up and realizes they were waiting to meet a band because there were posters of them all over and I think they had a concert there later that day. They looked like a Japanese version of the Backstreet Boys. We found another map that showed us where we needed to go and we also saw that there was a shopping center near by so we went there first to try and find some good sushi for lunch. We looked around and couldn’t find anywhere so we just ended up eating in the basement level of this mall which was the only cheap food we could find. So I got some chicken and rice and green tea ice cream. They did have sushi down there but they didn’t speak English so it was hard to figure out what you were getting.
We left the mall and the first place we walked up to was the A-Bomb Dome. We stayed there for a while and then walked across the river to the Peace Memorial Park. Here we saw the Children’s Peace Monument which we watched a documentary about in global studies. The statue is of a girl with her arms stretched out and a paper crane above her. She was a victim of radiation poisoning from the bomb and she believed that if she folded 1000 paper cranes she would be cured, but she died after making over 900. Around the monument there were glass cases full of paper cranes made by children, there were thousands of them. A lot of them were put together to spell out things like Peace and Love. After this we saw the peace flame and the peace bell. We continued down the walkway to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum where we spent about an hour or two walking through. The museum was very powerful and I think it’s something everyone should see. It was very sad, but it somehow didn’t hit me as hard as the museum in Vietnam. I’m hoping to also make it to Pearl Harbor while I am in Hawaii.
After we left the museum we found a trolley that would take us back to Hiroshima station and it was only $1.50. I’m still glad we walked on the way there though because it let us see a lot more of the city. There was a train that was going to leave in 15 minutes but we decided to take a later one so that we could shop a little and try to find post cards because we saw a shop when we were there earlier in the day. I got my postcards and then got a bite to eat from McDonalds because we weren’t going to make it back to the ship before the dining hall closed. We took the trains and subways back and I relaxed and watched some TV before going to bed.
Day 4: Kyoto
It was our last day in Japan and Andi Amy and I wanted to get the most out of our rail pass as possible so we decided to go to Kyoto which is a more traditional city in Japan. The train ride was only a half hour a way so we didn’t head out until about 9. Amy’s roommate had already been there and told us we should go to Philosophers street because it was really pretty and lined with cherry blossom trees and there were Geishas walking around and a lot of cute little restaurants. Once we got there we found a map and Philosopher’s Street looked pretty far away so we tried to find the bus that would take us there and we thought we were walking in the right direction but we got about 10 minutes away and realized we should turn around and actually ask the information desk. Right before we did this we saw a car accident, nothing big just someone getting rear ended at a red light. So we walked back and found a guy that spoke English and he told us what bus we needed to take and we could get a bus pass for $5 that we could use as much as we want for the whole day. The bus didn’t go to Philosopher Street but it went to a temple that looked pretty close on the map so we thought we would check that out first and then walk to the street.
We bought our ticket and got on this bus which they packed full of people and luckily I was able to just face the window and stare out otherwise I was going to get really claustrophobic. We could barely understand what they were saying at each station but we thought we got off at the right one after about 20 minutes. Either way I was just happy to get off of there. After staring at our map for five minutes we figured out the way to the temple and started walking. We walked for about 20 minutes and then we saw the big orange gateway to the temple which was right next to a 7-11 which seemed funny to me. Before we went in there were some vendors lined up along the street and we spent almost all of our cash buying t-shirts and other stuff because it was a lot cheaper than any of the other stores we had seen. Then we walked inside and checked out the different part of the temple. I didn’t have much background on it because we just picked it off a map so I’m not sure what type of temple it was. There were these little water fountains with a dragon statue in the middle and the people would walk up and use these wooden things to scoop out the water and they would sip it like they were going to drink the water but then they spit it back out. People would also buy these papers and write something on them and then tie them onto these wood tree branches that it looked like they had cut off of some tree and with all the papers that were tied on looked almost like pink leafs. To go further into the temple you had to pay money and we really didn’t have any left so we started walking to where we thought Philosopher’s Street was and hoped the restaurants would take credit card.
Amy had set the map down when we were buying stuff and forgot to pick it up so we really didn’t have any idea where we were. We walked for about 20 minutes and tried to ask some people where it was but we just couldn’t find it. One lady was telling us to get on another bus and go to a temple and then walk from there but we were tired and just decided to take the bus back to the station because we were right by a bus station. There was a McDonald’s right by where we got dropped off the first time so we went back there to eat because we thought they would take credit card, but they didn’t. Luckily I had enough money in coins to get a meal. So we ate and got back on the bus to Kyoto station and just missed the train so we had to wait another hour. We got back to the ship a little after 4 and I just stayed on because I was out of money. Apparently there was a long line at on-ship time and a lot of people ended up getting dock time. They later made an announcement that we had to leave four students in Japan, but they were ok and I didn’t get any more details than that. I just hope they are able to make up all their class work from the seven days of class they will be missing if they meet the ship in Hawaii.
After Japan:
We have been back at sea for about 5 days now and there’s not too much going on. We did pass the International Date Line and had two April 15ths which was pretty cool, so now I am behind California time instead of ahead which makes me feel a little closer to home. Last night we had the Students of Service Auction which was pretty exciting. Someone paid $1000 to raise the US flag when we pull into Miami and other things like the captains hat and blowing the horn in Miami also went for over $500. I’m not sure how much money we ended up raising, but it was definitely a lot. We don’t have class today which is nice and in four more days we will be in Hawaii! It’s going to be weird to be in the US and use dollars and my cell phone and have everyone speak English…I’m really excited! Plus I’ve never been to Hawaii before. I wish we had more time there. Anyway I think that’s all the updates I have for now…
I got up and went to breakfast and then at 8am they called everyone up to the faculty lounge for the temperature screening that was required before getting off the ship. I was expecting to get stuck in a long line, but the way the measure our temperature was to just have us walk in front of a video camera so I was in and out in less than a minute including the time I waited in line. After this I thought well maybe it really won’t take that long to get off the ship, and this of course was wrong. The rest would be done off the ship so we had to wait to be called by our ID number. Originally just Megan and I were going to travel alone but Andi and Amy’s plans fell through so they ended up coming with us. I had packed everything the night before so I just sat in my room and waited until they finally called my number just after 11. So I got off the ship went and picked up my passport and waited in line to meet with immigration and customs. The line only took about 20 minutes and then I met with immigration where I had my fingerprints and picture taken and then went to customs where they asked me some questions and then let me go. Megan and I were ready to go but Andi’s number was in the last group called so we didn’t end up getting out of there until 1pm.
Just when we thought the waiting was over we went up to get tickets for the portliner which took us to the station where we would validate our rail pass and there was a long line to get those tickets. So we waited another twenty minutes and hopped on the portliner for two stops and ended up getting there the same time as people who walked got there. We wandered around the station trying to find where to validate our rail passes and then we saw another huge line of SASers and knew we where in the right spot. This line took closer to an hour but we got our actual rail pass which was really cool! So we ended up reserving seats on the 3:25 train and at that point they only had smoking seats left but we took them anyway because it was better than waiting an hour for the next train. Finally we got on the subway to the Shin-Kobe station where the bullet train left from and got to the track with about ten minutes to spare.
The train finally pulled up and we were so excited to get on. We found our seats and it was no joke about being a smoking car, it was like being in a car with someone smoking and all the windows are up and this was continuous for the whole three hour plus ride. Megan escaped to another car but I just stayed and slept for most of the way and listened to my ipod. I was awake for about the last 45 minutes before Tokyo and then we were finally there…well almost. Once we got to the Tokyo station we had to take another JR (Japan Rail) line to where Disneyland/our hotel was. Luckily Megan looked up the name of the line ahead of time so we followed the path to where this line was suppose to be and it seemed like a mile walk through this train station! Luckily they had those moving pathways that sped up the process. We eventually got to the right line but didn’t know which subway to get on so we tried to ask some Japanese people and they were really helpful! There were like four guys helping us and they pulled out schedules and the one we needed to get on was actually on the other side of the track so we had to go back up the stairs and down the other side and it was already there so we quickly said thank you and ran up and down the stairs and got on just in time.
There was standing room only so we hung on to the little bars and paid close attention to the signs and announcements so we didn’t miss the stop. The ride only took about 15 minutes and when we got off and walked up the stairs we were literally right at Disneyland. The area we were in was a little bit like downtown Disney. From here we got on the Disney Resort Monorail that took us right to our hotel. We went to check in and because there was four of us instead of two they upgraded us to a room with four beds for $60 more which I think was a pretty good deal. We headed up to the room and two of the beds were queens and the other two were twins. I got a queen bed and I laid down for a second and it was so comfortable! We were all hungry and the restaurants in the Sheraton where all super expensive so we decided to head back to the downtown Disney area because we saw a burger place there on the way in the looked pretty good. The place was called Becker’s Burgers, I’m nit sure if it’s from the US but the food was really good and I think we paid about $7 for a burger fries and a drink which seemed pretty good to me after everyone obsessed over how expensive Japan was going to be. We went back to the hotel and we saw a business center with computers and we just stopped in to see how much it was and it ended up being free! So I spent a couple hours there when I probably should have been sleeping, but I applied for community college and got accepted all in this time which was awesome! I have to take a class this summer when I get home to make up for the credits I am missing by being here on SAS. I think I finally went up to the room to go to bed around 12:30.
Day 2: Disneyland!!!
I woke up at seven and got ready because we planned to head to the park by eight. I was ready pretty early so I went back down to the computers and used the internet until everyone else was ready to go. Megan checked us out of the hotel and then we went over and checked in our luggage for the day so we wouldn’t have to lug it around Disneyland. We got back on the monorail and got to the entrance at about 8:15 and the park opened at 8:30. There were huge lines when we got there and I think we actually got into the park around 8:45 or 9. The first place we ran to was Space Mountain. We grabbed fast pass tickets for later and then got in line which surprisingly only took 15 minutes. It was very similar to the one in California as far as where you get on the ride but the inside seemed a lot different. There was no music and the stars and everything didn’t look as cool, so I think California definitely has them beat on this ride. It was still really cool though! Our fast passes were already going to be good in like thirty minutes so we walked over to the other side of the park and got fastpasses for thunder mountain and then came back to ride Space Mountain again. Once we were done on Space Mountain we still had a while before our Thunder Mountain tickets were good so we got in line for Pirates of the Caribbean. This had a little bit of a longer wait, but it wasn’t too bad. We got inside and they had the Blue Bayou restaurant just like California and the ride was very similar too. They even put Johnny Dep in three places just like back home.
After Pirates we were ready for some food because the only breakfast we had were the little boxes of cereal we smuggled off the ship. We found this hot dog place with a foot long hot dog fries and a drink for about $8, which I don’t even think you can get in the US for that cheap. Next we got on Thunder Mountain, which I think might not be opened back home anymore because someone died on it or something, but it is such a fun ride! Then we went and got fast passes for Splash Mountain which weren’t going to be good until 4 so we had some time to kill. Without fast passes most of the lines were 2 hours long so we tried to find some that weren’t that bad. We made our way to toon town and rode the roller coaster there which only lasts for about 45 seconds but it was still fun. Then we went on Star Tours which didn’t have any wait and it was really funny because it was exactly the same as California’s but it was all in Japanese, except for when they said light speed! We took a break and got some green tea soft serve ice cream which was really good and then sat down to watch the 25th anniversary parade which was really cool. Once the parade was over we still had a little time until we could get on Splash Mountain so we tried to find this fresh fruit place that was on the map and it took a while but we finally found it and I got some really good pineapple and a banana.
After this we headed to Splash Mountain which I think was actually better than the one in California. The logs were a lot nicer and you sat two people side my side. All the songs were in Japanese which was kind of funny. Once we got off we were ready to head back because we wanted to make sure we got to the train in time. We went back to the hotel and got our stuff and used the internet for another 15 minutes. We got back to the monorail and when we were about to get on Megan realized she didn’t have her Rail Pass so she went back to see if it was in the room but they weren’t able to find it. Luckily we allowed plenty of time to make it to the train so we still had a chance to go back to Becker’s Burgers for dinner. I wanted to go to this huge Disney Store they had and get a Tokyo Disneyland T-shirt and some postcards but we didn’t have time for this so we hurried to the subway that took us to the Tokyo Station. Megan was able to just buy a ticket back to Kobe and we all reserved seats thankfully in the non-smoking car this time. We got to the track about 15 minutes early which was a relief because this was the last train of the night. I thought I would be able to sleep all the way back but I couldn’t so I just listened to my Ipod most of the way. We eventually made it to the Shin-Kobe station and then we thought it would be cheaper to just take a cab to the dock instead of paying for the two different subways for 4 people, but I think it only ended up being a dollar cheaper. I was happy to be back on the ship again and just showered and went to bed.
Day 3: Hiroshima
Megan, Amy, Andi and I met for breakfast at 7:30 and then headed back to the train station to go to Hiroshima. This train ride was only about an hour so we sat in the unreserved car and we all got seats but had to split up. Once we to the Hiroshima station we found a map of the city and figured we would walk to the different places we wanted to go to. It took us about 20 minutes to figure out how to get to the other side of the station, but eventually we were on our way. The sign said it was a ten minute walk to the Hiroshima castle which is where we went first, but it definitely took us a lot longer. As we were walking up to the castle we came across this big Kendo tournament, at least I think that’s what it was called because the back of someone’s jacket said it. It was kids of all different ages fighting with sticks and they had full metal face masks on and all types of padding and they would yell as they were fighting which was a little scary. There were boys and girls and some of them were really young. We watched this for a while and then walked up to see the castle, which was really beautiful. We didn’t end up going inside of it though because you had to pay.
Once we left the castle we wanted to make our way to Hiroshima Peace Memorial park and hopefully find some food along the way. On our way there we passed this recreational sports building and saw some kids playing water polo which was really exciting for Megan because she plays for CLU and really misses it. Then we saw a bunch of people lined up and realizes they were waiting to meet a band because there were posters of them all over and I think they had a concert there later that day. They looked like a Japanese version of the Backstreet Boys. We found another map that showed us where we needed to go and we also saw that there was a shopping center near by so we went there first to try and find some good sushi for lunch. We looked around and couldn’t find anywhere so we just ended up eating in the basement level of this mall which was the only cheap food we could find. So I got some chicken and rice and green tea ice cream. They did have sushi down there but they didn’t speak English so it was hard to figure out what you were getting.
We left the mall and the first place we walked up to was the A-Bomb Dome. We stayed there for a while and then walked across the river to the Peace Memorial Park. Here we saw the Children’s Peace Monument which we watched a documentary about in global studies. The statue is of a girl with her arms stretched out and a paper crane above her. She was a victim of radiation poisoning from the bomb and she believed that if she folded 1000 paper cranes she would be cured, but she died after making over 900. Around the monument there were glass cases full of paper cranes made by children, there were thousands of them. A lot of them were put together to spell out things like Peace and Love. After this we saw the peace flame and the peace bell. We continued down the walkway to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum where we spent about an hour or two walking through. The museum was very powerful and I think it’s something everyone should see. It was very sad, but it somehow didn’t hit me as hard as the museum in Vietnam. I’m hoping to also make it to Pearl Harbor while I am in Hawaii.
After we left the museum we found a trolley that would take us back to Hiroshima station and it was only $1.50. I’m still glad we walked on the way there though because it let us see a lot more of the city. There was a train that was going to leave in 15 minutes but we decided to take a later one so that we could shop a little and try to find post cards because we saw a shop when we were there earlier in the day. I got my postcards and then got a bite to eat from McDonalds because we weren’t going to make it back to the ship before the dining hall closed. We took the trains and subways back and I relaxed and watched some TV before going to bed.
Day 4: Kyoto
It was our last day in Japan and Andi Amy and I wanted to get the most out of our rail pass as possible so we decided to go to Kyoto which is a more traditional city in Japan. The train ride was only a half hour a way so we didn’t head out until about 9. Amy’s roommate had already been there and told us we should go to Philosophers street because it was really pretty and lined with cherry blossom trees and there were Geishas walking around and a lot of cute little restaurants. Once we got there we found a map and Philosopher’s Street looked pretty far away so we tried to find the bus that would take us there and we thought we were walking in the right direction but we got about 10 minutes away and realized we should turn around and actually ask the information desk. Right before we did this we saw a car accident, nothing big just someone getting rear ended at a red light. So we walked back and found a guy that spoke English and he told us what bus we needed to take and we could get a bus pass for $5 that we could use as much as we want for the whole day. The bus didn’t go to Philosopher Street but it went to a temple that looked pretty close on the map so we thought we would check that out first and then walk to the street.
We bought our ticket and got on this bus which they packed full of people and luckily I was able to just face the window and stare out otherwise I was going to get really claustrophobic. We could barely understand what they were saying at each station but we thought we got off at the right one after about 20 minutes. Either way I was just happy to get off of there. After staring at our map for five minutes we figured out the way to the temple and started walking. We walked for about 20 minutes and then we saw the big orange gateway to the temple which was right next to a 7-11 which seemed funny to me. Before we went in there were some vendors lined up along the street and we spent almost all of our cash buying t-shirts and other stuff because it was a lot cheaper than any of the other stores we had seen. Then we walked inside and checked out the different part of the temple. I didn’t have much background on it because we just picked it off a map so I’m not sure what type of temple it was. There were these little water fountains with a dragon statue in the middle and the people would walk up and use these wooden things to scoop out the water and they would sip it like they were going to drink the water but then they spit it back out. People would also buy these papers and write something on them and then tie them onto these wood tree branches that it looked like they had cut off of some tree and with all the papers that were tied on looked almost like pink leafs. To go further into the temple you had to pay money and we really didn’t have any left so we started walking to where we thought Philosopher’s Street was and hoped the restaurants would take credit card.
Amy had set the map down when we were buying stuff and forgot to pick it up so we really didn’t have any idea where we were. We walked for about 20 minutes and tried to ask some people where it was but we just couldn’t find it. One lady was telling us to get on another bus and go to a temple and then walk from there but we were tired and just decided to take the bus back to the station because we were right by a bus station. There was a McDonald’s right by where we got dropped off the first time so we went back there to eat because we thought they would take credit card, but they didn’t. Luckily I had enough money in coins to get a meal. So we ate and got back on the bus to Kyoto station and just missed the train so we had to wait another hour. We got back to the ship a little after 4 and I just stayed on because I was out of money. Apparently there was a long line at on-ship time and a lot of people ended up getting dock time. They later made an announcement that we had to leave four students in Japan, but they were ok and I didn’t get any more details than that. I just hope they are able to make up all their class work from the seven days of class they will be missing if they meet the ship in Hawaii.
After Japan:
We have been back at sea for about 5 days now and there’s not too much going on. We did pass the International Date Line and had two April 15ths which was pretty cool, so now I am behind California time instead of ahead which makes me feel a little closer to home. Last night we had the Students of Service Auction which was pretty exciting. Someone paid $1000 to raise the US flag when we pull into Miami and other things like the captains hat and blowing the horn in Miami also went for over $500. I’m not sure how much money we ended up raising, but it was definitely a lot. We don’t have class today which is nice and in four more days we will be in Hawaii! It’s going to be weird to be in the US and use dollars and my cell phone and have everyone speak English…I’m really excited! Plus I’ve never been to Hawaii before. I wish we had more time there. Anyway I think that’s all the updates I have for now…
Thursday, April 10, 2008
China!!
Day 1:
I got up extra early, around 6, to be sure that I had everything packed. I showered and headed to breakfast around 7 and then went back to my room to grab my stuff and head to the Union by 7:30. When I got there they gave me a name tag to wear, a blue semester at sea bag to give to a student, and an arrival and departure card that we had to fill out to enter China. We headed to the buses around 8:15 and we walked through the mall and down to the street and I was really sad that I had to leave Hong Kong already because it was such a cool city. There were 60 of us spilt into two buses and I got on bus 1. I think the ride to the airport was about 30 or 45 minutes. When we got there we lined up in alphabetical order and went to the counter to pick up our tickets. From I went through security and made my way to the terminal that our flight was leaving from. We had some time so I wanted to try and find the Starbucks in the airport. First I walked over to the terminal that we were leaving from to be sure that I knew where it was and then as I was trying to find the Starbucks I ran into Megan and found out she was on my same flight even though she had booked her trip independently. She knew where the Starbucks was so we left our heavy backpacks with some people staying at the terminal and made the long walk to Starbucks. We got our drinks and made our way back a few minutes before the flight was boarding. I boarded and stayed awake until they served lunch which was rice and chicken and then slept until we landed, the total flight time was about 3 hours. Once we got off the flight we had to wait a really long time to go through immigration. I finally got through and got another stamp in my passport which is always exciting! I’m really disappointed we didn’t get one in South Africa, but the pages are still filling up pretty quickly.
Once we were through I found an ATM and took out some cash and then we waited for everyone else to get through customs and then we got on a bus to the hotel. Our tour guide’s name was Jeff and he was from the University of International Business and Economics that was hosting our visit. We had about a 30 minute ride to our hotel and it was right across the street from the University. We got our rooms and I roomed with a girl named Anna from Texas. They gave us an updated itinerary and a book about Beijing and then we brought our stuff up to our room. We were originally suppose to meet with the students later that night, but they took this part out because it was actually a holiday so they weren’t able to meet. After we put the stuff in the room we met back down in the lobby to get a tour of the UIBE campus. We walked across the street and Holly another person from the school pointed out the dorm that I posted a picture of earlier and explained that it was the biggest in China with over 10,000 students. We walked further and saw the food they were selling that I also posted a picture of and then Jeff told us we could walk around for 20 minutes and then meet back at the lobby so that we could go to dinner. So we really didn’t get to see too much of the campus, but we tried to make the best of it. Anna and I walked over to the dorm to try and find the bookstore so we could get t-shirts or something because someone told us it was in the dorm but we didn’t end up finding it. When we walked up was saw the KFC delivery guy delivering to the dorm! There was a grocery store in the bottom floor of the dorm but no bookstore. By this time we had to hurry to get back in time for dinner.
We all met in the lobby and we walked to the restaurant which was right down the street. The set up was just like the Chinese restaurants I ate at in Malaysia where they sit 9 people at the table and they bring out several dishes for the table to share. This restaurant specialized in Peking duck which I actually really liked! I heard a lot of people say the food in China was a lot different then Chinese food in the US, but I actually found it quite similar. We even got some really good sweet and sour pork! For dessert they brought out these donut like things that you dip in sugar which were also really good. After dinner instead of going to meet the students we went on a bus tour of the city. We drove past a lot of the big buildings and then Tiananmen Square which I was surprised was right on the main street. We also drove by the water cube and bird’s nest Olympic Venues, which was really cool! The water cube was lit up and changing colors, but the bird’s nest was not lit up. After this we went back to the hotel and I just went to bed because I was exhausted!
Day 2:
I got up and went to breakfast at 8. They didn’t have any cereal or anything like that which was disappointing but they did have rice and noodles which seemed kind of strange. They also had dim sum and there was one with sweet beans inside which I really liked. After this I headed to the lobby where we were meeting at 8:30 to leave for the Great Wall! We got on the bus and had about a two hour drive to the wall. I slept most of the way, but for the part that I was awake I saw some really funny road signs that I wish I got pictures of. They said things like don’t drink and drive or don’t use your cell phone, but the funny part was they had illustrations next to them that were really funny. As we got closer to the wall I kept looking at the mountains to try and see the great wall and I finally saw it! We parked the bus and Jeff told us we would have to walk up the mountain for about 20 minutes to get to the top or there was a cable car for anyone that didn’t think they could make the walk. We would meet back at the bus in two hours so this only gave us about an hour on the wall. There were vendors lined up all long the street selling great wall souvenirs. My friend Kate and I both wanted to do some shopping when we got back down so we stayed together. To get to the wall we had to climb what seemed to be a million stairs. I regretted not actually climbing Tabletop Mountain so this time I decided I would definitely climb up to the Great Wall. It was really hard and we took a couple breaks, but we finally made it up there and it was the greatest feeling ever. The part of the wall we were at is called Mutianyu and we saw a sign that sent former President Clinton visited this part of the wall on June 28, 1998 and said “The Great Wall here is very beautiful, very grand, more beautiful and grander than I imagined” and I definitely agree!
Once we were at the top we walked up the wall to where the cable car was and decided to take it down. There was also a toboggan car that you could take down that everyone really loved so I kind of wished we did that. The cable car was still really cool though, definitely better then climbing down all those stairs again. Once we got down we bought some I climbed the Great Wall shirts and other stuff and made it back to the bus just in time. Unfortunately not everyone else made it back on time so we had to sit there for 45 minutes and this resulted in us losing our lunch reservation. Our tour guides decided to take us to a place called Big Pizza because they thought we would miss the food from back home. The place could fit up to 80 people so eventually all 60 of us got in as other people left. It was a big buffet with pizza and other stuff like popcorn chicken, French fries, chicken wings, a salad bar and all kinds of stuff. They also had unlimited soda and beer and frozen yogurt! It wasn’t the best food but it tasted good because we were all so hungry.
After lunch the bus took us to Silk Street Market to do some shopping. This place was six stories and then it also had two basement levels. The vendors would start out at a ridiculously high price and then you would bargain way down from like 1000 yuan to 100. I didn’t buy too much because I was too tired to bargain and the people were so pushy. At one point I literally had two women grabbing onto me trying to get me to buy something. They gave us a really long time here so I just left early and went to a Starbucks that I saw across the street. After this we headed back to the hotel to rest for a little bit before we had to meet again for dinner. This time we had dinner in the hotel, but it was very similar to the dinner we had the night before. After dinner we had a party with the Chinese students. They rented out a bar for us down the street so we walked there and paid 20 Yuan to get unlimited drinks. I was kind of disappointed with this because we walked in and the music was so loud you could barely hear anything. I ended up talking to a couple of students for a while. One girl told me a lot of the girls reminded her of Paris Hilton and sometimes she thinks all girls in the US are like that and go out to bars every night. I tried to tell her that wasn’t true. She said she never went out to places like this and she really liked to read. I felt kind of bad for her and some of the other students because I could tell they felt out of place. There were some though that got up on the dance floor and danced with the rest of the SASers.
After a while the loud music was too much so Kate and I decided to leave and walk to an internet café that our guide showed us that was right next to the hotel. It was only 3 yuan for an hour which is less than 50 cents. This place was huge and most of the people in there were playing games. One bad thing about the place was that people were able to smoke inside. So we enjoyed the internet for an hour and I tried to figure out how to register for summer school at the community college, but that didn’t go so well so hopefully I can take care of it in Japan. When we were done I went back to my room and went to sleep.
Day 3:
I woke up and went to breakfast again and 8 and met in the lobby at 8:30. Out first stop was Tiananmen Square. We walked around for a while taking pictures and this is also were they had a big countdown to the Olympics so I got a picture of that. From here we continued to the Forbidden City which was a huge complex that we had almost 2 hours to walk around. We got these little headset things to where that knew where we were and told us about the different parts. One of the things I really didn’t like about this trip was that Jeff wasn’t really a tour guide, he was just someone that worked at UIBE, so he didn’t really tell us anything about what we were seeing. I got to the end of the city a little early so I just waited for the rest of the group. From here we were going to lunch at the Temple of Heaven and then we were going to actually see the Temple of Heaven. We got to there and had to take these little cars to the restaurant because it was a pretty far walk and our driver had this Chinese techno music on so we had him turn it up on the drive and it was a lot of fun. We got there and it was the same style that we had at dinner the previous two nights. When we were done eating we took the little car back to the entrance of the temple complex and walked through the different parts which took about an hour and a half.
Once we left here we headed to the Chinese acrobatic show, which besides the Great Wall was my favorite part of the trip. Avi is the guy who is making the voyage video for semester at Sea and he was on out trip and videotaped the whole thing, so I’m hoping a good portion of it will make it on the voyage dvd. I got a couple video clips so I can show everyone when I get back. After the show a lot of people left to go back to the markets but I just went back to the hotel on the bus and relaxed until we were leaving for dinner at another local restaurant. There ended up only being about 25 of the 60 that went to dinner, which was kind of nice. The food was basically the same as it had been but we got to choose the plates they brought out for the table which was good. After dinner I went back to the internet café for a while and then bought a calling card from this corner store that someone at dinner had used already and it was only about five US dollars for 110 minutes. So I went back to the hotel and talked to my Dad which was really cool and then went to bed.
Day 4:
I woke up at 8 again for breakfast, but we weren’t checking out of the hotel until 9:30 so I used the extra time to call more people which was so nice! I packed all my stuff after this and went down to the lobby to check out and then we got back on the bus. The first place we went was the Summer Palace. We walked to one end and then took a bus back to the entrance to leave. There were a lot of really pretty building and they were all right on the lake which was really nice. When we left here it was time for lunch and this was not like any of the other meals we had. It was a really fancy buffet in a hotel that was like 5 different rooms of food. They had all the Chinese food and then things like sushi and all different desserts and drinks and all kinds of ice cream…it was really cool. The guy next to me actually ate a chicken food and a duck head. I stayed away from that sort of thing. After we ate we went by the Bird’s Nest and Water Cube to take pictures. We couldn’t get that close because they were still being constructed, but it was still really cool. We also saw the apartments that the athletes would be staying in.
Our next stop was the Lama Temple. This was a Buddhist temple and when we walked in there were people that would light three incense and bow three times in front of the different buildings and then through the incense into a fire pit. The sign said “Paying homage to Buddha three incenses”. We weren’t aloud to take pictures inside any of the building but they all had large statues inside. The largest one was about three or four stories tall and there was a sign out front that said that the Guinness Book of Records certifies that the statue of Maitreya in the Lama temple in Beijing was carved out of a single white sandalwood tree 26 meters high. Once we were done here we headed back to the airport for our flight to Shanghai. Once we got there we learned first that we would all have to check our bags if they were over 5 Kg and mine was like 8. Then they couldn’t check it yet because they didn’t know what gate we were at and then they said out flight was delayed because of fog and the ship might not even be in Shanghai when we got there. They told us we had 30 minutes if we wanted to leave our stuff and go grab food so I found a KFC and got some popcorn chicken. Then as we were sitting there we noticed all these people we taking pictures of some guy and it was a Chinese celebrity! Holly told us that he was in a TV series and he played a police officer. We went over to take pictures even though we didn’t know who he was it just seemed like a really cool idea and then he asked us where we were form and were we were going and he happened to be on our same flight. We asked if we could take a picture with him and he said yes, but I didn’t get one. I still thought it was really cool though!! Made me feel a little better after finding out we might be sleeping in an airport.
I went back to where our stuff was and now they said the flight isn’t delayed anymore and we could all check our bags now. Nearly everyone checked something and then we went to our terminal which had switched and as soon as we got there it switched again to the terminal right next to us and then all the way back to the original one which was pretty far away. We finally got there when it was supposed to be boarding but the plane wasn’t even there yet. As I was sitting waiting Megan came over because her plane was leaving from a terminal right next to ours. She told me about her trip and she actually got to sleep on the great wall because she planned it all independently and I was pretty jealous, but I was still happy with my trip. We finally boarded about 30 minutes late and our plane was huge! I think there were about 8 seats in each row, but I guess some people actually flew back on a double-decker plane! I thought I would sleep the whole way home but I couldn’t sleep. The flight was only about 2 hours which wasn’t bad. Once we landed in Shanghai our luggage was already coming out on the carousel and I found mine pretty quickly and everyone else got theirs without a problem. Once we all had our bags we hurried to find the trip leader meeting us at the airport and power walked/ran all the way to our bus because there were a ton of trips getting back that night and that meant we would all have to stand in line outside the ship and wait for everyone’s things to be searched by two people.
The running paid off because I got the third seat in the bus. We drove to the ship with no idea how far away it was because the last time we saw the ship we were in Hong Kong, not Shanghai. The city looked pretty cool from what I could see at night and it only ended up being a 30 minute drive. At one point the second bus from our trip tried to pass us but we told our bus driver not to let that happen! The trip leader told us we may have to sit in the bus for a while when we got there because the ship might not be cleared yet because it got in so late. We got there and she told us to wait but we just sort of got off anyways and they let us on the ship and I got through security in about 5 minutes and I have never been so happy to be back on the ship. It’s weird how it really feels like home now. I went back to my room and unpacked and went back to look at the line to get back on the ship and there had to have been 300-400 people out there, it was insane!! I should have taken a picture because it went all along the ship and then curved back around. I also found out the ship had only gotten to port around 6-7pm so some people that got back early on independent trips had to wait a couple hours for the ship to arrive. After this I went to bed and it felt so good to have my bed back!
Day 5:
I got up to go to breakfast with Megan at 8. We weren’t sure what we wanted to do, but Megan wanted to go shopping to find pearls because she didn’t get any in Beijing so we went tot the hospitality desk to ask were to go and she wrote down the name of some market for us. We went back to our rooms and got ready and then went out to find a cab to take us to the market. It was really cold and rainy, but it was a nice change from the heat and humidity of the previous ports. We got to the market which was actually pretty cool and after walking around for a few minutes we found a really cool pearl shop and Megan got a bunch of necklaces and earrings. We didn’t have anything else we really wanted to shop for so we looked at the map and we saw there was a Hyatt with an 88th floor observation deck and that sounded cool so we found a cab driver to take us there. He didn’t know exactly where it was so he dropped us off and we had to ask a few people which building it was. We eventually made it there and this is when we saw the McDonalds delivery guy! It seemed kind of funny that he was delivering to such an expensive hotel. Once we got in there we found out it cost about $10 US to go up and we thought that was too much just to go up and look around so instead we went to the lobby of the Hyatt to see if there were any restaurants up there to eat at.
We ended up going to an Italian restaurant on the 56th floor called Cucina…I think. It was pretty expensive, but we had a great view of the city and the pearl tower, I think it’s called. They had this deal where you could get a three course meal so we got that and got dumplings, a pasta dish and two scoops of ice cream. Everyone else that was up there were businessmen in suits so we felt kind of out of place but I liked it. Most of them were American or British with one Chinese guy at the table. When we got our bill we spent almost more on drinks than on food because we didn’t realize it was nearly $10 for the water and $6 for a soda, but I didn’t let it bother me because when would I ever be eating on the 56th floor of the Hyatt in Shanghai again? Well I guess you never know… After this we tried to see if there was internet available at the hotel but it was really expensive so we went back to the ship and asked the hospitality desk if there was an internet café around. There was but it was all the way over where we had just been and we were so exhausted we decided not to go and just use the ship internet to book our hotel in Japan.
After doing some research on the Tokyo Disneyland we found out that if there are too many people in the park they can stop selling tickets, but if you stay at a Disney sponsored hotel you were guaranteed tickets. So we decided to be safe and stay at a Disney hotel even though they were pretty expensive and we decided at the Sheraton Tokyo Grande Bay Hotel! It looks really nice so I’m pretty excited. After this I stayed on the ship for the rest of the day and tried to catch up on sleep because I had a sore throat and thought I might be getting sick or it was just from all the pollution.
After China:
So the day after China they posted Global Studies grades and I got a 96%! We also found out before we can get off the ship in Japan tomorrow we will have to get our temperatures taken, our fingerprints taken, a picture taken, and have a face to face meeting with immigration. They think we will be getting off the ship around 1pm which is really disappointing because tomorrow is when we are taking the train to Tokyo and staying at the Sheraton and I want to have time to enjoy my nice hotel room! The train ride is about 3 hours, the only thing I am worried about is finding the station, but with most of the ship using the rail pass I don’t think it will be too much of a problem. We have our logistical preport meeting in about 20 minutes so I hoping that will give us some more information. Once we leave Japan we will be passing over the International Date Line which means we will have April 15th twice, and yes we have classes on both April 15ths. We will have a total of 8 days at sea to Hawaii, where we will only have a day, and then a stretch of 10 days to Costa Rica. I am so exhausted form traveling so much that I think I’ll actually enjoying having time at sea to relax and catch up on sleep and homework. Anyway I think that’s all that is going on for now. I will actually be able to use my cell phone in Hawaii so if you want to call me I will be there on April 22.
I got up extra early, around 6, to be sure that I had everything packed. I showered and headed to breakfast around 7 and then went back to my room to grab my stuff and head to the Union by 7:30. When I got there they gave me a name tag to wear, a blue semester at sea bag to give to a student, and an arrival and departure card that we had to fill out to enter China. We headed to the buses around 8:15 and we walked through the mall and down to the street and I was really sad that I had to leave Hong Kong already because it was such a cool city. There were 60 of us spilt into two buses and I got on bus 1. I think the ride to the airport was about 30 or 45 minutes. When we got there we lined up in alphabetical order and went to the counter to pick up our tickets. From I went through security and made my way to the terminal that our flight was leaving from. We had some time so I wanted to try and find the Starbucks in the airport. First I walked over to the terminal that we were leaving from to be sure that I knew where it was and then as I was trying to find the Starbucks I ran into Megan and found out she was on my same flight even though she had booked her trip independently. She knew where the Starbucks was so we left our heavy backpacks with some people staying at the terminal and made the long walk to Starbucks. We got our drinks and made our way back a few minutes before the flight was boarding. I boarded and stayed awake until they served lunch which was rice and chicken and then slept until we landed, the total flight time was about 3 hours. Once we got off the flight we had to wait a really long time to go through immigration. I finally got through and got another stamp in my passport which is always exciting! I’m really disappointed we didn’t get one in South Africa, but the pages are still filling up pretty quickly.
Once we were through I found an ATM and took out some cash and then we waited for everyone else to get through customs and then we got on a bus to the hotel. Our tour guide’s name was Jeff and he was from the University of International Business and Economics that was hosting our visit. We had about a 30 minute ride to our hotel and it was right across the street from the University. We got our rooms and I roomed with a girl named Anna from Texas. They gave us an updated itinerary and a book about Beijing and then we brought our stuff up to our room. We were originally suppose to meet with the students later that night, but they took this part out because it was actually a holiday so they weren’t able to meet. After we put the stuff in the room we met back down in the lobby to get a tour of the UIBE campus. We walked across the street and Holly another person from the school pointed out the dorm that I posted a picture of earlier and explained that it was the biggest in China with over 10,000 students. We walked further and saw the food they were selling that I also posted a picture of and then Jeff told us we could walk around for 20 minutes and then meet back at the lobby so that we could go to dinner. So we really didn’t get to see too much of the campus, but we tried to make the best of it. Anna and I walked over to the dorm to try and find the bookstore so we could get t-shirts or something because someone told us it was in the dorm but we didn’t end up finding it. When we walked up was saw the KFC delivery guy delivering to the dorm! There was a grocery store in the bottom floor of the dorm but no bookstore. By this time we had to hurry to get back in time for dinner.
We all met in the lobby and we walked to the restaurant which was right down the street. The set up was just like the Chinese restaurants I ate at in Malaysia where they sit 9 people at the table and they bring out several dishes for the table to share. This restaurant specialized in Peking duck which I actually really liked! I heard a lot of people say the food in China was a lot different then Chinese food in the US, but I actually found it quite similar. We even got some really good sweet and sour pork! For dessert they brought out these donut like things that you dip in sugar which were also really good. After dinner instead of going to meet the students we went on a bus tour of the city. We drove past a lot of the big buildings and then Tiananmen Square which I was surprised was right on the main street. We also drove by the water cube and bird’s nest Olympic Venues, which was really cool! The water cube was lit up and changing colors, but the bird’s nest was not lit up. After this we went back to the hotel and I just went to bed because I was exhausted!
Day 2:
I got up and went to breakfast at 8. They didn’t have any cereal or anything like that which was disappointing but they did have rice and noodles which seemed kind of strange. They also had dim sum and there was one with sweet beans inside which I really liked. After this I headed to the lobby where we were meeting at 8:30 to leave for the Great Wall! We got on the bus and had about a two hour drive to the wall. I slept most of the way, but for the part that I was awake I saw some really funny road signs that I wish I got pictures of. They said things like don’t drink and drive or don’t use your cell phone, but the funny part was they had illustrations next to them that were really funny. As we got closer to the wall I kept looking at the mountains to try and see the great wall and I finally saw it! We parked the bus and Jeff told us we would have to walk up the mountain for about 20 minutes to get to the top or there was a cable car for anyone that didn’t think they could make the walk. We would meet back at the bus in two hours so this only gave us about an hour on the wall. There were vendors lined up all long the street selling great wall souvenirs. My friend Kate and I both wanted to do some shopping when we got back down so we stayed together. To get to the wall we had to climb what seemed to be a million stairs. I regretted not actually climbing Tabletop Mountain so this time I decided I would definitely climb up to the Great Wall. It was really hard and we took a couple breaks, but we finally made it up there and it was the greatest feeling ever. The part of the wall we were at is called Mutianyu and we saw a sign that sent former President Clinton visited this part of the wall on June 28, 1998 and said “The Great Wall here is very beautiful, very grand, more beautiful and grander than I imagined” and I definitely agree!
Once we were at the top we walked up the wall to where the cable car was and decided to take it down. There was also a toboggan car that you could take down that everyone really loved so I kind of wished we did that. The cable car was still really cool though, definitely better then climbing down all those stairs again. Once we got down we bought some I climbed the Great Wall shirts and other stuff and made it back to the bus just in time. Unfortunately not everyone else made it back on time so we had to sit there for 45 minutes and this resulted in us losing our lunch reservation. Our tour guides decided to take us to a place called Big Pizza because they thought we would miss the food from back home. The place could fit up to 80 people so eventually all 60 of us got in as other people left. It was a big buffet with pizza and other stuff like popcorn chicken, French fries, chicken wings, a salad bar and all kinds of stuff. They also had unlimited soda and beer and frozen yogurt! It wasn’t the best food but it tasted good because we were all so hungry.
After lunch the bus took us to Silk Street Market to do some shopping. This place was six stories and then it also had two basement levels. The vendors would start out at a ridiculously high price and then you would bargain way down from like 1000 yuan to 100. I didn’t buy too much because I was too tired to bargain and the people were so pushy. At one point I literally had two women grabbing onto me trying to get me to buy something. They gave us a really long time here so I just left early and went to a Starbucks that I saw across the street. After this we headed back to the hotel to rest for a little bit before we had to meet again for dinner. This time we had dinner in the hotel, but it was very similar to the dinner we had the night before. After dinner we had a party with the Chinese students. They rented out a bar for us down the street so we walked there and paid 20 Yuan to get unlimited drinks. I was kind of disappointed with this because we walked in and the music was so loud you could barely hear anything. I ended up talking to a couple of students for a while. One girl told me a lot of the girls reminded her of Paris Hilton and sometimes she thinks all girls in the US are like that and go out to bars every night. I tried to tell her that wasn’t true. She said she never went out to places like this and she really liked to read. I felt kind of bad for her and some of the other students because I could tell they felt out of place. There were some though that got up on the dance floor and danced with the rest of the SASers.
After a while the loud music was too much so Kate and I decided to leave and walk to an internet café that our guide showed us that was right next to the hotel. It was only 3 yuan for an hour which is less than 50 cents. This place was huge and most of the people in there were playing games. One bad thing about the place was that people were able to smoke inside. So we enjoyed the internet for an hour and I tried to figure out how to register for summer school at the community college, but that didn’t go so well so hopefully I can take care of it in Japan. When we were done I went back to my room and went to sleep.
Day 3:
I woke up and went to breakfast again and 8 and met in the lobby at 8:30. Out first stop was Tiananmen Square. We walked around for a while taking pictures and this is also were they had a big countdown to the Olympics so I got a picture of that. From here we continued to the Forbidden City which was a huge complex that we had almost 2 hours to walk around. We got these little headset things to where that knew where we were and told us about the different parts. One of the things I really didn’t like about this trip was that Jeff wasn’t really a tour guide, he was just someone that worked at UIBE, so he didn’t really tell us anything about what we were seeing. I got to the end of the city a little early so I just waited for the rest of the group. From here we were going to lunch at the Temple of Heaven and then we were going to actually see the Temple of Heaven. We got to there and had to take these little cars to the restaurant because it was a pretty far walk and our driver had this Chinese techno music on so we had him turn it up on the drive and it was a lot of fun. We got there and it was the same style that we had at dinner the previous two nights. When we were done eating we took the little car back to the entrance of the temple complex and walked through the different parts which took about an hour and a half.
Once we left here we headed to the Chinese acrobatic show, which besides the Great Wall was my favorite part of the trip. Avi is the guy who is making the voyage video for semester at Sea and he was on out trip and videotaped the whole thing, so I’m hoping a good portion of it will make it on the voyage dvd. I got a couple video clips so I can show everyone when I get back. After the show a lot of people left to go back to the markets but I just went back to the hotel on the bus and relaxed until we were leaving for dinner at another local restaurant. There ended up only being about 25 of the 60 that went to dinner, which was kind of nice. The food was basically the same as it had been but we got to choose the plates they brought out for the table which was good. After dinner I went back to the internet café for a while and then bought a calling card from this corner store that someone at dinner had used already and it was only about five US dollars for 110 minutes. So I went back to the hotel and talked to my Dad which was really cool and then went to bed.
Day 4:
I woke up at 8 again for breakfast, but we weren’t checking out of the hotel until 9:30 so I used the extra time to call more people which was so nice! I packed all my stuff after this and went down to the lobby to check out and then we got back on the bus. The first place we went was the Summer Palace. We walked to one end and then took a bus back to the entrance to leave. There were a lot of really pretty building and they were all right on the lake which was really nice. When we left here it was time for lunch and this was not like any of the other meals we had. It was a really fancy buffet in a hotel that was like 5 different rooms of food. They had all the Chinese food and then things like sushi and all different desserts and drinks and all kinds of ice cream…it was really cool. The guy next to me actually ate a chicken food and a duck head. I stayed away from that sort of thing. After we ate we went by the Bird’s Nest and Water Cube to take pictures. We couldn’t get that close because they were still being constructed, but it was still really cool. We also saw the apartments that the athletes would be staying in.
Our next stop was the Lama Temple. This was a Buddhist temple and when we walked in there were people that would light three incense and bow three times in front of the different buildings and then through the incense into a fire pit. The sign said “Paying homage to Buddha three incenses”. We weren’t aloud to take pictures inside any of the building but they all had large statues inside. The largest one was about three or four stories tall and there was a sign out front that said that the Guinness Book of Records certifies that the statue of Maitreya in the Lama temple in Beijing was carved out of a single white sandalwood tree 26 meters high. Once we were done here we headed back to the airport for our flight to Shanghai. Once we got there we learned first that we would all have to check our bags if they were over 5 Kg and mine was like 8. Then they couldn’t check it yet because they didn’t know what gate we were at and then they said out flight was delayed because of fog and the ship might not even be in Shanghai when we got there. They told us we had 30 minutes if we wanted to leave our stuff and go grab food so I found a KFC and got some popcorn chicken. Then as we were sitting there we noticed all these people we taking pictures of some guy and it was a Chinese celebrity! Holly told us that he was in a TV series and he played a police officer. We went over to take pictures even though we didn’t know who he was it just seemed like a really cool idea and then he asked us where we were form and were we were going and he happened to be on our same flight. We asked if we could take a picture with him and he said yes, but I didn’t get one. I still thought it was really cool though!! Made me feel a little better after finding out we might be sleeping in an airport.
I went back to where our stuff was and now they said the flight isn’t delayed anymore and we could all check our bags now. Nearly everyone checked something and then we went to our terminal which had switched and as soon as we got there it switched again to the terminal right next to us and then all the way back to the original one which was pretty far away. We finally got there when it was supposed to be boarding but the plane wasn’t even there yet. As I was sitting waiting Megan came over because her plane was leaving from a terminal right next to ours. She told me about her trip and she actually got to sleep on the great wall because she planned it all independently and I was pretty jealous, but I was still happy with my trip. We finally boarded about 30 minutes late and our plane was huge! I think there were about 8 seats in each row, but I guess some people actually flew back on a double-decker plane! I thought I would sleep the whole way home but I couldn’t sleep. The flight was only about 2 hours which wasn’t bad. Once we landed in Shanghai our luggage was already coming out on the carousel and I found mine pretty quickly and everyone else got theirs without a problem. Once we all had our bags we hurried to find the trip leader meeting us at the airport and power walked/ran all the way to our bus because there were a ton of trips getting back that night and that meant we would all have to stand in line outside the ship and wait for everyone’s things to be searched by two people.
The running paid off because I got the third seat in the bus. We drove to the ship with no idea how far away it was because the last time we saw the ship we were in Hong Kong, not Shanghai. The city looked pretty cool from what I could see at night and it only ended up being a 30 minute drive. At one point the second bus from our trip tried to pass us but we told our bus driver not to let that happen! The trip leader told us we may have to sit in the bus for a while when we got there because the ship might not be cleared yet because it got in so late. We got there and she told us to wait but we just sort of got off anyways and they let us on the ship and I got through security in about 5 minutes and I have never been so happy to be back on the ship. It’s weird how it really feels like home now. I went back to my room and unpacked and went back to look at the line to get back on the ship and there had to have been 300-400 people out there, it was insane!! I should have taken a picture because it went all along the ship and then curved back around. I also found out the ship had only gotten to port around 6-7pm so some people that got back early on independent trips had to wait a couple hours for the ship to arrive. After this I went to bed and it felt so good to have my bed back!
Day 5:
I got up to go to breakfast with Megan at 8. We weren’t sure what we wanted to do, but Megan wanted to go shopping to find pearls because she didn’t get any in Beijing so we went tot the hospitality desk to ask were to go and she wrote down the name of some market for us. We went back to our rooms and got ready and then went out to find a cab to take us to the market. It was really cold and rainy, but it was a nice change from the heat and humidity of the previous ports. We got to the market which was actually pretty cool and after walking around for a few minutes we found a really cool pearl shop and Megan got a bunch of necklaces and earrings. We didn’t have anything else we really wanted to shop for so we looked at the map and we saw there was a Hyatt with an 88th floor observation deck and that sounded cool so we found a cab driver to take us there. He didn’t know exactly where it was so he dropped us off and we had to ask a few people which building it was. We eventually made it there and this is when we saw the McDonalds delivery guy! It seemed kind of funny that he was delivering to such an expensive hotel. Once we got in there we found out it cost about $10 US to go up and we thought that was too much just to go up and look around so instead we went to the lobby of the Hyatt to see if there were any restaurants up there to eat at.
We ended up going to an Italian restaurant on the 56th floor called Cucina…I think. It was pretty expensive, but we had a great view of the city and the pearl tower, I think it’s called. They had this deal where you could get a three course meal so we got that and got dumplings, a pasta dish and two scoops of ice cream. Everyone else that was up there were businessmen in suits so we felt kind of out of place but I liked it. Most of them were American or British with one Chinese guy at the table. When we got our bill we spent almost more on drinks than on food because we didn’t realize it was nearly $10 for the water and $6 for a soda, but I didn’t let it bother me because when would I ever be eating on the 56th floor of the Hyatt in Shanghai again? Well I guess you never know… After this we tried to see if there was internet available at the hotel but it was really expensive so we went back to the ship and asked the hospitality desk if there was an internet café around. There was but it was all the way over where we had just been and we were so exhausted we decided not to go and just use the ship internet to book our hotel in Japan.
After doing some research on the Tokyo Disneyland we found out that if there are too many people in the park they can stop selling tickets, but if you stay at a Disney sponsored hotel you were guaranteed tickets. So we decided to be safe and stay at a Disney hotel even though they were pretty expensive and we decided at the Sheraton Tokyo Grande Bay Hotel! It looks really nice so I’m pretty excited. After this I stayed on the ship for the rest of the day and tried to catch up on sleep because I had a sore throat and thought I might be getting sick or it was just from all the pollution.
After China:
So the day after China they posted Global Studies grades and I got a 96%! We also found out before we can get off the ship in Japan tomorrow we will have to get our temperatures taken, our fingerprints taken, a picture taken, and have a face to face meeting with immigration. They think we will be getting off the ship around 1pm which is really disappointing because tomorrow is when we are taking the train to Tokyo and staying at the Sheraton and I want to have time to enjoy my nice hotel room! The train ride is about 3 hours, the only thing I am worried about is finding the station, but with most of the ship using the rail pass I don’t think it will be too much of a problem. We have our logistical preport meeting in about 20 minutes so I hoping that will give us some more information. Once we leave Japan we will be passing over the International Date Line which means we will have April 15th twice, and yes we have classes on both April 15ths. We will have a total of 8 days at sea to Hawaii, where we will only have a day, and then a stretch of 10 days to Costa Rica. I am so exhausted form traveling so much that I think I’ll actually enjoying having time at sea to relax and catch up on sleep and homework. Anyway I think that’s all that is going on for now. I will actually be able to use my cell phone in Hawaii so if you want to call me I will be there on April 22.
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
China pictures
Here are some pictures from my time in China, I will hopefully have my blog up in the next day or two.
The University of International Business and Economics (They hosted my Beijing trip)
The largest dorm in China, housing 10,000 students.
The food they were serving on campus
McDonalds and KFC deliver in China! Surprisingly I have seen a lot more KFCs than McDonalds in all the countries we have been too. There are also a ton of Pizza huts.
The Great Wall of China
The Temple of Heaven
Here are the bird's nest and water cube Olympic venues, this was as close as we could get and the fog/smog didn't allow for the best picture.
This was at the Chinese acrobatic show.
Countdown to the Olympics!
I'm on the Great Wall of China!!
The University of International Business and Economics (They hosted my Beijing trip)
The largest dorm in China, housing 10,000 students.
The food they were serving on campus
McDonalds and KFC deliver in China! Surprisingly I have seen a lot more KFCs than McDonalds in all the countries we have been too. There are also a ton of Pizza huts.
The Great Wall of China
The Temple of Heaven
Here are the bird's nest and water cube Olympic venues, this was as close as we could get and the fog/smog didn't allow for the best picture.
This was at the Chinese acrobatic show.
Countdown to the Olympics!
I'm on the Great Wall of China!!
Saturday, April 5, 2008
I'm in Beijing!!!
So I decided not to bring my lap top on trip because I was afraid something would happen to it, but we we found an internet cafe right next to the hotel for less than 50 cents an hour! I don't want to write my full blog right now but just wanted to let everyone know I made it and it's amazing. I climbed the Great Wall which was not easy but it felt awesome when I got to the top. I'll post more when I get back to the ship :)
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