Greetings from the Equator!!

Tuesday at about 3:30pm we passed the 0 degrees latitude commonly known as the equator. The captain came on the loud speaker and said that because of the swells we would not be able to see the actual line, but to look for it nonetheless, haha. Monday we celebrated Neptune Day to mark our crossing-although it didn’t happen till today. Various traditions of Neptune date back to the 16th century when navies crossed the equator. People who have not crossed it by boat are called “pollywogs” and those who have are called “shellbacks.” Classes were cancelled for the day- which was fortunate because at 7am the crew came through the halls banging pots and pans while shouting. Festivities began at 9am with a parade. All Shellbacks were painted green and had various forms of togas on. The weather was incredible all day long! The initiation of a Pollywog involved standing in the kiddie pool while having green colored water “fish guts” poured on you. Then you had to kiss Kind Neptune’s ring (the captain) and bow to the queen. Before jumping in the pool to clean off, you had to literally kiss a dead fish that someone was holding. After climbing out of the pool, a Pollywog then is knighted by another person and officially becomes a Shellback. I’m actually in the middle of a cold, so I did not participate in the activities, but served as a loyal spectator. The die-hards then go on to have their heads shaved. Altogether I think about 50 guys and 15 girls shaved their heads! Needless to say, I still have my hair.

I am becoming more and more involved with activities on the ship. I am the “mother” to a group of 8 students in the extended family program- 6 girls and 2 boys. We all had dinner together the other day and played a few games. They were all very nice and excited to join the family- notably one girl is from Jackson Hole and goes to Santa Clara and another one is an Alpha Chi at Bucknell. Later this week we are going to have a scavenger hunt. Thanks to Molly and Bridget, I have lots of great art supplies to make fun signs and invitations for them- reliving my days as a fourth grade teacher :-)

My fellow Lifelong Learner Hayley and I are also participating in the Vicarious Voyage program. We were paired up with a 4th/5th grade science/social studies class in Houston! It is an alternative learning school called The Joy School. Hayley is from just outside of Houston so hopefully we will be able to visit the classroom at the beginning of June while I’m at Institute. The teacher went on SAS herself while she was in college and is very enthusiastic. Hayley and I have both been busy collecting things from Spain and Morocco to send to the kiddies. They wrote us letters the other day that were adorable! Hayley taught 2nd grade the last two years, so between the two of us, I think we will do a good job of sending our experience back to The Joy School.

Lastly, I’m also serving on the Olympics Committee and Student Council. We have the Sea Olympics in-between Mauritius and India. It is an all day long event in which all of the “seas” compete against one another. Each sea is basically one of the halls and then all of the faculty/staff/ LLLs are on one team together- I am one of their representatives. While most of the seas have normal names- the Yellow Sea, the Mediterranean Sea, the Arctic Sea, etc., our group is called the Oddies-C. I also get to attend the student council meetings with another woman on behalf of the LLLs and learn about shipboard events, plans, etc. The topic of the first meeting revolved around the problem of there not being peanut butter at the lunch service… I’ll keep you posted on other breaking news. To be honest though, I think the majority of us realize how extremely fortunate we are to be on this voyage and don’t get caught up in such small stuff.

Catching up on Morocco!!

I truly enjoyed my time in Morocco, even though it was cut a day short because of bad weather in Gibraltar. The first two days I went on an SAS trip to Marrakech and Ourika Valley and had the third day to explore Casablanca. Our bus ride to Marrakech was about 3.5 hours long, but greatly interesting. We traversed through the large metropolis of Casablanca to pastures filled with sheep. Morocco is quite fertile for being so close to the Sahara. The main exports are phosphates (for fertilizers), oranges and tomatoes. Some of the soil is clay like though and the rural homes are made out of adobe- similar to Native American homes in the southwest. The land also reminded me of Ireland in that the people cleared the field of rocks and made fences out of them. Not to brag, but the Irish made better walls. :-) I really enjoyed getting to see the shepherds out with their small herds. I wasn’t exactly sure why someone would look after only a dozen sheep or so and I had varying answers: to make sure they weren’t lost or stolen, to keep away predators, and to ensure they only eat the best kinds of grass. It was neat to see such a completely un-touristy site. Most of the small clusters of adobe homes did not have electricity and if they did, it was a single wire carried out from the highway to one of their homes.

Morocco was long a French colony and thus Arabic and French are the two main languages, followed by Berber. Arriving in Marrakech we first ventured to a famous garden of a French furniture maker. In his day, he was known far and wide for his extraordinary collection of plants- I think there were over 1,000 different kinds of plants in the garden- including almost every variety of cacti. Funny enough, there was also a memorial for Yves Saint Laurent, the designer, who spent much time in the garden during his life and had his ashes spread there about his death last June. Next we visited one of the palaces of Marrakech- my understanding is that it is still owned and utilized by the royal family. However, despite royal wealth and the many tourists paying to see it, it sadly was not well kept at all. No furnishings or rugs- the main attractions were incredible mosaics and tile work. Though it was quite impressive, it doesn’t hold a candle to the Alhambra in Granada.

We then ventured on into the Medina of Marrakech- the Medina is a large wall holding the old part of the city- probably about 2 miles by 2 miles. Inside is the biggest mosque in the city, the main square, the Souks (the vendors) as well as a Club Med and other hotels, haha. The driving in Morocco is absolutely unbelievable!!! First of all, similar to most places other than the US, all of the cars are very small- a mini would be considered a larger sedan. Secondly, mopeds/scooters weave in and out of traffic at their leisure. Thirdly, there is NO space in-between cars. Our huge bus would literally pull up about 10 inches from the petite vehicle or bike in front of us. I cannot believe I didn’t witness any accidents, but I hear they do have a rather high rate. Nonetheless, it was truly something else- do not rent a car in Morocco!
In the Medina we first visited a public library before trekking by the Mosque to the square. Non-Muslims are only allowed in specific mosques at specific times and unfortunately, we were unable to go in. The town square was truly something else! Granted much of the spectacle was directed towards the many American and European tourists there, it still was cool to see. Monkeys, serpents rising from baskets, music, henna tattoos, storytelling, dancing, etc.

We had a delightful lunch at a neat restaurant that overlooked the plaza. We dined on traditional Moroccan grub- An eggplant and pico de gallo salad, a lamb with prunes and nuts main course, and plain yogurt for dessert. The main courses are served in a dish called a “Tajin.” It’s a clay plate with a lip around it with a teepee looking top part that is removed once the meal is served. Traditionally, the food is cooked in this clay “pot” over embers- but nowadays it’s usually just served in one.

After our dinner we ventured with our two guides into the Souks. I have no idea how many miles and miles of small meandering passageways make out the Souks and I am quite certain there is no map- it would be nearly impossible to make one. These narrow and sometimes medieval looking roads are bordered by shop after shop selling anything from dried fruit, to cow brain, to tourist magnets, to local pottery and more! As if these crowded streets, often lined with those less fortunate asking for money, weren’t crowded enough- people ride their bikes and motor scooters through them at full speed. It was crazy! I can’t believe I didn’t see anyone get hurt. Our guide took us to three specific shops, where I think he got a kickback from what we bought. We first went to a pharmacy where they ushered us into a backroom filled with seats and lined with hundreds of jars filled with who knows what. Clearly a tourist production, a guy came out with two assistants and promptly put on a show explaining their products. I thought no one would buy anything and it would be an awkward goodbye, but to my surprise- much of my group ended up buying random remedies and teas. I bought a few containers of saffron to bring home, but that’s it. As we checked out other shops, I also bought a small carved wooden rabbit :-) and a very mini “Tajin.”

We then headed to our hotel to clean up before dinner. I was paired up with a student from Quinnipiac who was very nice, however I felt terrible for her as she ended up rather ill from something she ate. The hotel was okay, nothing to go on about. At 8:30 our bus picked us up again and we travelled about 30 minutes out into the country to our dinner. Somewhere in-between Disneyland and Moroccan Medieval Times, we found ourselves at a huge venue with dozens of other tourist groups to witness the reenactment of traditional Moroccan life. Although I must say it was very well planned out and we didn’t even realize how many other people were there until we all left at the end. We walked through a line of gun toting men on horses into a fake cave to replicate where Moroccans used to keep their loot. We then walked through about 8 different groups of men and women each dressed in different traditional Moroccan wear. These same groups later came into our dining room and sang, drummed, hollered, and danced for us. Our dining room resembled the inside of a royal tent. We dined on more traditional Moroccan food-Bread, a tomato salad, a meatball with fried egg and tomato sauce dish, and then a large Tajin with chicken, vegetables and couscous, and for dessert- oranges. After dinner we made our way out to a large stadium where we witnessed belly dancing, men doing tricks on horses while the horses are running at full speed, camels, dancing, horses charging and men shooting off guns and a traditional Moroccan parade. It was truly a spectacle, but also kind of cool to see as I think it was rather accurate to the old days.

The next day our bus picked us up and we headed up into Ourika valley in the mountains outside of Marrakech. Again we were able to witness locals going about their everyday lives. We stopped at one Berber home- made more out of mud than adobe and saw a very primitive, but still in use, grain mill. They also had a small shop where I purchased a small stone carved rabbit J. We visited another Berber home and participated in a traditional tea service. Mint tea with sugar is the drink of choice in this Muslim country. While visiting this home, which also had their cows living just outside of the kitchen, I also got to use my first squat toilet- enough said. On the way back into town we had the opportunity to stop at a local school. It was actually a charter school with an emphasis on the study of nature. The principal said that the poorest in the community have the opportunity to attend. They are realistic in their studies and in middle school begin to focus on trades- handcrafts for the women and agriculture for the men. In the schools, the students learn classical Arabic, French and also how to properly write the common Arabic that they first learned. On a side note- there is skiing in Morocco! We passed the road up to the ski area while up in the mountains- I also took pictures of the snow covered hills.

We returned to Marrakech and to the main square for lunch. It was actually my favorite Moroccan meal of all. We started with a tomato salad with hard-boiled eggs and olives, and then a tajin with potatoes, green olives and chicken baked with a salty saffron sauce- I loved it! Lastly, we tried orange sections in orange juice sprinkled with cinnamon for dessert. After lunch, I picked up a few trinkets to send back to my vicarious voyage classroom before we boarded the bus to return to Casablanca. I spent that night on the ship- we would have gone out to see the town, but unfortunately the port is not centrally located and it was raining quite hard so we decided to stay in.

Our last day in Morocco a friend and I ventured into town and had lunch at Rick’s Café- it’s the restaurant from the movie Casablanca. I actually have not seen the movie, but it was very fun nonetheless. Also, the tech guy on our ship who is also a fairly famous guitar player was playing there that day so we got to listen to some great music with lunch. After that we wandered around a bit, unfortunately it was raining, and found a great souvenir shop where you don’t have to barter. I am not very good at bartering and usually don’t get a very good deal- so it was nice to just have the prices set out- which were all very fair. I actually didn’t get anything there, but my friend found a number of trinkets to spend his last “Durhams” on. It’s a big deal to get back to the ship on time- so we promptly made our way back after that.
More to come soon! Love always, Rose.