Mass Produced and Totally Fake!

The distance between Kobe Japan and Shanghai China was only two days! What were we going to do? Classes are turning into a joke as every few days we are getting off the ship into new countries. As we entered into Shanghai, the Skyline was quite astounding. Interestingly we navigated through the rivers of shanghai in roughly 4 hours before we reached the port right in front of pearl tower. Unfortunately, shanghai only lasted about 10 hours before we left! I had a field lab all day for my energy for the world class, the lab was amazing but I would have loved to go into shanghai and seen a few things! Oh well, just another excuse to come back! We got amazing jumping photos in front of the pear tower so I think I accomplished enough in the time I was there!

We went to the University of Shanghai, pretty much the MIT of the west, and we learned about power generation technologies in china. Most of china is powered by wind and water. Although china put’s out most of the pollution in the world, they also have the biggest population as well. After our lecture we went around to a few museums! The C.Y. Tung museum was quite interesting due to ISE (institute for shipboard education) originating from the man himself. He was a sea merchant who had donated a ship to start the Semester at Sea Program. Now it’s been 50 years since the program had started and SAS is on their 6th ship, the most advanced and fastest ship in the world. Due to the ship carrying mostly students and faculty and also circumnavigates the world, it was designed to out run almost anything. The MV Explorer is fast enough to get away from pirates and other things in the middle of the ocean but lets not think about that since this ship also doesn’t have any weapons other than water cannons.

The rest of the day we went to a rocket museum, walked around a little and made our way back to the ship to prepare to leave for Beijing! As we got back to the ship, Matt (one of my roommate’s) and I had packed our bags and gotten ready to leave. Matt is quite the talker so leaving on time didn’t happen, we also tired to find a train that would take us to the airport but no one spoke English to give us directions! After a good half hour looking for the metro and ATM we finally decided to take a cab and head on to the airport. Now this is where everything get’s hairy! We were the first ones to arrive at the airport and soon after Lisa and Phil showed their lovely faces as well. We ate dinner and slowly started to make our way to the gate but we got side tracked by a candy stand in the middle of the airport! Lisa and I got ripped off on gummy bears and ended up paying roughly 18 dollars for a 1-pound bag! Lisa and Phil had decided to go to the gate and get ready for boarding while Matt and I decided we weren’t quite ready to go over there. Matt and I only had one thing on our mind and that was SHOTS! We made our way into what was called a teahouse but instead of tea, it housed tons of alcohol. We sat down and ordered 3 shots each, 1 Chivas regal, and 2 Johnny walker red label! Alcohol was cheaper than the gummy bears, it was a joke! It took nearly 20 or so minutes to get our drinks and after we had drank them we realized the waitress had messed up our bill, she added two more shots to our bill so it only made sense to have her bring two more shots! I looked at my watch and saw we only had 6 minutes to get on the plane!

We dropped the cash and started to run! America is being put to shame as we sprint through airports, train stations and ferries! We hop on a rolling escalator to get to the gate quicker and BAM! Two guys are yelling at us screaming “Beijing”!!! We just watched them as we strolled along the escalator heading to the gate. As we jumped off we turned around and these guys were running towards us! We stopped to wait for them and as they approached us out of breath they told us our gate door had closed and we had missed our flight! Matt and I just glared at each other and grinned! We started making excuses to the gentleman saying that our cab had gotten lost and he started taking us to the wrong airport. Our poor excuses worked fortunately and we had gotten on the next flight to Beijing! We were traveling with 7 other people and they must have been wondering what was going on and why we hadn’t gotten on the plane. I know Lisa and Phil knew what happened and must of told everyone what we had been up to!

Matt and I had walked around for a while and finally decided to park it right next to our gate, we got on the Internet and there it was…the great super firewall of china! No Facebook, half of Google was blocked, and Wikipedia was somewhat non-existent. We found out the equivalent of Facebook, which is called renren and decided we would make a page and just mess around. Little did we know that renren does an extensive background check as to where you went to school , what your friends names are and whether your name is real or not. Mattelrajish was obviously not a real name and the system shut us down! As we boarded our flight matt and I had decided we would record our take off and landing with his GoPro camera! We had adhesive strips so we stuck the camera above the window and as it hung there matt tried to cover it up using his hoodie. There was a little Asian man staring at us at our 11 o clock and what must have been running through his mind is unknown, but what else would an Asian man think when there is a brown man with a beard and a white kid sticking a device to a window on an airplane? And yes we were quite the obnoxious kids on the plane, making jokes and being loud!

As we landed, we had no gangway, we took the stairs down, and you can smell the pollution in the air. Had we arrived in Beijing 2 day’s prior, visibility was down to three feet at sea level. We worked our way into a transport bus that was over crowded, people were grabbing my ass and other places which was very uncomfortable. As we got off the bus we made our way into the terminal and there was our tour guide holding up a sign that said “Raj Patel” we waved and smiled, as we introduced our selves we found out that our friends stayed at the airport instead of going to the hostel. I had emailed Flora (tour guide) that we had missed our flight so she insisted on waiting on matt and I, the rest of the night no one really spoke to us haha I wonder why.

The next morning we all got up, some of us ate breakfast and soon after we met with Flora and began our day. It started out with going to see the Forbidden City and man was it cold! As we got closer and closer, you could see the life-sized portrait of Mao (Chinese figure head) (total communist). Street vendors started to approach us with post cards, communist hats, and fake north face gloves. Of course me being me, I bought a panda hat instead of gloves…sacrificed warmth for a panda hat, total fail! As we made our way into the city, we found out it was closed due to weather so we did the next best thing, LUNCH! We feasted, tons of food and it was all sooo good. I don’t really remember everything we had but what ever it was it totally hit the spot! Right after lunch we all went to go see panda’s (in flora’s case it was pander’s since she couldn’t pronounce a’s, therefore Kayla was known as kayler, coca cola was coca coler etc). These panda’s we saw were quite amusing, one of them was just chilling, eating his/her bamboo and then all of a sudden passed out cold! About 2-3 minutes later it wakes back up and then decided to climb a tree where it picks out a spot to take an epic shit from above! Right after that he/she climbs down and rubs it’s but against the tree multiple times and then runs away. We were all-speechless, I was just clicking away on my camera getting some candid shots of this amazing animal, we all had a good laugh and continued on to the summer palace.

The summer palace its definitely a tourist destination if anyone ever decides to go to china! My goal was to get some sick jumping pictures from every port on our itinerary, so right as we start jumping, tons of Chinese photographers turned into paparazzi and started to take pictures with us, some of them even joined in. My one idea turned into a nightmare, I couldn’t even get a decent picture! Time to fast forward a little, if I cover everything I won’t have stories to tell when I get back home!

I got my jumping picture on the great wall, I didn’t get to toboggan down because of snow, we saw the bird’s nest and the water cube and all in all Beijing was a success without any flaws or regrets! We went to an acrobat show that was absolutely amazing, we saw people move in ways people should not be moving!

Now our trip to Hong Kong was absolutely horrendous. It started out being delayed almost two hours with Air China taxiing to the runway. As we took off the food onboard was disgusting, tasted like cardboard. They had some sort of desert type of Jell-O with ham in the middle, made me gag a little! We had landed around mid night and Phil, Matt and I had decided we would slum it at the sketchiest hostel in Hong Kong, we didn’t know where it was or what it was called but we just decided to wing it. As we took the train from the airport into Kowloon, we had realized that the train actually cost money and wasn’t free at all. It cost us7 dollars for a 15 minutes ride…it was a joke! We were pulling money out of an ATM and a woman approached us. Right as I saw her I thought she was literally cracked out of her mind. She didn’t know any English and she had lost her credit card, passport and had no money at all. Phil came over and I had told him that this girl was on crack, Phil bends over and looks under her nose and says “hey, did you know she has cocaine on her nose”. It was a bad time to laugh, but yes it did happen. Matt in the mean time was in the bathroom, he came running back and right as we told him he started laughing as if this were all a joke, unfortunately it wasn’t. We tried to help this girl but all she said was she had no card, and then she asked us if we had it. That’s when we got the queue to leave! What a great start to our evening? We planned on slumming it and so far it was a success!

We found a cab outside of the station and told him we needed to get to the Kung Ching Mansion. He said “are you sure”. Like that wasn’t enough for us to back out, but no, we had that “we are men” mentality and decided to go! As we got their an Indian man approached us asking if we needed a place to stay, we didn’t even make it out of the cab and Matt said “uhhhh YEAHHHHHH!” At least another 15-20 Indian males were staring us down on our way into this super sketch hostel. Apparently matt had gotten us acquainted with “sunny” the hotel manager or what ever you would call him and now we were down to first names like we were all best friends. We walked into what is supposed to be a 3-man elevator with 6 people; it was Matt, Phil and I with 3 Indians cramped up inside of this death trap. The hostel was on the 16th floor of a hi-rise as if that wasn’t bad enough.

Here was are in this elevator, matt is giving sunny our information thinking he was diffusing the situation while Phil and I were contemplating on what we needed to do in order for us to get out alive. A bigger guy was standing behind me, I had my back pack on so I didn’t know what was going on back there but I had a thought “ well there goes my kidney’s…Hong Kong black market will definitely love these!” We made it to the 16th floor alive and sunny showed us our room, which was absolutely filthy! Matt had a pillow on his bed that someone recently puked on and Phil and I decided we would share the other bed. There was one sheet covering the mattress, it was moist so we ripped it off along with the pillows and then we just started talking about how shady everything so far had been. Phil was having thoughts about taking sonny’s neck and driving it into the elevator doors had he moved an inch, and I was just thinking about elbowing sunny while turning around and throwing a jab to his adam’s apple. The door was an entire piece of steel with no peephole and the only way out was the way we came in or the window 16 floors up, with no fire escape. We slept for roughly 5ish hours and high tailed it out of there, didn’t even say good-bye! We went back to the ship, took showers and started out for Hong Kong.

This was the longest blog post yet and I am getting very tired of typing, just look at my pictures and I’m sure you’ll find the word’s yourself J.

Next post is Vietnam and Cambodia!!

-Raj Patel

Sake, Steak and Sumo's

What a storm! We just lived through 25-35 foot swells for the past two-ish days! After sailing in the open sea’s for roughly ten days straight we finally arrived to Yokohama. Right as we arrived, we had no time at all to see the city; we went straight to the metro and made our way into Tokyo to make it in time for the Sumo World Championship. Talk about a language barrier from hell. The only words I knew where Konichiwa (hello) shumi masen (excuse me) aregato (thank you) and that got us nowhere! Figuring out the metro when no one knows English was quite the challenge but once we got the hang of it, we navigated Tokyo like we owned the place. Food was absolutely amazing everywhere we went to eat, although everything we ate was nowhere near being authentic! After arriving at a new restaurant every meal we figure it’s all Japanese but no, its Chinese, Vietnamese, Thai food, and the everyday street food that all of us Americans are so accustomed to!

The sumo championship was amazing; we saw the last six fights and stayed for the award ceremony, which seemed to have lasted for ages! For someone who just won the super bowl of his sport, this man maintained composure and showed no excitement at all. He was given roughly 20-25 trophies which some weren’t even trophies! He was handed statues of cow’s, corona beer pictures, pots and pans…pretty much the usual household utensils. The fight was inconveniently located, as we had to go from one end of Tokyo to the other side in less than 30 minutes to make it on time for the final match. There were six of us running down the narrow halls of the Tokyo metro making the United States look terrible. We were being culturally insensitive as we pushed people out of the way and screamed franticly! I’m sure some of these Japanese citizens didn’t think very highly of us after their brief encounter with SAS kids. We went out for dinner searching for sushi and ended up eating Chinese food in japan, pretty much pre-gamed for what was to come. Great food, although we ate like a traditional family with the spinning glass at the center of the table. Food was absolutely delicious, loved the people I was with and the times we had. We woke up the next morning and split up into groups, some went shopping in Shibuya, which has the busiest crosswalk in the world and also the shopping attractions.

After the fight we had to go all the way back where we came from, and that was far! It was super cold and all of us wanted coffee and hot chocolate and guess what!? A vending machine that vends Hot Coffee and Hot Chocolate in a CAN that is HOT and ready to drink all for just a dollar. The hot chocolate I had bought was absolutely astounding! Through out the rest of my time in Japan, little did I know that one can of hot chocolate was one of a kind and I would never see it again L.

After we got back to our hotel we all decided to go out and check out the Tokyo nightlife, and yes it was a whole lot better than Hilo. To tell you the truth I can’t really remember much of it. I asked my friends while walking back to the hotel if they were ready to start Semester at Sea and how they like San Diego. Of course the next morning I come to find out I made a complete ass of my self!

Lisa, Julia, Phil and I decided we wanted to rent bikes and ride around the imperial palace. Our second day in Tokyo was very exciting; we rented bicycles for 5 dollars and rode around the emperor’s palace. The scenery was quite nice, it was a cool, clear day and plenty of things to see along the biking route.. Riding bikes was one thing, riding bikes while trying not to hit a cluster of people was a whole different ball game! After biking for most of the day we decided to go out again once more at night and that also did not end well for me, those stories will be for another day for sure!

Our time in Tokyo was amazing; it was time to head to Kobe! We hopped on the Shinkansen (high speed bullet train) and it was a very fun 3 ½ hour ride. Along the way we got a great view of Mt. Fuji and tons of snow, and I mean TONS! After arriving in Kobe we checked into our hotel and began to unwind. Dinner was very interesting, we went to a steakhouse called steak land, it was a Chinese restaurant that served Kobe steaks, our chef’s was Italian and his name was Febreeze! The steak on the other had was absolutely amazing, no chewing required! The next day I decided to solo Kobe by my self, I went back to the ship to drop off my bags at the ship and on the way back I found my self in front of a sake museum. Of course I didn’t come to japan to just walk around so I went in! There were plenty of Lifelong learners in the museum that were taste testing the sake so I decided to join in. They had all sorts of flavors; plum, orange, peach, you name it and they had it! After having quite a bit I started walking towards the hotel and met some SAS kids. They said they tried to climb Mt. Rokku and said it was impossible.

Of course me not being in my right mind had to go and say “nothing is impossible”! I took the train to the mountain and just glared at it for a good 5 minutes and then just started to climb, I mean literally scale! Through trees and shrubs, jagged rocks and steep cliffs, little did I know there was an actual trail roughly 500 ft to the right of me. As I summited the mountain after 3 or so hours, I somewhat sobered up and took in the views. You could literally see both Kyoto and Kobe from the very top. I went into a gift shop and decided to buy some chocolate fondue for my friends for when I return to the hotel. On the way down is when shit went south, Literally! I was walking down the actual path, which was quite steep, I twisted my ankle and just had the best time making it down the mountain. I made it back to the hotel and I was the last one to show up. I soaked my feet in the hot tub for roughly an hour and called it a night. In my opinion I thought it was a pretty successful day. Didn’t have to deal with anyone else but me!

The next day I had a field lab with my field lab with my psychology class in Kyoto where we went to meditate with a Zen Priest. I have to say it was amazing! We meditated for roughly 20 minutes and in that time most of the class fell asleep which is what we were aiming for. During mediation, one tries to find inner peace by clearing ones thoughts and attempting to relax the body. For the longest time I thought there was no way I can sit there for that long with out moving, or not thinking about anything but it ended up being very easy. We ended with a traditional tea ceremony with the priest along with a short Q&A about his daily life, which was quite interesting.

Anyways, that’s Japan for me guys!

Stay Tuned for China!

25-Hour Days

Hilo was a bundle of joy! The amount of things we had accomplished in such little time was incredible. It all started out pretty late with car rental trouble, which led to lots of lying, pretending to be married, having an adopted sister and much more! After failing to get a car, the agency recommended a tour company, she said for 30 dollars they’ll take us everywhere, and she meant EVERYWHERE! So here we are, sitting outside the car rental place and here comes this van, absolutely beat to hell, doors don’t close, seat belts are far from being functional and the guide was quite a character. Her name was Teresa; she was in her mid 50’s or so but had the mind of a college kid! She tried to get us to go skinny-dipping in the Hot Ponds, she has a friend that grows pot; she looked baked out of her mind and was all around a pretty nice person!

The tour started out with a trip to Safe Way for subs, and snacks, then we went on to see some lava fields, waterfalls, volcanic beaches, and chowed down some legit authentic Hawaiian food. Unfortunately most of the time it was raining but every minute we stepped outside of the van it stopped. Later that night we went back to ship, showered down and went out to experience the Hawaiian “night life”! I’ll tell you first hand that Hilo is not the place to go out at all, super dead, and absolutely no fun…Semester at Sea knew what would have happened if we spent the night in Honolulu. Although 30 or so kids did get their license taken at a local bar which was quite hilarious, it surprises me that of all the places we are going to visit they will have to explain to mommy and daddy why they messed up in the United States!

Phil and I woke up the next morning and went out to the market, did some shopping and came back with some extraordinary souvenirs! I bought a ukulele; a mariachi band will be made on the MV Explorer before the end of the trip! Apparently after walking around downtown Hilo, we decided to go to Richardson beach where everything was going down! Phil and I decided to go check it out, we were roughly 6-7 miles away and the epic walk began! This right here was the highlight of my trip so far, after walking 1-2 miles I just decided it was enough and stuck out my thumb hoping for a ride to the beach. Little did I know the next 15 minutes were going to be the scariest of both of our lives! So two surfer dudes pulled over and offered us a ride, we got up to their passenger window and they just had the most disgusting truck ever. There were also some very vulgar pictures on the dashboard. We were so tired of walking, Phil and I just decided to get in their truck bed and get to the beach. The driver started out offering coconut candy, cocaine, marijuana, and heroine.

We kindly declined all of the above, Phil almost took some of the coconut candy and I just gave him the death stare and screamed NoooooooooooooooOOO!! So he also kindly declined. So here we are on the back on someone’s truck and we think we are headed to the beach, roughly 2-3 minutes into the ride, the driver takes a detour. Phil and I just glared at each other and pretty much embraced the fact that these two guys were gonna rob us and kill us. We started speeding up to roughly 70-80 mph and both of us are in the back of a pick up truck sitting on tire wells. Had it not been for Phil, I would not be writing this post! Thanks Bro!! It was about 5 minutes and the driver slammed on the brakes like an asshole and Phil and I flew into the rear windshield, he asked us “where you going guys”? We told him yet again we needed to get to the beach. He pulled into a driveway that just so happened to be his house, It looked really sketch, Phil and I just stared at each other knowing that this would be our last moments alive. Why were we going to get robbed and killed in Hawaii? We would have been known as the two screw-ups on the MV Explorer. Dying in America would have been a joke. We jumped out of the truck and booked it right to the beach, barely even said bye! The rest of the day was uneventful, as what we had just lived through could not be matched with anything else in anyway. Hawaii was a tease!

Land sickness was just starting to settle in and here we are getting back on this BOAT. I refuse to call it a ship when you can’t even walk straight to class or get a cardio work out going to dinner. It was back to pasta, pork, and potatoes, and a good yelling from Tom Jelke. It was a monologue, not a dialogue. Apparently 30-40 kids had their licenses taken at a local bar. Yes I was there but right as a girl said the words Call and Cops we were outta there! We sailed for Honolulu that evening to refuel, since it wasn’t a scheduled stop we spent 2 days on the ship just staring at Diamond Head. The captain had decided to leave Hawaii a day later due to severe storms in the pacific, after taking a massive detour and 3000 gallons of fuel later we hit the perfect storm. So much fun, from what I heard, there were 30 ft waves and our boat was rocking all over the place. A girl in my psychology class was launched across the room, and yes we still had class. Life onboard was somewhat of a drag being cooped up in a ship, not having the option to see different scenery for days on end was growing on everyone. I along with 600 college students never lived January 21st 2013. Martin Luther King Day was non-existent; as we crossed the International Date Line a day in my life never happened! 25-hour days became routine as every night we set our clocks back an hour, in theory it sounded amazing! Living an extra hour got old very quick! I have picked up morning yoga as a new hobby. There’s nothing better than seeing the sunrise, trying to stay balanced and finding inner peace while the boat sways from side to side. I would write more but I am too tired! Hope everyone is doing well back home!!

Raj Patel

Sea Legs

Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Mpilo Tutu

The last week has been amazing! Cannot begin to describe how much fun I’ve had since I left America! I was one of the very few that was the first ones on the boat, work study students got to get on early and start helping the staff prepare for more students to arrive later. My work-study was great; I walked into the computer lab and BAM! Desmond Tutu needs help with his computer and iPad! Of course I was very honored in helping the archbishop of South Africa! I was so nervous being in front on such a big religious figurehead, I almost destroyed his iPad by dropping it on the ground, the almighty father was so forgiving and looked right past my clumsiness!

MV Explorer

The drive from San Diego was amazing as we drove down Oceanside and looked at the great wall of Mexico. The bus drivers were a little sketchy though, we almost had three near death experiences while making our way to port, almost fell off cliffs 1-2 thousands feet in the air that literally faced down into jagged rocks and ocean! Ensenada was beautiful! The boat was rocking quite a bit for it still being docked in port. I finally met my roommates and I have to say, these guys are the best! I had the option to get my own room but decided to make this trip even better by sharing this world class experience with a few people and man did I get quite a handful haha. Matt Irish and Philip Bergen are my roommates for the next 100 or so days; we’ve already settled into the room, unpacked and met a lot of new people. They are really outgoing and very energetic! Matt is from Detroit and attends the University of Michigan and Philip is from South Carolina and attends school at the Citadel! The Citadel is a military school so when Matt and I met Phil we imagined him being a hard ass. I guess when you get yelled at on a daily basis, you either get wild or keep composure, Phil has switched to the slightly wild side!

The first two days of Semester at Sea were very boring, as we had to do numerous safety drills and Orientation. I now know how to abandon ship when shit hits the fan I guess, as some would say! Finally on the third day class had started and life had finally begun on this voyage, we began slowly trying to get our sea legs, as weather was absolutely horrendous right as we left from Mexico! Kids were quarantined for 24 hours due to strong seasickness! The ship was pitching and yawing like crazy and no one could walk straight. I didn’t get sick at all, seems like everything I do works out…like a boss! The food has already started to get really repetitive, the three p’s of semester at sea were clearly stated by alumni and should not at all be questioned! Pasta, Pork and Potatoes are clearly the perfect 3 meals a day aboard the MV Explorer! After a while you just eat salad or the occasional hamburger at the poolside bar! Alcohol service had officially commenced on the third day as well, I went to the bar and the line for a beer was incredibly long, people waited up to two hours to get a miller light…what a bunch of alcoholics! I started getting very involved within the shipboard community as sitting around on a ship all day was just not going to cut it for me!

I am officially working with a company currently called Evotech, which is trying to develop a cost efficient way of creating an endoscopy machine that can be used in third world countries. The co-founder and CEO of Evotech (Moshe Zilversmit) and I are working on a new light source to incorporate into his custom made endoscope, the idea is to get more light inside the human body during invasive procedures while also trying to reduce heat being generated by the light! Current endoscopy machines are very expensive and inefficient. Evotech has decided to create a mobile endoscope that can connect to a laptop or tablet to allow surgeons to operate on women during pre-birth. I am slowly starting to work with most of the unreasonable institute companies working on artificial vision for the blind and solar powered hearing aids! I am totally loving every second of this semester so far and already dreading counting down the days. I know it’s just started but I hate to think about it ending. There is so much yet to do but so little time. We have until the end of this voyage to get a prototype built using the light source I have developed to incorporate into something that could possibly save thousands of lives if all goes well. The companies apart of this unreasonable institute program are very excited to be working with students one on one exchanging ideas and possibly creating new ways to change the world thorough social enterprise!

I am very excited to see what there is too look forward to for the rest of the semester but right now I’m just trying to soak it in and live and love every minute of it. Spending roughly six days so far on the open ocean makes me realize how vast the oceans are and actually how big the world really is. I can’t help but to get off topic in class and start looking out the windows to mesmerize the ocean! The girl to guy ratio is exactly what I was expecting and I am loving it! There are very, very cute girls on this voyage and I have the pleasure of getting to know many of them as we travel around the world! On my beijing trip its just me and five girls…what are the odds?

Yeah tons of people are pretty jealous but the same ratio also exists in my classes which I am also not going to complain about. I have met 3 girls that live relatively within an hour from my house which is very interesting, hopefully we stay in touch and meet after the voyage. We are currently less than 4 hours from the port of Hilo, Hawaii and a lot of us are very excited to get off the ship and finally have some fun on land. Classes have temporally ceased until we return to the ship, I will be posting pictures and more as I will have cell phone service one last time in Hawaii before I officially begin my International travels!

Cheers,
Raj Patel

Irish Kilt

This card came from the the guys mouth…

Well Here I am in San Diego, my last domestic stop before I board the MV Explorer tomorrow! My time spent in phoenix was very fun. Visited old friends and made many new ones, thats for sure. My last few days in Arizona I decided I would visit a good friend from my past job, we went out to a bar, watched RG3 tear his knee to hell, and met some very interesting people all at the same time!

Good Times in Arizona, now on to California!

I checked into my hotel at the Embassy Suites and got settled into my room, made my last few phone calls back home and to family and friends, letting them know I was all ready to go. Shortly after, I decided to walk down the road to the Hilton Hotel (where all the SAS kids were staying) to meet all the kids I would be living with for the next 4 1/2 months! There were plans to go to a restaurant called Dick's, don't know why it's called that and maybe I don't want to know, but after a 20 minute walk and arriving at the hotel, the plan seemed to have died off.

It’s supposedly stuck on their ceiling, FOREVER!

I finally met Kayla Hauser, a fellow SAS'er that I had been talking to for a very long time trying to prepare for this voyage. Putting words to a personality is always fun and meeting her in person was great! We all had decided to go grab a bite to eat before we called it a night and officially kicked off this semester! We walked around downtown and found a restaurant called Tilted Kilt, great food along with an amazing magic show live one on one!

After we had ordered our food, we meet the restaurant magician! I can't remember his name but this guy was LEGIT! Let's just assume his name was Bob. BOSS LEVEL. Totally a blow your mind kind of guy. Of course I was the closest next to him so I was forcefully volunteered to be his guinea pig! As all magicians do card tricks (or at least most) he asked me to pick a card, I picked a card from the very bottom of the deck, a seven of diamonds! He then hands me a sharpie and asks me to write my name on the card in big letters. After I get done we place the card back on the deck and he starts shuffling like crazy. After staring at the deck for such a long time he then snaps his finger and bam, theres my card! Yeah, my mind was blown! BUT! It wasn't over…he then took the card and made it disappear, and yes I said disappear, he placed the card on a table and after he lifted his hand it was gone! He then pointed towards his lips, we gazed at his face as he slowly opened his mouth and smoke started to come out, I was thinking all sorts of things at this point, then he slowly regurgitated my card.

He made the card disappear while it was flat on a table and when it came out it was folded over 3 times into a small square. At this point I still was pretty much clueless how this all worked, and for the finale of course it had to be BIG! Bob had us pick one last card, he then made all of us sign the card, we then placed the card back on the deck. Bob's plan was to permanently stick this card to a 20 foot ceiling so that if we all ever came back our names were still going to be on that same wall. Bob had the deck rubber banded over 2-3 times and then threw the deck up towards the ceiling. Right as it hit, our card magically somehow came out from where ever it was within the deck and had in a sense glued itself to the ceiling. After a while I started worrying, feeling around my pockets to make sure my wallet, phone and watch were still where they were before!

After eating dinner, we started walking back to the Hilton, talking along the way about the adventures we would have in the next 100+ days! Unfortunately I was still another mile away at my hotel, as I began my walk a guy offered a bike peddled cab ride, how could you refuse when you were about to walk a mile in 40 degree weather? This guy had neon lights and a sound system on his little bike buggy. It was like a pimp my bicycle type of moment, if anything like that were to exist! All in all I had a great night meeting tons of new people and possibly starting out my semester with a bang!

Expect new updates when I arrive in Hawaii next week, more stories to come!

Adiós América, Hola mundo!

New Years!

WOW! 2013 Already?

It surprises me that its been thirteen years since the turn of the century, it all started out being in the 3rd grade and now here I am a Junior in college! Most people start their new years out with a bang...Mine not so much. Although it was my mom's birthday on New Years day (which went very well) I was leaving for semester at sea only two days after! Time was winding down as I spent time with my family as it would be my last for a very, very LONG time. The excitement had been building since be beginning of December along with the dreadful idea of all the things that could possibly go wrong on a trip of this magnitude...

And things started to go downhill two hours into the start of my lengthy journey.

I started missing flights, weather got bad, 100 mph head wind (don't know what that means) and being stuck at O'hare International Airport! Being in Chicago has it's perks, especially if you have family, which in my case I did. I took the train into downtown which took nearly an hour after going through what may have seemed like the projects, I made it safely to my cousin's apartment! What an amazing view, right next to the John Hancock tower and a great view of the Chi-Town Skyline.

Thankfully Nina, (my cousin) had not for left rochester that evening, surprisingly we walked to her mall in less than 5 minutes and got some food. We chatted for about an hour and caught up on each other's lives before she headed out taking an overnight train to new york.

After spending a night in Chicago, I made my way back to the subway, going through some sketchy parts of town to make it back to the airport and then finally boarded my flight to phoenix!

Man was it cold when I got off the plane! Who would have thought Arizona would get cold? I decided to go shopping yesterday with a few friends at fashion square in phoenix, talk about hurting the wallet! Seeing the various types of stores compared to what we have back home may have scarred my mind. Who would have thought they started to sell cars inside the mall? This tesla to the right has pretty much turned into my dream car…which in the near future will hopefully turn into reality!

Only 3 days away from boarding the MV Explorer and starting my worldly travels, although my nerves are on edge, I am prepared to face the challenges yet to come and possibly have the best time of my life! I am looking forward to meeting lots of new friends, learning new things, and most importantly figuring out how Social Enterprise will change the world. Getting to know some of the brightest minds on earth has always been a dream of mine and in just a few days will become reality, who would have ever thought I would possibly be attending a formal dinner with Desmond Tutu? Or maybe helping multiple tech companies achieve their goals developing life changing technology such as artificial vision for the blind, or Carbon Nano-tubes that capture the carbon product from automotive or industrial exhaust and converts it into nano-tubes that can be used to build cars, space ships, buildings, laptops and mobile phones!

I am very excited to begin this chapter of my life, I am ready to expose my self to the world and see what I can do to help change it. I'll miss everyone plenty, hope a lot of you try to keep in touch! I will try to update this blog when I can or if I have something cool share since these last few posts have been pretty dull.

I will follow up with one more post until I reach Hawaii and hopefully all goes well all the way there.

Take care everyone!

Can You Imagine?

After around 6 months of paperwork and prep, the logistics side of things is done. I have one week before I begin my journey around the world! All that’s left to do is email SAS my transcript whenever grades are posted. Beyond that, it’s time to start collecting gear and packing up. There’s an immense list of things that need to be addressed, not to mention I need to buy my books. I’m afraid with limited internet access, my usual method of total book avoidance won’t function as well at sea. The timing isn’t very good either, as my Amazon Prime subscription just expired, which makes me a sad panda, but I don’t think having free two-day shipping is going to benefit me much while I’m in the middle of the ocean.

Soon, I’ll be anxiously boarding a plane to San Diego, and the next time I set foot in Kentucky, it will be coming from the other side of the world. I don’t know what to expect at all, but that’s a nice feeling. While I love living here, I’ve been here long enough for most things to be predictable. I’ve become comfortable, and it’s about time I got a little less so.

Also, I’m working on my writer’s voice and the way I deliver content. I don’t write much, so establishing a “personality,” so to speak, will be challenging. Bear with me.

Close your eyes and try to imagine this…oh wait, you can keep your eyes open so you can read this. You’re leaving home for 4 months. LEAVING. 4 MONTHS. You will have very limited and sporadic internet. You’re not allowed to use Skype (not enough broadband). NO cell phone (service WAY too expensive). You have only email with which to communicate with the outside world. Those emails are text only, no pictures or attachments. We could stop right there – some of you probably have increased heart rates already. Who’s going to handle your bills and run your life while you’re gone?! No phone? What?!

Now, the places you’re going will range from 20 degrees and probable snow, to 100 degrees with horrific humidity. There is potential for torrential rains in some places and scorching sun in others. There are approximately 8 different currencies involved and the risk of being robbed in many of the places. There are malaria-carrying mosquitoes and lots of food that is, um, strange and may not agree with you…I mean, really not agree with you.

Wow. You wanna stop?

Nah, let’s keep going.

You will be swimming in the ocean and rivers. You’ll be doing some strenuous hiking, kayaking, riding a bicycle over long distances and tons of walking. You’ll go into temples where your legs and shoulders must be covered. You may be walking through very unclean water and trash at times. You will be sleeping in places that are not super clean or have any amenities. You may have to use the bathroom squatting over a hole. You will attend a formal dinner with Desmond Tutu. You may be going into Universities, banks, hospitals or corporate offices. You will be staying in the homes of local people. You will be riding on camels and elephants. You will be planting gardens and teaching school children. You may be crawling through tunnels or helping build a house. You will be attending classes. You will participate in fitness classes. You’ll go to puppet and acrobat shows. You will go dancing in clubs. You’ll shop in markets. You will do your laundry mostly in the sink. You will be eating the exact same food every day for about 95 of your 106 days. You’ll be studying, reading and writing papers. You will want to take pictures of every moment of every day.

Now try to Pack!