Global studies was pretty much unbearable, We had the interport speaker talk about Ecological Economics. Not that the topic is all the terrible, but I have already sat through 3 Econ classes and really don’t want anymore. Plus, supply and demand curves and the growth theory is not something I really care about at 9 in the morning.
I had lunch with Mackenzie and I met 2 new people named Allison and Ashley. We had a mini-rant session during lunch about the field office. The people that work there never give out consistent information and we all just felt like they should have had more of a system. I mean come on this is the 100th voyage. They should have it down to a science, but they are still making dumb mistakes and not being able to answer questions.
Anyway, Service Learning was just how it always is. We had a group meeting afterward, but it got a little complicated because Mackenzie was late because of work and then I forgot about the bridge tour I had. The bridge tour was so much fun. It turned out that all the LLC’s (leaders like Mario) and PC’s (me and other work study) were all on this tour.
We went to the bridge and it was really cool. One of the crew members went through all the equipment and how everything works and why we should care about it. Another crew member showed up how they plot our course on the map. It was all really interesting. I didn’t realize how slow we were going. If the ship was going at full speed, we could get to Spain in just under 4 days. Instead, we are dragging it out into a week because we have to have enough days for classes. Also, I was really excited to see the steering wheel. I guess I just always envisioned this massive steering wheel, but that is definitely not the case. The steering wheel looks more like what a rather larger model car would use. While Captain Jeremy was not up there at the time, we did get to wear his hat and sit in his char. We all had a mini-photo shoot.
I met back up with my group and we finished up the meeting. Mackenzie, Becky and I then had to rush because we only had 15 minutes for dinner before the Vicarious Voyage meeting. The Vicarious Voyage is where we students send “culture packets” back to schools in the US to help those countries come alive for those kids. The program is really neat and they try to match you up with schools close to you so that you can visit the class once you leave SAS. I got matched up with two other girls and we have a 5th and 6th grade class (roughly 100 students) in Shelby, Mississippi. I have no idea where Shelby, Mississippi is or how close it is to Nashville. The thing that is frustrating is that there was a school from Knoxville and if they were trying to get people matched up to schools close to them, why didn’t I get put in that group? I would like to be able to visit this class because in addition to the packets we are going to be sending them postcards and letters from each port. The kids have the opportunity to write back to us and I thought it would be neat to go see the class.
Tonight we also had our first cultural pre-port. This is where they go over the culture about the place we are about to visit. They went over the different types of food in Spain and how much we should expect to pay. We also went over a bit of the pop culture, like music and sports. It was all run by the interport lecturer and the interport students. At the end, they went over some stereotypes that the Spanish have about Americans. They were pretty funny and included things like
-       Americans only eat hamburgers and French fries and that this is a standard meal
-       In big cities, we drive big cars and in the country we ride horses.
-       Adults wear cowboy hats and college students wear baseball hats
-       We talk really fast and like we have gum in our mouth
-       Football and beer our the most important things (this one caught a huge round of applause from the audience. So I guess we count that as true?)

Overall, the cultural preport was entertaining and pretty informative.
Afterward, we tried to get a board game from the student life desk, but they were already closed. We checked out a Spain guidebook to try and figure out what we want to do in Spain. We have talked about going to Gibraltar or Seville, but we really have no idea. We might just stay in Cadiz. We talked to the Interport lecturer about where to go, but he made us ask in Spanish. What’s weird is that both he and Rosario say that I have a really good accent when I am speaking, which is weird. Carla McDaniel would be proud. We lose another hour of sleep tonight. Right now on-ship time is 0129 and according to my watch it is 1829 at home so I guess I better get to bed.