Looking Forward to Looking Back

Hellooooo!

So we have about twenty days left. It’s a little scary, if you ask me, and no one on the ship is really prepared for what it’s going to be like to come back to a place that, before we left was so comfortable, and now it’s going to feel completely different. It took us a while to get used to traveling and being without the comforts of home, and now we have adapted to our new environment- just in time to return home. There’s a whisper going around the ship. You can hear it in the dining halls and outside by the pool- the one question…What are you most looking forward to having when you get back home? And we’ve been talking about it a lot. What we’ve missed having, what we haven’t. So I thought I’d let you all in on our little game. Here are a few things we are going to be excited to have when we get back:

First, the food- mom’s chocolate logs & no-bakes, real peanut butter, Kathy’s tacos, Doritos, good cereal, microwave popcorn, pop-tarts, skittles, fresh fruit, milk, my dad’s pancakes, and ramen. Other things we are looking forward to: cell phones (really any consistent communication with the outside world would be great!), internet, cars (being able to go to the store and get something we need), more clothes, our little sisters to play with whenever we want, and CNN.

A few things we’re going to miss: having our friends/classes/food/everything within 100 ft walk from our room, the routine we’ve gotten into, being in a new country every couple of days, seeing/talking/having dinner with your professors (even seeing them laying out tanning or singing in the pool), the excitement of taco/BBQ days, waking up to see nothing but waves outside the window, Kenton (our cabin steward), our cute little neighbor/adopted sister, Ellie, being together at the “same school”, doing homework while tanning on the 7th deck, the wonderful crew, sitting in class while a man overboard drill is going on, the captain interrupts on the loudspeaker in his wonderful English accent, and the ship does a 180, the fun of rough seas- watching people try to walk/eat/sit in class while the ship is rocking, the awesome vocal stylings of Greg and Jillian, “Gooooood afternoon…” aka Luke doing the announcements in his creepy voice, being in a place “where everybody knows your name”, being in our own little bubble-in a sort of amazing alternate reality. That’s all for right now, but I’m sure we’ll think of more later.

As for ship life since we left Japan, there has been A LOT going on. We had our second global studies test, so the entire ship was studying for about two days beforehand, and you would randomly be stopped in the hallway by someone asking, “What is the Buddha of our time?” or “What are zooxanthallae?”. It went better than last time, but we were still all very relieved when it was over. We had the Students of Service Auction and raised over $12,000. Some of the prizes auctioned off were: Joe (our conduct officer and former LAPD policemen) tucking you in with a bedtime story, a trip for 8 to a cottage near Yellowstone Park, complete with a cultural and logistical pre-port from John, honking the horn as we pull into Ft. Lauderdale, a movie party for 10, including popcorn and sodas (which we won), and the chance to be “The Voice” for a noon announcement. It was really fun and we raised a lot of money (the money goes to charities chosen by ISE that we have visited this semester). We also had the “Explorer’s Got Talent” talent show last night. It was amazing. I swear it was a requirement for boarding the ship to have a special talent because there is so much of it on this ship!! There were acts like singing, playing guitar, Chinese Yo-Yo, tap dancing, lip-synching, swing dancing, spoken word, and more. The LLL’s even sang a song about SAS set to the tune of Gilligan’s Island, and Greg & Jillian did another amazing parody about SAS that was really fun. I sang a song while playing the piano and everyone said it went really well. I’m glad I got up the courage to do it…it was a lot of fun! The play is tonight, and we signed up for seating for the Ambassador’s Ball which is on May 3rd. The rest of the time has been filled with Scattergories, long lunches, studying, and sleeping. We arrive in Hawaii in 2 days, and we still haven’t quite figured out what we’re doing yet- except going to Taco Bell. haha. We’ll see. Until then…

We love you all and miss you tons!

K & S