Still at Sea

Currently, we are halfway to Cadiz and moving too slowly for my taste! It has only been three days, however it feels like much longer due to the incredibly busy days combined with the multiple naps I’ve been taking (going to sleep at 2 AM to wake up at 7 will do that to a person with chronic fatigue).

In terms of classes, I feel hesitantly comfortable. My Spanish class is an introductory course (however there are prerequisites: prior Spanish study), and, having taken four years of high school Spanish, I feel rather comfortable. About half the class has not taken Spanish before, though, and I sympathize with the professor, who has had to—for lack of a better term—“dumb” down the class in order to accommodate everyone. He has eliminated about one third of the assignments and has even broken his solely Spanish-speaking style to help the more inexperienced keep up. I do think that they will still have a very hard time though, as it is an expedited course encompassing a great deal of vocabulary and grammar.

Global Studies is required for everyone on the ship, and it is an incredibly hard class to sit through. As there are no rooms on the ship that can accommodate the 725 students onboard, the lecture is projected to all the classrooms, allowing for students not in the live lecture to fall victim to sleepiness and conversation (I have done both). I have heard from excellent sources that the class is very easy, however boring it is, so I think I will be fine with the two essays and two tests.

Art in the Mediterranean is where I begin to fidget. Believing it was an art history class, I enrolled, enthusiastic that it would help earn me an Art History minor back at Northridge. The professor, however, is an archaeologist, and so the area of focus is more so on ancient architecture and pottery (two very sleepy subjects to me). I fear that I might be too bored to pay attention and falter on the tests, though I think the essays will be to the teacher’s satisfaction.

Socially, I’m overwhelmed. I’m very used to spending my time holed up in a bed or couch with a paper to write, so I am pleasantly aroused by the flutter of social activity on the ship. Two girls have become my staples: Jill and Steph, roommates from New Jersey and Miami, respectively (I met Jill previously on my trip to the east coast several weeks ago). Together we mock the horrible food in the cafeteria and judge all the douchebags aboard (roughly 70% of the guys). Pub nights are daily, however we are limited to three drinks a person so I have not even bothered getting a voucher (at three dollars a beer or TINY cup of wine, it seems a bit silly to me). Jill and Steph have schemed to sneak alcohol to their rooms (by filling their water bottles with the wine and saving it for several days), but as a very rare drinker, I have chosen not to partake.

Four days until Cadiz! See you then (perhaps I will post some pictures as well).