casual lunch

Hello!  It’s been a good day so far. I woke up absolutely exhausted from staying up late last night blogging/studying so I’m laying in bed now, but it’s been an interesting enough day so far that I figured I would swing through and write a little bit before I forget. 

Meal time on the ship is pretty consistent… everyone is usually so hungry by the time a meal starts that we all eat right at the beginning (with the exception of breakfast – most people skip it but I wake up around 7:30 every morning to have coffee and a croissant).  We have a crew of about 15 so no one is ever sitting alone and we always have either three tables or multiple seating’s.  On occasion, however, there will be breaks in the routine that make it more interesting.

One of my favorite memories here that I have previously forgotten to write about was a week or two ago when Aidan, D and I were sitting by ourselves for some reason.  A life-long learning couple, Betty and Boyd, came to sit with us.  Betty and Boyd are arguably the oldest people on the ship.  I’m not sure of their exact ages but during an assembly when someone described the ages of shipboard participants as “5-80” Boyd yelled out “some of us are older than that!”  They are the sweetest couple, always sitting in on classes, going to the front row during assemblies and talking to participants.

On this particular day that my friends and I were sitting alone they hobbled over to our table and asked “Do you mind if a few old people sit with you?”  We quickly made room for them and started with the typical introductions.  After talking for about 15 minutes, Boyd took off his glasses and started tearing up.  He looks at us and says “What is the process this ship goes through to get you specific young people here?  This is the most open, intelligent, socially conscious group of young people and we feel so lucky to be here.  I just…  I can’t believe it.” He didn’t finish what he was saying because Betty told him to “dry it up” or something to that effect but it was incredibly sweet and I definitely left lunch that day crying as well.  What is also interesting to me is that there aren’t very many “normal” students on the trip on paper… I am absolutely one of the most normal ones in terms of no disciplinary problems, get good grades, went right into college, etc.  There are many unconventional students who have been on Wilderness or who have transferred schools or are on probation (from school) and so many other things, yet everything Boyd said is true about a large part of the student body.  It isn’t always the people who are great on paper that end up making a difference, it’s the people with the intelligence and the motivation to question things whether or not authority deems that acceptable.

Today, I had a different experience at lunch. D, Andrew and I walked in to the dining room and began getting food and within a minute two “waiters” (the people who clear dishes, hand out juice, etc.) appeared on either side of me, once asking if I wanted to sit with the captain and the other already carrying my plate to his table. I’m not sure if it was because I was wearing a dress, have a happy disposition or just timing, but five minutes later D and I were sitting on either side of Captain Jeremy at a 16 person table having water poured for us, warm rolls set in baskets in front of us and napkins placed across our laps.  The table began to fill out and we started talking to Captain Jeremy.  I have never spoken to him before because he’s the captain…duh. I always assumed we shouldn’t waste his time with small talk and that he had serious matters he had to deal with. Turns out he just wanted to hang out!  Apparently he comes down to the dining room sometimes to sit with students and get to know them.  We ended up sitting for about an hour, talking about travel, soccer, school, the boat, and various other things that came up.  We had him clear up some rumors that we’ve heard as he’s been sailing the MV Explorer for six years (no one ever snuck a monkey on but monkeys have climbed on in India and someone did try to touch the water by tying bed sheets together and climbing down them) and filled him in on the new rumors that were going around the boat.  The meal went on through coffee and dessert until all of the students had to leave for various reasons. Andrew, D and I were the last ones left.  Captain Jeremy stood up, shook our hands and said “Now that you know me, feel free to come talk to me anytime.  Don’t be shy!  Well… I guess I’ll go do some paperwork now, or something…”

While nothing mind blowing happened, it was awesome getting to hang out with the Captain of the ship who has spent his entire life at sea.  He’s been a master Captain since the 80’s and has traveled the entire world.  The fact that he made an effort to come down to the student dining room and eat with students for the sole purpose of getting to know them I found incredible.  One of my favorite things about the ship is that the majority of the people highest in command go out of their way to shatter the illusion that they are powerful and out to get students, and instead make it clear that they are here for the purpose of enriching our experience and that they respect us.

That being said, there are a few lower level people on power trips that have been going out of their way to get people in trouble over stupid matters but I won’t get into that because I don’t like them and they are not even worth writing two more words about in my blog.   I had my first test this morning in World Religions and I think it went really well! Going over my notes afterwards I think I only missed 2 questions (out of 30) and both of my answers were extremely close so I still feel confident that I learned the information. The test today was about Indiginous religions, “new” religious like Rastafarianism and Voodoo and Judaism.  Surprisingly, Judaism gave me the most trouble! Probably because I didn’t focus quite as much on it and it was the only religion with specific dates and that threw me off (one of the questions I got wrong was “What happened in 586 BCE?” I put “destruction of the second temple,” and it was “destruction of the first temple. Silly me!).  Not too much else is going on. Just kind of kicking it until class at 4:15 and I’m going to try to ACTUALLY get a full night of sleep tonight.  I need to wake up early tomorrow to go to Clinic hours to interview some of the medical staff for a beat I’m writing because sadly I have class during the afternoon clinic hours. Oh well, as I said earlier I like getting up early.

That’s all! Hope everyone is having a great day!
J