Hilo

I know this is a little late, but sooo much happened in Hawai'i that I felt the need to split it into two posts. Hilo was BEAUTIFUL and AMAZING! Day 1 was RIDICULOUS (and in case you were wondering, yes all of the caps are necessary because that's how good it was, lol). I awoke on the first day in Hilo in just enough time to watch the sunrise over the lusciously green mountains that compose the island of Hawa'i. After clearing customs, and calling everyone to say hello (having cell phone reception was such a wonderful thing, and it will be missed), I proceeded to get dress and head out for the day with some friends. At the end of the terminal we encountered a tour guide named Hector, who would turn out to be a blessing in disguise and one of the coolest and most hilarious guys we would meet in Hilo. Hector took us on a tour of the island, where we saw the volcano, the mountains, the waterfall, and one of the many black sand beaches. But before seeing all of the beautiful and tropical things that Hawai'i had to offer, Hector took us to this restaurant named Verna's to have a traditional Hawa'ian breakfast called the Moco Loco. The Moco Loco is composed of a bed of rice, with chicken or a beef pattie on top, an egg on top of that, and all covered in brown gravy. I know it may sound a little heavy, but it was sooooo delicious! I could have eaten that all day. Toward the end of our island tour, Hector took us to another place where we had the Teri Burger, which is a regular hamburger but the pattie is dipped in teriyaki sauce. Again: DELICIOUS! After the tour I went back to my cabin to get some rest and get ready for a night out on the town in celebration of one of my newfound friends birthday. Shooter's, a local bar/club was a good time, even though there were more SASers than locals in the place, lol. After Shooter's, it was time for a late night meal at King's, another local favorite and a 24 hr breakfast spot. Imagine my surprise when I saw Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson's photo on the wall behind the counter several times. Turns out he frequents King's and he is friends with the owner. Anyone who knows me know that I have been in love with this man since the tender age of 9, so this was a huge deal for me. I got pictures of the wall that held many autographed pictures of him, and savored the moment because that might have be the closest I will ever get to him *sigh.




Day 2 in Hilo was more relaxed. We took the Jeep that we rented to a beach on the other side of the island where we swam and had a good time. It was soo beautiful. There were many locals on this beach, which was refreshing, and they were really laid back. You could tell that a lot of people who would be called hippies come to Hawai'i because of the feel of the island. People we smoking marijuana on the beach, making hats and picking up shells. If I had to choose one word to describe the island of Hawai'i it would be paradise. I was extremely sad to leave Hilo with its laid back island feel for the big city of Honolulu.

Hawai'i

Aloha

Checking in from the beautiful American Island of Hawaii. This beautiful liberated treasure is rich in culture, chiefly because those with indigenous root retain their identity. Wiki the Wocaca bill and see what I’m speaking of. Yesterday, we spent the majority of the day at the beautiful black sand beaches of Hilo. After driving about an hour and a half into the island we arrived to the tail of a winding road, in the landscape sat large grassy plateau and rugged mountains and volcanic lava structure seemingly a mile high. The exclusivity of the black sand beaches was among topic of conversation. Turtles, crabs and wild dogs gave the beach life in addition to the beach bum families who we saw crafting hats out of coconut tree leaves and smoking marijuana on the piers in celebration of Bob Marley’s birthday. We ate at a local favorite, Verna, where we had Teriyaki burgers. Partying in Hilo was a blast we made Shooters live. Now we are in Honolulu and will be making stints on North Shore, pearl harbor, the Polynesian Cultural center and all the must see spots. O yea and passport pages are on deck #shoutout to the Honolulu Passport Agency.

After a great trip to Pearl Harbor and a aerial good time we are now headed to japan

Recovering...

This entry is not going to be anywhere near as eloquent as Cam’s previous post. I am not that witty, nor has anything moved or motivated me to the point of wanted to engage the readers of this blog (I still love you all though!). I am currently recovering from being extremely sea sick. This ship as been doing crazy things, and they finally got to me two days ago. Without exposing all of the details, my stomach and I didn’t get along until today, lol. I am fine now, although I am worried about the state of the room because the rocking and rolling of the ship as caused several of our things to fall out of the proper places. I have finalized my 15hr course load, and I have all of the books for my classes, so now the primary reason for this voyage, scholarship, can commence. I am so excited about Hawaii! We should be there in about 3-4 days, God willing. That’s all for now, stay tuned for more.

I watch the sunrise

90 pages down, intense US-Sino Relations reading from 1AM- 5AM... but I drank in every page. Its not everyday you have a class guest taught by renowned China scholar Jonathan Spence (Cambridge, Yale).

Thankfully I had enough time to head to my cabin grab my camera and a cup of tea to start the morning off right. My global studies professor and two other shipmates of mine nestled down for a wonderful surprise at 6:50am, the sun peaking over the silver lining of the horizon...until that moment my world was encapsulated in the readings Liang Qichao and 18th century Sino-US relations.

The day is commencing so solemnly and the wind is anything but calm, the rolling of the waves mirrors the inescapable atmosphere that tosses my book pages to and fro.

I'm indulging you, the reader, to compensate for the post from yesterday...

Until Next Time

Class 2

I have about 100 Pages of reading to do, so this will be brief
....

Class!

I am so sorry that it has been so long since my last post :( . I tried to blog last night, but for some reason I couldn’t post it after I wrote the entry, so it is below this one. Today was the first day of classes and my first day at my work-study job; I think I am going to like both a lot. Most of my classes seem interesting so far, and I am also excited at the prospect of skipping Global Studies, lol (not to worry momma, I will still do all of the assignments and readings, I just may not get out of bed for class every day, lol). Before dinner, Cam, some new friends, and I played a fun game of Scattergories. It was during this game that the ship began to slow down and rock violently. Needless to say, we were all a little scared (mostly because we didn’t know why we were slowing down), but after we saw that the sea was rolling and found out that the Captain was turning to avoid a storm, we were calmed. Day two of classes is tomorrow. I hope I like my classes as much tomorrow as I did today. Stay tuned for more adventure!

I tried to post this last night, but the website was trippin...

It is now the 2^nd day on the ship and Cameron (aka Caramel Thunder) is tired as hell and is failing asleep on me. It has been an adventure with children thinking I’m there their parent on the flight to Pheonix, super-Target adventure trips in San Diego, and a little bout of nausea from the rough seas. Cameron and I have decided to get walkie-talkies so we can talk to one another on the ship. We have started a trend because everyone wants to do that now too, lol. Orientation was so boring, and I fell asleep a couple of times, but I am glad to have that out of the way because tomorrow is the first day of class. So tomorrow begins a long day of work at 7:30am (I have a work study job with the AV crew on the ship) and class. But at least my afternoon will be free which is when I finally plan on getting that mani-pedi! I am trying to convince Cameron to go with me, lol. Tonight my roommate and I took the picture in our room off the wall to read the messages that other SASer wrote for us (It is an SAS tradition to write on the back of the picture on the wall of your cabin on the last day on the ship, leaving behind advice for people who will be going on future voyages). There was some funny and good advice. Above a picture of the whole board and one message in particular that I thought was hilarious! Well, it has been a fun couple of days meeting new students, professors, and the life-long learners, and I know there will be even more amazing days ahead!

Finally Aboard

After a 2.5 hour journey from San Diego to Ensenada Mexico we finally looked to the beauty of the MV Explorer, our home of the next 4 months. The first day consisted of check in, i ended up signing up for a couple excursions i.e. (Theatre trip in Japan and Luau in Hawaii). met some awesome people today too.
A bunch of people are sea sick and after we became acquainted with our staff and faculty we met with our fellow shipmates.
My roommates awesome.

He's a religion major at Wisconsin, a school who is definitely reppin'

anyway, its been a long day and shoutout to DeAngela for working all day fro SAS.

San Diego at last

So I am here in the lobby of the Sheraton Marina and Resort with a sea, no pun intended, of other SASers. Many people with their families and I am trying to figure out what to do, I got in early 10am went to the local deli for lunch with a new friend Spencer, I also met a host of new folks from U-Penn, Pitt and UVA. Everyone seems really excited. I worked out, got a sport massage and played a lil basketball just to let off a little stress. The flight was terrible, Ive never had a middle seat for 5hrs. smh. DeAngelas' flight should arrive in about 20min then we are hitting the town. She informed me that she has a Walmart issue and I've vowed to be her sponsor. As my mom would say "Budget, Budget, Budget"

Nevertheless, SD is beautiful I hate i didnt get a chance to go to the zoo but hey i'll be in Hawaii next week so NO WORRIES

Packing is a PAIN!

So, as Cam said, we have two days until we sail and I must say it has been one busy ass week getting ready. This week, I have gotten my India and Chinese visas, my yellow fever and typhoid fever shots, and gotten class credit approved for this trip and the trip I took last semester. So, now I am packing since I have finally gotten all of things out of storage. I never thought I would say this, but it was definitely easier to pack for Egypt, lol. I still have some stuff I need to buy for the trip, so Cam and I are gonna make a trip to Wal-Mart. Hopefully I will be able to stick to the list of things I know I need to get, but that is probably highly unlikely because I get easily distracted at Wal-Mart, like a kid in a candy store. Oh wells, I hope you enjoy the picture of the hell that is my living room as I began packing, lol. Oh, fyi, it looks no different now that I am almost done; I would actually say that it looks a bit worse, lol.

Crisis Averted

OK so we are 2 days from Disembarkation, I JUST got my passport back from the Indian Embassy/Travisa Outsourcing. Thank God for Fedex

I ended up having to stay in Detroit and extra day, I will be catching the 5AM flight DTW-ATL-SAN

But everything is good, I'm all packed ready to go...at least I hope :-/

Itinerary

We got a request to post the itinerary, so here it is. Now you guys can know know where we will be. If there is anything that you want to see just ask us and we will try our best to post it.

We are gonna get used to this Blogging thing

DeAngela and I decided that since we aren't the greatest with keeping up with Journaling we'd collaborate, in an effort to keep our follower updated about our travels.

Last Minute has been the theme thus far...
I still need to get my visa for India and take care of a couple odds and ends (e.g. finish packing up my ATL apartment, meet with Advisors at Morehouse and find a hotel in San Diego) any tips for a brotha' let me know!

Progress comes with time and to echo my co-blogger

Everything will fall into place.

Check Back Soon for Updates

I need to get used to this blogging thing...

Since I will have very limited access on the boat, I have created a blog so I can keep everyone posted on my travels. I figured I may as well start it now so I can get in the routine of writing in it. Once I am on the ship, I will try to write here at least once a week, maybe more if I can. Please do not get mad at me if I forget to write because I am horrible at keeping up with journaly type things, lol.

So right now I am just trying to get everything ready for this trip, lol. I still need to get visas for China and India and I need to buy some new luggage since I get use the ones I have. Imma try to buy some rolling duffles, but really huge ones, lol, so if anyone knows where I can get some for cheap, help will be very appreciated, lol. At least I have a plane ticket to San Diego and a place to stay when I get there now (thanks to a wonderful person named Lindsay who I met on facebook). Everything else will fall into place. Well that's all for now. Check back for the latest news on the trip!