Flight of the Fish

This morning my roommate was pacing around our cabin at some ungodly hour, and i was like, Ariel, what time do you think it is? and she was like, 8, right? and i was like, huh turn on the TV (we have little closed-circuit TV onboard that shows the Dean’s memo and the film class movies on loop and - the best part - our little map projection channel, which shows where we are, tells us the speed of the boat and our current location (in degrees of lat. and long.) and, best of all, provides us with totally free, totally corny ‘80s and ‘90s soft rock), and so she turned on the TV, and, sure enough, it was five of six. it’s that clock retardation thing, man. anyway, after that i couldn’t really fall asleep, so i sat up and noted with great excitement, large schools of tiny flying fish darting around out our window. they fly for really far, for a fish.

the last two days have been hectic and have involved far too much decision-making than my tiny brain is capable of handling. i finalized my classes AND we had to pick out next round of trips. you thought schoolwork was hard, try deciding what to with yourself in Egypt. it’s no easy task. speaking of ports, tomorrow we at last make land - only to leave it that night, but still. seagulls and islands and ground oh my! we can’t wait to get to Honolulu! we have a few hawaiians on the ship, including this one guy, TC, who ended up doing this awesome hawaiian dance for us. it took him ten minutes to say the names of the people who taught him - all the kulani and leliokalanis and such. i felt special because he kind of became a celebrity after that, and he actually introduced himself to me. he’s a hawaiian studies major. interesting. i’ve been quite reveling in hanging out with certain people - i actually have inadvertently managed to spend a lot of time around this guy Ben, who, for you Earlham people (and at least in my mind) looks quite like Christopher Richmond, just taller and with shaggier hair. we talk about random things. no worries, he will be bored of me soon. and then there’s Carrie and Diana (remind me someday to tell the funny story about Diana and tanning, because there are profound conclusions there) and Lindsay and Mike, who came together. all very very nice. and tonight i had dinner with Lara the music teacher, and (accidently) with another girl named Juliana who seems perfectly lovely aside from her lack of social awareness (she just has an interrupting problem, is all. she was very nice.)

yeah. i forgot what else i was going to say. except that the only thing in life that i want to be able to do is a homestay in India, and i won’t be able to. and that i’m totally freaked out because supposedly the seas after hawaii get pretty rough (though my new friend Nancy, whose husband is the assistant Dean, has been quite reassuring. although they might have to get me valium.) and i’m terrified that i joined yearbook staff. that was dumb.

oh yeah, and today i got to act in a skit about how you shouldn’t mix prescription drugs and alcohol.

altogether a productive day, really.