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The voyage from Cape Town, South Africa to Port Louis, Mauritius had the roughest seas so far. The Indian Ocean currents sweeping down and around the tip of Africa made for choppier and taller waves. I ended up being miserably seasick the majority of the time. A friend of mine gave me a patch to place behind my ear and wear for three days and it did really help make me feel better. After twelve hours though I took it off because the patch made my vision completely blurry. I could hardly focus when trying to read, and even long distance vision was affected. As I was typing e-mails to people back home I could barely see what was on the screen. (Sorry if I made spelling errors, but I just couldn’t see). Later I took a picture of my pupils, which were completely dilated.
The rough currents made it difficult to arrive to Mauritius on time. The crew anticipated a 10-hour delay, which would make it impossible for me to go on my “underwater safari” submersible trip, really quite a disappointment. We finally arrived in port about four hours late. This meant that my submersible adventure was indeed cancelled. I was very upset since that trip was one I was definitely looking forward to, but instead I ventured out with a few friends and explored Port Louis. First things first, we had to get to the city.
There were two ways to do this from the ship. Either you take a taxi along the long peninsula of the dock (cost about 30 dollars) or take the water taxis across the short bay area (cost one dollar). We opted for the water taxi. I thought this would be a fairly easy process – just walk to the end of the dock, hop in, take the ride, and pay at the end. Essentially that is what happened, but with a few minor details. The bay currents themselves were fairly choppy so as we arrived at the water taxi stop they informed us the location would have to be moved. So we followed the taxis as they traveled several hundred yards away. Then there was the issue of physically getting on the boats. They didn’t really have the facilities to appropriately transport passengers on and off the boats. You had top hop several feet onto a staircase that was on top of a floating dock. Then you went down the staircase and had to jump from the floating dock onto the boat. For many this was fine, for others (like me) a bit nerve-racking, and for others like my friend Ally – dangerous. She ended up not jumping quite far enough off the staircase, cutting and bruising her legs. I have no idea how some of the older life-long learners like the 91 year old could have used the water taxis.
So finally we arrived on land again and paid our one US dollar to “customs”. We then just walked around, running into a really neat market. The bottom floor was reserved as a food market with many wonderful looking fruits and vegetables I didn’t recognize. The top floor had handicrafts and other touristy type souvenirs. I should mention that Mauritius has a significant Indian immigrant population, so many of the items resembled things you could find in India. Because India was a destination on our voyage I decided to hold off and buy authentic Indian crafts instead of the Indian-Mauritian type.
We kept wandering and ran into many other stores including several American-brand surfing shops, which apparently my group was excited to shop in. We found a park in the middle of the city, the name of which I can’t recall. It featured wonderful hanging trees and interesting statues.
Another store we ended up in was the grocery store. It was much smaller than typical American grocery giants, but pretty much had the same items, just different brand names. I ended up buying some Coke (soda isn’t provided on the ship in the cafeterias, but you can buy it from our snack bar). I also bought some cookies called Tim-Tams. A couple girls in my group were raving about them having tried them in other countries on other trips - and yes they were good. An interesting thing I’ve found in foreign grocery stores is that they don’t ask the typical “paper or plastic”. Those resources are valuable and they don’t just give them away. Instead you have to purchase however many bags you want. Your two options are buying standard plastic bags – like those you’d find in our own stores – or a cloth/nylon/fabric bag, which is reusable for future shopping trips.
Our fist day in Mauritius happened to be my boyfriend (Lance) and my anniversary. I wanted to do something special provided by my distance and resources so I ventured out with three friends to use a phone and computer. Now in between each port we have a student and a lecturer join us from that particular country. The student had informed us that there was a program in Mauritius that was free wireless internet access island wide. Now you can imagine how excited everyone got at this prospect since internet on the ship is so valuable (40 cents per minute). So we set off to find the free internet. As life typically goes, we didn’t find it. Apparently the program wasn’t fully developed and you could only get a connection in limited areas for a split second. Just taking our laptops into port was terrifying. I was so worried someone would mug us and steal them, and even if that didn’t happen I was terrified of jumping into the water taxis and potentially losing my computer to the sea. Thankfully neither happened but I don’t think I’ll take it in public again.
So we didn’t find this wonderful free wireless, and we eventually ended up at a local hotel hoping we could pick up their connection. We did indeed get the connection, but we couldn’t log in. Finally we surrendered and went to the front desk and purchased an hour of internet time for seven US dollars. For some reason my computer was refusing to connect and it took me forty-five minutes just to even see a webpage. I then emailed and wrote a special anniversary message to Lance and did a few other odds and end emailing. As I already mentioned my vision at this time was completely shot. I could barely focus on any letters coming off of my keyboard and I kept on having to put my face two inches from the screen, still barely able to see anything. So basically using the internet in Mauritius was quite a disastrous and unpleasant adventure. On the way back to the ship I discovered that international phone cards didn’t work at any pay phone. I guess you are required to buy a local Mauritian one, and at midnight there were no shops in sight to sell me a card. Sorry Lance for not calling you, but I hope you’ll appreciate my efforts.
Another little interesting experience was on the way back from the hotel. As you exit the water taxi, you have to walk several hundred yards or so. First of all there were stray dogs that would pop out of nowhere. Then there were strange men walking around that would stare at you. There was the smell of molasses from the molasses storage plant located opposite the ship. But worst of all: cockroaches. As many of you know I’m a biology major who loves animals. I have no problem handling most snakes, and “bugs” don’t really creep me out either. Yet it’s something about cockroaches scurrying around your feet in the dark with unfamiliar surroundings that completely gross me out. They were just everywhere and after trying to watch my step, I gave up and tried my best to pretend they weren’t there. So far my impression of Mauritius was not too pleasant.
The second day I just wasn’t in a good mood. I got back to the ship really late so I decided to sleep in. I woke up with a headache, and my vision was still pretty much useless. All of my close friends had other trips planned, and I didn’t feel like going out by myself. I’m sure it probably would have been safe enough, but feeling as bad as I did and not being able to really see I decided to take it easy. I stayed in that day and got ahead on a lot of my homework. I finished one paper, and started another – researching all I could find on the yellow-bellied sea snake (Pelamis platurus) for my amphibians and reptiles class. I also watched a move and took a much-needed nap.
I’m sure Mauritius has a lot to offer, but most people know it as a beachy resort spot. Many of the students on the ship ventured out and rented villas on the beach – tanning all day and partying all night. Unfortunately their behavior was less than acceptable. I never traveled out to see the villas, but it was well known that the kids there got completely trashed - drinking so much to excess that they were out of control. Property was damaged, people got sick, and sadly enough one girl got raped and her friends were so drunk they couldn’t do anything to stop it. It’s the unfortunate behavior of a small minority on this trip that taints the whole reputation of the Semester at Sea program, of American students, and for everyone in the community. I just don’t see the appeal in any of it. Traveling around the world is an incredible opportunity and not being able to remember it because you were too drunk is just a waste of time. Drinking to a point is fun, but when you don’t even know where you are or what is happening to you, then it is completely distasteful.
For my last day in Mauritius I had a trip planned to go on a catamaran and snorkel. Mauritius apparently had a wide variety of coral reef fish that I was anxious to see. The bus ride to the dock took us past volcanic mountains and fields of sugar cane. Many of the shops we passed along the way were painted with Kraft brand signs, an interesting sight since my dad used to work for that company. I suppose Mauritians really love their mac-n-cheese and kool-aid.
The catamaran ride was pretty fun. I had never been on a catamaran before and it was really enjoyable just lying down under the sun. After awhile they starting cooking barbeque chicken and fed us a delicious lunch including fresh pineapple and garlic bread (one of my favorites I haven’t had since I was back in the US). We ran into a pod of 25 or so dolphins. I remember when I was little seeing dolphins from my great grandmother’s house in Florida. They seemed pretty playful and a few did flips.
After lunch we finally got to go snorkeling. Unfortunately there weren’t enough masks and fins for everybody so I patiently waited my turn. When equipment became available I put it on and jumped in the water. It was a good temperature, a little cool but not too bad. As excited as I was to see all the brightly colored fish I was severely disappointed. Instead of anchoring near a coral reef it was actually sea grass beds. This basically means all the fish blend in with the bland grasses and not with brightly colored corals and anemones. I can’t identify the fish I saw by name, but one looked like a small green wrasse, there were flat fish similar to the fluke we catch each summer in New Jersey, and plenty of sea cucumbers. The variety of sea life was not exactly what I had been expecting, but overall the trip was enjoyable. I think the highlight was actually getting to sit down with a girl from one of my classes, Kate. She had gotten married just before Semester At Sea and we talked for a long time about classes, “growing up”, love, future plans, and life in general. It seems like I have met so many people on this voyage, but I enjoy getting to just sit down and talk about our lives and truly get to know people. It’s hard to connect with someone if you’re just asking the basic “what’s your name, what’s your major, where do you go to school?” etc.
There’s a very important thing you should know about Mauritius: it was home to the well-known and well extinct dodo bird. These flightless birds stood at about three feet tall and apparently were quite delicious. The Dutch settlers found them so tasty that they ate them all into extinction. On my last day in Port Louis I went to the mall (see pictures) that surprisingly is featured on the back of their rupee bills. I found a great market where one booth was selling hand-painted dodo bird magnets. They were so cool I had to buy a bunch. Another thing Mauritius is apparently known for are ships in a bottle. I went to a store where these ships were being sold, all of which were way too expensive and fragile to bring back home. By the way, one US dollar equals about 30 Mauritian rupees.
As I was leaving the mall it began to rain and shortly after a complete rainbow formed. It stretched all the way across the bay and was a wonderful sight - a good way to send me off from this dodo-free beachy island known as Mauritius. I went on one last water taxi ride and happily boarded the MV Explorer.
The day after we left Port Louis we had the Sea Olympics. Basically these are a series of events where each sea (groups of hall mates) would battle it out for the chance to get off the ship first in San Diego. Each sea had a color and chant. My sea – the Baltic – was bright orange and our cheer went something like “Baltic-tic-tic-tic-tic-tic-tic boom dynamite, boom boom, dynamite.” We competed in tug of war, photo scavenger hunt, trivia challenge, basketball, synchronized swimming, volleyball, music lip-synching, and juice pong. For those of you not familiar, juice pong is a game typically played by college students where you throw ping pong balls into a group of cups at the opposite side of the table trying to finish before the opposing team throws them all into cups on your side. Usually juice is not the preferred beverage, but rather beer is. The Baltic Sea did pretty well in all events and we ended up third behind the Arabian and Aegean.
Now we are headed off to India and I can’t believe I am actually going to be going there. As some of you know I had met several Indian graduate students back at Virginia Tech, introducing me to a culture I just had to experience for myself. I’m so anxious to see and appreciate where they come from. I can’t wait to see the people, eat their food, and just soak up everything India.
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