The Pacific Crossing

We've all been warned that crossing the Pacific Ocean was going to suck pretty badly. After the last month or so consisting of almost no time at sea and at least four days in port, I had sort of forgotten what being at sea for more than two days at a time was like. Let me tell you, I miss it.

This time around, we're at sea for nine days before we stop in Hawaii for Thanksgiving, and we then continue another eight days until we hit Costa Rica. Many people consider Japan to be our last real port. Personally, I'm stoked for Costa Rica. Our last port has changed yet again, from Cuba to Guatemala, to now Honduras, so I'm trying not to get too stoked for that, in case it changes again. Not getting stoked for Honduras is hard though... there's whale sharks. I FUCKING LOVE WHALE SHARKS.

Anywho, spending this long at sea is kind of brutal. Especially on The Pacific Ocean. First of all, the waves are kind of nutty. Being in my room is really similar to being on a roller coaster at all times. I'm situated at the front of the ship, so I can feel us going over crests of waves and hear the crashing when we come down. It's kind of cool, but kind of annoying.

Second of all, we're losing an hour of sleep almost every other day. Because of this, my schedule is wonky as fuck. I've developed pretty bad insomnia. For example, it is currently 6 AM on the 21st of November. I tried going to bed at midnight on the 20th of November to get a good nights rest, and woke up at 2 AM. I was unable to fall back asleep until about 7 AM, and then I couldn't wake up until 6:30 PM, meaning I missed all of my classes, work, and one rehearsal... woops. I fell back asleep around 11:30 PM, and I woke up at 4 AM, or about two hours ago. Since then I've been checking emails and watching "Supersize Me" and "The Laramie Project" on the TV, all while trying really hard to be tired. Finding a normal schedule is a massive pain in the ass, and it's just not working out.

Third, eating is weird too, because of my schedule I'm rarely awake or hungry during regular eating hours. So i find myself snacking, if anything. Also, because the worms in my feet are dying and there's been a rush of white blood cells and phagocytes down to them, the rest of my immune system is totally fucked, making me just not hungry at all. Yesterday I ate a burger and a bag of dried pineapple. The food on the ship has become progressively less appealing to me, to the point where looking at most of it makes me feel nauseous, so that doesn't help. And the rockiness of the ship makes my stomach a little queasy too, so it's just a whole lot of craziness.

Some cool things:

We had the shipboard auction, which is a night where members of the ship can donate items to be auctioned off, and all the money raised goes towards scholarships. It was AWESOME, and my first auction ever. There were some really interesting items, everything from week long getaways in Mexico to having our academic dean (who's British) read you Harry Potter over tea and crumpets. I bid on a few things, but the prices for most things got outrageous pretty quickly, as a lot of students on this ship have parents paying off their credit card bills. I found myself getting frustrated about it, but it's ok because all of the money goes towards people (like me) who wouldn't be able to do this trip otherwise. I did buy a raffle ticket and win a seat at the ship captains table at our alumni ball, which is a pretty cool thing, so I'm excited about that.

Today is the talent show! I'm not in it, but I'm one of the people who has helped organize it and create it and make it happen. Working on it has been fun and a bit stressful and annoying, having people constantly asking if they could join after we had to move acts around due to lack of space. We had a tech run that actually went really, really smoothly, so I just can't wait to get the whole thing over with so I can stop worrying about it.

Also, I'm performing two monologues for World Aids Day, which I'm very excited about. One of the pieces is from a book written by South African youth who have been affected by AIDS or HIV in one way or another, and the other is a piece from the Vagina Monologues. We've had rehearsal almost every day, and it's starting to come along nicely.


Well, there you have it world. That's pretty much what's going on here. There's still a lot of things I completely forgot to talk about in my blog, like Sea Olympics and other shenanigans, but I almost like having a few things left to my memory and not for the people who read this to know... assuming of course, that people actually read this. Maybe I'll try to go back to sleep now.