Aloha!!!!

I’m sure everyone has noticed the stark comparison between Joy’s entries and mine. I’ve never been good at keeping a journal and I guess this is no different.

Like to give a shout out to the Crown RAs who, I believe, returned to campus today. I’m not really sure what day it is. We have gained an hour every night for the past 3 nights and I’ve lost any clue what day it is.

We can see Hawaii on the little map on our tv, should be able to see the big island tomorrow as we sail on by. We had really nice weather today and even sitting out on by the pool at 2100 writing this it is warm. The warm weather means that we now have a number of sunburnt students who sat outside all day long.

Haven’t been able to go to any classes except the Global Studies class because of my hours in the Text book center, hopefully that will change after Sunday, when I will be done with the text book portion of my job for awhile.

I enjoy the global studies class but I think I may be one of the few, I’ve been trying to think if I would have liked it as a 20 year old college student and I don’t think I would have. Sign of old age, I guess, or maybe its wisdom. It would be an impossible class to teach, you have students all over the ship so the class can’t be interactive or you leave half the students out and you have a number of other faculty members critiquing every class. Overheard some of them “objecting” to the way it was being taught but like I said, I happen to enjoy it.

Tonight we had a community college chat about malaria. Amazing the number of students who did not bring any kind of medication with them, not only for malaria but also for typhoid. Luckily, it is available on the ship.

The “Aft”er hours is mellowing out nicely, students have to study so the numbers of them drinking has gone down by almost half. Though I am still floored by how much the ship can turn into a trendy night club every night. Kind of weird and I get the feeling the students see this as more of a vacation then an education. I hope I’m wrong for most of them, but I know I’m not for some. Have a feeling this trip will make them even more ethnocentric then they already are, more sure that the U.S. is “right” in all it does, and there is nothing to learn from the rest of the world.

Time will tell… night!!!!!

joe