Atlantic Crossing

view from my cabin

I've been home and suffering from reentry for three weeks now, but want to fill in the gaps in my blog so that I'll have a somewhat concise view of the entire voyage to share with those who ask.

So, dear readers, you might recall that we were looking ahead to a daunting 14-day transatlantic experience between Barcelona and Rio. Our faculty, staff, and students were so organized (anxious?) about preparing for it, though, that we amply filled the time with events:

• evening seminars 
• a hilarious reduced production of Hamlet with the backwards version as an encore 
• non-documentary movies (and catch-up on assigned documentaries) 
• ice cream with our library student assistants 
• talent shows by students and crew 

Neptune and Court

• halfway party for faculty and staff 
• star-gazing with the ship's outside lights off 
• Halloween dance 
• singing with the faculty and staff music club (we flash-mobbed the dining hall at lunch on a rocky day with "Wade in the Water" 
• speed-friendship-dating 
• African drumming and dancing 
• a serial reading of the entire Odyssey 
• and the highlight as we crossed the Equator--NEPTUNE DAY!

Yes, I kissed the fish. Yuck, bleah, icky-poo!

Royal Barber

and a lot of people shaved their heads

It was not all fun and music, though. Our thoughtful group created some learning opportunities to assuage the loss of Ghana and Senegal from our itinerary. We had seminars about Africa, faculty discussions about how and why the decision was made, and a very moving reading of slave narratives by students, faculty and staff as we traveled part of the very route they had endured, the Middle Passage.

photo courtesy of Marissiko Wheaton aka Koko

              

whale-watching from Deck 7