Bali III.

I didn't go.

Bali Take Two.

So back to Bali.

When I was on the way to Egypt earlier in the Summer I flipped out. Catching me on the way back to my seat, between my hiccups and sobs, the flight attendent asked me if this was my first flight. I told her that I used to fly internationally two or three times a year and had never had this kind of reaction before. That I had no idea how or even exactly when I lost my mind. That I had felt the weeks before this flight, a sense of impending doom that made my entire body want to revolt in any way possible... And she asked me why I did it, and the only possible response I could croak was, "Because I ought to. I need to."

When I was in highschool I wrote one of my long-gone college essays on my love of flying. I loved how at peace I felt so far above and away from my regular life. It's hard for people to have expectations of you, of the things you ought to be and ought to do when you are 30,000 miles above the ground. Hurdling through the air there is only so much control you have over your own life and the rare opportunity to deny that responsibility, to relenquish all power and surrender yourself, was something I cherished. I've always been in my own head. Like some nuerotic mumbling kid I have the tendancy to mull things over and over and over before acting on them - as a result of this I sometimes completely flip out and do things without any thought at all. Maybe as a result to get some slippery grasp on that feeling I used to love so much I got my nose pierced, went to Spain alone, got a prison tattoo at 13, and kissed a hobo. It's a fucked up system I know.

I am aware that I lead a priviledged life. I am thankful. Really I am. However I am stuck here. For whatever reason, I now hate that feeling while flying. I am so frightened by my own lack of power while flying I imagine myself crumbling apart the whole time... Maybe this is why I can't stand flying anymore, right when I started to feel that lack of control encroach upon my normal life (transfering, having trouble at CNU, feeling alone, ect. ) that powerlessness became to common and all-together too real... Now I dont know how to get back to that place. Being a religion major I pretty much spend all my time devoted to that study, of the kind of submission of will that God requires to believe. The ability to let something slip from your hands (whether it ever really existed there at all or not) is a dangerously frightening thing...

Port Info.

TO MAIL ME:
It is recommended to send international mail at least two weeks in advance preferably via courier. Do not send currency, food or
medicine. Sending packages is not recommended because of customs restrictions and/or duty charges (as a result, packages are not always
received by the intended recipient onboard). ISE is not responsible for any mail not delivered to the recipient. The port agent in each country is
able return it to the sender at the sender’s own cost. Please address mail to participants as follows:

MV Explorer – Spring 2009 Voyage
Attn: Name of Recipient
Port Agent Address (from list below)

+ Port: Cadiz, SPAIN
Arrive: Jan 28, 0800
Depart: Feb 01, 2000

Address of port agent:
Perez Y CIA S.L.
C/ Ecuador, 2
11007 Cadiz, SPAIN

Suggested airmail date: Jan 14
Phone: 34 956 276 112
Fax: 34 956 276 766

+ Port: Casablanca, MOROCCO
Arrive: Feb 02, 0800
Depart: Feb 05, 2000


Address of port agent:
LASRY MAROC S.A.
Avenue des Far
20000 Casablanca, MAROC

Suggested airmail date: Jan 18th
Phone: 212 61 29 8894
Fax: 212 22 484793

+ Port: Walvis Bay, NAMIBIA
Arrive: Feb 14, 0800
Depart: Feb 16, 2000

Address of port agent:
OCEAN LINER SERVICES
The Maritime Building
2 Third Street / PO Box 4
Walvis Bay, REPUBLIC OF NAMIBIA

Suggested airmail date: Jan 31
Phone: 264 64 201 2200
Fax: n/a

+ Port: Cape Town, SOUTH AFRICA
Arrive: Feb 18, 0800
Depart: Feb 22, 2000
Suggested Airmail date: Feb 4

Address of port agent:
JOHN T. RENNIE & SONS
19th Floor
No.1 Thibault Square
8001 Cape Town, SOUTH AFRICA

Phone: 27 21 419 8660
Fax: 27 21 413 0290


+ Port: Louis, MAURITIUS
Arrive: Feb 27, 0800
Depart: Feb 27, 2200
Suggested airmail date: Feb 13
Address of port agent:
Ireland Blyth Limited
Shipping Operations Department
No 6 Dr Ferriere Street
Port Louis, MAURITIUS

Phone: 230 202 70 40
Fax: 230 208 5814

+ Port: Chennai, INDIA
Arrive: March 05, 0800
Depart: March 09, 2000
Suggested airmail date: Feb 19

Address of port agent:
J. M. Baxi & Co.
3rd Floor, Clive Battery Complex
4 & 4A, Rajaji Salai
Chennai 600 001, INDIA

Phone: 91 44 252 12032
Fax: 91 44 252 43813

+ Port: Bangkok, THAILAND
Arrive: March 15, 0800
Depart: March, 2000
Suggested airmail date: Feb 27

Address of port agent:
19 OIA GLOBAL LOGISTICS (THAILAND) Ltd
1168 / 20 - 4th Floor
Lumpini Tower Rama 4 Road
Thungmahamek, Sathorn
BANGKOK 10120, THAILAND

Phone: 66 2 285 6880
Fax: 66 2 285 6686

+ Port: Ho Chi Minh City, VIETNAM
Arrive: March 22, 0800
Depart: March 27, 0600
Suggested airmail date: March 6

Address of port agent:
General Forwarding Agency
5th Floor Osic Building
8 Nguyen Hue Avenue
D. 1, Ho Chi Minh City, VIETNAM

Phone: 84 8 825 7996
Fax: 84 8 824 2996

+ Port: HONG KONG
Arrive: March 29, 0800
Depart: March 30, 2000
Suggested airmail date: March 13

Address of port agent:
Inchcape Shipping Services (HK) Ltd.
Units 1802-1805, 18th Floor
N° 3 Lockhart Road
Wanchai, HONG KONG – CHINA

Phone: 852 2786 1155
Fax: 852 2744 3240

+ Port: Shanghai, CHINA
Arrive: April 02
Depart: April 03
Suggested airmail date: March 19

Address of port agent:
Penavico Shanghai
3/F 13 Zhong Shan Road (E 1)
Shanghai 200002, P.R. CHINA

Phone: 86 21 6323 1350
Fax: 86 21 6329 1519

+ Port: Kobe, JAPAN
Arrive: April 06, 0800
Depart: April 07, 2000
Suggested airmail date: March 23

Address of port agent:
Inchcape Shipping Services (Japan) Ltd.
Kenryu Bldg, Room 502
6, Kaigan-dori, Chuo-ku
Kobe-shi, Hygo-ken 650-0024, JAPAN

Phone: 81 78 391 3046
Fax: 81 78 391 3105

+ Port: Yokohama, JAPAN
Arrive: April 09 , 0800
Depart: April 10, 2000
Suggested airmail date: March 26

Address of port agent:
INCHCAPE SHIPPING SERVICES
2F Asahi Seimei Yokohama Honcho Bldg
36, 4-Chome Honcho, Naka-ku
Yokohama-shi, Kanagawa-ken 231-0005, JAPAN

Phone: 81 45.201 6991
Fax: 81 45.212 1614

+Port: Honolulu, HAWAII
Arrive: April 19, 0600
Depart: April 20, 2000
Suggested airmail date: April 3

Address of port agent:
Inchcape Shipping Services
521 Ala Moana Blvd.
Suite 256
Honolulu, HI 96813

Phone: 1 808 599 8604
Fax: 1 808 599 1950

+Port: Puerto Quetzal, Guatemala
Arrive: April 28, 1100
Depart: April 30, 2000
Suggested airmail date: April 14

Address of port agent:
Transoceanicas S.A.
Modulo #208
Nuevo Edificio de Servicios Auxiliares II
Puerto Quetzal, Escuintla, GUATEMALA, C.A.

Phone: 502 7881 2325
Fax: 502 7881 1319



Arrival/departure times are listed above in local times. Based on Eastern Standard Time, the time on-ship is behind by the number of hours listed below:
Spain: +6 hours Morocco: +5 hours Namibia: +7 hours South Africa: +7 hours Mauritius: + 10 hours India: +10.5 hours
Thailand: +11 hours Vietnam: +11 hours China: +12 hours Japan: +13 hours Hawaii: -6 hours Guatemala: -2 hours

Things Will Be Different.

Professor Robert Fessler, end of the Fall 2001 Voyage: "You're going home. No you're not. At least...not to the home that you left in January. When you get off the ship in Miami, you are going to know that. You already know it in your head, but when you get off the ship in Miami, you are going to know it in your bones. You are going to feel it in your skin. The world that you left behind isn't there any more.

There's a story that I like to tell my students about a fish in a fishbowl. There is a way in which a fish swimming around in a fishbowl knows nothing at all about water...because water is so much a part of the fish's life. It is surrounded by water...it is embedded in water. In that sense, the fish does not really KNOW water. If you want the fish to really understand water, you have to take the fish out of the fishbowl and say, "Look, that's water". Now if you put the fish back in...the water doesn't look the same any more. Well, in a certain sense, we've all been taken out of our fishbowls. You've been out of your fishbowl for three and a half months. Now you have to go back. It may not happen to you immediately. Caught up in the excitement of seeing your friends and your relatives...it may take a day. Maybe a week. But sooner or later there is going to be a moment. It might happen to you at the airport. It might happen to you in your hotel room. Maybe not until you get home. But sooner or later there is going to be a moment when you realize that the world just doesn't "fit" the way it fit before.

Many of your friends...even your good friends...are going to seem suddenly...strangely...stupid. You will want to talk about...India. And they will say, "Yeah, right. That sounds great". And somehow, that is just not going to be enough. And you'll say, "Yes, but I was in Chennai...let me tell you... the smells...the colors...and the babies... Let me tell you about the babies!". And your friends will say, "Uh huh." And you will watch their eyes glaze over as they smile and nod and glance over your shoulder. So you will try Japan. "You know, I was in Japan! I was in Japan right after the September 11, 2001, tragedy, and people comforted me, after we had bombed them years before. Can you believe that? I was in Japan!" And your friends will say, "Oh".And then your friends will suddenly get enthusiastic again as they begin to tell you all the things you missed while you were away. Like that big party...where everybody threw up on each other. And that really funny episode of Ally McBeal. And they will start telling you some of the lines...and laughing as they are telling them to you. And you will be crawling out of your skin.

And you will say, "But I saw beggars! I saw children begging! Did know that parents sometimes actually maim their kids to make them better beggars?". And your friends will say, "Awesome". And you will know that they don't get it. In fact, you might even begin to wonder if some of your friends really know what it means for something to be...awesome. Seeing a sunset while walking along a beach in the Seychelles Islands... that's awesome. Watching the ship crash through the great waves and have splashes of white and blue...that's awesome. Seeing the Great Wall zigzag off across the mountains into the mist...that's awesome. That big party you missed... isn't.

And you are going to hear yourself sounding pretentious. You won't FEEL pretentious, but you are going to hear yourself SOUNDING pretentious. You know, here on the ship, if you are sitting around with one of your friends or your roommate and you start a sentence like, "One night in Ho Chi Minh I was taking a cyclo back from the War Atrocities Museum....". That doesn't sound odd...here. But can't you just see your friends back home rolling their eyes? You are going to have to choose between sounding pretentious...and being silent. An you are going to long to be back here with us...where you can be normal.

And maybe you have a relationship back there. An important one. One that seemed really comfortable and promising...back in September. Oh boy! All those letters you wrote? Or didn't write? Some of them maybe feeling a little forced as you wrote them? Tht relationship might not feel right any more. Like an old pair of jeans that's all broken in, but out of style. And you think, "I just can't wear this any more."

Many of you have become independent on this voyage. Much more genuinely concerned about the world. About other people. Stronger. Braver. BETTER than you were in September. And the life that you had planned for yourself may not be big enough any more. You might be thinking about changing directions. A new major. A new career. Maybe even a new country. Who are you going to talk to? How are they going to understand?There are a thousand litle ways that the world is just not going to fit any more. And a thousand little reminders that it doesn't fit. WORDS are not going to seem the same. You will hear the word, "Havana City". Havana City is a place now...it's no longer just a word. Vancouver. It all comes back. It's not just a word. How could you posibly have imagined, back in September, that you would spend the rest of your life smiling whenever you heard the phrase, "plate tectonics"?

The world is never going to be the same again.So what do you do? Well, I think one of the things that you have to do is to forgive your friends. Looking at your pictures...listening to your stories...is not the same as having been th ere. You know that. You've looked at people's vacation pictures before. You know that pictures can't capture the experience. They are going to be looking at it and listening to it...you've lived it. It has changed you ...it hasn't changed them. So you have to be a little patient with them. You have to be a little forgiving if they don't quite get it.

But I think that you can only do that if they are willing to let you be the person you have become. It is not the places you have been to...and it is not the things that you have done that have to be shared. It is who you have become that has to be shared. You don't have to find people who have been around the world to understand you, but you have to find people to understand you. And if your old friends won't let you be the person you have become...get rid of them. Make new friends.

There are plenty of people out there. And I'll give you a good suggestion. You know those foreign students on your campus? Those strange people with the accents? You see them wandering around confused and not knowing what building to go into. Been there. Done that. Go talk to them.There are a lot of people out there who can confirm who you are ...and who you are becoming. Even if that is not clear to you now. In many ways, the person you will be six months from now is still brewing ...still developing right outside of consciousness. You don't know yet how much you have changed. And you won't know that for another six months or a year.

Other people who have been up here have suggested that you might want to try action. Find a cause...something that you believe in... and work for it. I agree with that. I think that's a good idea. But I am not worried about you. I don't think that you need to be urged to do that...you don't even need to be reminded to do that. I think you are going to HAVE to do that in order to feel at home. If the world does not fit any more, then you have to create a world for yourself that does fit...a place where you can feel at home.

I have been on this trip before...and gone home. So has Les... and Elaine...and Milt [academic deans]. We have all been taken out of our fishbowls and put back in again. And I think I can speak for all of them when I say ...come on in, the water's fine."

New Itinerary!

Also I forgot to mention that the itinerary was changed due to piracy concerns, here's the new one:


Nassau, Bahamas Departs:
Monday
19 January
1700

Cadiz, Spain
Arrive Depart
Wednesday Saturday
28 January 31 January
0800 2000


Casablanca, Morocco
Arrive Depart
Monday Thursday
02 February 05 February
0800 2000


Walvis Bay, Namibia
Arrive Depart
Saturday Monday
14 February 16 February
0800 2000


Cape Town, South Africa
Arrive Depart
Wednesday Sunday
18 February 22 February
0800 2000


Port Louis, Mauritius
Arrive Depart
Friday Friday
27 February 27 February
0800 2200


Chennai, India
Arrive Depart
Thursday Monday
05 March 09 March
0800 2000


Laem Chabang (Bangkok), Thailand
Arrive Depart
Sunday Thursday
15 March 19 March
0800 2000


Ho Chi Minh City, Viet Nam
Arrive Depart
Sunday Friday
22 March 27 March
0800 0600


Hong Kong/Shanghai, China
Arrive Depart
Sunday Friday
29 March 03 April
0800 2000


Kobe/Yokohama, Japan
Arrive Depart
Monday Friday
06 April 10 April
0800 2100


(Cross International dateline, add one day)


Honolulu, Hawaii, USA
Arrive Depart
Sunday Monday
19 April 20 April
0600 2000


Puerto Quetzal, Guatemala(Antigua, Guatemala City)
Arrive Depart
Tuesday Thursday
28 April 30 April
1100 2000


(Transit Panama Canal - Sunday, 03 May)


Fort Lauderdale, Florida, USA
Arrive
Wednesday
06 May
0800

Bali.

So the plane from Singapore to Bali we were trying to catch was blocked by United so now we're leaving on Monday. As of now the flight plan is Dulles to New York (1.5 hours), NY to Beijing (12 hours), Beijing to Singapore (6 hours), and then Singapore to Bali (3 hours.) Pretty much non-stop. I'm still geeking out; I keep waffling back and forth whether I'll go or not... I mean, it's ridiculous that I wouldn't considering it's a chance to see a country where Hinduism, Chinese philosophy, and Islam all meld together in a completely unique place that'd be really influential in the kind of work I wanna do after college (not to mention will look really impressive on a peace corps application...) I'm going to have to travel which means I'm going to have to fly. I'm going to have to suck it up.

And yet there's this completely irrational terror, this panic that wells up inside my brain and makes me want to simultaniously run around the cabin foaming at the mouth and cry hysterically. I worry that at some point during all these flights I'm just going to flip out and be one of those completely nuts people who have to be emergency sedated on the plane... The whole thing is just weird... I mean I used to fly internationally three times a year. When we flew to New Zealand I pretty much just relaxed and slept the whole time - whatever changed happened so suddenly and I have no idea why.

I don't know. I realize it's ridiculous. I don't want to miss out on all the amazing things Indonesia has to offer but at the same time it seems so strange that I would fly all the way to South East Asia for two weeks just to come home for a week and then leave again (to eventually end up back in S. E. Asia!) for four whole months.

I think another part of it, however irrational, is that I feel like missing out on the Canada trip would mean a lost opportunity to have another adventure with the theme unit friends. I mean I know I'm going to be living with them next year and that I could call or write them anytime but I'm also leaving at what feels like the worst time... I know I'm going to miss everyone so much and while I'm ridiculously excited about this trip I worry everything will be different once I get back. It's inevitable that I will change and that they will too, but this semester was so great I worry I'll be an outsider after seven months apart.

Anyways... I am leaning towards going. I am hoping I can get over it and enjoy myself like I want to. It's such a weird thing to do before SAS though, in one sense it's like this awesome relaxing get away and in another sense it's also like a ridiculous whirwind adventure that I'm not sure I need since I feel so ill-prepared for the semester abroad anyways... Who knows. I'm in my head enough since coming back that sitting home alone for two weeks - especially during the holiday season - without any family on either side around, could only be bad for me.

I miss all my NoVA friends. I miss feeling like I knew the direction of my own life... I've been feeling kind of shitty about myself lately and everything is up in the air; it's exciting and really frightening all at once...