never forget

Sunday, September 11, 2011 (1:13pm) - Atlantic Ocean

first off, i can't believe it's been 10 years since 9/11. i am so humbled and grateful to be on this trip around the world right now, and cannot be more proud to be an american. we had a ship-wide moment of silence about a half hour ago and down in tymitz square there is a wall of remembrance where you can write your memories or thoughts about today. 10 years ago today, i was in mr. keeley's 5th grade class at st. james... and now i'm aboard the mv explorer sailing around the world. crazy.

in lighter news, we are getting ever closer to the equator. we've been in the tropics for about 2 days now which means it is HOT outside. so yesterday after global studies, i went to the pool deck and laid out. so nice! only downer was having to cut it short cus i had to go to work. some things never change.

yesterday was also the first time we met our extended families. extended families consist of "parents" which are staff or professors on the ship, and "siblings" which are other voyagers. some families also get lifelong learners as "grandparents." it's supposed to act as a shipboard family, and just a different group of people that you know and get together with every so often. all the sas alumni told me to sign up, so brewer and i did. so we were scheduled to meet our families for dinner last night at 6:15 in the main dining room. i was really eager to meet my families... then i discovered my parents were my boss and his wife. haha don't get me wrong, the guy is awesome... but as if i don't see this guy enough. at least he's cool and i like him. and i have 7 other siblings in my family. so it's going to be really fun getting to know them. we're planning on having dinner together again when we get back from ghana. when we were at dinner the entire dining room got distracted by a HUGE school of dolphins putting on a show outside the window. there were dozens of them and they were all jumping like 8 feet out of the water. it was really neat. there's a rumor going around that a hammerhead shark was swimming next to the ship yesterday, but i didn't see it.

they're starting to play some good movies on the tvs. yesterday, harry potter 7 part 1 was on loop so we watched parts of that... and we laid in bed last night and watched eat pray love before bed. today, up is back on... which could be one of the greatest children's movies made lately. but, i could kill for cable. or at least the opening charger's game. GO BOLTS!

tonight is our cultural preport meeting for ghana. we'll see what they have to say about that. but before that, brew and i have a hot date. but actually. i'm pretty sure i've told you guys about how we were playing hangman on our whiteboard outside our room to figure out who these guys were... well we figured it out and tonight we're meeting for dinner at 7 to finally meet them. again, best "how we met" story EVER. so stay tuned for that story.

anyways, it's been raining a lot today. we saw a lot of other ships yesterday, but not so much today. i have 2 more classes today and work. need to catch up on some homework today too. can't wait to get to ghana. even though my father oh so kindly emailed me today that he's friend at the gym who is from a neighboring country hires armed body guards whenever he has to go to ghana. as if i wasn't scared enough in morocco... now i need armed body guards? stressful, to say the least.

love and miss you all.