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31 October 2010

India: Louder Than Words






















India absolutely blew my mind. Words could never do justice to what I saw, heard, smelled, and felt. These photos represent just a snippet of this whirlwind experience, but I think they tell the story pretty well themselves. Love you all!

15 October 2010

More - ish - us

Mauritius. More - ish - us. Quickie update :)

If ever you have the urge to pick up and get the heck out of dodge, call United Airlines immediately and book the earliest flight to this tiny island off the coast of Madagascar. You probably never even heard of this place before you saw it listed on my itinerary and that’s exactly the reason why you must go, like now.

I feel spoiled beyond belief to have been afforded the chance to run around an island in the middle of the Indian Ocean with my closest friends without any responsibility whatsoever. We made it to port early yesterday morning, jumped off the boat with our bathing suits and towels, and booked it straight to the beach. I can’t convey to you how amazing it felt to actually swim in the pristine waters we sail through and stare at day in and day out. I felt like a broken record because I kept saying to everyone “I am soooo happy! This is amazing!” Swimming, floating, lounging in the sun, volleyball, and great conversation made for an absolutely perfect day.

Because we only had one night here and many of us had trips planned for early this morning, we opted not to stay over in a hotel and camped out in our floating dorm room instead. It’s definitely strange being “at home” when you’re definitely not “at home.” There are however some phenomenal resorts that I hope one day I can come back and share with family and friends (family reunion? Hint hint).

It wasn’t a total lounge fest though… today I had the opportunity to survey the variety of Mauritian health facilities with visits to a traditional Chinese medicine shop, nursing school, public hospital, an ayurvedic wellness center, and a private hospital. Get this: healthcare is free for everyone. Even alternative medicine practices are free. Private hospitals are available for those who can afford them, but only 10% of people actually utilize them. This isn’t a public service announcement for socializing healthcare in the states, but people here really do seem to be impressed with what they’ve got going on.

Now I’m back at it. So long Africa, get ready India. Four days until my trip is officially half way complete, I truly cannot even believe it.


Until next time :)


12 October 2010

"The Laughing Bishop"

It is mandatory that every member of the shipboard community take a class titled “Global Studies” which is basically like global issues for aspiring philanthropist high school seniors. The been-there-done-that attitude means the Union, where these lectures are held, is rarely at capacity and if you walk out to use the restroom you’ll return and find that most people are completely checked out and on their computers emailing friends and family. When it was announced that there would be a special guest lecturer in a joint-session of Global Studies, students camped outside the lecture hall the morning before readying to snag good seats just like those people who wait outside the Apple Store for new iPhones. Everyone knew what was coming, the hall was packed and abuzz… 0930 had never rallied so much excitement. Our dear friend Desi, as we all call him affectionately, arrived at the doors of the hall and danced his way up to the front, tapping people on the head and giggling through the aisles. Plopping himself onto a chair he sighed, scrunched up his shoulders, and burst into infectious and exuberant laughter.

His two hour lecture, if you could call it that, was a pinch-me-am-I-awake-or-this-actually-a-dream type of amazing. Albeit a wavy day I was able to capture a fair amount of video footage that I just can’t wait to share with you all soon. Under the umbrella of apartheid he spoke about Nelson Mandela, the townships, raising a family, unity and individuality, reparation and reconciliation, justice, and most emphatically… being joyful and keeping the faith. I was completely transfixed. Here is a man who has seen the absolute worst of human nature, of ruthless hatred, and still believes that people are made for goodness, that truth will prevail, and that laughter will heal a broken world. It never ceases to amaze me that it is the people in this world who have experienced the most evil that end up being the most hopeful for the future.

There were so many treasures he shared, but one of the most important before traveling throughout his homeland was the following:

“With all of its faults, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission is the best thing that happened to South Africa. Let people tell their story, it was… it IS therapeutic. The wounds have not yet been healed, but they are still festering. There is still work to be done.”

Even though there is so much reason to rejoice, South Africa is still in the middle of quite an identity crisis. Apartheid ended just sixteen years ago and its legacies are still very real for most of the country. At least 35% of the population is HIV positive, the country ranks highest in the world for homicide and crime, 28% of men are unemployed, and millions of families live in squatter camps. There is still work to be done. Just because there is freedom doesn’t mean there is equity or justice. I knew that within its geographic beauty there was something heavy and ominous lingering throughout. Don’t be fooled, I thought, tread lightly and with eyes wide open.

On the morning of our arrival, I sat in a dewy pool chair, bundled in a blanket on the seventh deck, taking in the beauty of the new day with gratitude and anticipation as we slowly pulled into the V&A Waterfront.. The stars behind me were fading over Cape Town as the horizon before me morphed from the deepest navy, magenta, orange, pink, until in an instant the sun made its grand appearance. My friends and I spoke no words, exchanged no glances – there was this sense of profound fellowship though, as we all processed independent thoughts and truths about the world and ourselves. It’s funny now looking back because our arrival in South Africa and this sunrise seems so long ago, but I remember having one of those out of body moments where my mere existence was absolutely mind boggling and the fact that the sun rose and set every day without fail gave me so much comfort. Maybe I’m just hyper-aware of the phenomenon because I watch it take place almost every day now. In any case, this small epiphany helped ease some of the apprehension or eagerness for discovery that I had accumulated from my pre-port lessons on the history of this fascinating nation.

Par usual, I tried to cram each day with as much I possibly could without sacrificing too much of my sanity or sleep. The V&A Waterfront was a total tourist trap, but at least had a full-fledged grocery store (where I spent the best $75 of my entire life on oatmeal, dried fruit, and nuts) and some nice restaurants. I was happy to head out of the port and spend three full days hiking up and picnicking atop Table Mountain, visiting a local medical clinic that works with HIV/AIDS patients, and playing with children in the Marcus Garvey Rastafarian Township.

I spent the remaining three days on an amazing Safari in the middle of Kruger National Park. Making our way from Cape Town to Johannesburg and onto Hodespruit, I stopped in an airport bookshop to pick up any form of news I could get my hands on. I spotted TIME and Newsweek, and gleefully made my purchase. Back at the terminal I opened up TIME to page 27, a photo of none other but Desmond Tutu. WHAT! Crazy, right? The photo accompanied a feature article on his retirement from public life made official on his 79th birthday. The article is titled “The Laughing Bishop” which I’ve titled this blog in tribute.

I made it to Hodespruit and let my mind get swept away by the amazing scope of the African bush. Safaris are basically everything you imagine, but even cooler. Hippos, Elephants, Rhinos, Giraffes, Lions, Warthogs, Eagles, and Impala are the names you’ll recognize, plus many many more. I felt the same feelings here that I experienced in Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Alaska, even the middle of the Indian Ocean… I hope one day if I have children, they will be able to see this. I get nervous. The more I read about the combinations human footprint, mass consumption, rapid economic development, resource depletion, and crumbling biodiversity, the more anxious I become that future generations will not experience the natural profundity of our planet, our home.

Here’s an armchair perspective (literally and figuratively) of what I see taking place in South Africa after dabbling in a few different facets of culture and society:

On my flight from Johannesburg to Hodespruit I sat next to a South African national who worked for USAID administering and assisting with HIV/AIDS treatment. She was traveling to a small village in the northern region of Kruger to check on a trial drug some members of the community were testing. We talked about a range of topics – family planning, treatment options, and stigmas associated with the disease. On the flight back to the ship from Johannesburg to Cape Town I sat next to a business man who has lived all over the world working for Dow Chemical in plastic resource manufacturing. I had requested a water and peach juice from the flight attendant, he pointed to the containers and the accompanying cups with ice and said to me “I work to round this up all across Africa,” and smiled. It gave me the shivers.

South Africa is a country of extremes: wealth and poverty, overabundance and famine, both diversity and racism. Apartheid is over but the gaping cleavages it left are just getting wider and wider. It seems that the country is being carried in two opposite directions – one toward recovery and rehabilitation, and one toward capitalism. It emphasizes our mentors wisdom: There is still a long way to go.

My Grandma Beard has this great saying, “God can’t move a parked car.” Despite the paradoxes glaringly present in South Africa, if we think of the state as a car, it certainly isn’t parked at all; it’s moving all right and it’s trying hard to figure out where it really wants to go.

There is still a long way to go. But it is going, and that is a blessing.



01 October 2010

Everywhere, All At Once

Starting my post-port blog just keeps getting harder and harder as the semester continues. In a sentence, my time in Ghana was rich, full, emotional, and entirely too short.

Walking up from the beach on our last afternoon we passed a little deserted apartment complex with a sign out front that read For Sale, Yours Now. I looked at the tattered and faded pink building, fairly amicable compared to its distant neighbors, and had a very dangerous idea: STAY. Stay? Are you kidding? You’re almost twenty-one years old and you think you can do this, now? The moment was fleeting, and soon interrupted by the myriad of wisdoms that took a vacation for that passionate split second. Ghana just had so much more to teach me, and saying a premature goodbye was difficult.

I’m staring a blinking cursor, thinking of what to share, and my (amazing) roommate Amanda says to me, “Kels, you’re stressing out about this way too much.” She’s probably right. I’m bombarded by not-yet-formulated ideas and conclusions about my time in Ghana so trying to lasso a good sentence together, let alone a report on the matter, feels impossible. Well okay, that’s what the perfectionist control-freak side of me nags at least. Amanda suggests I write something like: “Ghana was amazing, I’m alive and safe, not much to say yet, come again soon.” But I think that would be a cop-out because this blog is just as much for me as it is for any of you lovely people who might be reading it. When I look back in 30 years and cannot make any sense of what is written in my journal, I can turn to this and say, “Okay, there was a literate human being in that 20 year old body somewhere.”

So instead of trying to make something pretty here, I’ll give it to you in skeleton form. There are four things (of I’m sure many) that make up Ghana: poverty, community, resilience, and happiness (okay, well maybe gratitude but you can decide that). They’re everywhere, all at once.

Poverty: It’s everywhere. Despite the fact that Ghana has twice the per capita output of poorer countries in West Africa, at least 30% of the population still lives on less than $1.25 a day. Acquiring basic human needs like clean water, nutrition, health care, education, clothing, and shelter for many Ghanaians is a daily struggle. In Takoradi, most housing consists of scrap wood, concrete blocks, or corrugated tin – affluent areas outside the cities are rare and are still well below most Western standards of living. I spent two days in Cape Coast, two hours east of port, and took a cooking class from a women’s co-op called Global Mamas using Ghanaian staples like: yam, cocoyam, plantain, cassava, okra, canned tomatoes, onions, garlic, peanut butter, palm nut oil, and a few spices. Health note… I notice that these primary starches are easy to grow, but lack the nutritional punch of other complex carbohydrates that our bodies really need. What they do, however, is fill you up quick and keep you full for a long time – extremely important when getting another meal for the day is not always guaranteed.

Community: It’s everywhere. Not in my short life have I ever seen or taken part of a community so devoted to the welfare of each and every member. A Ghanaian university student sailed with us from Casablanca to Takoradi and she explained to us in pre-port lectures that if a child is out in public misbehaving, an adult does not ask who the mother or father are, they ask what village the child comes from. Villages raise children, literally, and each members contribution is a reflection of the community as a whole. There is no my house or your house – surpluses are spread to those according to their need so that everyone can be the most productive member of the community as possible. Theoretically, the college experience would support the “we’re in this all together” model, but so often we (myself included) get caught up in our own needs that we forget that we need to carry each other so that everyone can “survive” and be successful.

Resilience: It’s everywhere. I can’t tell you how many people I talked to who sang the same sort of tune “You know, life is hard but it is good, finding work is hard but I have my family and I have my health, I have freedom and I have justice.” This country was once the main hub for the trans-Atlantic slave trade where 12 million Africans were held captive in European slave dungeons on West African coasts and transported by ships to the New World between the 15th and 19th centuries. And even though the slave trade was officially banned in the mid-1800s, British colonial rule did not end until 1957. The people here are not angry though, rather grateful actually and hopeful for the future. Shaun and I share a magnet that says “Keep calm, don’t feed the pug, and carry on” and nobody epitomizes that better than the Ghanaian. They carry on all right, and they celebrate what they have with song and with dance and with light. I was in a cab one day heading to lunch or something and we passed by a church hosting a huge wedding. Attendees wore their brightest kente clothes and buzzed around the bride and groom cheering, singing, kissing, hugging. Life is hard, but there is always reason to rejoice.

Happiness: It’s everywhere. In my Global Studies class on the ship, we’re taught that prosperity leads to greater happiness around the world. On paper it makes sense – someone who makes $200 a day has a better chance at self-actualizing compared to the person who lives on $2 a day who struggles to meet his or her basic physiological and safety needs. But when you get down on the ground, this barometer is useless. If I’ve learned anything in life it is that everyone’s version of happiness looks different, so it’s absolutely impossible to judge. If you get your hands dirty or in my case get completely soaked in a rainstorm, you’ll meet people who have nothing and everything all at the same time. I spent my third day in Ghana trekking around the center of town, eventually winding deep into the cacophonous and pungent markets. The women at every shanty shop clamored over us, dropping buckets of shrimp or platters of plantain onto the muddy ground to welcome us. It was superiorly muggy when we left the ship and it didn’t take long for the equatorial rains to break the tension, ushering vendors and shoppers under the auspicious tin overhangs. We tried to keep walking; all decked out in our North Face gear, but were pulled by the arms to a fabric shop (F333) and scolded for “trying” to catch a cold. We were instructed to sit with her until the rain stopped, the women in the shops across and around F333 nodded in agreement. She began to tell us about her life and her family, asking us questions about school, about our faith values. She was so full of hope, full of gratitude, making us promise we would pray every morning and every night thanking God for our multitude of blessings. As the rain started to calm down she asked me, “where do you see God?” and I responded, feeling it with absolute certainty, “I think Gods light is right here, right now.” She smiled, hugged us both, and we went on our way. I’m not naïve enough to think that an hour spent with this woman in her lean-to fabric shop represents the spirit of an entire country, but the happiness she experienced was built upon the “attitude of gratitude” that literally everyone in Ghana was outwardly displaying for the world to see.

I loved Ghana. And not in the oh-how-precious, people-can-be-happy-with-nothing type of way that I’m witnessing a lot of my fellow sailors experience. I loved what it showed me about myself, and I loved how it pushed me to the edge of something big that I’ve sometimes tiptoed away from. That smack you up side the head reality check that says “you were lucky enough to be born into a situation where you can do anything you want in the world, you have the power to make a huge impact in whatever pulls at your heart.” I don’t love the poverty. I feel pretty strongly that people shouldn’t romanticize the struggle. But I’ll carry their experience, the struggle and the joy, forever. I’ll carry it and look at it and know that I can be as strong as them too.

Desmond Tutu, or Arch as he wants us to call him, has made several appearances in the past few days. I’ll log back on to share some of his stories and wisdoms about South Africa soon. He is SUCH a goofball, and on that note I’ll leave you with a funny encounter… some friends and I were eating breakfast in one of the dining rooms and he comes up to our table and asks “so were you glad to take your test yesterday, girls?” We laugh and respond “well, I’m not sure if we were glad to take it, but it went okay.” He giggles, looking off into the distance, “Well that’s good, at least you’re not a masochist!”

Much Love