Here's a little info. about my trip..Enjoy!

About 1000 people will be aboard our ship, the MV Explorer including crew, faculty, Desmond Tutu (see info below), and 670 or so students. ((FYI – it is the fastest passenger ship in the world!)) Surprisingly, there are 6 people on my voyage from Ithaca! Three of us are sophomore occupational therapy students (Alison from NY and Hayley from Atlanta) and the three others are juniors. I’ve met all but one of the students from my school that are going. During the fall semester, the study abroad office put together informative and social meetings for study abroad students to get together so they could meet and exchange ideas. Anyways...here’s more about the trip…We could choose from a wide array of classes; everything from economics to music and theater. I opted to only take 12 credits while on the ship: Global Studies (everyone takes this), Abnormal Psychology (a requirement for my major at IC), Cross-Cultural Perspectives on Family, and Learning, School and Society. Since SAS is a non-affiliated study abroad program, only my credits will transfer, not my grades. (So I technically only need a C- in each class in order to pass!) All of the class grades are a combination of tests, papers, and fieldwork. 20% of our grade is the “field work,” which is observations, individual research, and organized trips with professors in any given country. So…Needless to say, I’m pretty excited about this whole thing! :)

I have less than a month before I embark on this once-in-a-lifetime adventure. Dad surprised mom on Christmas with tickets to the Bahamas so they can come see me off. We’ll be leaving on Friday 2/2 to head down to Nassau (that way I’ll have a day and a half to start my tan before boarding the ship!). Early in the morning on Sunday 2/4 I’ll be boarding the MV Explorer, my new home for the next 4 months! I can’t believe it’s SO SOON now! It seems like I’ve been looking forward to this trip forever and now it’ll be over before I know it. You can check this site while I’m gone to get updates on where I’m at and what I’m doing. I figured this would be the easiest way to get information out. Unfortunately, we only have 250 internet minutes on the ship (and apparently it’s super slow), so I’ll probably be making most of my updates in internet café’s along the way!

SAS Spring 2007 Itinerary 2/4-5/14

Nassau Bahamas Sunday 2/4, 1700 

San Juan, Puerto Rico: Wednesday 2/7, 0800 / Friday 2/9, 2300 

Salvador, Brazil: Saturday 2/17, 0700 / Wednesday 2/21, 2300 

Capetown, South Africa: Friday 3/2, 0800 / Thursday 3/8, 2300 

Port Luis, Mauritius Thursday 3/15, 0800 / Saturday 3/17, 2300 

Chennai, India: Sunday 3/25, 0800 / Thursday 3/29, 2300 

Penang, Malaysia: Monday 4/2, 0800 / Thursday 4/5, 2300 

***stop in Singapore for bunker***

Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam: Monday 4/9, 1000 / Saturday 4/15, 0600 

Hong Kong: Tuesday 4/17, 0800 / Wednesday 4/18, 2300 

***between Hong Kong and Quindao, I will be traveling independently through China to Bejiing and meeting the ship in Quindao on Sunday***

 Quindao, China: Saturday 4/21, 0800 / Sunday 4/22, 2300 

Kobe, Japan: Wednesday 4/25, 0800 / Sunday 4/29, 2300 

Honolulu, Hawaii: Monday 5/7, 0600 / Monday 5/7, 2300 

San Diego, CA: Monday 5/14, 0800

Here’s a little blurb from the SAS website…

“Archbishop Desmond Tutu will be sailing aboard the MV Explorer for the entire Spring 2007 voyage.

Serving as Distinguished Lecturer in Residence, Archbishop Tutu will be a guest lecturer in courses including anthropology, history, religion, and political science. He will also present a series of lectures between Brazil and South Africa.

‘I have had and will have again this coming spring the good fortune to be a small part of a wonderful experiment in education called Semester at Sea,’ said Archbishop Tutu, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984.

‘The mission of this grand experiment has been to foster greater intercultural understanding by exposing its participants-young and old, students and faculty-to people and cultures around the world while providing them with a sea-going classroom in which to study and absorb what they've seen and learned.’"