BONJOUR!

I have officially been to Mauritius - the only place on the itinerary I had never heard of before signing up for Semester At Sea. I am extremely glad that I learned where it was and that I spent my past two days there. It is extremely similar to Hawai'i physically, except they have a very different history and are going about their business much differently. There are about 250 miles of coastline and beautiful beaches and the rest of the island is covered in Mountains and miles of green, just like Hilo and Honolulu were; however, Mauritius does not want to be like Hawai'i. They have a population of 1.2 million people and about 900,00o tourists annually although their maximum amount of tourists to maintain the sustainability of the island is around 700,0o0. In order to not lose natural resources or have to become more dependent on tourism [they have a HUGE sugar market] they are raising hotel and airfare costs to decrease tourism and attract wealthier tourists [a flight appare
ntly costs about 3,000$ round trip]. Also, because their population is about 48% Hindu and India is the #4 country with regards to internet usage world-wide, they are marketing the island as a cyber island in order to attract business tourists and their families. It seems to be working so far - except that I couldn't find Wi-Fi anywhere, but we well get to that later.

When the ship was docking it was ugly, foggy, gray, and rainy. It was also Dr. Abel's birthday and Carson and I had spent a fair amount of our time the night before making him an awesome birthday sign that we sneakily hung up outside of his room after he went to sleep. Anyways, I woke up, got ready for life in the rain, and ate far more French toast than I imagined was possible of someone my size. We had a diplomatic briefing after going through customs [pointless still] which was far less exciting than the others have been so far - maybe because the speaker was a poor speaker and fairly old and boring. He ran his mouth then I got off the ship for my marine science FDP with Dr. Abel. Around 930AM I ran to the bus in the rain, took a seat, and took a nap.

We drove for about an hour in morning traffic to a marine research center that was raising small shrimp. I realize I did not make that sound very thrilling and that was slightly intentional, because it was not. However, they did have lots of snacks for us after the power-point presentation which was kind of interesting - or at least the parts where I was not singing to myself were. We left and went to what everyone was really excited for - Isle De Deux Cocos. We got in a glass bottom boat and drove around for a while looking at the reefs and all of the fishes. It was so beautiful to see and the coral was much prettier and healthier than it had been in Hawai'i. Also, we found big juicy Nemos swimming around in a bright yellow "anem-anemonem-onemenie" [an anemone -spelling ? - for those of you who have not seen Nemo]. From there the boat took us to the island for lunch!

Lunch was outside on the beach under tents, buffet style. I am continuously amazed at myself for my ability to eat a buffet style meal practically every meal, every day; maybe I should move to Vegas. Anyways, lunch was delicious - yellow rice, spaghetti, lamb, BBQ chicken, grilled shrimp, and bread with fresh apple juice! I finished my lunch and decided it was necessary to explore; I did this on my own while everyone else continued to stuff their faces full of Marlin and Tuna which were apparently delicious - if you like eating fish. During my exploring I climbed out over a bunch of rocks to check out some tide pools and get further out from the sand; in doing this I found a rare species of fish generally only found in Mauritius - the Rupee Fish! I found 200 Rupees - score! I took an "I Love the Eclectic Chef" picture then plopped myself down in a chair after following a mole around the island, just in case he know something I didn't.

Some of the people went snorkeling but, after talking to my ship mom [Mrs. Harnish] for a while, I decided it was a god day to be lazy - so that is exactly what I did. I swam out to a big black volcanic rock, climbed up onto it and sat and watched - slightly jealously - someone going kite-boarding. I stayed there until it was time to leave the island to head back to the ship. It was a great place to contemplate my life or future or career or something - or really, just to space out which is what I did most of the time. It sprinkled for literally 30 seconds then went back to being cloudy with a nice warm breeze - lucky since it poured the whole way back to the ship, which took about an hour I was told after waking up.

I got back to the ship about 40 minutes late and ran to Lydia's room since she had been waiting on me to go out exploring at night - I was supposed to have been back by 5. We went upstairs to dinner with Collin - who is unfortunately not allowed off the ship in Mauritius - and I had two PB&Js… I was eating when I noticed a man try to sneak by me with a tray full of mixed desserts which included brownies with icing. Do you think he got far? No, he did not. But he told me I could not have one, and I told him he was mistaken and I got one and sat down and ate it with a giant smile on my face. It was wonderful and I left the ship in a water taxi in a great mood. If that doesn't sound like foreshadowing, I am not sure what else does…

We got to the waterfront around 8PM in search for groceries and internet. We found an internet café but we didn't want to pay for internet on a cyber island where you would assume you could find Wi-Fi. We went to McDonalds because they have free Wi-Fi for people who buy food there and I had yet to get ice cream in Mauritius, so I did. We sat down and tried for literally an hour to get the internet to work while literally everyone around us enjoyed the freedom of Facebook. I was genuinely frustrated for some reason and gave up and just went back to the Zenith internet café. We got an hour of inter for 4$ and sat down to work. I tried to upload 3 photo albums to my travel blog - didn't work. I tried to upload any photos to Facebook - didn't work. I tried to talk to one of my friends on AIM - he was at work, which didn't work. I am still being tailed by a young man with a permanent shield and long sword - if you know what that means then you understand my frustration, if not don
't worry about it. I have also apparently acquired a new stalker. Not having the internet is almost a good thing - almost. We went back to the ship with no groceries and no success and got a snack on the 6th deck with Collin and then did some passing out.

Auxilio, the guy who cleans my room every day [which I greatly appreciate, don't get me wrong] decided he would clean my room at 7AM - meaning I would be waking up. I got up, got clean, got fed [more French toast!], and got going. Lydia and I took a water taxi back to the waterfront where we were confronted with more ATMs, banks, and currency exchange places than I have ever seen in my entire life - helpful since I needed some cash. We got Rupees and then a taxi which took us to the botanical gardens where we spent the next hour, amazingly enough without getting lost.

We had our hearts set on finding the giant lily pads we had seen in some pictures the night before, so we went exploring. We found what I am sure is the world's biggest palm tree ever and then found our lilies! There were a gazillion of them and they were HUGE! It was really pretty and slightly fascinating - I really wanted to sit on one, but I figured that wouldn't end well for either of the involved parties. Instead we kept marching and found more lilies with pink and white and purple flowers which I went crazy photographing. Apparently, one of the park guides explained to us, the flowers bloom white in the morning, turn light pink in the afternoon, then turn purple at night before dying. From there we accidentally stumbled upon some tortoises.

Before I tell you about the tortoises I want to remind you of who I am. I am Simone Provence, and all of you who are reading this travel blog know me [presumably] and understand that I have a very small filter, if I even have one at all. This travel blog was designed with memories in mind, and as an aid for me to share the memories with those of you who could not experience them with me. That being said we walked past more lily pads to find the tortoises - and by we walked, I mean I walked because Lydia freaked out and ran because she has an odd obsession with tortoises that I may never understand. Anyways, there were about 10 giant tortoises doing what giant tortoises do - eating grass, playing in mud, and having tortoise sex. There was an odd noise emanating from the garden all day that neither of could identify until we came across the two tortoises who were making it. Quite the cultural experience I would say, as they had no problems with us curious bystanders.

From there we left the gardens [which we could have spent all day if we had it] got a giant pack of postcards, found stamps at the post office, then walked around the water front where our taxi driver let us out. Lydia got a new watch because her old one died, and I got some gifts and a sweet Mauritius soccer jersey. I also got ice cream because it was chocolate covered strawberry ice cream which I obviously could not resist. We went to a small grocery store and Lydia got some drinks and I didn't get anything because the rules on the ship of what you can and cannot bring on are ridiculous and very restrictive [and I don't have any way to cook]. We took a water taxi back to the ship with the South African inter-port lecturer's wife and two daughters who were really nice. Then we went to lunch where we discovered Collin shoving fries into his mouth, so we joined him and did the same.

After lunch Lydia and I attempted to write postcards. The writing was easy, but the removing of the postcards from the plastic packaging literally took 20 minutes - and we are college students so imaging how long it really could have taken otherwise! There was so much unnecessary tape and packaging separating each individual postcard that it truly may be the cause of global warming in the world. After getting the cards out I threw some stamps on the back of them. Has anyone ever been thankful for not having to lick stamps in the US when sending mail? If not, you should be because I am beyond sick of licking stamps. I am literally pretty sure that the US is the ONLY country in the world that has non-licky stamps. I cannot wait to send something in the mail that I do not have to cover in drool beforehand. Could you imagine the people Amazon.com would have to hire during Christmas to lick their boxes?! Me neither.

I will arrive in South Africa a week from now - the port that I was originally the most excited for. So far, Viet Nam has been my favorite place… but will it remain?