This is some non-SAS material, but interesting nonetheless. The Babson Habitat for Humanity club just got back from Vera Cruz, Mexico where they built two homes for poor families. Emily was on the trip and she took a TON of great pictures. She and the rest of the group had a great time getting to know the families and it was hard for them to come back to the states. It was great that they were able to give two families a new place to live.
Check out some of the pictures at http://picasaweb.google.com/ezickell1
Friday, March 30, 2007
India
India
*Pcitures are up, enjoy*
WARNING: This is pretty long, Im sorry.
If someone were to ask me what India is like, I would have to respond by saying India is everything. India is poor and rich, it is happy and it is extremely sad, it is delicious and disgusting, it is fast and slow, it is religious and secular, it is developed and undeveloped, it is hot and….alright well its just plain hot. India is a shock to all the senses, the sights of the poorest people in the world, sleeping in the dirt with absolutely no belongings, then there is the sounds of a thousand horns all blaring at the same time, the smell of India is so bad sometimes that you can taste it in your mouth and it burns the back of your throat.
I saw things in India that I don’t even want to write about, it was a whole different world and I have never seen anything like it, even after seeing the poor of South Africa and Brazil. I’m sure it hasn’t even set in for me yet and it will take some time to do so. Nevertheless, my experience in India was one I will never forget.
Day 1: After dealing with the extremely bureaucratic Indian immigration officials, we finally got off the ship and made our way to THE GATE. Dean Mike had warned us about the gate in both of our preports (which I could write a whole entry about and maybe I will). As soon as we passed through the gate we were bombarded with rickshaw drivers looking to take our money. “You want rickshaw? I give good price! Where you want to go, you want to go shopping? I give good price, my friend, my friend, come come!” I left the bartering for the rickshaw up to Kyle and Slava. We were told that the going rate to get into town was about 70 rupees, yet the first rate offered to us was 200 rupees a piece. We were able to get the driver down to 70 and we were on our way in our first rickshaw ride, over the course of which I probably said “holy shit!” at least a hundred times. India has absolutely no traffic rules, the lanes don’t mean anything, the horn is used liberally, stop signs are optional, and everyone drives within 6 inches of other vehicles (and I’m not exaggerating).
Our destination was Spencer’s Plaza, a market/mall type place where we were going to do some shopping. However, the rickshaw drivers get commission for taking us to some of their stores so we agreed with our driver that we would go to two stores before making it to Spencer’s. Once we got there we bought a lot of stuff for extremely cheap.
The rest of the day was spent on similar adventures with some arguments with rickshaw drivers thrown in. We also had some great Indian cuisine: Pizza Hut.
Day 2: My Delhi/Agra/Taj trip through SAS left the ship at 4:15am. We took a 2.5 hour flight to Delhi, had lunch and then transferred to the train station for what was supposed to be a 3.5 hour train ride. The train was delayed for over an hour and we ended up sitting at the train station for about 2.5 hours. The station was filled with poor families, beggers, and other pretty sad sights. We finally got on the train, a second class sleeper which was pretty short of comfortable. The ride ended up taking over 4 hours and we didn’t end up getting to the hotel until past 7:00pm. Fifteen straight hours of traveling wasn’t too enthralling. A group of us walked around the streets of Agra for a bit and hung out at the hotel and then headed to bed.
Day 3: The day began at 5:30am with a trip to the Taj Mahal for sunrise. What an experience this was, seeing one of the wonders of the world, something that you look at in photographs your whole life. It was surreal to have it right before my eyes and I just couldn’t stop taking pictures. Of course everyone knows what the Taj Mahal looks like, but not many people know what it actually is. It was built by the 5th Mughal emperor, Shah Jahan as a tomb for his beloved wife. It took 20,000 men and 22 years to construct. The middle dome required a 2 mile long ramp to be built in order for the marble stones to be brought to the top. The white marble is inlayed with some absurd amount of precious gems and jewels. In the midst of the construction of the Taj, Shah Jahan was imprisoned by his own son who was upset that his father was spending all of his inheritance on the Taj. Shah Jahan watched from his cell as the Taj was completed and never was able to visit the finished product. Upon his death, he too was buried inside of the Taj, though this wasn’t part of the original plan. The wife’s tomb is directly under center of the middle dome and Shah Jahan’s is off to the side, his tomb is in fact the only asymmetrical part of the Taj.
It is rumored that Shah Jahan wanted to build a second mausoleum for himself but was never able to complete this task. His tomb was going to be a second Taj, directly across the river and made out of black marble. If you wikipedia Black Taj, you can find a lot more interesting facts about this.
We left the Taj and headed back to the hotel for breakfast, then headed to a silk carpet store. The owner explained to us how the rugs were made and how durable and long-lasting they were. They take about 5 years to make and are only made in Kashmir. After teaching us about them for a half hour or so, of course the store wanted to sell us some. The starting price? $650. Surprisingly, a few kids on the trip bought some. From here, we boarded the busses again and took a 45 minute drive to a ghost city of the Mughal Empire.
This city was built by emperor Akbah, the 3rd emperor, after finding a healer in the area that allowed Akbah’s wife to produced a male heir to the throne. The capital was moved from Agra to this city, constructed of red sandstone. Because of water shortages, Akbah and his people were forced to leave after just 20 years and though the city is 400 years old, it is in pristine condition. It even houses a life sized Parchese board. Did you know that the US and India are the only two countries that play Parchese?
After the ghost city, we headed back to Agra for lunch at the hotel, and then back out to go to Agra Fort. Agra Fort is actually not a fort, but a city of mosques and palaces where the Mughul royalty spent many years. Like the ghost city, the fort is in amazing condition for being 400 years old. From the fort, you can see the Taj further down the river and also the “cell” where Shah Jahan was imprisoned. The architecture and intricacy of the buildings is amazing. After touring the fort, we headed back to the Taj for sunset. Beginning and ending the day at the Taj Mahal was incredible and no matter how long I stared at it, I still could not grasp the fact that I was there seeing it.
We had dinner at Pizza Hut, where the waiters performed a choreographed Indian dance (if only they did this while waiting for pizza in the states) and then headed to the train station for the train back to Delhi. Thankfully, it was first class and the express train this time. We arrived in Delhi at an amazing hotel called Hotel Ashkok and headed to bed.
Day 4: After breakfast at the hotel, we headed out on a bus tour of Delhi. The city is actually quite amazing and extremely different from Chennai. It was carefully planned out by the British while they still colonized India. The city is very green, as trees were planted along every street and every median to make sure the city would stay cool year round. The government buildings are quite remarkable (Delhi is India’s Washington DC). The presidential palace is three times the size of the White House. After seeing some of the sights of Delhi, we headed to the house where Ghandi spent the last 144 days of his life. The house has been turned into a museum, but they have left Ghandi’s bedroom, office, and meditation area untouched. They even retraced his footsteps out to the garden where he was assassinated. I wish we would have had more time to spend here because there was a lot of great things to read and sights around the estate to take in. Unfortunately, we had to head back to the hotel to checkout and then off to the airport. After a lot of traveling, we reached the ship in Chennai at about 9:00pm.
Day 5: I slept in pretty late and had lunch on the ship before heading out with a group of people to do some shopping (because there really isn’t that much else to do in Chennai). We spent a few more hours out at Spencer’s and returned to the ship pretty early.
Today we have an off day, which means time to catch up on sleep, schoolwork, and blogging. We have just a few days before reaching Malaysia. The voyage gets very condensed from this point forward and we won’t have a long stretch at sea until after Japan, which is a good thing. I just hope the next few weeks wont fly by too fast, I’m not ready for the time of my life to end just yet.
*Pcitures are up, enjoy*
WARNING: This is pretty long, Im sorry.
If someone were to ask me what India is like, I would have to respond by saying India is everything. India is poor and rich, it is happy and it is extremely sad, it is delicious and disgusting, it is fast and slow, it is religious and secular, it is developed and undeveloped, it is hot and….alright well its just plain hot. India is a shock to all the senses, the sights of the poorest people in the world, sleeping in the dirt with absolutely no belongings, then there is the sounds of a thousand horns all blaring at the same time, the smell of India is so bad sometimes that you can taste it in your mouth and it burns the back of your throat.
I saw things in India that I don’t even want to write about, it was a whole different world and I have never seen anything like it, even after seeing the poor of South Africa and Brazil. I’m sure it hasn’t even set in for me yet and it will take some time to do so. Nevertheless, my experience in India was one I will never forget.
Day 1: After dealing with the extremely bureaucratic Indian immigration officials, we finally got off the ship and made our way to THE GATE. Dean Mike had warned us about the gate in both of our preports (which I could write a whole entry about and maybe I will). As soon as we passed through the gate we were bombarded with rickshaw drivers looking to take our money. “You want rickshaw? I give good price! Where you want to go, you want to go shopping? I give good price, my friend, my friend, come come!” I left the bartering for the rickshaw up to Kyle and Slava. We were told that the going rate to get into town was about 70 rupees, yet the first rate offered to us was 200 rupees a piece. We were able to get the driver down to 70 and we were on our way in our first rickshaw ride, over the course of which I probably said “holy shit!” at least a hundred times. India has absolutely no traffic rules, the lanes don’t mean anything, the horn is used liberally, stop signs are optional, and everyone drives within 6 inches of other vehicles (and I’m not exaggerating).
Our destination was Spencer’s Plaza, a market/mall type place where we were going to do some shopping. However, the rickshaw drivers get commission for taking us to some of their stores so we agreed with our driver that we would go to two stores before making it to Spencer’s. Once we got there we bought a lot of stuff for extremely cheap.
The rest of the day was spent on similar adventures with some arguments with rickshaw drivers thrown in. We also had some great Indian cuisine: Pizza Hut.
Day 2: My Delhi/Agra/Taj trip through SAS left the ship at 4:15am. We took a 2.5 hour flight to Delhi, had lunch and then transferred to the train station for what was supposed to be a 3.5 hour train ride. The train was delayed for over an hour and we ended up sitting at the train station for about 2.5 hours. The station was filled with poor families, beggers, and other pretty sad sights. We finally got on the train, a second class sleeper which was pretty short of comfortable. The ride ended up taking over 4 hours and we didn’t end up getting to the hotel until past 7:00pm. Fifteen straight hours of traveling wasn’t too enthralling. A group of us walked around the streets of Agra for a bit and hung out at the hotel and then headed to bed.
Day 3: The day began at 5:30am with a trip to the Taj Mahal for sunrise. What an experience this was, seeing one of the wonders of the world, something that you look at in photographs your whole life. It was surreal to have it right before my eyes and I just couldn’t stop taking pictures. Of course everyone knows what the Taj Mahal looks like, but not many people know what it actually is. It was built by the 5th Mughal emperor, Shah Jahan as a tomb for his beloved wife. It took 20,000 men and 22 years to construct. The middle dome required a 2 mile long ramp to be built in order for the marble stones to be brought to the top. The white marble is inlayed with some absurd amount of precious gems and jewels. In the midst of the construction of the Taj, Shah Jahan was imprisoned by his own son who was upset that his father was spending all of his inheritance on the Taj. Shah Jahan watched from his cell as the Taj was completed and never was able to visit the finished product. Upon his death, he too was buried inside of the Taj, though this wasn’t part of the original plan. The wife’s tomb is directly under center of the middle dome and Shah Jahan’s is off to the side, his tomb is in fact the only asymmetrical part of the Taj.
It is rumored that Shah Jahan wanted to build a second mausoleum for himself but was never able to complete this task. His tomb was going to be a second Taj, directly across the river and made out of black marble. If you wikipedia Black Taj, you can find a lot more interesting facts about this.
We left the Taj and headed back to the hotel for breakfast, then headed to a silk carpet store. The owner explained to us how the rugs were made and how durable and long-lasting they were. They take about 5 years to make and are only made in Kashmir. After teaching us about them for a half hour or so, of course the store wanted to sell us some. The starting price? $650. Surprisingly, a few kids on the trip bought some. From here, we boarded the busses again and took a 45 minute drive to a ghost city of the Mughal Empire.
This city was built by emperor Akbah, the 3rd emperor, after finding a healer in the area that allowed Akbah’s wife to produced a male heir to the throne. The capital was moved from Agra to this city, constructed of red sandstone. Because of water shortages, Akbah and his people were forced to leave after just 20 years and though the city is 400 years old, it is in pristine condition. It even houses a life sized Parchese board. Did you know that the US and India are the only two countries that play Parchese?
After the ghost city, we headed back to Agra for lunch at the hotel, and then back out to go to Agra Fort. Agra Fort is actually not a fort, but a city of mosques and palaces where the Mughul royalty spent many years. Like the ghost city, the fort is in amazing condition for being 400 years old. From the fort, you can see the Taj further down the river and also the “cell” where Shah Jahan was imprisoned. The architecture and intricacy of the buildings is amazing. After touring the fort, we headed back to the Taj for sunset. Beginning and ending the day at the Taj Mahal was incredible and no matter how long I stared at it, I still could not grasp the fact that I was there seeing it.
We had dinner at Pizza Hut, where the waiters performed a choreographed Indian dance (if only they did this while waiting for pizza in the states) and then headed to the train station for the train back to Delhi. Thankfully, it was first class and the express train this time. We arrived in Delhi at an amazing hotel called Hotel Ashkok and headed to bed.
Day 4: After breakfast at the hotel, we headed out on a bus tour of Delhi. The city is actually quite amazing and extremely different from Chennai. It was carefully planned out by the British while they still colonized India. The city is very green, as trees were planted along every street and every median to make sure the city would stay cool year round. The government buildings are quite remarkable (Delhi is India’s Washington DC). The presidential palace is three times the size of the White House. After seeing some of the sights of Delhi, we headed to the house where Ghandi spent the last 144 days of his life. The house has been turned into a museum, but they have left Ghandi’s bedroom, office, and meditation area untouched. They even retraced his footsteps out to the garden where he was assassinated. I wish we would have had more time to spend here because there was a lot of great things to read and sights around the estate to take in. Unfortunately, we had to head back to the hotel to checkout and then off to the airport. After a lot of traveling, we reached the ship in Chennai at about 9:00pm.
Day 5: I slept in pretty late and had lunch on the ship before heading out with a group of people to do some shopping (because there really isn’t that much else to do in Chennai). We spent a few more hours out at Spencer’s and returned to the ship pretty early.
Today we have an off day, which means time to catch up on sleep, schoolwork, and blogging. We have just a few days before reaching Malaysia. The voyage gets very condensed from this point forward and we won’t have a long stretch at sea until after Japan, which is a good thing. I just hope the next few weeks wont fly by too fast, I’m not ready for the time of my life to end just yet.
Thursday, March 22, 2007
Feelin Good
Just a quick update, i put some pictures up from Mauritius (still more coming), the sea olympics, and the lip sync. I'll put the link again for convienence http://picasaweb.google.com/ggallant1
Last night I went to an info session for a non-profit called Feel Good. It is run by the sister of Jason Walter, who is on the voyage and lives in the bering sea. Feel Good is currently on 10 campuses nationwide and has a partnership with the Hunger Project. Its goal is to elimate world hunger by selling grilled cheese sandwhiches on college campuses...and it works. It has national non-profit status and hopes to grow to 30 campuses by 2008. The website can explain how it works a lot better than i can, but its worth checking out. The website is www.feelgoodworld.com and they have a blog at www.feelgoodforlife.blogspot.com
We get to India on Sunday morning, check back for more pictures from Mauritius.
Cheers
Last night I went to an info session for a non-profit called Feel Good. It is run by the sister of Jason Walter, who is on the voyage and lives in the bering sea. Feel Good is currently on 10 campuses nationwide and has a partnership with the Hunger Project. Its goal is to elimate world hunger by selling grilled cheese sandwhiches on college campuses...and it works. It has national non-profit status and hopes to grow to 30 campuses by 2008. The website can explain how it works a lot better than i can, but its worth checking out. The website is www.feelgoodworld.com and they have a blog at www.feelgoodforlife.blogspot.com
We get to India on Sunday morning, check back for more pictures from Mauritius.
Cheers
Monday, March 19, 2007
Sea Olympics
I’m sure for all the blog readers out there, you will find plenty of detailed posts about the Sea Olympics. I’m going to keep it short and sweet, mostly because I’m bitter that the
Mauritius - The Best Plans are No Plans
Mauritius was a pretty laid back port. For any of you who have never heard of the place, it’s a small island nation (consisting of the two islands of Rodriguez and Maurice) east of
Day 2: After cooking up some breakfast, we all headed to the beach for the day, stopping on the way to book a catamaran for day 3. We stayed at the beach til 5pm or so, then came back to the villa and some 3 or 4 of us cooked for the house. That night we went to some local bars and clubs.
Friday, March 9, 2007
Cape Town - The long one
More Africa pictures are up at http://picasaweb.google.com/ggallant1
The Explorer is docked at a bunker in Cape Town Harbor refueling before we depart for Mauritius. We were supposed to leave by this morning, however high winds kept us from moving to the bunker until early this morning. It takes the ship 7-8 hours to refuel.
South Africa is an incredible country filled with culture and beauty. Though its rocky history and the period of apartheid still leaves a very strong mark on the modern country, there is an overall feeling of hope and optimism for a “New Africa”. Cape Town is vigorously preparing for the World Cup in 2010. New buildings and roads are being constructed and the airport is being completely renovated. The event will certainly bring a lot of attention to the country and it will hopefully provide an economic boost not only to the rich, but also the poor who reside in the informal settlements known as townships. Much like Brazil, there is an enormous inequality in the distribution of wealth in South Africa. Whites own almost 90% of the land and hold most of the income. Despite this, there is a feeling of positivity that consumes most of the nation, both black and white. We spent 7 days in Cape Town and we could have spent 7 more, there is so much to do here and all we could do is try to fit as much as we could into the time we had here.
Day 1: Our plan was to go to Robben Island in the morning and hike Table Mountain in the afternoon to make it to the top by sunset. However, Robben Island tickets were sold out until after my safari, so that wasn’t happening. Slava and I bought tickets for Tuesday morning. We walked around the waterfront which is really modernized and touristy. We stopped into an internet café to put some pictures online and grabbed some lunch. We then started walking towards downtown Cape Town and spent the afternoon walking around there and also planning a trip to the winelands for Wednesday through a tourism office. We took a taxi to the base of Table Mountain arriving around 4pm with the hopes of hiking up. Unfortunately, the rangers thought that the weather would be changing for the worse very quickly and we would get stuck hiking in very windy and dangerous conditions. We were pretty disappointed and had to take the cable car to the top of mountain.
As can be seen in my pictures, the view from the top of the mountain was incredible. It was truly the most breath taking thing I have ever seen. You are able to see the whole cape: from the Atlantic Ocean to the Indian Ocean. After spending a little while at the top, we met up with some other SASers who were about to hike down and Slava and I decided to join them. The hike down was pretty rough and my knees took a beating that lasted a couple days after. That night a group of us went out to a game restaurant on the waterfront. I ate a dish of Ostrich, Springbok, and Kudu meat – Amazing! Slava and I finished the night by going to a local jazz club (SA is famous for its Jazz) and we met up with some of our staff and faculty members.
Day 2-4: For these three days I was on a Safari in the KwaZulu Natal province of the country. This area was the home of the infamous Zulu warriors and King Shaka. It is also home to the second largest game reserve in the country. A groups of 40 SASers took a 2 hour flight to Durban, followed by a 3 hour bus ride to our tree “chalets”. We went on an evening game drive as soon as we arrived, seeing lots of giraffe, impala, nyala, and wildebeest.
The next morning we got up at 5am for an all day game drive. We were incredibly lucky and go to see a plethora of animals. Though the lions and leopards eluded our view, we did get to see rhino, hyena, buffalo, elephant, zebra, warthog, kudu, and giraffe. Both our driver and our guide mentioned that we were very lucky to see so much in a day. We got to see three of the famous big five. We had a great dinner in the bush where we were accompanied by a group of native African singers.
On our last morning we took an early morning game drive in hopes of finding some lions, to no avail. We headed off for our 3 hour bus ride back to the airport around 8am.
Day 5: The day started with our 8am trip to Robben Island, where Nelson Mandela and many other political prisoners spent significant time. Though the island was very rich in history, I thought the tour itself was a little less than spectacular because we were left to view much of the island while aboard a bus. We were able to get off the bus at the prison and tour the inside halls. We were able to see the cell where Nelson Mandela spent 18 of his 27 years in prison.
After returning to Cape Town, slava and I headed back to the ship for a quick lunch and headed off to the train station to catch our train to Stellenboch in the winelands. Upon arriving, we rented some bikes and started riding out of the town and into the country where all the wineries were located. Now, I’m no Lance Armstrong, but I thought I was in shape enough to ride a few miles. The cycling was really tough and the terrain was very hilly. We finally got to our destination, Simonsig, after an hour and a half of riding. Once there, we did a wine tasting and some of the wines were great. I wanted to ship some home but unfortunately the shipping costs were outrageous. We realized that we had only an hour to catch our train back to Cape Town, so we got back on our bikes to rush back into town. We rode about 8 miles total this day and my quads weren’t too happy about it.
After the train ride home we stopped and had an Ostrich burger before heading back to the ship for some much needed sleep.
Day 6: Today I spent the day with the Amy Biehl Foundation, which I wrote about in my last entry.
Day 7: I woke up early and headed to Green Market Square with Kyle to do some shopping. The morning was filled with haggling and bargaining and I ended up with some cool gifts and souvenirs. I also found some uniforms for the Bering Sea Pirates (future champions of the sea Olympics). We headed back to the ship around 11 and I spent the rest of the taking care of some things onboard. At on ship time, an African choral group boarded and sang for about a half hour, they were extremely talented.
Cape Town was a great port and is definitely a place I would like to return in the future, there is just so much to this place in terms of culture, sightseeing (or as SAS calls it, sightthinking) and history.
The Explorer is docked at a bunker in Cape Town Harbor refueling before we depart for Mauritius. We were supposed to leave by this morning, however high winds kept us from moving to the bunker until early this morning. It takes the ship 7-8 hours to refuel.
South Africa is an incredible country filled with culture and beauty. Though its rocky history and the period of apartheid still leaves a very strong mark on the modern country, there is an overall feeling of hope and optimism for a “New Africa”. Cape Town is vigorously preparing for the World Cup in 2010. New buildings and roads are being constructed and the airport is being completely renovated. The event will certainly bring a lot of attention to the country and it will hopefully provide an economic boost not only to the rich, but also the poor who reside in the informal settlements known as townships. Much like Brazil, there is an enormous inequality in the distribution of wealth in South Africa. Whites own almost 90% of the land and hold most of the income. Despite this, there is a feeling of positivity that consumes most of the nation, both black and white. We spent 7 days in Cape Town and we could have spent 7 more, there is so much to do here and all we could do is try to fit as much as we could into the time we had here.
Day 1: Our plan was to go to Robben Island in the morning and hike Table Mountain in the afternoon to make it to the top by sunset. However, Robben Island tickets were sold out until after my safari, so that wasn’t happening. Slava and I bought tickets for Tuesday morning. We walked around the waterfront which is really modernized and touristy. We stopped into an internet café to put some pictures online and grabbed some lunch. We then started walking towards downtown Cape Town and spent the afternoon walking around there and also planning a trip to the winelands for Wednesday through a tourism office. We took a taxi to the base of Table Mountain arriving around 4pm with the hopes of hiking up. Unfortunately, the rangers thought that the weather would be changing for the worse very quickly and we would get stuck hiking in very windy and dangerous conditions. We were pretty disappointed and had to take the cable car to the top of mountain.
As can be seen in my pictures, the view from the top of the mountain was incredible. It was truly the most breath taking thing I have ever seen. You are able to see the whole cape: from the Atlantic Ocean to the Indian Ocean. After spending a little while at the top, we met up with some other SASers who were about to hike down and Slava and I decided to join them. The hike down was pretty rough and my knees took a beating that lasted a couple days after. That night a group of us went out to a game restaurant on the waterfront. I ate a dish of Ostrich, Springbok, and Kudu meat – Amazing! Slava and I finished the night by going to a local jazz club (SA is famous for its Jazz) and we met up with some of our staff and faculty members.
Day 2-4: For these three days I was on a Safari in the KwaZulu Natal province of the country. This area was the home of the infamous Zulu warriors and King Shaka. It is also home to the second largest game reserve in the country. A groups of 40 SASers took a 2 hour flight to Durban, followed by a 3 hour bus ride to our tree “chalets”. We went on an evening game drive as soon as we arrived, seeing lots of giraffe, impala, nyala, and wildebeest.
The next morning we got up at 5am for an all day game drive. We were incredibly lucky and go to see a plethora of animals. Though the lions and leopards eluded our view, we did get to see rhino, hyena, buffalo, elephant, zebra, warthog, kudu, and giraffe. Both our driver and our guide mentioned that we were very lucky to see so much in a day. We got to see three of the famous big five. We had a great dinner in the bush where we were accompanied by a group of native African singers.
On our last morning we took an early morning game drive in hopes of finding some lions, to no avail. We headed off for our 3 hour bus ride back to the airport around 8am.
Day 5: The day started with our 8am trip to Robben Island, where Nelson Mandela and many other political prisoners spent significant time. Though the island was very rich in history, I thought the tour itself was a little less than spectacular because we were left to view much of the island while aboard a bus. We were able to get off the bus at the prison and tour the inside halls. We were able to see the cell where Nelson Mandela spent 18 of his 27 years in prison.
After returning to Cape Town, slava and I headed back to the ship for a quick lunch and headed off to the train station to catch our train to Stellenboch in the winelands. Upon arriving, we rented some bikes and started riding out of the town and into the country where all the wineries were located. Now, I’m no Lance Armstrong, but I thought I was in shape enough to ride a few miles. The cycling was really tough and the terrain was very hilly. We finally got to our destination, Simonsig, after an hour and a half of riding. Once there, we did a wine tasting and some of the wines were great. I wanted to ship some home but unfortunately the shipping costs were outrageous. We realized that we had only an hour to catch our train back to Cape Town, so we got back on our bikes to rush back into town. We rode about 8 miles total this day and my quads weren’t too happy about it.
After the train ride home we stopped and had an Ostrich burger before heading back to the ship for some much needed sleep.
Day 6: Today I spent the day with the Amy Biehl Foundation, which I wrote about in my last entry.
Day 7: I woke up early and headed to Green Market Square with Kyle to do some shopping. The morning was filled with haggling and bargaining and I ended up with some cool gifts and souvenirs. I also found some uniforms for the Bering Sea Pirates (future champions of the sea Olympics). We headed back to the ship around 11 and I spent the rest of the taking care of some things onboard. At on ship time, an African choral group boarded and sang for about a half hour, they were extremely talented.
Cape Town was a great port and is definitely a place I would like to return in the future, there is just so much to this place in terms of culture, sightseeing (or as SAS calls it, sightthinking) and history.
Wednesday, March 7, 2007
Cape Town, Part 1.5
I haven't had the time to write my full Cape Town entry yet, but it will be up probably on Friday or Saturday. Today, i spent the day with the Amy Biehl foundation. Amy Biehl was an American student killed in a township outside of Cape Town in 1993 during a anti-aparthied uprising. Her parents set up this NPO to continue on Amy's work of providing after school programs for poor children. As part of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) (headed by Desmund Tutu), Amy's killers were granted amnesty and now actually work for the foundation. I thought this was a really interesting approach to the perpetrators of a murder, certainly something that would never take place in the USA. The TRC sought not to punish whites and other criminals for their apartheid crimes, but to condone reconciliation and amnesty to them in the interest of creating a united South Africa.
The Amy Biehl Foundation provides after school programs such as music classes, dance, drawing, singing and other fine arts programs that arent a part of regular school. We got the opportunity today to see the program in action at four different township schools. The kids were so excited to see us and to have their picture taken. They are all extremely talented in everthing they do. Unfortunately, the Foundation has had to downsize in recent years since they have lost some funding from the USA. I've never felt compelled to donate to anything in my life, but i would really love to be able to help out this organization sometime in the near future.
Here is a link to the foundation's website if anyone would like to check it out
http://www.amybiehl.org/
The Amy Biehl Foundation provides after school programs such as music classes, dance, drawing, singing and other fine arts programs that arent a part of regular school. We got the opportunity today to see the program in action at four different township schools. The kids were so excited to see us and to have their picture taken. They are all extremely talented in everthing they do. Unfortunately, the Foundation has had to downsize in recent years since they have lost some funding from the USA. I've never felt compelled to donate to anything in my life, but i would really love to be able to help out this organization sometime in the near future.
Here is a link to the foundation's website if anyone would like to check it out
http://www.amybiehl.org/
Friday, March 2, 2007
Cape Town Part 1
We just arrived in Cape Town this morning. The sunset coming up over table mountain was beautiful. Today, I am planning on hiking the mountain and exploring a bit of the Capt Town Waterfront. New pictures of Cape Town and Salvador are up.
http://picasaweb.google.com/ggallant1
http://picasaweb.google.com/ggallant1
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)