Cairo/Luxor

Hello all! I returned yesterday from a 4-day trip to Cairo and Luxor, and there is definitely a lot to tell!  Egypt is completely different from all of the other ports we’ve been to.  I’d have to say that what we saw (pyramids, Sphinx, museums, temples, etc.) was by far my favorite of the entire trip, but by the end, I couldn’t stand the people. More on that later. Here is my day-by-day!

-----Tuesday, July 27-----

We are in Egypt! I had planned to wake up to watch us pull into Alexandria, but my snooze button just kept calling and I slept in (ha) until 0730.  We quickly grabbed breakfast and finished packing for our 4-day trip to Cairo and Luxor. Our trip was meeting in the Union at 0930, and it was so hectic!! There were around 120 people on our trip alone, and many people had parents going on the trip.  It was fun seeing parents reunite with their kids, and one girl’s brother even surprised her when he showed up!  That made me even more excited for seeing my family again in a few weeks.  Not that I want to leave the ship, of course!  We went out to our buses, which were cramped but very well air-conditioned. The bus ride to Cairo was 3 hours long, which was ample time for a nap! We got to Cairo a little after 1300 and ate a buffet lunch at a 5-star hotel that overlooks the pyramids! We were still fairly far away from them but it was so cool to get off the bus and see them!  A little band greeted us as we walked in, and we went to the dining room for a wide variety of food. No one really knows what traditional Egyptian food is, but the food we ate was fairly common—“oriental” rice, roast chicken, beef in “brown sauce,” and penne pasta.  After lunch and dessert, we got back on the bus and headed to Memphis, which was the first capital of Egypt.  On the way, our tour guide pointed out a village saying “this is where the middle class people live,” and we were amazed.  What they refer to as middle class, we would probably refer to as slums.  Pretty much everywhere we drove was so dirty and there were piles of trash everywhere.  It was amazing just to see the vast difference in the qualities of life between Egypt and the previous countries we’ve visited.  Once we reached Memphis, we saw a huge statue of Ramses II that was found lying on its back and has stayed that way every since.  The statue is HUGE and very well preserved considering it is several thousand years old.  We then proceeded to the alabaster sphinx of King Amenhopis II, a small preview for the large sphinx at the Giza pyramids.  After exploring the area, we proceeded to Sakkara, a cemetery complex.  We saw a 5000-year step pyramid belonging to King Zoser, and we explored a few tombs.  I am getting better at managing small tunnels! If I thought people selling stuff in Turkey was bad, people here were even worse.  They follow you and keep following you, even when you turn around and say NO loudly, they still follow! My goodness, people!  There are “security” people everywhere who are just wearing long gowns and turbans, they didn’t have any badges except for a paper nametag that said “security.”  They all ask for “baksheesh,” which is a tip.  The man at the door to one of the tombs wanted a tip for, well, I guess standing at the door.  He actually grabbed my arm and asked for baksheesh but I pulled away and he moved on to asking the next person. Pushy people!!! We then headed off to our very nice 5-star hotel.  SAS does well!  There were two different buildings in the hotel, and of course Steven and I were in different ones. My room was amazing and had the absolute comfiest pillows EVER.  I felt like I was lying on a cloud.  We had a half hour “siesta” before we had to meet to go to the Khan El Khalili bazaar.  Our tour guide gave us many warnings, like not to stray from the main street and not to buy anything expensive (like jewelry) because it was most likely a knockoff and overpriced.  This bazaar was nothing like the one in Istanbul!  It wasn’t even a tenth of the size and the streets were full of trash and food.  Ick!  We walked for a while, not really finding much variety.  Steven found a stone statue of Anubis, and I got a pyramid and a votive made out of a really pretty stone.  They were 45 Egyptian pounds each (~$8) but I haggled him down to 60 pounds for both.  I am redeeming myself from the lamp incident!  I had also been eyeing some colorful cloth bags with embroidered elephants or camels on them.  I got one with elephants on it for 45 pounds down from 60.  The guy wouldn’t go any lower because he claimed it was hand-embroidered (which I highly doubt because every bag looked the same).  Steven wanted a set of canopic jars, so we went to a store with hundreds of statues.  He is now a pro at bartering, and he got the shopkeeper to accept a price much lower than he wanted.  I believe he was asking 320 pounds for a set of 4 small jars, and Steven got him down to 150!  We left the bazaar for a buffet dinner at the hotel at 10pm.  4am wakeup call tomorrow!

-----Wednesday, July 28-----

After only getting about 4 hours of sleep, we were off to watch the sunrise at the pyramids!  Apparently they closed off the area so only our SAS group was there.  We sat on a wall and watched as the dark sky became lighter and lighter.  It was very foggy so we couldn’t see the sun, but it was still amazing.  We had box breakfasts from the hotel which included 3 rolls, a croissant, an apple, and a hard-boiled egg.  We had been told to avoid fruit and I didn’t trust the egg, so my breakfast was bread.  We walked down to the pyramids, and some people bribed the guards so that they could climb on one of them (after we were told not to since someone on an SAS trip many years ago climbed up, fell, and died. But whatever makes them happy I guess).  We then headed back up to the buses because camels were waiting for us!!  Steven and I got on the same camel and the driver took my camera to take pictures.  We were told to lean back, and the camel started to get up.  It was pretty scary!  His back legs stood all the way up while his front legs were still kneeling, so we REALLY had to lean back to keep from sliding off the front!  It was a bumpy ride, but it was a lot of fun in the end.   The driver took pictures of us with the pyramids in the background.  At the end of the ride, the camel kneeled but didn’t want to sit, so the driver whipped the poor thing =(.  He of course asked for baksheesh and we gave him a dollar because he took pictures (we weren’t required to tip because we had already paid for the ride).  My behind was pretty sore after that ride!!  We again boarded the buses for a close-up look at the pyramids.  We walked around the Great Pyramid, the only remaining wonder of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and Steven climbed up a few stairs (legally).  The next stop was the Sphinx, where we sat for a while with my “uncle” Greg and my sea’s graduate assistant, Sarah, admiring the view of the Sphinx with the pyramids.  Next we were off to the National Archaeological Museum, where we saw a collection of the treasures found in King Tut’s tomb.  Unfortunately we were unable to take pictures, but Steven bought a CD with pictures of all the artifacts.  We bought an extra ticket to go into the mummy exhibit, where we saw mummies of many pharaohs!  The mummy of Rameses II even still had hair!  Since we hadn’t eaten since 4am, we were starving, but we still had one more stop before lunch.  We drove to the Citadel of Saladin to visit the alabaster mosque of Mohamed Ali (no, not the boxer—he’s the founder of modern Egypt).  From the citadel, we had a panoramic view of Cairo.  FINALLY we went to lunch (it was around 2pm already), which was on a boat cruise down the Nile.  We ate a buffet lunch with pretty much the same exact food that we’ve been having at every meal, and we were entertained by folk music, a bellydancer (a very out-of-shape bellydancer), and a guy with a big skirt who spun around really fast and did tricks with his skirt.  We cruised for a while down the Nile, but we were in a fairly Westernized/touristy area.  There are buildings on the water with restaurants like TGI Fridays and Chili’s.  It was still a fun trip, and we were thankful to have food for the first time in almost 10 hours!  We then headed back to the ship for another siesta (it’s extremely hot in the afternoons so we get to spend them in the air-conditioned hotel).  I took a 2-hour nap (yay!!!) and then we headed out for the Sound and Light show at the pyramids.  I had heard that the show is extremely touristy and lame, but we really had nothing else to do so we went.  I swear that SAS bought out the show.  Our trip was there along with the Cairo Overnight and the Cairo Extended trips.  Probably half the ship was there.  Anyway, the show started with the pyramids being lit up.  I have to admit that the lighted pyramids against the night sky was really striking, but we could really do without the sound.  The Sphinx narrated the show, there was dramatic music, it was all very over the top.  Example: The Sphinx says “The world fears time, but time fears…….THE PYRAMIDS” *dramatic music with the pyramids lighting up*. Yeah.  After the show, we went back to the hotel for dinner, again at 10pm, and went to sleep because we had a 3am wakeup call for the next day!

-----Thursday, July 29-----

After another night of little sleep, we were up and packed by 3:30am and on the bus to go to the airport.  We again got the same box breakfasts, yum!  We were missing 2 girls from our bus, and our bus leader went to call them thinking that they overslept.  He woke them up and apparently the wakeup call was too early for them because they said they were signing off the trip (and thereby throwing away about $600).  Whatever, the rest of us were off to Luxor!  The benefit of getting to the airport at 5:30am is that no one is there!  The flight took about an hour (no food this time), and once we landed we were off to the Valley of the Kings.  Our ticket got us into three royal tombs: Ramses I, Ramses VI, and Ramses IX (apparently it was a popular name).  The tombs were so well preserved that most of the hieroglyphics and drawings still had their original color.  Steven and I paid extra to go into the tomb of King Tut, which was worth it except for the “security” person there.  We were the only two people besides this security guy, and he started talking to us.  As soon as he started, I knew we would have to pay him baksheesh.  He pointed out all of the artwork on the walls and gave us his flashlight so we could get a better look at Tut’s sarcophagus.  At the other end of the tomb was his mummy, which was extremely tiny considering he died when he was around our age.  The guy pointed out his buck teeth.  After we were taught everything about the tomb, we were preparing to leave when the guy asked us if we were married.  He was amazed when I said we weren’t, since Muslim couples don’t date in public.  He immediately grabbed my arm and clutched it to his stomach (ew) and proceeded to tell Steven that he needed to marry me because I was pretty or something.  He alternated between grabbing my arm, touching Steven’s beard, and touching my face, the entire time we were inching toward the door and trying to leave.  He then told Steven that we need to come back in a year and we had better be married and have a kid.  Riiiiiiiiight.  We were making it obvious that we were trying to leave, and he finally let us go, but not before asking for baksheesh.  I gave him 5 pounds (less than a dollar) and we bolted out of there.  I pretty much bathed in hand sanitizer when we got out.  It’s amazing and a little scary how we learn in America that it is bad if a stranger touches you, but here it is so common.  It’s not threatening or anything, I wasn’t afraid of the guy (I probably would have been if I didn’t have Steven with me) but it was just uncomfortable since I grew up knowing that it’s weird for a stranger to physically touch you.  So after we bolted out of there, we checked out the shops that were near the bus.  It was like the bazaar in that everyone was trying to get our attention, but they were REALLY persistent and just kept following us.  I seriously told one guy about 15 times that I didn’t want to buy his book of Luxor.  I did, however, spy an adorable wooden camel that I wanted.  Thinking it didn’t cost more than $10, I asked the man how much.  He said 160 Egyptian pounds, which is about $29.  Heck no!  I said all I had was 50 pounds (~$9).  He said “no, 85!”  Again, I said all I had was 50 pounds.  He kept going lower: 75, 70, 65.  Then I said my bus was leaving and I had to go, so he finally gave it to me for 50.  I trotted off happily with my purchase (and my remaining 200 pounds).  We then headed to the temple of the only female pharaoh, Queen Hatshepshut.  Three different “security” people tried to get baksheesh from us (I was starting to get really annoyed with them).  One guy jumped in a picture I was taking of Steven and then demanded a tip.  We lied and said we left our money on the bus.  Another guy offered to show us a place behind a rope we weren’t supposed to cross, and we just walked away.  The last guy started pointing things out to us like the guy in the tomb did, but we learned our lesson and just ignored him.  It was already extremely hot (our tour guide said we were lucky as it was only 110 degrees, and the day before got up to 130 degrees!!!!), but we only had one more stop.  Just outside of the valley with the temple were two huge statues called the Colossi of Memnon.  They are pretty weathered and you can only make out the shape of a person, but they were definitely colossal!  We returned to the hotel for another buffet lunch with the same food and then we had a 5-hour siesta away from the blazing heat.  Some people went to the pool, which overlooks the Nile, but I chose instead to nap in the air-conditioned room.  We got back on the bus and went to Luxor Temple, where our guide gave us a very detailed tour of the major statues and pictures on the wall.  We headed back to the hotel for an (early) dinner and got some much-needed sleep.

-----Friday, July 30-----

Our wakeup call came at 6am this morning, so we got ample sleep.  We got a real breakfast this time, and I got a scrumptious omelet that was made right in front of me.  Our big group was divided in thirds for the flights back to Cairo.  Steven was on the 10:25 flight and I was on the 2:15 flight, so we had different itineraries.  Everyone went in the morning to Karnak Temple, which Steven was very excited to go to.  I’m not really up on my Egyptian history or mythology, but I definitely appreciated the amazing statues, obelisks, and carvings on the walls.  We all went to the airport and said adios to the 10:05 and 10:25 flights.  They were flying back to Cairo, eating lunch there, then driving the 3 hours back to Alexandria (yes, Alexandria has an airport but I guess SAS bought roundtrip tickets to save money).  My group went back to the hotel to pack and rest before lunch was served.  At 12:45 we were off to the airport again for our flight.  I had to open my bag at security because I stupidly forgot to take my nail clippers out of my makeup bag before the trip, but the security guy just looked at them and gave them back to me.  Other people were traveling with huge bottles of liquid and razors, so they had to throw them out (common sense, people?).  We finally all made it through security and we were off to Cairo.  The plane was extremely small and a little bumpy, but I made it out alive =).  Once in Cairo, we hopped on the bus for our 3-hour ride from hell.  The first two hours were fine, but our driver began to get really impatient.  He laid on the horn and tailgated cars, and it seemed like we were driving really fast (the kid in front of me said we were only going 55-60 but it seemed like so much faster).  We even drove another bus off the road!!! Once we got into the city of Alexandria, it became a lot worse.  We had been told to be extremely careful in crossing streets because oncoming traffic doesn’t stop.  Traffic here is HORRENDOUS.  There are no lane lines, and if there are, people don’t obey them.  It’s a free for all.  I took video of us driving through the city, and I think we almost hit 5 cars and came close to hitting several people.  At one point we were stopped in traffic, no one could move, and our driver was laying on the horn.  Crazy!  The scariest part was when we had the ship in sight and everyone was so relieved, our driver drove right out into 4 lanes of traffic and we were inches from a collision.  It’s all on video!  As soon as we got to the ship, we all bolted off of that bus and ran to the ship.  The whole trip was amazing, but I was definitely happy to be home. I missed my room!!!

If you've got a date in Constantinople...

She'll be waiting in Istanbul!

The past couple days have been pretty crazy as it’s been 11 days since our last class day. I had a poetry exam today, which ended up being extremely easy as it was open book. We also had a tentative due date today for a poetry paper, so I was trying to get that done, but he pushed the final due date to after Egypt. Right now I’m taking a break from packing to write this post because I won’t be writing for 4 days! Steven and I are doing the Cairo/Luxor overnight trip, which involves 2 days/2 nights in Cairo and 2 days/1 night in Luxor. On our last day (Saturday) we have a visit to an orphanage in Alexandria. It should be a good time, although I’m a little sad that we have no time to explore Alexandria. Anyway, about our last 2 days in Turkey…..

We didn’t have any trips planned for the last 2 days, so we decided to spend a few hours in the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul.  We got there around 9am and stayed until well past 2pm. And we probably didn’t even see half of it.  The bazaar has 61 streets and over 4000 shops, but we were told a lot of the shops sell the same exact things. There were lamp shops selling the same kinds of lamps, jewelry shops selling the same kinds of jewelry, and leather shops up the kazoo. I really wanted a lamp, so we went into a store to look around.  The price they give you is too much and you’re supposed to barter it down to a reasonable price. We were given a lot of tips beforehand, like to shop around to find the best price and everything. We get to this first shop and I see a lamp I really like. It’s a hanging metal lamp with a glass bowl covered in a multi-colored glass mosaic, I figure it probably costs around $40-$50.  I asked the salesman how much, and he said 120 lira, which is about $78.  I said thank you and that I was going to go look around and he goes, “No no no I will not let you leave! How much do you think it is worth?” Despite my protests he would not let me go, and I offered 80 lira, which is about $50. He took it, and I walked off happily with my lamp but still a little disappointed that I gave in too easily.  Steven also wanted a lamp, so we stopped at another store nearby.  I wish I had just walked out of that other store and shopped around!!!!!!! Steven got an even bigger lamp for 40 lira ($25).  I was really mad at myself for overpaying for my lamp!! I guess it was a learning experience, and I definitely got better at bargaining after that.  We wandered around, looking at different stores.  I usually hate shopping while at home, but I have really enjoyed shopping on this trip.  While I loved looking at the variety of new things in the bazaar, the salesmen really started to get on my nerves.  Let’s just say I like my personal space, and these people get in your face and try to sell you carpets and leather jackets and cashmere and everything you can think of. As soon as you tell one that you don’t need a carpet, another one swoops in. I know it’s their culture and they are trying to sell their goods, I just wanted my bubble!  They said funny things to us like, “come in so I can help you spend your money!” or “how can I take your money from you?” Clever, huh?  I knew of some things I wanted to get, like scarves, tea, teacups, and possibly a blanket, so we shopped around.  I got a set of six teacups and saucers, blue with etched flowers, for 20 lira.  Turkish teacups look more like shotglasses than our idea of teacups.  I also got an obscene amount of tea (I tried apple tea and pomegranate tea and absolutely loved both, so I guess I’m developing a liking for tea?) for really cheap.  We found one shop with boxes of tea for 5 lira each.  The owner said “for you, 3 lira.”  I ended up getting 4 for 10 lira! I was getting better!  A lot of shops were selling ceramic plates and bowls, and I saw a really pretty turquoise pattern that I loved. I picked out 4 bowls of the same color but with slightly different patterns, all handpainted, and asked how much they were.  They were 12 lira each, but I ended up getting 4 for 35 lira.  Woot!  I got other little things, like a scarf, a t-shirt, a magnet, but my biggest purchase was a throw for a future couch in a future apartment.  We stopped at the first shop we saw, where I saw a pretty maroon and beige patterned throw.  This kid was trying to sell it to me, saying it was 120 lira, but I kept saying I wanted to look around. I could tell it wasn’t really high quality. An adult came out of the shop and started talking to us, and I was only able to get it down to 90 lira.  I asked him for his card and said that I would probably be back, I just wanted to look at other styles (and not be in the same predicament as the lamp).  We wandered around a bit more until a guy pulled us into his shop.  He showed us to a room across the street where we sat down on a bench and he brought out different throws for us to look at. I wasn’t too thrilled about any of them and they were really expensive, around 400-500 lira. I said my highest price was probably 150 lira, so he brought out a stack of silk and cashmere throws.  I fell in love with a red and beige one with a simple flower design.  The salesman said he usually sells it for 220 lira, but since I was (allegedly) his first customer of the day, he said he would give it to me for 130 in cash.  I still wanted to keep looking around to see if I found one I liked more or for cheaper, but he said that offer wouldn’t stand if I left and came back.  I was still really unsure, I was between paying around $80 for a silk/cashmere throw I really liked or looking around and possibly finding a better price. I also didn’t have 130 lira on me in cash. His last offer was 130 lira with credit card, which they try to avoid as they have to pay a 5% commission. I was happy with that and walked away with my new purchase. It was a fun but long 5 hours of shopping!  Oh, I forgot to talk about lunch! We found a little area with cafes and we each got a panini, thinking we would be getting a hot sandwich. Apparently in Turkey, panini means a French bread pizza type thing. It was delicious! Mine had ham, mushrooms, and cheese while Steven’s had sausage. 

So after our long day at the bazaar, we went back to the ship with our new treasures to relax.  We then walked a few blocks to the Galata Bridge, which has a bunch of restaurants underneath it.  I thought we were done with the people-in-my-face thing for the day, but every single restaurant had a waiter outside getting in your way and trying to get you to eat at the restaurant. We passed on 2 restaurants, wanting to see what was ahead, but we ended up eating at the 3rd restaurant because the waiter practically pushed us into our seats. We got a 10% discount on our dinner though! I got meat shish, which was deliciously tender meat on a stick served with rice, and Steven got some kind of meat stew that was served boiling hot in an iron pan. Both were very tasty! Shaara had told us that there was a place to get ice cream on the bridge, but we walked the entire thing and didn’t find it. Bummer! We called it a day and walked back to the ship.

For our final day in Istanbul, Steven said he wanted to go to the Topkapi Palace Museums. We had been told in Global Studies that the museum holds the jewels and weapons that belonged to the sultans of the Ottoman empire, and that these jewels made the crown jewels look like rocks.  I was bummed that I couldn’t take pictures of anything, but we saw jewelry, thrones, and weapons completely encrusted with gold, diamonds, emeralds, and rubies. We even saw an 86-carat diamond—it was HUGE! (and had a rope around its case so you couldn’t even get remotely near the thing).  After a few hours in the museum (half the places were closed for some reason) we took the tram back to the ship, ate lunch, and wrote postcards. We tried our luck at the free wi-fi at the Starbucks outside of the port, but there were about 40 SASers there and the internet was too slow. Lame. I’ll have a lot of pictures to upload when I get home!

The stupid questions and comments just keep getting better and better. Today I have two official (spoken by The Voice) and two that I overheard.

1. “Why do I need a Turkish visa if I already have a credit card?” (We needed to buy a Turkish visa if we were planning on leaving Istanbul)
2.  Girl 1: “I wish we had chunky peanut butter on the ship”
Girl 2: “But then the people who are allergic to nuts can’t eat it”

3. “That big statue in Egypt with the body of the lion and the face of a human, what is that called?”
4. “Can we go to Mecca?”

So that’s it. My next post won’t be until Friday at the earliest. Adios!

Istanbul (not Constantinople)

The last few days have been absolutely crazy! I guess I will start from the beginning—prepare for a long post!

We arrived in Istanbul on Tuesday around 7am, and we woke up early to watch the ship pull into port. We watched the sunrise over the Asian part of Turkey and passed by the famous mosques we had learned about—the Blue Mosque and the Hagia Sophia—on the European side.  It was amazing! After our diplomatic briefing, we were told that we all had to carry our passports while in Istanbul. We’ve had 4 people lose their passports already (2 people found theirs and 2 were left behind in Greece and had to meet up with us in Turkey) so I wonder how many people will lose theirs this time. Anyway, off we went on our 6-hour city orientation. We saw all of the major sites in the city and it was very worth it. Our first stop was the Sehzade Mosque, where we enjoyed the architecture and detailed mosaics after we took off our shoes and I covered my head with a shawl. We learned that icons are forbidden in the Islamic religion, so you will never find a person, face, or animal in a mosque. The next stop was the Sultan Ahmet Mosque, better known as the Blue Mosque because of its blue mosaics inside. It was huge, more than twice the size of the previous mosque. We had some free time to look at the mosaics and then we were off to the Hippodrome, where chariot races used to be held. All that remains are 3 columns: a very tall one made of stones, part of an obelisk stolen from Egypt, and the bronze serpent column stolen from Delphi (which we learned about in Global Studies—it was made by the Greeks from the melted weapons of the defeated Persian army—ha!).  A road is now in place of the former track so there is still a feel of the shape of the Hippodrome. The next stop was the Hagia Sophia, which was first a church, then was converted into a mosque, and is now just a museum. It has the largest dome in Istanbul, and the inside of the building was amazing. We could see how the Muslims covered the Christian icons with their mosaics, some of the icons had been uncovered so we could see the juxtaposition of the two religions in one building. On our way to our next stop, I grabbed an ear of corn from a street vendor, hot and delicious!! The final stop was the Byzantine Cistern, a huge underground vault where water for the city used to be stored. We walked through the pathways and looked at the modern art that is now exhibited there. To give you an idea of the size of the cistern, it contains 336 Corinthian columns! We went back to the ship to shower and eat dinner, then walked around the port area trying to find a place for dessert. We happened upon a string of hookah bars, and everyone was trying to get us to come in and smoke. Ick. We finally pulled away and found a little ice cream stand. Good stuff! Turkish ice cream is really thick, not as creamy as gelato but still very good!

The next day was our overnight trip to Cappadocia, a region in central Turkey. We met in the Union bright and early at 6:15am and received SAS’s version of a continental breakfast, which apparently includes a few pastries and orange juice. I, of course, had planned ahead and brought a baggie of cereal and a granola bar. Go me! We boarded the motorcoach and were off to the airport! It was crazy trying to organize 81 people with their passports and plane tickets, it probably took us an hour to get to our gate. Our flight was slightly delayed, but soon we were taking off. The flight was only about an hour long, but they served us a sandwich and almond bread! I was amazed—for our 2 hour flight to Halifax, we didn’t get anything! Almost as soon as I finished my lunch, we were preparing to land. We landed safely in possibly one of the tiniest commercial airports in the world. It was basically one runway and a small building. And it was in the middle of nowhere. Our tour guide met us there and we were off! We stopped at so many places that I may not remember the names of everything, but here we go! The first stop was the Kaymakli Underground City, where Christians had built houses, churches, schools, and other buildings to live in during times of persecution. It was 8 stories deep and went about 130 feet into the ground, but we were only able to look at the first 4 stories. The passageways were small and we had to crouch down and crawl at some points to get through. The passages would branch off into other passages and open up into rooms, our guide said they were used to confuse enemies. There were also trapdoors and hiding places so the Christians could surprise their attackers. It was amazing to see how they could carve an entire working city out of rock! They even had a winery—important things! The next stop was a panoramic view of Pigeon Valley. Pigeons were apparently very important in Cappadocia as they served as food and fertilizer. Yum. There were pigeon houses carved into the rocks.  After that, we were well overdue for lunch. We stopped in an area with several restaurants and were given an hour to eat. We went to the first restaurant we saw: Steven got some kind of meat dish with tomato and egg, and I got chicken kebab. Quite tasty. Our tour guide took us to many different places, and this was where I started losing track of what was what. Everywhere we went, we saw these large conical rocks made out of volcanic stone with doors and windows carved into them. The volcanic stone is pliable enough that it can be easily carved and people made houses and entire cities out of these rocks. The guide also took us to two “fortresses” where the castles were also built in the same fashion. We got to the hotel completely exhausted, but we had to grab dinner and get ready for a Whirling Dervish ceremony. Dinner at the hotel was pretty good, but dessert was amazing. Everything was buffet, and there were probably 40 choices for dessert. We hopped back on the bus for the Whirling Dervish ceremony, which was held in an old camel caravan resting station. The ceremony was very involved, I was glad we got a pamphlet explaining the different parts or I would have been completely lost. The Dervishes apparently spin approximately 800 times during the entire ceremony and are in a trance the whole time. They spun around so fluidly –I would get dizzy! After the ceremony we were given cinnamon tea, which was delicious. We went back to the hotel, which had rather sucky air conditioning, and instantly fell asleep after an exhausting day.

My hotel roommate had a hot air balloon ride the next morning and had to wake up at 4am, I woke up with her alarm and then went right back to sleep for 2 more hours. I called my mom from the hotel phone =) and then got ready for breakfast. Not as good as dinner, but it was a lot better than the ship’s breakfast! The group who went for the hot air balloon rides met us at breakfast and then we were off for our second day of sightseeing. In the morning, we visited the open air museums of Goreme Valley and Zelve Valley, more cities carved into rock. In the Zelve Valley, our tour guide led us up a path to a rock with a tunnel inside. None of us had brought flashlights, so everyone was using the flash from their cameras to light the way. It was pretty scary! It was completely pitch black, and we were crawling through a downward-sloping tunnel until it became a set of stone stairs. We made it out alive but rather dusty (I washed my clothes when I got back to the ship and the water in the sink was a nice dark brown—yummy!).  The Goerme Valley was more developed and we explored the different chapels and buildings in the city. After Muslims took over the city, they scratched the eyes out of most of the icons in the chapels, again because icons are forbidden in Islam. Some of the frescoes were still very well preserved and have been there since the 11th century! Our last stop of the morning was to see the “fairy chimneys.” It’s hard to describe these, basically they are very tall cone-shaped rock formations with “caps” on top. Go search them on Google images!! They are made of 2 different kinds of rock from 2 different volcanic eruptions: the “cap” rock on top is much harder than the rock below, and wind has eroded the bottom rock to make it look like the cap is precariously balancing on the cone. Quite cool! We then stopped in the town of Urgup for lunch (I had Turkish pizza which consisted of meat, cheese, and egg, and Steven had a meat shish kebab) followed by some delicious apple tea, and then we were on the road to the airport. We were apparently going to a different airport than the one we arrived to, this one was thankfully much bigger. Our flight was delayed half an hour—boo! We again were fed on the flight, this time there was a chicken sandwich, a weird salad with sour cream and lettuce (?), and banana chocolate mousse. We returned to Istanbul safe and sound. Although Cappadocia was amazing, I was very happy to see the ship, my air-conditioned cabin, and my comfy bed again!

All right, it’s pretty late over here and I have class in the morning, so I will talk about the last 2 days in Istanbul tomorrow! But now (drumroll please) here is the stupidest comment of the entire voyage:

--A girl was talking about her time in Istanbul. She said, “I made it to the Europe side and the Asia side, I wish we were going to Africa!”

Winner winner, chicken dinner.

One person apparently lost their passport, we don’t know yet if they made it back to the ship or not. I believe the two people we left behind in Greece made it back. Fun times!

New post tomorrow!

Hello, faithful blog readers! Sorry I have not updated in 4 days...by the end of the day all I want to do is sleep!! I will write a huge post tomorrow explaining life in Istanbul!

Turkey Day! (Not Thanksgiving...)

Greece is now behind us and we will be in Turkey tomorrow! Today is “Turkey Day,” a free day where we don’t have classes but we have lots of optional programs to attend. Apparently there is going to be good food, too! I haven’t written in three days, so here’s what’s been going on:

Three days ago (Friday) we had an SAS trip for Greek cooking lessons.  I was excited for it, but it ended up being kind of lame.  We weren’t taught how to cook at all. Our group of 40-some was split into 5 teams, each at a different table with lots of ingredients. Each team was given a menu and the ingredients in each dish (just the ingredients list, not how much of each). We were given 5-8 minutes to prepare each dish, and one of the chefs walked around with a finished dish for us to try to make. So we basically just threw things together. I definitely don’t know how to cook, but at least I know that when something calls for salt, it means a little bit, not the palmfuls that people were chucking into the salads. Yum. The trip was from 1100 to 1400, so we thought that we would be fed lunch after the lessons, but we were expected to eat what we made. I tried a little spoonful of each dish, but I wasn’t really into eating a meal out of stuff we threw together in 5 minutes. Steven and I signed off the trip at the end and took the metro to Monastiraki, one of the main squares in Athens. We grabbed a very satisfying lunch there: we shared a “cheese pie” (basically fillo dough filled with cheese), and we each got souvlaki (pork on a skewer).  Yum! After lunch it was the search for the sandals. Both Shaara and I read the same girl’s Summer 2009 blog before coming on the trip, and the girl went to this famous sandal shop in Athens where they custom-fit these leather sandals for you. It was actually only a couple blocks away from where we ate lunch! The shop is very “hippie” with lots of paintings and eclectic decorations all over the wall. And leather sandals EVERYWHERE. A guy handed us a “menu” of sandal styles to pick from and I tried a few on before picking one. They adjusted the straps to my feet and I was done! They were fairly cheap too—only 27 euros. Steven got a pair of sandals, too! I need to break them in, but they are already comfortable and they fit perfectly! We hailed a taxi and asked him to stop at the Hard Rock Café before taking us to the port. I literally ran into the store, bought my guitar pin, and ran out in 30 seconds because our driver couldn’t park on the street. Fun times! (if any future SASers happen to be reading this, the sandal shop is at 2 Aghias Theklas Street in Psirri. Or just go up to a local, point to your feet and say “sandals?” and they will tell you where to go).

On Saturday we had a free day, so we had gotten ferry tickets ahead of time to go to Aegina, one of the closest islands to the Greek mainland. The boat we were going on was called “Flying Dolphin” and it was actually a hydrofoil! It went really fast and glided on top of the water. We got to the island in about half an hour and then realized we didn’t really know what to do. The man who was selling us the ferry tickets told us to take a bus to the other side of the island to a place called Aghia Marina, so off we went. The port area was full of shops and people, but the middle of the island seemed to be run down and abandoned. Apparently very few people on the island spoke English, because when we asked which stop to get off, no one could help us. We finally asked a couple “marina?” and they said they were going there too. So we made it successfully. There was a dress shop at the place the bus dropped us off so we decided to shop a little bit. Steven got a pair of swim trunks and I got a couple of dresses. The store owner started talking to me in Greek (everyone thinks that I’m Greek because I have really tan skin now) but thankfully she spoke English. We went to a few other shops before deciding it was time to eat. I had read on WikiTravel about a cheap but delicious restaurant called Pita Tom, so we went there, but they said we wouldn’t be able to get gyros until 1pm (it was noon at the time). So we decided to do dessert first and went across the street to a snack bar to get ice cream with this warm brownie kind of thing. I wanted baklava but the place didn’t have it =(. We then went down to the beach. The sand was absolutely scorching, even through the beach blanket I had. We parked ourselves very close to the water and I ran in. I was expecting the freezing cold water like in Capri and Croatia, but the water was so warm! I could have stayed there forever. I wish we had someone else to sit on the beach watching our stuff because Steven and I had to take turns going in the water. After about an hour on the beach, we went back to Pita Tom for some much-needed food! I ordered a feta cheese “salad” and a gyro, Steven got a stuffed beefsteak. The feta cheese was delicious, just a nice brick of cheese covered in oil and spices. The gyro was even better, with tender meat, tzatziki, and even French fries! Steven’s dish was kind of like a meatloaf thing stuffed with cheese and tomatoes, he said he really liked it but I would take my gyro over his any day! After lunch we went to a little grocery store, I picked up some snacks and a frappe “maker,” basically just a cup with a top to shake the frappe in. The frappe is the “specialty” coffee drink in Greece, and it is basically instant coffee, water, milk, and sugar, served cold and very frothy. So I got the shaker and a can of Nescafe instant coffee and I am ready to make my own frappes! Then we waited about 40 minutes for the bus back to the port. Apparently the bus only comes every hour. Our return ticket to Piraeus wasn’t until 7:15, but we got it changed to 5:30 because we couldn’t find anything else to do. On the ferry we met an older couple from the US who were just in Turkey and were now in Greece, so we told them all about our ship and where we were going. When we got back, we just bummed around on the ship and enjoyed air conditioning and free food.

Yesterday was another free day, but we had to be back on the ship by 6pm so we decided not to go into Athens and just stay in Piraeus. Big mistake. Being Sunday, absolutely EVERYTHING was closed. Restaurants, shops, pharmacies, everything. Well, the sex cinema was open, but that wasn’t a destination we wanted (there was a man hosing down the chairs outside when we walked down that street—eww). So we went back to the port terminal, where some shops and a snack bar were open, and we ate lunch there. Pork wrapped in bacon on a stick = delicious!! We went back to the ship to write postcards and then ventured out a little later. I think we saw two restaurants open, everything else was still closed. We wanted to find a grocery store so I could buy some olives, so we asked someone at a snack bar. They said the main market was closed but there was an Asian market a few blocks from there. No olives there (I think the only reason it’s called Asian market is because it’s owned by Asian people, it was just a regular grocery store) but I got a box of “Nestle Fitness” cereal. It’ll be a nice change from tiny boxes of Special K and cornflakes. So our second outing was a bust, and we went back to the ship to bum around until dinner. I’m mad I didn’t get any olives!!!!

Special comments/actions of Greece:
-“I really do like this Greek style of gyros”
-People were trying to send postcards with stamps from Italy and Croatia.

Turkey tomorrow!!!!!!

It's all Greek to me!

So we have officially been on the ship for a month, it definitely feels like longer! We have over a month left and three more ports! Quite exciting. Right now we’re watching Labyrinth on a movie channel (I haven’t seen this movie in FOREVER!) and Steven is amazed at the awesomeness of David Bowie’s hair. I miss this movie!

After Croatia, we had two days at sea, which included my Anthropology midterm. We had about an hour and a half to write several definitions, 7 few-sentence essays, 3 one-paragraph essays, and 4 one-page essays. Definitely didn’t have enough time to finish. =( Oh well. In other news, they curved the Global Studies midterm A LOT and I got a 96% (I got 6 wrong out of 35). Woohoo!

Yesterday was our trip to Athens and the Acropolis. Our trip didn’t leave until 1300, so Shaara, Steven, and I went out into Piraeus and got breakfast. A lot of the restaurants in the immediate vicinity of our ship were closed, but we found a place to get really filling omelets and freshly squeezed orange juice. I don’t think I’ve ever had orange juice that just tasted like, well, just the juice from an orange. Definitely better than the stuff from a box! We left for Athens, which is about 6 miles from Piraeus (Athens is technically not on the water, so we are docked in Piraeus). First there was a short bus tour of Athens, which basically included the guide pointing out things that we could see for a split second between buildings. We got to see the stadium that held the first modern Olympic games in the late 1800s. Pretty cool. We also drove by the Temple of Zeus. Next stop was the Acropolis and Parthenon! By that time it was a nice, comfortable 40 degrees Celsius, which is about 104 degrees Fahrenheit, and no shade in sight! The walk up the hill was very slippery as the path was made out of marble, but we finally made it up to the Parthenon. We could see all of Athens from the top of the hill. Unfortunately not much of the original Parthenon is left as it has been looted and it even exploded once. We were given free time until we had to meet the bus to go back to the ship, but Shaara, Steven, and I had signed off early to go to the New Acropolis Museum. The museum opened just last year and it holds the small amount of artifacts left over from the looting of the Acropolis. A lot of the sculptures and stuff were stolen by the British and are in London. Lame!

After the museum, we walked down a random street and grabbed dinner. Shaara and I both got gyros—it was quite tasty. Not the same as the gyro we get at Greek fest though, this was a pile of meat, a pile of tzatziki sauce, and little triangles of pita to make our own gyro “nachos.” Steven got lamb with potatoes. There were a lot of touristy shops around the area, so we went window shopping and grabbed some gelato. We then hailed a cab back to the port, which was an experience in itself. I’m pretty sure he was only in a lane for about 30 seconds of the entire trip. Scary!!

So we have access to the port’s free wi-fi, and I tried connecting so I could upload pictures. Everybody and their uncle is Skyping, so Facebook was being super slow. Oh well.

Today we were up bright and early to go to Delphi, where the Temple of Apollo is. Steven is big into Greek mythology and he was really looking forward to this trip! It was a 3-hour drive to Delphi—sleep time! We drove up windy mountain roads (we seem to hit these in every country) until we reached the Delphi Museum at the base of ancient Delphi. The guide showed us around the museum, which contained sculptures and remains from Delphi. Everything in the museum was original, unlike in the New Acropolis Museum where the large majority of things were cast models. Also unlike the NAM, we were allowed to take pictures in the Delphi Museum. So, moral of the story: you can take pictures of real artifacts but you can’t take pictures of fake casts of artifacts. Good deal, Greece.

After the museum, we started the slippery trek up “The Sacred Way” to the Temple of Apollo, stopping along the way to learn about the other buildings that are still standing or were once there. Whoever decided to make steep paths out of marble is not very smart, we were slipping all over the place! I was laughing at the girls wearing sandals.  The view from the Temple of Apollo, which is now only 5 or 6 pillars standing on a base, was amazing. We got to see dioramas of what Delphi looked like at its prime, it would have been amazing to see it before the buildings were destroyed.

Everyone was starving, and it was time for lunch! I can definitely say I had the best meal of the entire trip. We stopped at a restaurant, seemingly in the middle of nowhere. Our guide told us that it was a 4-course meal of traditional Greek food. Yay! Out comes the bread and tzatziki sauce. I could have made a meal out of that alone! Then came the appetizers. Everyone got one of each food: stuffed cabbage (stuffed with veal), fried zucchini, fried cheese, and spinach pie. Everything was SO GOOD. Then we had Greek salad (lettuce, cabbage, onions, tomatoes, kalamata olives, and FETA CHEESE). The entrée was “fried meat steak” which is basically a glorified meatloaf, but it tasted really good with tzatziki sauce. It also had a little feta surprise inside. =) That came with some rice and fried potatoes (they like frying things).  We were stuffed, but not too full for dessert! Baklava! Steven highly enjoyed his first tasting of baklava, and I, as always, loved it. I wish I could take some home!

We rolled out of the restaurant to our last stop, the monastery of Hosios Loukas (Holy Luke). Our guide told us all about the architecture of the monastery and how it was influential for future churches. There were gold mosaics all over the ceilings, and she was really detailed in telling us what each mosaic was depicting. Very cool! We also saw the body of Holy Luke himself, a little worse for the wear. As we were leaving the monastery, our guide pointed us to a bowl of Turkish delight and said that we could take a piece. Now, I just heard that we had to try Turkish delight, I didn’t know what it was. It’s apparently like a gummy candy covered in powdered sugar. It didn’t taste too great, but maybe if I get some in Turkey it will taste different. Anyway, we hopped back on the bus and slept all the way back to the ship. Hooray for long bus rides!

Long time since last blog post = lots of stupid questions!

1. “How many more games until the world cup finals?” (This was asked AFTER they broadcasted the WC finals on TV for us and everyone was talking about Spain winning)
2. “Do we have to exchange Spanish euros for Greek euros?”
3. “Isn’t a drone just a copy of a human?” (This requires a story--as we were sailing through Greek islands, apparently a drone flew by us. We were told that they think it was Israeli, just checking us out. They apparently flew fairly close, but not many saw it because we were in Global Studies at the time)
4. This wasn’t an official stupid question/comment, but Shaara just told me what a girl said on her trip: “I just had a Greek version of…..what do they call a gyro here?”

Tomorrow we have Greek cooking lessons (fun!) and then I’m going to try to find this shop that makes sandals. Shaara and I read about this shop from a girl who wrote about it in her blog from last summer, they apparently measure your feet and custom-make the sandals for you right there for only 40-ish euros. So hopefully I’ll go get that done, stop at Hard Rock Café for my guitar pin, and back to the ship. We’re going to try to get to a Greek island for Saturday, then spending Sunday in Piraeus. Busy busy!

Snorkeling fun!

Those four days in Croatia went by way too fast! I was very sad to leave, but in a couple of days we will be in Greece! We have lots of fun trips planned: SAS trip to the acropolis, SAS trip to Delphi, a Greek cooking class, and then going to a Greek island for a day. Exciting!

So yesterday we went on the coveted snorkeling trip! We were lucky that we both got that trip, as a lot of people wanted it! We got off the ship and couldn’t see a bus for our trip, but someone pointed past the buses and a little boat was waiting to take us to the snorkeling place! We sped away from the ship and around a little peninsula to a place called Abyss diving center.  We got our fins and snorkels (which I’m sure weren’t sanitized but whatever) and off we went to a nearby island. I know snorkeling isn’t hard, but they didn’t give any instruction, basically told us just to jump off the side of the boat and snorkel. Well I sucked at it. Every time I tried to breathe through the snorkel underwater, my brain told me “you should not be breathing right now!!” and I froze up. I think I also had a rather crappy snorkel because it kept letting in water and I was tired of blowing air out of it. I gave up on the snorkel and just swam around with my mask, exploring the rocks and swimming with fish. There weren’t too many fish, but I was able to get really close to some of them. The rocks were covered with sea anemones and sea urchins. The water was FRIGID and extremely salty, but it was a lot of fun! After about 45 minutes at the island, we were boated back to the diving center and we had about 2 hours of free time to snorkel off the beach or pay some extra money and go parasailing or tubing or something. We got a couple of fruit smoothies at the bar and then went swimming around the beach. The water was cold, but I went right in. Steven was being a sissy and inching into the water. Silly! There were actually a lot more fish around the beach than at the island, and we just enjoyed swimming around and exploring. It was finally time to leave, and the boat dropped us off right underneath the MV Explorer, definitely a cool experience!

After eating lunch on the ship and washing out all the salty water, we caught the bus to the old city, where there are a ton of shops and restaurants. We had been warned that the marble cobblestones were slippery, and they definitely were! For some reason I was wearing old navy flip flops. Not a good idea. Anyway, our first stop was an ice cream shop that Steven had gone to when he did his tour of the city walls. We got 2 HUGE scoops of ice cream for 20 kuna, which is about 4 dollars. Probably the cheapest ice cream we’ve gotten this whole trip. Croatia seems fairly cheap! We then wandered around the streets, stopping in stores. I was on the lookout for a magnet and a good t-shirt, but everything I was finding was really touristy and poor quality. I found a hand-painted magnet in a food store, where I also picked up some olive oil which I was told was “the best olive oil in Croatia.” I got to try some of it on bread and it was quite tasty! I was told it can go on everything, even vanilla ice cream. I think we’ll skip that one and just stick to bread. =) After shopping around some more, we stopped at Taj Mahal, a restaurant our tour guide had suggested to us. Despite its name, it served traditional Croatian food. We got a sampler platter of lots of different kinds of meats: chicken kebabs, meat patties, sausages. Meat city! It was quite tasty, but we were so full! We walked around some more, but places were starting to close down and once you’ve seen one touristy souvenir shop, you’ve seen them all. We headed back to the ship, tired from an extremely long day.

Today we thought we wanted to go back to the diving center to go tubing or something (riding in an inner tube being dragged by a boat).  There was another SAS snorkeling trip leaving this morning, so we walked down to see if they could tell us how we could get to the place. They apparently had a bunch of openings, so we just bought a ticket for the trip and did the same thing again! We went out again to the island and explored a different area, this time finding a lot more fish. One of Steven’s flippers broke so he had to climb up on some pointy rocks to fix it. Ouch! I swam in an entire school of fish, so close that I could just reach out and touch them. Very cool! I also saw those tiny little shiny fish that change directions really fast to confuse their predators—they are in Finding Nemo and they make shapes while talking to Dory and Marlin (hopefully people know what I’m talking about). They definitely look like they are flashing! After 45 minutes of exhausting swimming, we went back to the dive center. We looked into parasailing but we didn’t have enough cash. We decided on an “aquahog” which is a mix between a tube and a banana raft and seats 2 people. We donned our lifejackets and got into the boat to head out. Getting on the raft was a trip. Steven got on first so he could be in the back, and he fell into the water. While he was getting out, I tried to get on, and I too fell in the water. It was not an easy feat! Finally we both got on and we were off! I was holding on for dear life, but it wasn’t too hard and was a lot of fun! All of a sudden, about halfway through our time, the boat driver started going really fast. I started freaking out. I was being pelted by water from the wake and I was so tired from 2 days of snorkeling that it was getting really hard to hold on. Then he started making sharp turns, and I couldn’t hold on anymore and flew off. Now I know what a skipping stone feels like! Apparently when I flew off, I took Steven with me, so we both ended up in the water waiting for the boat driver to get us. I guess his going fast and doing tight turns was the “grand finale” because we started heading back to the beach with Steven on the raft and my choosing to sit safely on the boat. I am not one for extreme water sports. Definitely not doing that again! Steven, of course, had a blast. =P After that we still had about 1.5 hours of free time, so I swam around with the fish while Steven napped on the “beach.” I am beat!

Again we went back to the ship for food and such, then headed out to the grocery store to spend the last of our kuna. Yay for cheap sodas!

Stupid question, Croatia version:
On a tour of the city walls, the tour guide said, “this is where the prince was beheaded.” A girl asks, “Did he die?”

Tonight’s the last night we have to set our clocks ahead! Woohoo!!

Croatia!

Soooo yesterday I had my first and most likely last shot. It was pretty nasty. But more on that a little later.

Croatia is so gorgeous!! When we had our logistical pre-port meeting 2 nights ago, they surprised us by saying we were going to be docking that night instead of in the morning. We still couldn’t get off the ship but we went up to the decks to see the city. The area around the port is the new town and the houses are built into hillsides. The majority of the houses are white with red roofs, which is really pretty when put against the blue water. The water here is even prettier than it was in Capri! I just want to jump off the side of the pier and go swimming! I’m soooo excited to go snorkeling tomorrow!

Yesterday I had my FDP to the Osojnik village for a folk show, and Steven went to a tour of the walls of the old city. We drove across a bridge that spans the harbor and we were able to get off and take pictures of the water and the town. I have never seen water bluer than this! We then drove to a little abandoned town and walked through, our bus picked us up on the other side (I really didn’t see the point of this, our guide didn’t tell us anything about what we were seeing…). Finally we started making our way up a mountainside and into the little mountain village of Osojnik. We went into a small church that had been completely destroyed by fire in the Yugoslavian conflict about 20 years ago. They rebuilt the church using some of the stones that survived the destruction.  Most of the buildings in that area of town were completely destroyed and have since been rebuilt. While we were walking around the area, a breeze blew through and it just smelled like flowers! There is no industry in Dubrovnik, so there is no pollution, the sky is clear and everything is just clean! It reminds me of Switzerland. =)

So we got to the house where we were going to eat and watch the folk show, passing by some cute donkeys on the way, and the second we got there, we were greeted by shots of their local drink, a plum-flavored brandy. Our tour guide said it was a form of welcome, and, following my try-anything-once mentality, I tried it. Only after I drank it did she say that it was about 80 proof. She said it’s basically Croatia’s moonshine. It was extremely strong, like drinking pure alcohol. Not pleasant at all! =P I washed that down with some delicious candied figs and orange peels.  While some people stayed back for more brandy (some people had 5 or 6 shots…yikes!) I went into the little courtyard where the patriarch of the family was starting to play a kind of fiddle and women were dancing around him. SAS people started dancing too, I’m sure the brandy helped! After that, we went down to another little courtyard covered by a lattice with grapevines. The women brought out plates of bacon, cheese, and bread, as well as their homemade wine made from the grapes above us.  We put the bacon on a stick and cooked it over a flame, then put it with the cheese on the bread. A bacon s’more! Yummy! I had a taste of the wine and it was pretty good, not strong, very sweet. After people had time to enjoy the wine, we went inside to a cellar-like room for the main meal. It was dimly lit and we sat at long benches. Out came more wine! (I stuck with water, the people around me were getting a bit out of hand).  Following salad, platters of (what we think was) pork and potatoes came out.  The people reminded me of the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding: we asked what kind of meat it was and they said, “It’s meat! Just meat!” Yep, helpful! It was tasty nonetheless. The dessert was little pinwheels of cake with chocolate frosting, those were quite good too. After dinner, we went upstairs for more dancing and singing.  I just enjoyed watching. =) It was a fun trip!

When I got back to the ship, we grabbed dinner and then headed to the supermarket that is right outside the ship. We stocked up on drinks: a can of fanta or coke here is 4.99 Kuna, which is about 88 cents! We were paying 3-4 euro per can in Barcelona and Italy, and soda on the ship costs $2! Yay for savings! I also got a little bag of “crazy sours” Skittles to see if they were the same as our sour Skittles, and they are nothing alike! These taste like sweet tarts and aren’t really sour =(

So today was our trip to Trsteno, Ston, and Korcula. This was actually our alternate choice trip since we didn’t get the service visit to the orphanage.  In the end, I kinda wish we hadn’t picked an alternate. We were at the bus bright and early at 0700! First we went to Trsteno (slept on the way there), got off the bus, and walked to the botanical garden.  At the entrance was a HUGE 500-year-old tree. That was cool. We walked along a path and our guide showed us a fountain from the 17th century.  That was it. Back on the bus and off to Ston. Again, slept. We get to Ston, where we walked to a field of salt mines, basically just pools of salt water that they let evaporate to get sea salt. We spent approximately 5 minutes there, then got back on the bus. Back I went to sleep for the hour bus ride to the place where we would catch the ferry to the island of Korcula.  Korcula is gorgeous!  We first went to the Museum of Icons, which is really just a room with icons. Adjoined to that was St. Mark’s Cathedral. A woman told us all about the architecture and artwork there, and our tour guide translated for us. Our final stop was the Municipal Museum, where there were a lot of artifacts of the town and area. Lots of coins. Understandably, everything was in Croatian, so we didn’t really know what we were looking at. Lunch was included in our trip, so we went to the restaurant next (we were all starving!) The first course was a piece of lettuce with a cold seafood salad consisting of mussels, clams, and squid. I did try it and ended up eating only the lettuce—all the seafood tasted really fishy—not good! I think only one person in our entire group actually ate the salad, I felt bad about all the food going to waste. The entrée was grilled fish with potatoes and green beans. Of course, Steven doesn’t eat seafood so he was mad that he wasn’t going to eat anything. Also, there were a couple vegetarians and one person allergic to seafood in our group! The main server was being pretty rude, one of the vegetarians asked if they had anything without meat and they said “that’s fish, not meat! You can eat that!” and they said they wouldn’t switch their meals for anything else. I flagged down our tour guide and told him that Steven doesn’t eat seafood, so thankfully he went to tell a server and Steven got a nice piece of pork thrown in front of him. I wish I had pork instead of my fish! There were still bones in the fish, and even though I picked them out, every mouthful still had 3 or 4 bones. Not a pleasant dining experience. I felt bad for the girl allergic to seafood, I don’t think she ate anything. The dessert was the saving grace of the meal, it was a custard-like cake thing that’s hard to describe but tasted really good. After lunch, we had an hour of free time. Steve and I checked out some jewelry shops and wandered around, then we went back to our meeting point early and put our feet in the water while we waited for the ferry. We got the ferry back to our bus and immediately got on for the 2.5 hour ride back to the ship. More sleep time! We finally got back around 6pm, feeling like we spent the majority of the day sleeping on a bus (that’s because we did). Every SAS trip before this one had been amazing, I guess there had to be one dud. Our tour guide was so nice and knowledgeable, I just wish we were seeing more interesting things or we stayed more than 20 minutes in one place. Oh well.

Tomorrow we are snorkeling near the island of Kolocep! I’ve heard from other trips (there have been snorkeling trips every day) that it was amazing so I’m sure we’ll have fun! I wish my camera were waterproof, though! After that, we’ll be exploring the old city for the rest of the day, possibly hitting up a beach or something. Exciting!

On the [sea] again...

We will be in Croatia tomorrow! Yesterday was pretty hectic as it was the first day in 12 days that we’ve had class, and everyone had to take the Global Studies midterm. It was hard! I attended all the classes, took notes, and studied, but he definitely pulled out little details and made questions about them. Then my Anthropology paper on Pompeii was due at 8am this morning so I had to churn that out in the early hours of the morning.  I’m ready for some sleep!

On our last day in Naples, Steven and I went on an SAS trip to Mt. Vesuvius.  The roads up the volcano are definitely not made for a motorcoach bus! The driver went a lot slower than the one going up Montserrat, so I felt a lot safer this time. They drove us to around 1000 feet, where we had to wait until 0900 for the ticket office to open. Some of the guides and shop owners there had dogs, and we played with them for a while.  I have lots of pictures of Steven with his new friend!  The dogs were so sweet but they definitely needed to be brushed!  We started hiking up the remainder of the volcano, about 250 more feet, and one of the dogs was following us for a while.  The hike wasn’t too hard, but it was all gravel and volcanic stone so it was kind of like hiking up through sand.  It was a fairly foggy day so we couldn’t see much until we got to the top and the sun started coming out.  We were above the clouds!  We were able to see into the extremely deep crater and I picked up a volcano rock as a souvenir. =) I thought the walk down was harder than the walk up because we kept sliding on the gravel and sand.  It was a good trip!

When we got back to the ship, we grabbed lunch and started to study for our Global Studies midterm.  We had to be on the ship by 1800, but there was a July 4th barbeque at 1730.  We were told that the crew went all out for the BBQ, and they weren’t kidding! The food was amazing for being mass-produced for 700+ people.  Burgers, delicious ribs, corn on the cob, macaroni and cheese, all topped off with some patriotic chocolate cake.  YUM!! About an hour after we had to be on the ship, we had a huge group picture. Everyone went out to the back of the 4th-7th decks and the photographer took the picture from the dock.  The picture must be crazy!

It was hard to transition back to classes yesterday! I guess the hotel staff thought that it would be a rough day because it was TACO DAY for lunch! I had read about the amazingness of taco day from alumni, and although it was a very welcome change from the daily pasta, potatoes, and meat, I didn’t find it as amazing as everyone had said.  Stale tacos!

So we will be in Croatia tomorrow morning! I have an FDP for my Anthropology class at 1300, we’re going to a village about an hour away from Dubrovnik and will be watching a folk show while learning about the village.  We have to use a tender to get from the ship to Dubrovnik, so that should be an interesting experience!

I know everyone has been missing stupid questions, so here are two overheard in Italy:

1.      On a tour of Rome, the guide said, “This building was built in 76 AD.” A girl asks, “Wait, is that 1876 or 1976?”
2.      “How long is the bus ride to Capri?”

And for rumor control, we are officially going to Greece. Yay! Next post will have updates from Croatia!

Pompeii and Capri

Happy 4th of July from Naples, Italy—the sketchiest place on Earth! Seriously, the port area is scary. We wandered up and down the street just outside the port in search of a restaurant or something, but everything around the port is shut down or really dirty. Sooooo we decided to stay on the ship. Anyway, here’s what we did for the last 2 days!

Yesterday Steven and I had an SAS trip to Pompeii. I have to write a paper on Pompeii for my Anthropology class, so I had to go on one of the trips to Pompeii (like I wasn’t going to anyway?). They have actually excavated the majority of the town, and the first stories of most of the buildings are still intact. We saw Mt. Vesuvius looming in the background. Our tour guide showed us many little details that we would have missed, like how a certain male reproductive organ is a symbol of good luck and is therefore carved on the doorways of many buildings. Yep! This symbol is also carved on the streets to show the direction to the brothels, of which there are several. There are also 3 dogs that live in Pompeii, apparently people just left them there. We saw all 3! Two of them were playing with each other in what was once the square, and one was sleeping in the sun in the public bath. I miss my puppy!!!!! There are dogs everywhere! Our trip also included a little tour of a cameo factory. Cameos are drawings carved into pieces of seashells. We got to watch an artist work on a cameo, they said it takes about 3 days to make one! We then went down into the store, where we found that the cameos cost several hundred dollars. There was a lot of jewelry made out of lava stone and real coral. Unfortunately we only had about 20 minutes of free time, not enough for significant perusal.

We grabbed lunch on the ship and decided to check out the area around the port. Most places were closed. We went to a tabbacheria (no idea if that is spelled right) because they sell stamps. We somehow communicated to the woman who spoke no English that we each wanted 6 stamps. It was fun! Since we couldn’t find anything to do and we were told to stay off the side streets, we thought it best to just stay on the ship the rest of the day. We have a Global Studies midterm in a couple of days anyway!

This morning we were up bright and early to go to Capri! We had bought ferry tickets the night before for the 0730 ferry, and we grabbed a window seat for the 80-minute ride over. People in Italy do not believe in lines—they believe in mobs. Seriously, every door is like a cattle chute! Once we finally got off the ferry in Capri, we joined another mob hovered around the ticket booth for the tour around the island. We got our tickets and joined yet another mob to get on a motorboat (the boat holds about 25 people). The guide/captain drove us all around the island, making stops and telling us about some of the different places. We first saw the coral grotto, which has a band of bright orange coral growing on the rocks just underneath the level of the water. We peered into the white grotto, which apparently had a stalactite shaped like the Virgin Mary (we couldn’t see it). He drove us precariously into the green grotto, almost knocking some girls’ heads on the roof of the cave, and we saw some very pretty bright green water. The final major stop was the blue grotto, La Grotta Azzurra, which was absolutely amazing. I think my mom might cringe at what we did to see this cave, though. =) So there are all these motorboats floating around the entrance to this cave, and rowboats come up beside the motorboats for people to get on. Only 3 or 4 people can get on a rowboat, so it takes some time for everyone to get a turn. When it was our turn, I made the leap over the side of our boat to the rowboat and somehow got inside without my usual klutziness. Then the driver of the rowboat took us over to the ticket booth boat, very interesting. We waited in a short line to go in, and then it was our turn! Quickly, our driver told us to lay flat on our backs…and he meant it!! The entrance to the cave is very narrow, and we had to lay completely flat to fit through it. Once we were inside, though, the cave was huge! The water was so amazingly blue. The rower sang to us in Italian and explained why the water was lit up like that. He said that sunlight hits the water outside the cave and then reflects into the cave, giving the water a natural luminescence. We were only in there for a couple of minutes before we had to squeeze out of the cave again. It was so worth it!

When the boat brought us back, we were starving, so we went to one of the many pizzerias along the water. We each ate THE BEST pizzas ever. Mine had mozzarella with ham and mushrooms while Steven’s had mozzarella and salami. Yummy! We then ordered a sundae type thing with 2 spoons, but I guess the waiter heard wrong and brought us 2 desserts. Oh well! It was such a good meal! After lunch, we headed off to the “beach.” Now, when I think of beaches, I think of hot sand and cool water, relaxing, and people-watching (not to be confused, of course, with creeping). This beach was a pebble beach, and the pebbles were not only scorching hot but also really really hard and painful to walk on! We finally made it to a semi-open spot and laid our blankets down. Steven went in the water first while I watched our bags, and he said the water was freezing and the rocks were slippery with moss. I made my way to the water and immediately decided that I needed to go in with my flip flops—walking on those pebbles is just too painful! The water felt so nice and cool after laying in the hot sun, but he wasn’t kidding about how slippery it was! A tiny wave hit me just as I stepped on a slippery rock, and I slipped and my shoes came off. Steven had fun watching me flail in the water trying to find a less slippery spot. I painfully made my way back to our spot and decided to just get a little sun for the rest of our time there. No more pebbles for me! Oh, and definitely the best part of the beach was the lovely display of what I like to call “people wearing bikinis who should not be wearing bikinis.” You can also replace “bikinis” with “speedos” and get a similar effect. Oh yes.

Steven needed to get some more cash, so we hiked about a mile up a hill to the center of town (there was a funicular that went up there but we didn’t feel like paying for it). We definitely worked off that lunch! I don’t think I’ve ever sweated more in my life, and yes, you really did need to know that. We finally reached the top and saw the most beautiful view of the port (I forgot to take a picture…darn!) and found our ATM. There was also a store selling limoncello in all kinds of bottles, and I got a little bottle in the shape of a cello! So cool! Mission accomplished, we walked back down, which is a much, much nicer walk than the one up. We shopped around for a bit and then stopped at another little restaurant for dinner. I got seafood risotto, which, for 15 euro I got a heaping plate of delicious risotto, about 8 mussels, 3 clams, 10 pieces of cuttlefish, and 2 shrimp. I got one bum mussel, but the rest was delicious! I like Capri! We walked around a bit more since we still had an hour to kill before our ferry left, so we got gelato again, this time coffee and cookie mixed. Yay! On the ferry back, we sipped limoncello and reminisced about the enjoyable day. =)

Right now I’m watching Vicky Christina Barcelona on one of the movie channels and writing postcards. Tomorrow morning is a hike up Mt. Vesuvius! Apparently they drive us up to 1000 meters and we just hike the 200-some meters to the crater. I’m quite excited…the view should be amazing!

There has been talk that we may not be docking in Athens, but I don’t think they have made any final decisions yet. Apparently the port authority is on strike now, and there is a big general strike planned for the day we arrive. I haven’t had access to news for the past 3 weeks, but I’m assuming there are still riots or at least some form of political unrest. I’ve heard that they’re looking into other places for us to dock or we may stay longer in Croatia. I know our safety is the most important, but I was really looking forward to Greece! Bummer!

All Rome-d out!

Hello, faithful readers! Today you are in for a very long post…4 days worth of stuff! Rome was amazing, but as the title of the post says, I’m definitely “all Rome-d out.” So enjoy this big post made up of 4 mini-posts! And leave me comments! I like comments! And emails, lots of emails!!!!!! =)

-----June 29, 2010-----

Early this morning, we docked in Civitavecchia, Italy! We arrived and were cleared earlier than expected, so we were able to leave the ship at 0930. Steven and I picked up our passports and were off to the hectic train station to buy our tickets to Rome. Thus began the first hiccup of our trip. The ticket we bought said our train left at 10:30 (they run every half hour), and it was currently 9:45. This little tiny train station had no signs whatsoever, and the ticket didn’t say where the train was or anything. We asked a guy who worked there and he pointed to a track around the corner, so we went to that train. There were other SAS students on the train who said that it was the 10:30 train. Well, the train started pulling out at 10! We were officially on the wrong train, but thankfully no one came around to check tickets and we sat across from a group of German people who kept trying to talk to us in German when we told them we only spoke English. Anyway, after the 1.5 hour train ride, we made it to Rome and made our way to the hostel. We arrived at the hostel to find two other SASers checking in too! The man who showed us to our room, Gino, was extremely nice and joked around a lot (when we asked him if we could get air conditioning, he jokingly said “no, you must die in the heat!”) I was so surprised how secure the hostel was. We had 3 keys: one for the door to the street since it is locked at night, one to get into our hallway (there are 2 rooms in the hall) and another to get into our room. Talk about security! We have a teeny bathroom with a teeny shower stall, but it’s a nice room. When we got in, the temperature was 28 degrees C, which is 85 degrees F! Air conditioning cost us 5 euros per night, which we immediately got.
        After dropping off our bags, we went across the street to a restaurant called La Famiglia. Steven ordered cannelloni, I ordered lasagna, and we each had half of each others’ meal. They were so good! After lunch, we trekked to the Spanish Steps. It took us a while to figure out how to navigate…there aren’t signs on every street corner telling you where you are! We made it to the steps, where we were harassed by a man selling flowers and we filled up our water bottles at the public fountain (which is totally safe, clean, potable water). Our next stop was the Trevi Fountain. It was flooded with tourists and we didn’t have any small coins to throw in so we decided to go back later. Next we went to the Pantheon, half of which is now under construction (Boo!). We were too late to go inside since it closed early (today, of course, was a Roman Catholic holiday) so we plan to return tomorrow. Our final stop on the little tour was the Piazza Navona, a piazza with beautiful Bernini fountains AND where I had my first gelato 4 years ago. The place I had gelato was gone! It was renamed and is now more of a restaurant with only 10 flavors of gelato as opposed to the dozens that were there before. Bummer!!! We walked down the piazza to another gelateria—Steven got chocolate chip, and I got Nutella (with real chunks of Nutella—yum!!). We then started working our way back to the hostel, stopping at many of the shops along the way. We also stopped at the Trevi Fountain again to throw our coins in so as to ensure a speedy return to Rome. We were SO tired and hot by the time we made it back to the hostel, and we went for an “early” dinner (7pm) at another nearby restaurant, Babbo’s.  Our Italian interport student told us we HAD to try mozzarella di bufala (buffalo mozzarella) and pasta amatriciana, so we did both!  Our antipasti was parma ham with mozzarella di bufala and foccacia bread. Yum!! Then Steven got the amatriciana and I ordered gnocchi with shrimp and tomatoes. Although I don’t mind getting shrimp with their heads on, I’m getting tired of peeling them! When we got back to the hostel, I took advantage of the free internet and our now-18 degree room. =)

-----June 30, 2010-----

        Today was such a long day!! We walked all the way from our hostel to the Circus Maximus, where chariot races were once held. It was very disappointing—there are only a couple of ruins amidst construction vehicles, piles of dirt, and modern fences. They are apparently trying to excavate or restore it or something. We then walked back toward the Colosseum, contemplating the Arch of Constantine for a while. We had tickets for a guided tour through the interior of the Colosseum, but we couldn’t find the entrance! We walked ALL the way around and finally saw it and started our tour. The inside was amazing—our guide showed us pictures that recreated how it looked. They’ve actually started to rebuild some of it to show what it used to look like. I took quite a few nice panoramic pictures inside! After the Colosseum, we started to head to the Campo de Fiori, where our interport student said there was a market. Most of the shops were already closing up, but we picked up 2 little bottles of limoncello (a type of alcoholic lemonade-y drink). We grabbed lunch at a little pizzeria (the restaurants on the side streets are best!) and got 2 pizzas to share. One had cheese and thinly-sliced ham, and the other had beefsteak, parmesean, and rocket (which we learned was a type of salad green).  Both were delicious! After lunch, we stopped at a gelateria for our 2nd gelato of Italy! I mixed coffee and chocolate while Steven mixed chocolate and chocolate chip. Yum-o!
Our next stop was the Pantheon, and thankfully it was open this time. We marveled at the huge dome and the sculptures inside. Steven was just amazed at how big the place was! At this point, we were tired, hot, and sweaty, but we decided to head down to the Roman Forum. We wasted half an hour searching for the entrance, and once we found it, it was too late to get an audiotour. So we used a tour book that Bridget had loaned me (thanks, Bridget!) and did the tour ourselves. We didn’t get through all of the forum before it closed, so we may return tomorrow! We headed back to the hostel for showers and to eat dinner. We ate at La Famiglia again, except this time Steven got pasta carbonara and I got meat-filled tortellini with peas and mushrooms. So good! For dessert, I had the most delicious tiramisu and Steven had some tasty chocolate gelato. Tomorrow we are checking out of our hostel and heading to the Sistine Chapel! Oh, and limoncello is delicious! =)

-----July 1, 2010-----

Today definitely had it’s ups and downs. This morning, we checked out of our hostel and left our bags in the lobby. We grabbed the metro to Vatican City, and passed by the extremely long line for the Vatican Museums because we bought tickets online beforehand. Hooray for being prepared!  We walked through the many rooms of the museums, enjoying the Egyptian room the most with its REAL mummies! There was also a room full of animal sculptures, full of horses and dogs and a big camel. Our main goal was the Sistine Chapel, and even though we kept following the signs to the chapel, we were lead through an extremely long maze of rooms and hallways and stairs (I think we went up and down stairs about 5 times) before we finally made it. The artwork was absolutely amazing, we just stood there and marveled at the murals for a while. We understandably weren’t allowed to take pictures, but some awesome gems of individuals were sneaking pictures (some with flash). Steven and I were surprised with how small the chapel was, it was just one rectangular room, but Michelangelo’s artwork covered the majority of the walls and ceiling. We made our way to the exit and had some lunch just outside St. Peter’s Square. I had a little pizza while Steven had a “tour of Italy” including lasagna, pasta amatriciana, and ravioli. Italy is all about carbs, carbs, carbs!!! The place we ate also had gelato, so I got pistachio and Steven got a mix of hazelnut and tiramisu (and he liked it!!!). We caught the metro back to the train station (the two metro lines in Rome intersect at the station) and then got on the other line to go to the Forum. Rome’s metro is so dirty and crowded—they literally shove as many people as possible into a train and then they are smushed up against the windows and doors when the doors close. It’s scary! We made it to the stop in one piece, and it was then that I realized that I left our ticket back in the hostel (our ticket for the Colosseum also includes admission to the Forum and Palatine Hill for 2 days). Ugh!! So I went to buy two more tickets while Steven got the audio tour, and we began our long tour of the forum and Palatine Hill. We tried to follow the map that they had given us with the guide, but there was so much construction going on that the map was not accurate and we either missed stops or weren’t looking at the right things. Not to mention that once we got to Palatine Hill, there were so many different streets that we turned down the wrong one and got completely lost. The numbers for the audioguide were only on the map and weren’t marked in the actual area that we had to be in, so we had no idea where we had to be. We decided to skip the last couple stations and head back. We grabbed our bags from the hostel and went to the train station to head back to Civitavecchia. Now, I know that we are in Italy and that Italian is the main language, but I didn’t expect there to be such a lack of English! We went to a little kiosk thing to buy our tickets, and even though we pressed English as our language, a lot of the important stuff was in Italian (who knew there were so many different train tickets?). We asked someone for help, but everyone is in a hurry and no one would help us. Finally, we found a man who helped us work the machine even though he didn’t speak much English. We got our ticket and asked him which platform we had to go to, he said 15. The train was leaving in about 20 minutes, so we started our walk to platform 15. No train there. We asked someone and he said the train to Civitavecchia was on platform 28, not 15. Platform 28 is EXTREMELY far from 15, and we only had 10 minutes, so we basically ran half a mile to the other platform. The train at 28 was actually going to the airport, not Civitavecchia, but luckily the train next to it at 29 was our train (or so we thought). Once we were on the train, we realized that this was a train that was leaving 20 minutes later than our ticket said, so we were yet again not on the right train. The freaking ticket was all in Italian, and there are no signs anywhere! Nowhere on the ticket did it say 28 or 29. So we thought we could just stay on this train like we did on the first train, but a lady came around and started checking tickets. The man in front of us apparently had the wrong ticket, and he was kicked off the train at the next stop. I became worried that we would be kicked off next, but thankfully she never came back and we finally made it back to Civitavecchia and the ship. I was so glad to see the ship!!!! We missed dinner, so we grabbed food from the pool deck and just enjoyed being on the ship, safe and sound. Tomorrow we go on a tour of the catacombs!

-----July 2, 2010-----

        I was so thankful that today we had a full-day SAS trip because I didn’t have to deal with Roman public transportation. I fully enjoyed our hour drive into the city in an air-conditioned motorcoach! Our trip was called “unusual Rome and catacombs” and our first stop was at the catacombs. We walked down lots of stairs until we were about 20 meters underground. It was so nice and cool down there, I wish we could have explored for more than the 15 minutes we were there. Our guide showed us some of the main crypts and explained all of the writings on the walls and how the catacombs were built. Very cool! Apparently the catacombs were raided by Barbarians so many of the crypts were emptied or destroyed.  After the catacombs, we went to the Crypt of the Capuchin Friars. The crypt contained 5 little rooms decorated in human bones. Different bones covered the walls and ceilings in interesting patterns, and some bones were used to make chandeliers and altars. Most of the rooms had the hooded skeletons of Capuchin friars. They said that the bones were a “hymn to life.” I really enjoyed the visit, although it was a little creepy!
        After the crypt, we had almost 5 hours on our own to get lunch and explore the area. Since we just spent 3 full days in Rome and pretty much saw everything we wanted to see, we weren’t sure what to do. Rome’s Hard Rock Café was on the same street as the crypt, so we went there so I could buy a pin. We then decided to eat there (there’s only so many consecutive times you can have pizza or pasta). We had some delicious burgers!!! After lunch, we walked around the area, but since we had already walked around there, we got back to the meeting point an hour early and just sat there to wait for the bus. As amazing as Rome was, I was definitely ready to leave and go on to Naples!
        We are traveling to Naples overnight, and tomorrow morning we have a tour of Pompeii. That should be a lot of fun, although it ends at 1230 and we’re not sure what to do for the rest of the day. It may be a day of relaxing (or studying for our Global Studies midterm that is in 3 days!)