Finally on Ship and Savoring the Good Life

Dianne and I feasted with both sides of our families in San Diego in the final days til launch of our around the world teaching tour. Cindy delivered us to dockside after a scrumptious lunch at Milton's with John, Hilary, Dianne and Cindy. The ship was more large looming and fancy than we expected...it is a real marvel of luxury, esp ironic in its current incarnation as an educational institution going to some of the poorest places in the world -- as well as meccas of present or past wealth, such as Hong Kong and Japan. The ship is registered in Panama and internat. maritime law requires that we sail down to Ensada Mexico to pick up the students, since this is not a native US ship. Go figure.

The second picture is of a faculty/staff meeting, about our fifth in two days. in what the Explorer (the ship) calls the Union, which is really a very hi tech auditorium seating about 250 at the bow of the ship's sixth floor. The trainers are academics from all over the country (and world) and about 1/3 are student affairs staff, ie registrar, RAs, Exec Dean, asst Exec Dean, doctors and nurses, psychologists, etc. With close to 600 students and about 30 faculty, there's a lot to do in preparing for the students, the 12 countries we will visit, the common course Global Studies, the Community College (every night a one hr session of topics of student, sr student, staff or faculty choice...even crew, 85% of whom are Phillapeno), classes for about 20 children of fac and staff, etc.

Our living quarters, two rooms adjoining with a bathroom/shower on my side and a door directly between the two rooms, are very cosy but still strangely roomy. We've got materials for 16 weeks of three courses on both our twin beds and haven't had the courage to start unraveling everything. But students get here Sunday, parents Sat nite for a cocktail reception, and classes start Tues. We've gotten to know about 12-14 of the faculty, and had drinks and meals esp with the art, English, history and philos faculty and their spouses.

Oh, there's a fancy spa with 6 massage rooms, a staff of 3, and about 18 different kinds of "personal care." There's also a barber and beauty salon on board. THere's no water in the small pool yet...why we don't know. The first picture, by the way, is after dinner sun set on the back deck of level 6; we ate with the ship doctor, who is a neuro surgeon and has taken at least 5-6 trip with SAS. D. is in room reading...it's 8:20 Thurs nite. Breakfast is at 7 in the morning. I may go to the social gathering at nine tonight. Next entry soon. T