Entries this day: Biting_Natalie Cheese Eilat Fucked_up_situations forgot_Port_Orientation!!! sunset unfun_silent_football zzzz

Biting Natalie

4:33am AST Friday 17 June 2005

Good thing today is a holiday cause I am tired and I haven't really slept yet. Natalie massaged my hand and I fell asleep. The rest of the guys were debating gun control as I fell asleep. Natalie suggested that a group of us go to the front deck to watch the stars. Natalie and Greg were out there when I arrived after brushing my teeth. I gave them a "lecture" of sorts about where shooting stars come from (comet dust). Greg left and then Natalie and I fell asleep. I tried to kiss her a bit, but I was too tired. Good times.

Cheese

8:53am AST Friday 17 June 2005

I hope I can get to breakfast on time. Oooh; did it!

- - - -

Mmmmm cheese! I guess we will get plenty of cheese in Europe! We hadn't had any until Jordan.

Eilat

am AST Friday 17 June 2005

I'm at the meet-the-guests, where we will hear about/from Niveen and Eilat.

Eilat said something like, "I got involved in social action work when I was about 14. Many Isrelis find it easy to ignore it and not be involved, but once you get involved, it's impossible to quit - like a disease that takes up the rest of your life."

Fucked up situations

9:58am AST Friday 17 June 2005

Oh dear. I have just learned that my Silent Football game has been translated to "silent soccer" (in Japanese).. That has got to change.

12:17pm AST Friday 17 June 2005

We are nearly to the Suez Canal. I have given up on transcribing while on the boat. There just won't ever be time.

1pm AST Friday 17 June 2005

During lunch, Natalie and Greg were talking about their visit to the Palestinian refugee camp in Jordan; they went there for that tour. It sounds like it's just a totally fucked situation for them (the refugees).

They didn't have much time to let the experience sink in.

While they were floating around in the Dead Sea, there was an explosion near the wall being built in the area.

I'm not upset that I didn't go, though I am sure it would have been amazing.. I know I will be doing helpful things after this voyage.

(But I would like to go to the Dead Sea sometime.)

forgot Port Orientation!!!

8:07pm AST Friday 17 June 2005

Nightmare today before the GET Meeting. I thought everything was all cool: chillin' with my new Japanese teachers (that Pat sorted out for us) and 25 minutes to go before the GET meeting when Audrey came out of the room all, "the port orientation started five minutes ago..."

My heart dropped like a stone. I'm in charge of the Port Orientation today for this port. I thought it was supposed to be tomorrow. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

I went down to my computer to get it printed, not even remembering where I had left off last time when I was researching. Copied it from my computer to the network (with printer), printed it, and went to copy it. The machine was in Japanese mode, so it took about a million years to figure out how to get it into English mode so I could see how to copy 1 -> 2 sided.

Got it switched to English and started it copying. It's a fast machine but it was taking forever and ever and ever and I could just have *died* from embarassment at what was being printed. I had done hours of research online, but not sorted through it nicely; I had planned to do that today / tonight / tomorrow in our ample free time.

Yuuka came down to help and stapled some of them for me; I'm thankful to her for that.

Headed up, dreading what Audrey was going to say. ((( Now let me be 100% clear on this: Audrey is Awesome. She is a hero to me for all that she can do and all the plates she keeps juggling and spinning and all her genki energy is just inpirational. She would never (far as I know) say directly, "you were late/wrong/bad/etc" but always says things in a very respectful manner and totally empathising with the person who didn't get something done on time. But to hear, "hey guys, it would be good if you could try to keep an eye on the schedule and just be ready when your time is coming up, that would be really great.." .. oh my god I was totally dreading it.

- - - -

But it never came. She didn't say anything like that at all.

- - - -

After the meeting: the port orientation, and GET meeting, Petra told me "thank you for putting together that information."

I just started to cry. Just her little bit of appreciation tipped my brain over and air escaped my nose like a little laugh at the cosmic irony of how someone could possibly thank me, a man who felt like total poo.

"Are you alright?" she asked.

I shook my head no.

"Let's go upstairs (to the top deck) and talk."

I nodded my head.

I escaped the room without anyone letting on that they could see my angst.

Petra started talking as we left the area, "you missed the discussion while you were gone, but,"

And I wondered what she could possibly say that had any relevance to the situation at hand right now: Was it one more thing to add to the schedule? Something about getting around Cairo?

"we talked about it and no one else knew it was today either."

Oh my gosh. Hearing that one thing helped a lot. I didn't even make it up to the top deck; just made it to the stairs before I started to cry hugging Petra. Kim came too; I really appreciated the support.

Told them how I felt and how I had been unable to concentrate for the remainder of the meeting. Got everything synchronized in our calendars (I lamintated mine today) and it was all good.

sunset

- - - -

Up to the top deck where we gazed over the ocean, Kim lost her headband (after we had been talking about losing things that way) (I would like to buy her another somewhere), and we were alerted to stop jumping by someone whistling at us from the captain's area: He mimed "people could be sleeping in the deck below."

- - - -

Chowed dinner in the Yacht Club (almost got there too late, but Natalie was there and the guy said it was never too late for her), and watched the sun set. Clapped when it said as per the restaurant in Texas where Maryann used to work.

unfun silent football

8:50pm AST Friday 17 June 2005

And soon it's time for Silent Football!!!!

1:06am AST Saturday 18 June 2005

Silent Football was fun-ish, though it got a bit boring for me cause they kept missing errors slash not tattling on errors due to lack of language knowledge. I wrote on the whiteboard some different sentences they could use for tattling, but it wasn't enough. or something.

Hitomi, Kin, Manako and Emiko came. And Francois, the rabbit.

Some teachers said they would come after the Soul Flower concert, but none arrived.

zzzz

- - - -

After Silent Football, Hitomi asked if I could burn movies to CD for her. It turned into movies from three different cards plus her camera. Fortunately it all fit on one CD. Annoying, though.

I can only imagine it wasn't very comfortable for her either; I was not in a talkative mood - just falling asleep as I waited for each set of movies to be copied.

- - - -

Natalie mentioned to Katt that she (Natalie) had intended to come watch stars with me tonight, but never made it. Katt called my room, woke up Shinji just as I was walking in. I was like "hello?" and Katt put Natalie on. Cool. I zipped down to their room to chat and get a much needed hug.