Entries this day: Cape_Town! Cape_Town Mombasa,_Kenya! Penguins!! iPhoto_2_legible.pl

Cape Town!

Cape Town!

Hello from Cape Town, South Africa!!

I never found an internet cafe around the port of Mombasa; we didn't have much time
after our overnight safari adventure.

We have arrived 26 hours late in Cape Town.  Yesterday, due to high winds and fires
on all(?) the mountains in the city, we spent the day going back and forth out in
the bay, far enough away that we could barely tell a city was on the land.

Until our unexpected vacation yesterday, the most recent leg of the journey has
been quite hectic, with several guest speakers, including Lee Hirsch, cool and laid
back, plus the director of _Amandla!, Revolution in Four Part Harmony_, about the
collapse of Apartheid in South Africa through music.

The movie quite impressed me, especially when I used headphones to listen to the
audio.  (Thanks to Hitomi for renting it before the voyage even started!)

Lee Hirsch is a cool guy - very approachable and happy to chat about anything. 
Most nights he joined us to boogie down on the dance floor, and he even DJed for a
while.  He invited us all to his suite to hang out and stuff.  He's definitely not
full of himself about his movie; when I was hanging with him, he never even
mentioned it even though it was in the back of my mind the whole time: he spent 10
years on this super-cool project that has documented a revolution, and affected
millions of people in very positive ways.

Classes have been going quite well for me.  Fantastic Rabbits rival Cheerful
Dancing Fellows (the name of one of my classes last voyage) as far as bonding goes.
Fighting Goats seem more bonded than Happy Wonderful Girls did.  (my shy girls'
class from last voyage)

I am quite pleased to say I am quite close to having pictures online!   I wrote a
program that changes image filenames to a more human readable name.  If I can find
a cafe with a fast connection, I'll get them uploaded.

We put on two big Events recently: GET Language Olympics, a day of fun and loudness
on the pool deck with almost all the GET students participating...  and the Charity
Auction, where we raised 450,000 yen ($4500-ish).

I was much more involved with the Charity Auction: we do a one minute skit for each
item up for bid.  For the day in the suite with bath, Dan came up with a genius
plan.  We put a table on its side to represent the bathtub.  He got behind the
table, and I walked up to the tub wearing just a towel.  I scooped up a bowl of
blue ribbon to represent water, and then when I got into the table/tub, Dan tossed
more blue ribbon over the side as the water overflowed.

Phil had the great(?) idea of Shaving Our Chests for Charity.  Carl and I decided
to join the fun, so we all went up onstage wearing wigs on our chests.  Phil
actually wore a wig plus whiteboard with hair drawn on it, which was erased onstage
to represent the shave.  In reality, we set up the pricing so I would be shaved for
5000 yen, Carl and I would be shaved for 10,000 yen, and all three of us would be
shaved if we were sold for 15,000 yen.  For a while, it looked like Phil would get
away UNSHAVED, which would have been a grand irony.  But, at the last second, CC
Rie went for the kill and bought us all.  I bounced cheeringly off the floor and
ran offstage with glee.

-------------

All the above and previous email was written prior to our arrival in Cape Town. 
Cape Town!!! The city reminds me of any western city with streets and CD stores and
taxis.  All the stores facing Long Street (which Lee described as "just like
Bourbon Street at night") have balconies on the second story, but varied
architecture past that.  Wood, stone, brick, iron all merge into this mosaic of
cultures.

We're about to go out and about; actually I don't see my peeps right now, but the
good news:

I've got pictures: 
http://robnugen.com/images/travel/Pb/52nd_Dec-Mar_2006/pre-Cape_Town/

I hope everyone is blessed with love, light, music and joy.

    - Rob! 

Cape Town

7:57am SAST Friday 27 January 2006

It's looking quite like we will arrive in Cape Town today. Kellie and I could definitely see there had been a fire; smoke and occassional flames are still visible on a ravine on Table Mountain, and there was smoke visible on the nearby pointy mountain. And we saw a fire extinguishing helicopter flying around that mountain.

- - - -

We arrived around 9am and all the passengers seemed so happy .... we didn't know if we'd be able to disembark at all.

Mombasa, Kenya!

Mombasa, Kenya!

Thursday 19 January 2006

We're in Kenya!!

Over the past two days we've been based in Ngutuni Lodge, a couple hour bumpy dusty
drive from Mombasa port.  This wooden lodge blends within 11 or 13 thousand square
kilometers of savannah filled with all variety of animals.  On our two safari
adventures, we saw plenty of elephants and zebras, several wart hogs, scads of
water buffalo, a pride of lions sleeping last night, a pride of lions hunting this
morning, a few ostriches, several distant giraffes, and a momma cheetah and two
cubs.

I've not gotten pictures online yet.

Last night featured a performance by Peter Band, who encouraged a lot of audience
participation and really had the place groovin' singin' joyfully celebrating life. 
Peter loves and chats easily with everyone in encouraging tones of a grandfather
with heaps of children all seeking a moment with him.

Before this adventure, we spent a day in Seychelles, on Mahi island.

For $50, I went scuba diving with Francois, my stuffed rabbit and several Japanese
passengers from the ship.  We saw lots of different fish.  Black fish, yellow fish,
black and white striped fish, little orange and white spotted fish, an eel, several
sea cucumbers, and several star fish.

It took me a bit of effort to keep my ears equalized, and near the end of the dive
I had to keep blowing my nose to keep it clear.  Good thing I practiced that during
my training back in Japan!  It turns out I had tried too hard to equalize and had
some bleeding in my sinus cavity.  Upon ascent, I hawked up some blood with mucus,
which floated brightly in the water.  The ship doctor gave me some antibiotics,
anti-inflamitories, and some ear drops.  Everything is a-okay, no worries. 
Hakunamatata, as we say in Swahili.

Before Seychelles, we crossed the Indian ocean from Singapore.  Most of the nights
were cloudy, and most of the main events were held inside, due to rain:

1) Happy New Year!!  We had planned for everything to be on the top deck by the
pools, with a slide show of past voyages, and a big countdown to the end of 2005,
but ended up down in Broadway Show Lounge, the biggest room on the ship.  One of
the passengers read a poem for his wife; their wedding anniversary is New Year's
Day.

2) The Fruits Party was held the day after Singapore; it was rained off the top
deck down to the Topaz Dining Room, the other biggest room on the ship.  During
this party, I was part of the group who danced hula under Kellie's tutelage; she's
from Hawaii and taught about 8 of us how to do a simple dance called Hukilau.  I
didn't know all the moves represent everyday life in Hawaii!

The Fruits Party featured mango, star fruit, dragon fruit, dragon eyes, oranges,
pineapple, apples, pears, durians, and coconuts as beverages.  My favorite were the
dragon eyes, some of which I stuffed into my shorts pocket for later consumption.

3) The Coming of Age Summer Festival was something I did not help plan, nor attend,
so I only know a couple things: Traditionally, Japanese who turn 20 during a year
celebrate near the beginning of the year.  And, it got rained out from the top
deck.

There have been a variety of fun / interesting things on the ship..

(A) We've started teaching our classes!  I am teaching classes M and N (of classes
A-Z), right in the middle of the pile of students.  This voyage I again have one
really genki (*) class, and one pretty shy class.

      (*) I believe every language has a word that should be
      ported to other languages.  In Japanese, the word is genki.
      It means energetic / cheerful / healthy / excited.

      (In Spanish, the word is hay, pronounced "I" and means
      "there is" or "there are."   In Swahili, the word is
      "Jambo" a delightful word used as a greeting.)

My genki class named themselves Fantastic Rabbits, partially in honor of Francois. 
They've all been talkative in class, and are planning to perform an English version
of a play we will call "Peach Boy," which will be based on a Japanese fable about a
boy who is born in a peach.

My shy class named themselves Fighting Goats because it sounds like 52 in English
and Japanese.  We've been working on ordering in bars and meeting new people.

(B) We met Chiaki something from Japan, who has lived in Nairobi, Kenya for about
18 years, after leaving Japan in search of something more fulfilling in her life. 
She bought a house in a slum and started a school!  It began with just a few
students and now helps about 130 kids every day.  She showed us pictures of her
library and was thrilled when we said we could give her a bunch of books that had
been donated during the 49th voyage!  (Thanks, Kris!!!)

(C) The GET Teachers have been working more closely with the Communication
Coordinators (CCs) on this voyage than my last voyage. At least, that's my
impression; I know all their names this time, which I couldn't say last time so
early in the voyage.  For fun, I attended one of the CC meetings, and learned some
new vocabulary in Japanese.  Yobi means extra.  The others are rarely used: 1st
Seating and 2nd Seating at mealtimes.

(D) I've been taking a lot more Rob-Time this voyage.  I've finished reading two
novels and am beginning another book (Dale Carnegie's classic _How to Win Friends
and Influence People_).  This voyage I've been getting a lot more sleep, and have
been better able to teach classes each day!

(E) I left Francois on the table in the safari lodge.  Fortunately, it was noticed
and given to me immediately by one of the wait staff. Whew!

(F) I found the dragon eye fruits in my shorts pocket a couple days after I placed
them there. They were quite edible, but tasted just a bit fermented.  I enjoyed
them all. 

Penguins!!

10:06am SAST Saturday 28 January 2006

Super special thanks to Karen's friend Luke for taking a day off to cart us around and for watching our bags while we swam.

- - - -

Carl: "Now I think I know what it was like back when people first got here. Just walkin' around with the animals."

Rob: "Yeh." (after some thought: "def.")

Penguins were just chillin' out on this beach and on the rocks and swimming in the water in little penguin herds of like 10 to 30 animals. Every time we walked gently by them, they generally took little notice, unless we were less than a meter away, which was sometimes unavoidable due to the placement of the water, rocks and penguins.

They seemed to walk aimlessly at times, though mostly they just lay on the rocks, sunbathing in tuxedos.

The water was a bit colder than my preference, but became acceptable with just a bit of exercise. Lee had asked if brought a swimsuit; I hadn't, so he was like, "just swim in your shorts." I knew how long they would take to dry; he was like, "just swim in your briefs. This is Africa [no one will care]."

Africa. South Africa, to be more precise. European as anything, save for the townships of poor black Africans who are still crammed into corrugated tin buildings from Apartheid.

Climbing on the rocks reminded me so much of Hawaii and California. Moreso of California, plus the landscape looks just like highway 1 just north of Santa Monica. I literally surprised myself when I realized I was *not* in California. Holy shit this is Africa!

Other people were around, but the only people who cared what I wore were the voices in my mind, plus I figured I would appreciate having had the experience of swimming in my briefs with penguins in South Africa.

I'm really bummed that I didn't bring my underwater camera or swim goggles. I had no *idea* I would have a chance to swim! Especially not in such beautiful water!!

iPhoto 2 legible.pl

1:44am SAST Friday 27 January 2006

Nice. I've basically finished the code for my picture renamer.

11:14am JST Tuesday 11 April 2006

(update: new version available: go to 17 May 2006 in my journal.)