September 20 2010 / MV Explorer

Poetry this morning was lovely, as per usual.  We learned about synecdoche and chiasmus, which are pretty neat.  I am always impressed by the level of interpretation that we do in class that is helped on by our professor, and how whatever terminology we are learning about fits the reading perfectly.  It really is an incredible English class.  I really want to do more with poetry in later classes and in my later life, even.  I have never been able to write long stories particularly well, but with poetry you can tell a huge story and the trick is to be concise, which I love being anyway.  Mmm, delicious poetry.  A trick he told us to do for writing is to use unconventional/strangely related vocabulary for a subject matter, so I am trying that out with the poem I’ve been working on today.  I had told James I would write one for him but this just sort of turned out to be weirdly inspired by him.  It is strange but great.  I’ll post it (maybe) when I finish it. 

Off I went later to AOT, which only strengthened my desire to go to Elmina slave castle and dungeons when we get there, because it sounds like suuuuuch an interesting tourist spot and just historical site in general.  Luckily, Lorelei and I worked out later in the evening that if we left really early for Kakum park, like at 6:45 in the morning or so, we could get there for the morning, eat lunch at the crocodile restaurant, and then go over to the Elmina slave castle to explore that in the afternoon.  It will definitely be a packed day but I think we can manage it, especially if we just hit the ground running, which I am totally ready to do. 

I came back to my room and worked on my poetry for a little while, including printing out three poems I’ve done so far and dropping them in my professor’s box.  Considering some of the poetry I’ve seen from my peers, which they proclaim themselves took ten minutes, I feel pretty good about it and am looking forward to what my professor has to say to this first draft.  Contemporary Social Issues I felt waaaay more at ease with, because we were talking about wealth vs. income and inequality vs. poverty, which I am pro at, as this was more sociological stuff than political.  So I was able to contribute a lot, which was good.  South Africa has the highest Gini Coefficient of all the countries that we’re going to (.65), higher than even the USA (.48), undoubtedly due to apartheid.  We also talked about the Bush tax cuts that are expiring soon and how Obama wants to extend them for middle class only.  Neat stuff.

It’s hard to write poetry in rhymes.  I don’t know how Dr. Seuss did it.  I keep coming up with awesome lines just to change them because nothing rhymes with “bloody” that I want to use.  After a while we went off to dinner, joining Julie and later Lorelei, Jared, and a couple of people from Deck 2.  For all I said that I should stop eating beef yesterday, they had beef with sautéed onions, which I immediately was a goner for.  My bad, Planet Earth.  The seas were particularly rolling in the evening, and when someone hollered something about a whale, I almost fell over myself to get to the window.  I did not see any stinkin’ whale, and apparently neither did anyone else, as he was just blowing water occasionally up into the air.  But I didn’t see him so I went back most dejected.  We were cheered by some people at the table next to us who decided that they had far too much birthday cake and wanted to share though!  And I was made fun of for saying groovy.  I tried to counter it saying that Shaggy from Scooby Doo says groovy, but no one seemed to buy it. 

Around 2000 there was Ghana’s cultural pre-port, so I went over and sat next to Lorelei.  We saw Caroline (our Seville buddy!) and called her over, and she was interested in doing Thursday (the packed day above) with us too!  So we’ll have a pretty full group, which will be fun and I’m definitely excited for it.  Apparently I need to eat something called fufu, which I didn’t write down what it was, so we’ll see what that turns out to be, and red red, which is fried plantains and beans.  I can already tell this country and me are gonna get along just fine.  Also, my Ghanian name is Adwoa/Adjoa (you have to say the jw together) because I was born on a Monday.  There was a little bit of info about how to be respectful of royalty, which I was grateful for because I’m gonna go see the queen mothers of the Ga tribe and I don’t want to offend anyone (I’m going to have to sit on my left hand).  Apparently Archbishop Tutu is getting a reward that is like… the African Lifelong Service award and is going to meet with the king and stuff, so that’s awesome.  I think we’re going to be debriefed afterwards on how that was too, so that’s exciting.  :D  I cannot wait for Desmond Tutu to teach the Global Studies class on South Africa.

Jared and I went and worked out again today, because we’re hardcore like that.  This time I was able to be on the stairmaster for ten minutes, which was more than enough for me, as well as having some bike time in there too.  Then we lifted weights again on the deck and failed to figure out how to cool down so we just walked back.  Baby steps.  We’ve got it covered.

I took a most excellent shower and then decided to write this blog!  Tomorrow in Women in High Courts we’re going to be briefed on how to be respectful for the queen mothers, which will be a fun class, and then some Global Studies, and then… GHANA!! :)