Day 8 – Neptune Day

Sept 5th

Festivities
After drifting off to a late sleep, I was completely disoriented when our cabin stewards began banging pots and pans at 7AM. Upon opening our door, Julie and I discovered our friendly-faced Dalfie dressed in an aluminum foil helmet and white toga cheerful singing some song that wasn’t English. After diving back in bed, I couldn’t fall asleep to the continued percussion that was marching up and down our hall. My grogginess faded when I got to the top deck, which was packed with students watching professors dressed like kings and queens. Since it was the first time most of us were passing the equator, we had to go through a ceremony to become official “shellbacks.” This ceremony involved having fish guts dumped on us, swimming across the pool, kissing a wet, scaly fish and Medusa’s ring before finally being knighted by Neptune. Of course the “fish guts” were really colored water mixed with fish sauce for the smell, but the whole thing was pretty fun. It took hours to get everyone through, so in the meantime students got their heads shaved as part of the ceremony. One boy won a raffle to get your head shaved by the captain, while about 50-60 other of kids got their heads shaved by other staff. Some opted for mohawks and a lot of the girls donated their hair to locks of love. There were about 20 adventurous girls that went through with it too. I was pretty impressed. After the festivities died down, the crew scrubbed away the clumps of hair and fish smell with soapy water. Of course this excited a number of college students who realized we could then make the deck into an impromptu slip and slide. With each wave, students glided on their bellies across the floor. I think the crew found it as entertaining as we all did. Since we had the day free, we mostly hung around the top deck. I had my second animal sighting! Some black and white bird called a “mashed booby” flew around the ship for a while. At least there is some indicator of land near us!

Cultural Pre-Port
We had an orientation meeting to prepare us for arrival in Brazil. This included presenting the general cultural practices, food delicacies and places to see while in Salvador, Rio and nearby places. The program with capoeira music and a samba dance party. A few brave souls, including an elderly life long learner, boogied down in front of the whole crowd.

Another Pub Night
Another packed pub night tonight. We celebrated our imminent arrival in Brazil as we enviously watched the lights along the distant coast. As the night wore down, a crowd of us decided to play limbo with a rolled up t-shirt, leaving me to hear “How low can you go…?” ringing in my sleep.

Highs and Lows
My “high” was late night limbo and late night fro yo. My “low” was kissing the same mono-prone fish that 600 other college students kissed.