Location: Underway to Palau
Today was a grey day. Cloudy when the sun came up, cloudy when lunch was served, and cloudy as I write this in the evening. But just because it was, as my grandmother calls it, an Eeore day (That’s the sad donkey from Winnie the Pooh), doesn’t mean it was a bad day at all! After our amazing lunch, courtesy of Sydney, Tom, Smash, and Elexia, the students were gathered below deck for presentation day! We have all been working hard to research topics that interest us over the past few weeks, and today was the day we got to share all we learned with our friends and shipmates. Some of us dressed in business casual attire, while others dressed in their best fish-based outfits. Yes, an outfit based on fish! Some of the presentations were serious, touching on heavy subjects that could affect our floating lives right here on Vela, while others were entertaining and lighthearted. However, no matter what the subject or the presentation style was, these presentations taught us all a little more about the environment around us, as well as the people we are surrounded by every day in our strange life aboard.
Seeing how our work came together today, after picking what we wanted to research what seems like forever ago, has made me reflect on our passage and our situation. It seems both so close and so far at the same time that we were sailing around the islands of Fiji, meeting new people that we would be spending literally every hour with for 80 days. Now it feels like I have known both the Crew and my classmates forever, and they feel closer than I thought would be possible after only a month. We haven’t even hit the halfway mark yet! Taking the time to look back at our beginning has only made me more excited for what is to come, and I can’t wait to experience where our watery road takes us!
To my family, I say hello! I miss you all and am excited for the time when we will have service again for a call. It shouldn’t be too long now before we reach Palau, and I promise to call as soon as I can!
To Sierra’s family, she says, “I love you!”.