3/1/2007
33° 17.98S
004° 43.41E

I can’t believe it’s March! This winter has gone by so fast. Well, we are now within several hundred miles of Cape Town, South Africa and what an adventure it has been crossing the Atlantic. Three days ago we crossed over the mid-Atlantic Ridge, which is the tallest mountain range in the world. The water depth as we crossed the ridge was 6,000 meters and change. Even at one of its shallowest points, this ocean sure is deep.

Finding things to do on a ship for eight days can be difficult, but I think we have all managed to keep ourselves sane. On February 24th, we were entertained with Neptune Days, which is a celebration in honor of the sea Gods when we cross the equator (although we didn’t celebrate it as we crossed the equator). The crew came through the halls at 7:30am banging pots and pans to awake everyone. The festivities then took to the pool deck where the captain, painted green, poured fish guts on each student while inducting him/her into a life at sea. That afternoon about half of the student population shaved their heads. Because I shaved my head before departure, I was able to escape this initiation. Other than that, I have written about one paper per day, ate lunch with the captain, listened to Archbishop Desmond Tutu speak, and participated in my first ever kick boxing class.

I’m finding the education here to be borderline socialist. So far we have spent most of our time discussing globalization (90% of the time talking about why it is so bad), inequality, sustainability, and discrimination. The other day our global studies professor ended his lecture claiming that an article by Jeffrey Saches’ on development was “wrong, wrong, wrong.” If you don’t know anything about Saches, he’s like the Tiger Woods of developmental economics. Who would argue that Tiger Woods doesn’t know how to play golf? The comment may have come out “wrong”, but it really didn’t surprise me much considering Saches personifies capitalism. This ship seems to have a strong distaste for capitalism. Regardless, it’s a great learning experience to hear this perspective.

On Friday, March 2nd, we will be arriving in Cape Town, South Africa at 8:00am SAST (GMT +2). I have a full week of adventures planned, so check back next week for more goodies.

Thanks for you support!

Best,
Mike