Something's fishy

(Luana:) One of the things I really love about Semester at Sea is that we're thinking about our world and seeing up close what is going on in it. So while Bob burrowed under the blankets, I eagerly popped out of bed at 5 a.m. on our last day in Hawaii to go on a field study led by the ship’s biology professor. Dan Abel, of Coastal Carolina University, had set up a trip to the United Fishing Agency fish auction on the docks in the industrial section of Honolulu. This is one of the largest fish auctions in the world and it offered students of Dan’s marine biology class an opportunity to explore sustainability issues in the fishing industry, as world fish stocks become depleted and fish becomes affordable for fewer and fewer inhabitants of the earth.

Originally, I wanted to tag along on this trip because I thought it would be a great photo opportunity, but I wound up learning a lot about how fish are caught, how they are valued, what people will pay, how the fisheries interact with endangered species like the monk seal and the sea turtle, and how the government is addressing these problems. None of these fish were net-caught; all were done from lines, which eliminates a lot of the problem of catching fish and creatures that shouldn't be caught. We saw some mammoth fish at this market -- ahi and yellowfin tuna, opah, ono -- and each one made its own little barcoded journey from ship to cart to pallet to auction to the purchaser’s truck. Some of the fish was headed for Japan to become sushi, but a lot of it goes to local restaurants and markets. One tuna alone sold for about $1,000, while another fish in very poor shape sold for 20 cents a pound!

They use so much ice to keep the fish cold as it travels through the morning’s process that they make their own in a building outside and it is constantly being squirted into rolling bins from a pipe that’s at least twice the size of a dryer vent.

The fish agency has a lot of very hard-working people doing very serious work, as it’s a huge business and a source of good employment, but everyone was very nice to us, even though we were a bit in the way. After we saw the docks and the auction, we had breakfast at one of the fish restaurants on the property. Most of the students couldn’t face the idea of fish for breakfast, but my theory is always go for what is special about a place, so I had an ahi tuna omelet that was garlicky and delicious, but sort of an odd match for coffee. We topped our morning off with a 75-minute lecture by a government biologist from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (where I’ll admit my mind wandered a bit and I ran out of coffee...). All in all, a great experience.

I Hear Music--Sweet, Sweet (Island) Music

(Luana:) History is often dry and dusty and impersonal, but sometimes it just reaches out and grabs you in the gut--and that happened to me in the Lyman Mission House Museum in Hilo. We were looking at the museum exhibits when Bob called out to me from across the room, “Luana, isn’t this your godfather?” Short answer: No. It was my godfather’s brother. But still very cool. More on that later.

First, let me backtrack a bit: My Hawaiian name (Luana means “take it easy“) has often been a mispronounced annoyance, but I’ve always loved the Hawaii connection my parents bestowed on me. My Dad was stationed at Hickam Field in Honolulu, next to Pearl Harbor, from 1948 to 1950, and those apparently were two of the happiest years of my parents’ lives. So, even though I wasn’t born until their next assignment in slightly less exotic Indiana, they gave me a Hawaiian name as well as Hawaiian godparents: Clarence and Florence Kinney. I was named for their daughter Luana Kinney.

Clarence was a musician and composer who wrote some well-known Hawaiian songs of the ’20s, ’30s and ’40s. His brother Ray was even more famous as a composer and performer, at least according to my parents. But the display at the Lyman Mission confirmed their story -- in fact it elevated it. According to the Hawaiian Music Hall of Fame, Ray scored higher than Rudy Vallee and Guy Lombardo in a popularity poll of American singers taken in New York in 1938. He performed all over the mainland, including New York, where his band was in a Broadway show that included Hawaiian music. He also headlined at a famous hotel nightclub. Clarence, my godfather, didn’t reach Ray’s level of popularity on the mainland, but the whole Kinney family (there were six brothers) were known in the Islands for their beautiful Hawaiian music. I know my parents tossed down many a beer listening to them play in clubs around Honolulu and got to be very good friends with them. The Christmas cards and letters continued throughout their lives, and I finally got to meet them on my first trip to Hawaii in the late 1970s.

Even though our shipboard Internet connection is slow and balky, I managed to find some of my godfather’s music online and listen to little snippets of it. If you’d like to hear one of my godfather Clarence’s songs, go to http://www.territorialairwaves.com/index.php?page=3 and scroll down to the song Holoholo Ka’a and click the little arrow button. It isn’t sung by him, but I’m still hoping to find one that is. He also wrote a song about the Aloha Tower, which is where we are supposed to dock in Honolulu. What a thrill! It gives me goosebumps.

Mahalo, Mom and Dad. Aloha!

Pele hates the Hills

Most of you probably know that Pele is the Hawaiian goddess of fire and volcanoes. (No relation to the soccer player.) Well, something that we did in our past must have ticked her off. (Possibly it was our love of Smokey the Bear.) She really got back at us in the visit to our first port, Hilo, Hawaii, on the Big Island. Arriving there Jan. 25 after more than seven days at sea, we were going to do this special volcano experience we researched on the Internet. You take a small boat trip out to the area where the lava from Kilauea volcano is falling into the sea. The best time is at dawn when it makes for some great pictures.

The boat trip costs from $80 to $140, depending on the time of day you do it, but it seemed like one of those once-in-a-lifetime experiences, particularly since the Volcanoes National Park (VNP) rangers are keeping people farther from the lava flows on land because of accidents. (“George, go stand next to the lava flow while I take your picture. A little closer George. Ooooops!”)

The first thing we learned when asked about the boat trips was that the lava stopped flowing into the sea about 20 days before we arrived. As one ranger said. “It just disappeared. It’s down there someplace, looking for a new place to come out. It’ll come out someplace; we just don’t know where.” (With our luck, it’s probably flowing into our house’s basement right now.)

So with that plan foiled, we rented a car and drove up to VNP. We had been there about 10 years ago with the kids, but changes have occurred. Back then we hiked on the crater’s floor; now you can’t do that because a new volcanic vent -- now about 200 yards in diameter -- opened in 2007 and is sending large amounts of sulfurous steam into the air and across Crater Rim Drive, the 11-mile highway that circles the crater. So the road is closed. We were going to have a nice lunch at the Volcano Hotel, inside the park on the crater rim. It was closed for renovation.

The prevailing winds usually blow the volcano sulfur/steam north. On the day of our visit, the winds had shifted, so we were smelling the stuff throughout much of our visit. In fact, it gave me a sore throat, which I had for a couple of days.

So, Pele, whatever we did, we’re sorry. We’ll sacrifice a goat or our cat or something to you when we get home. (Correction: Luana nixed the cat.)

Land ho!

(Luana:) After seven days of rockin’ and rollin’, it’s good to be back in the USA, especially the palm tree version. Spent the day in funky little Hilo, talking at length to the sweetest family that ran a local restaurant (one of their specialties: spam sushi!) and walking all over town. We walked the 2 miles from the ship into town, and then took the local free bus back to the ship at the end of the day after seeing parks, statues, Japanese gardens, the Tsunami museum (Hilo had tsunamis in 1946 and 1962), and some rockin' souvenirs.

Even with the Hawaiian flora and fauna, you can tell we’re not far from home. The first thing we saw getting off the boat was the free Walmart shuttle bus that runs every 30 minutes from ship to store. I’ve heard that Walmart is now the number one seller of Hawaiian souvenirs in the islands, and I believe it after seeing all the students, staff, crew, and lifelong learners waiting in line to get back on the ship. Bag after bag with Walmart labels--but most everyone needed shampoo, laundry soap, and other items they didn’t want to carry on the airplane trip to San Diego. Nearly the last chance before heading out into new territory--and unknown brands. Let’s see -- do I have enough toothpaste?

The Hills Hit the Deck

(Bob:) Days 4-7: The last entry was about the ship pitching about. Well it got worse -- a LOT worse. It you see those cruise ship ads about how smooth all cruise ships are now with their stabilizers, it’s a lot of B.S. if Mother Nature decides to take matters in her own hands. The ship started some serious rolling on Days 4 and 5 because of the big storm to our northeast. It was the kind of rolling that makes even sitting difficult in some circumstances and keeps you awake at night as drawers in your room open and slam shut by themselves from the motion of the ship. Forget about keeping anything stored on a flat surface.

I don’t suffer from seasickness, so I was feeling smug until on Day 4 I was sitting in a class I was auditing, a swell hit, and me and my whole student desk I was sitting in pitched sideways onto the floor. Immediately, students in the class rushed to my aid -- OLD COOT ON THE FLOOR IN AISLE 7. I said I was fine and tried to compose myself. I had actually bruised my hip on the desk but didn’t want to let anybody know since I was embarrassed enough already. I made jokes at meals about providing some comic relief for the students.

Then the next day the rolling continued, and this time Luana did the same type of sideways fall in another meeting we were both attending. This time it wasn’t funny: a dislocated ring finger on her right hand. People rushed to get the ship’s doctor, while I told her not to look at it. Fortunately, almost before we knew it, another of our old coot group, who turned out to be a neurologist, popped her finger back into place -- and it didn’t even hurt when he did it.

The ship’s doctor and nurses showed up quickly and took Luana down to the infirmary where he put a splint on it as a precaution, since it seemed fine with good movement. The doctor and nurses seem very competent and are very nice people. The splint came off today, although Luana is keeping it taped to another finger as a precaution for awhile. Now, the only problem is the paperwork we have to fill out to satisfy the ship’s lawyers.

Finally today the rolling became much more manageable. Now you just have to lean a little one way while walking another, and sitting and sleeping are now getting closer to normal.

The anticipation is starting to build for Hawaii, which we reach on Day 9: Hilo on the Big Island first.

Rockin' and Rollin'

(Bob:) Day 3: A little bit about our home away from home: Imagine living your whole day on top of a water bed. It’s not quite that bad because the ship does have devices called stabilizers (like outriggers) that are usually deployed to cut roll. They do not eliminate it. The very first day we were dodging Pacific storms so the ship was in high winds, and you could feel it as you lurched from chair to chair in the dining room and wall to wall in the hallways -- oops, I mean passageways. The barf bags also came out, although I didn’t see anyone use one, but a lot of people were wearing motion-sickness patches.

We went 300 miles out of our way on the first day to avoid directly going through the storm, so first we were going about 20 knots (23 mph), now we’re doing about 12, so we might cover anything from about 550 miles in a day to somewhat more than half that. The ship can go as fast as 29 knots, which makes it the fastest passenger liner afloat. At the slower speed we occasionally roll more than at fast speeds -- we just picked up several items off our bathroom floor that weren’t “secured.” Nothing broke. Any typinb errory are caused by the rolling of the ship.

Weather has been windy on occasion, but no rain. I spent an hour on the deck this morning reading a book. It was very pleasant and sunny. Outside temperature is in the high 60s as we sail southwest toward Hawaii.

Sailing west has one nice advantage. Every couple of days we cross a time zone and gain an extra hour of sleep. By the time we get home we will have gained 24 hours of sleep. Great idea for everyday life

The students spent most of their first full day at sea receiving introductory lectures, many of them dealing with the dangers of binge drinking while ashore. I was sitting in on many of them and finally had to leave to get a gin and tonic. The one bar on board is restricted to faculty, staff and old coots. The bartenders are quite friendly. We’re hoping alcohol makes it easier to navigate on a moving ship.

For both of us, one of the chief highlights has been sitting on deck watching the world go by -- very relaxing. The biggest frustration has been trying to be compatible with the ship’s computer/e-mail system. We are working it out slowly.

Cast Off

Or, All good ship rides begin with a boring bus ride. Day 1 on the ship (Jan 17): A 2.5-hour, 7- a.m. bus ride from the program’s headquarters hotel in San Diego took us to the rather seedy town of Ensenada, Mexico where the ship, the M.V. Exlorer, was docked. (M.V. stands for Motor Vessel, the acronym for ships registered in the Bahamas.) The most chilling sight on the ride was the border fence, which currently resembles what you used to see in Berlin, without the guard towers. To answer a question frequently asked us, supposedly, the ship couldn’t pick us up in San Diego because it had dropped off the previous semester’s passengers there and U.S. maritime law restricts the ability of some foreign-registered vessels to pick up and drop off passengers in the same port.

The registration process went very smoothly; we were in our room and reunited with our luggage by noon; our six bags traveled separately by bus from San Diego to the ship. Our first day was spent getting unpacked, going to orientation meetings, taking pictures and what promises to be one of the chief activities: getting to know our fellow passengers. More on that soon.

A couple of housekeeping notes here: While we have free 24-hour Internet access, that is less than it sounds. The ship has somewhat limited bandwidth, so we might be limited in the pictures we can send, at least initially until we get it worked out how much we can compress them with available software. If you can’t understand that previous sentence, tough, I don’t have the space or time to explain it further. For the same reason of limited bandwidth, these entries of text are being typed in a word processing program and then downloaded, so I can’t always see what I’ve already written and might repeat myself -- more useless pap, but it can’t be helped. At least we Lifelong Learners (paying old coots) are luckier than the students who have time limits on their Internet time before they have to start paying (No lingering over Facebook.)

Back to the people: There are about 583 students aboard, 23 Lifelong Learners, 78 faculty and staff and some of their families -- so there are some small children aboard -- and about 200 crew members. The LLs, who we have had the most interaction with at present, are a varied lot, including an 88-year-old from Salt Lake City who still kayaks, a retired dentist from Seattle, some Canadians, a 26-year-old currently unemployed who decided to do something fun while waiting out the economy, a homeopath from Denver and a psychopath from Canby (me, not Luana). One thing that seems to link them all is they are an amazingly well-traveled group, having been to about every corner of the earth collectively. We haven’t met too many students yet, although Luana met one from Western Oregon University who is good friends with a guy who played rugby with Larry in high school and is now in the Marines (6 degrees of separation). Luana also went to a literature class this morning taught by a professor from Linfield who got his doctorate from UofO. There are supposedly two UofO students and a PSU student on board, but we haven’t met them yet.

The students, too are a diverse lot, from 224 different universities, and they have an average GPA of 3.3, although many don‘t seem that smart, but that‘s probably an old coot prejudice speaking. The courses that are taught are social science, art and music courses, and all are linked in some way or another to the countries we are visiting. There are 85 different courses, and they are taught almost every day while at sea. We old folks are free to audit any of them. Luana and I both went to a class today on Chinese-American relations taught by two professors -- one from the U.S. and one from China. They offered some interesting and different perspectives that they will be elaborating on in coming weeks before we visit China.

On the first day, we heard some welcoming speeches and had a preview of the one course that all students must take, called Global Studies, that will try to provide some links to all the countries we visited. In that session, we learned the 10 most populous countries in the world. In order, they are China, India, U.S., Indonesia, Brazil, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Russia and Japan. Counting the U.S., we’ll be visiting five of those, making up about 40 percent of the world’s population of 6.8 billion people. That sounds crowded, but all I can see is water.