In Reflection...

I am excited to come home, but I can imagine I will miss it here a lot. Its interesting how quickly the ship becomes home to all of us. Upon seeing the ship after a grueling hike on Mount Vesuvius or my long trip in Egypt, I remember thinking “ahhh, finally, I am home!” At this point, I cannot imagine not going somewhere new each day, experiencing a culture entirely different from my own, and being utterly swept up. I was looking at the map Autumn and I hung in our room, charting our voyage as we went along, and it astounds me how little of the world we actually saw. Sure, its more traveling than most people will do in their lifetime, but its so little in the grand scheme of things. It makes the idea of global citizenship even more relevant in my mind, because we are a part of the world, not just the USA.

There are a lot of little things about the ship I will miss. For instance, I love walking around and seeing all of the different t-shirts and soccer jerseys for each of the previous ports that people wear everyday. I will miss passing Delroy at the Piano Bar and giving him a hard time for working too much. I will miss getting my mealtime calls from my friends to meet on Deck 5 (I will not miss the food!). I enjoy my ritual of walking into the dining hall and getting hand sanitizer from the strategically placed dispensers. I will miss not being able to go out on the deck and sit for hours, starring into the never ending abyss. I will miss hearing Dia come over the intercom everyday, always starting with GOOD EVENING (or AFTERNOON) VOYAGERS, giving us the latest statistics on our progress and announcing the evenings events. I will miss the little bit of satisfaction of reading the dean’s memo everyday for what movies will be playing that night.

I will really miss the environment on the ship. Everyone here is really geared towards learning. If SMU held the same optional seminars that are held on this ship, they wouldn’t have even half the number of people who show up. I thought, surely, it would die off by the end, but it didn’t! Every “Explorer Seminar” was packed. The seminars ranged from discussions on Human Rights, to architecture in Spain, to entrepreneurship, to the Hip-Hop culture in Morocco, to female circumcision and human trafficking issues the world is facing. I will miss going to pre-port before we get to a new country and trying to guess the population amongst other statistics for a bag of M&Ms, or hearing our crazy on-ship doctor talk about wearing condoms and avoiding travelers diarrhea (included but not limited to: Turkey Trot, Pharaohs Revenge, and the Moroccan Mudslide).

When this trip began, I knew exactly who I was and exactly what I believed, but it has all changed in just 67 days. I am still essentially the same person, but I have changed more than I ever expected. I understand now how important it is to reassess and seriously question your own beliefs, even if its frustrating. My thirst for knowledge has grown exponentially, especially when it comes to language. Traveling has become a need as opposed to a want. I learned how to be a traveler instead of a tourist, how to really adapt to a culture and understand that the world isn’t full of people just like me. I have been reaffirmed that the heart of life is good and that most people in this world are well-intended. I made some of the best friends I have ever had. It is hard to believe how quickly you get to know people when you travel together. I feel like I have known Sarah and Audrey my whole life and I am so excited that they live only 20 minutes from me in Dallas! Coming back to a place that is essentially the same as when I left it, I can’t help but be a little scared as to how I will fit. Don’t jump to think that I am a completely different person, its just that I have such new perspectives and have experienced so much, I can’t begin to think how I will be able to explain it to anyone. The only way I can describe it at this point is that this truly was the solitary, absolute, BEST experience I have ever had!