Saturday, 21st March
I do apologise for the abrupt ending to the last blog. the rest went into cyberspace and I could not retrieve it; instead it published a photo I had given up on!
This image is taken in the grounds of the Grand Palace Bangkok.
I have tried to put up other images this morning but no luck.....it's only 6.30 am and I thought it would work as. hopefully, most students should be sound asleep and not on their computers. Perhaps everyone has thought the same way!
Last night after a 7 pm rehearsl we had a pre-port lecture given by two "inter-port" passengers from Vietnam. Unfortunately, although their English is good, their accents are very difficult to penetrate. George and I disobeyed orders and watched on our cabin TV which at the very least meant we could get on with other things; polishing lectures for George and learning lines for me, and we didn't freeze which is my main problem with sitting in the Union as I've mentioned before. Following that the MV Explorer crew gave us a show which was at times hilarious and at others we sat amazed at the talent they have hidden from us up to now. There were quite a few professional standard singers, comedians and jugglers. Our crew members mostly come from the Carribean and the Phillipines, but there are also a few from South Africa, the UK, Canada, Ukraine, Germany and other countries I have forgotten. They all stood together at the end of the show,each holding a small flag of their particular country and sang 'We are the World", it was very moving. The ones we know best of course are our cabin stewards and dining room staff, but there are in all 198 crew members....we shall be looking at them quite differently from now on. Theresa Mueller took both video and still cameras and is going to try to send something I can insert on the blog....keep your fingers crossed?!
The sea is a different blue today; we are on the southern edge of the South China Sea, strange how the colour differs depending where we are. One tends to think of the sea as simpy being blue or grey but there are a hundred and more variations of that theme believe me. It's rather like fabric; yesterday a heavy silk, today a crinkled crepe, sometimes shantung!
I'll put up the co-ordinates later for Liam and Katie. We arrive in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam at 8 am tomorrow. George and I are doing a city orientation tour and the next day he has his FDP (Faculty Directed Practicum) at a college where they teach studens to work in English and I shall be spending the day travelling to and seeing the Mekong Delta. The third day we leave for two nights in the Cat Sien Park (Description in our tour book: very rustic and basic, hot and humid, no hot water, bring hiking boots, insect repellant, sun screen and a hat!) Oops what have I let myself in for? I'm an air-con person in the tropics these days, I could certainly regret this decision!
More later....
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