Testing

This is a test. Attempting to post via email like I will be doing on the ship, so I need to make sure this works. I'll even be all fancy and attach a pic.

T-minus 2 months

You could say I'm just a tadddd excited for Semester at Sea to start.
So field program (excursion) registration was a week ago. I was tempted to sign up for a lot of them, but I've heard from so many people to plan out most of the stuff on the ship after you meet people you want to travel with. I only signed up for 3:
-"The Glory of the Ganges" in India
-"Ngwe Saung Beach Tour" in Burma/Myanmar
-"Impact: Dieu Giac Pagoda & Orphanage visit" in Vietnam.
The rest of the days and countries I will travel with friends or find other tour companies that are cheaper than SAS. I'm already looking into it and there are some awesome tours I've been finding.
Also, all the classes I registered for have "field labs". I have 4 classes so 4 field labs, and these are in Japan, India, South Africa, and Namibia. I'd go through all the field program and field lab descriptions, but that would get boring and I'll post about it after it happens.

Just a little over 2 weeks ago I met up with 3 people going on this voyage with me and it's made me even more excited. I went to the SAS Founders Day Potluck in San Diego with 2 of them and it was so great getting advice from the alumnae. All of this happening has made it so hard to focus in school. I'm taking 19 units this semester and have many projects to do that are hard to find the motivation for. But I just have a month of school left and then can fully focus on packing and buying whatever else I need (like an actually good camera) for SAS. For now, I just have to submit my medical forms (luckily I don't need to get any shots) and try to finish this semester with good grades!

These past 2 days though...

October really is a crazy month when it comes to SAS! This week, I:

1. Got all of my courses approved by my advisers, and successfully registered for all of them! I woke up at 4:30am yesterday so I could register at 5, but most people were having server problems. I kept trying for a solid hour, and some people got through and registered so I started worrying my classes would fill up. Then the system had to be shut down and it would be re-opened at 8am, so I went back to sleep and woke up then and finally got my courses! I am taking:
-International Marketing
-Consumer Behavior
-Evolutionary Psychology
-Social Media and Global Change
I'm so excited for all of these classes!

2. Financial aid & scholarships came out 2 days ago. The program's cost is $23,950, not including traveling around in each country. I got $1,500 for a merit scholarship and $5,000 for a need-based grant, so I'm happy with that! I still need to raise some more money though and trying to find random ways (right now I'm looking into getting companies to sponsor me) and I also have a gofundme account if anyone reading this would be willing to donate anything!  http://www.gofundme.com/88if4k

This voyage is starting to feel more and more real and I leave in less than 3 months! CAN'T.WAIT.

Visas: check!

This visa process sure takes longer than you think it would! On September 22, SAS emailed us all the visa info, and we have to make sure it is all received by Travisa by October 10th. The visas required for this voyage are China and India, and we will get our Burma/Myanmar and Vietnam visas when on board. It cost about $450 for the 2 after the service fees from Travisa, the actual fee itself, and shipping payments. It's finally all done (with some help from my parents) and will be mailed off tomorrow! Other than visas, I'm desperately awaiting 3 more days until the financial aid & scholarship awards come out! October 9th is course registration AT 5AM. It's 8am ET which sucks because, well, I like sleep. But that's okay because I can't wait to solidify my courses! I have gotten 1 approved by my major, 2 by my minor, and am going to the last adviser tomorrow so I can get my general education course(s) approved! So it's going to be a very eventful week :D

Here's the visa link for those who are going to go on Semester at Sea in the future and want to know what to expect:

http://tours.travisa.com/TourInformation.aspx?tsc=HS6PP8TZ

Itinerary Change: it's official!

I woke up this morning around 8am with a lot of energy and was really confused why. I don't have class on Friday here at San Diego State University, so Friday is my lazy sleep-all-day day. A few minutes later, I got an email from Semester at Sea titled "Itinerary Change" and after rapidly reading it, we are now going to....

Walvis Bay, Namibia (instead of Ghana)

Casablanca, Morocco (instead of Senegal)

I almost cried tears of joy. We used to have Morocco as one of our ports, but a few months ago, SAS took it off for some reason. This was one of those ports I was looking forward to the most due to various reasons: camel trek through the Sahara desert, camping in tents in the desert, movies like The Prince of Persia was filmed here and tv shows like Game of Thrones was, and Morocco just seems plain cool. I am also excited for Namibia but don't really know what there is to do there, so lots of research is about to go down. 

So I guess somehow my body just knew to casually wake up and be awake right when that email was sent out. I am happy about the itinerary change and glad that SAS is taking a precaution to not go anywhere where ebola could possibly be. Now to just wait until October 8th. Until next time!

First Post!

I never planned to study abroad until I heard about Semester at Sea. My television, film and media studies major & business marketing minor don't require me to study abroad, but there are such similar courses offered so I'm almost positive they will transfer. Semester at Sea is a study abroad program that is on a ship and takes you to different countries for a semester. Classes are centered around the different ports we will be going to, and each class has a "field lab" where the professor picks a place to take the whole class out into a country and see what you are learning about in class firsthand. 

I applied to Semester at Sea after touring its ship, the MV Explorer, when it was docked in San Diego at the beginning of January 2014. I heard about it from a Facebook friend, and since I've been on 5 cruises and they are my favorite thing in the entire world, cruising to multiple countries while taking classes on board is the ideal study abroad program for me. 

The itinerary:

1. San Diego, CA (bus to Mexico)

2. Ensenada, Mexico (embark)

3. Hilo, Hawaii

4. Yokohama, Japan

5. Kobe, Japan

6. Shanghai, China

7. Hong Kong, China

8. Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

9. Singapore, Singapore

10.Rangoon, Burma/Myanmar

11. Cochin, India

12. Port Louis, Mauritius

13. Cape Town, South Africa

14. Tema (Accra), Ghana

15. Takoradi, Ghana

16. Dakar, Senegal

17. Southampton (London), England

18. Random European cities/countries I will later decide on

*Because of the Ebola situation, I'm almost positive we will not be going to Ghana or Senegal anymore sadly, but I can't wait to find out where we will go instead! The current voyage is going to Rome and Barcelona instead, so that's very exciting! I'm hoping for Morocco, Portugal, and Spain for my voyage.

The payment deadline is in 1 month on October 15, and I find out what scholarships I got on October 8. I am literally counting down the days until I find out because one of them I could get up to $10,000, and the other is a work study scholarship worth $4,000 where I would work for 2 hours every day we are NOT in port. Wish me luck!

So that’s about it for my intro post. I’ve never blogged before but I am determined to keep this updated and take you (if anyone actually reads this) with me on my amazing journey around the world!