on this voyage because we were able to cross the Equator at the Prime
Meridian! In maritime world this is a pretty big deal because 0,0 is
not on any route that many ships take. When someone crosses the
equator on a ship you become a 'shellback' (where before you were
considered a polywog) but if you cross at 0,0 then you are an emerald
shellback (the rarest form of shellback, might I add) So the morning
after we left Ghana we were awoke with a parade in the hallway. The
Resident Directors and dependent children (professors kids) had a
bunch of instruments and came banging on everyones door. This was all
happening at like 730am....a little early for the loud noises in my
opinion. Then over the PA system they announced that King Neptune and
Minerva were here and ready for the initiation of the polywogs. So my
roommate and I rolled out of bed and went up to breakfast. After
breakfast we didn't really know what to do so we headed back to our
room and sat around for a while. At 9am we decided to go up to Deck 7
outside to see if anything was going on. Well we somehow missed the
memo because most of the ship was out there jumping in the pool or
getting their head shaved our kissing real fish. So we ran back
downstairs, changed into our bathing suits and got in line for the
'initiation'. The initiation consisted of getting a pitcher of fish
juices (it was the water from where they keep the frozen fish in the
kitchens...so it definitely was fishy) dumped over your head and then
jumping into the pool, then kissing a fish (yes a real-dead- giant
fish) smack on the lips and then kissing King Neptune's ring (which
was our Executive Dean dressed in a wig painted green in a skirt, and
then getting salt drizzled on our head. After all of that we were
officially shellbacks! (and smelled gross). All of our professors were
painted and dressed up and super into it, it was hilarious, my
anthropology professor was the one who was making everyone kiss the
fish hahah. Then another tradition for crossing the equator is to get
your head shaved (goes back to the military/navy days on ships). So I
got my head shaved...JUST KIDDINGGGG. Yeah right, hope I scared you, I
don't think I could pull off the bald look. But quite a few people
(even girls) shaved their heads! After the nonsense had calmed down a
bit we headed back to our rooms to shower and then went up to lunch.
We didn't actually cross 0,0 until 4pm-ish so when that time rolled
around we went and stood outside, taking in the thought that we are at
the center of the world! It didn't look any different (obviously there
is no flag floating out there with a 0,0 sign on it...though that
would have been cool!) but it was still cool to be there! Everyone had
a lot of homework that night since most of the midterm exams were
before we got to South Africa so I studied for a while and then went
to bed early. But now I can offically put on my resume I am an Emerald
Shellback!! haha!
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