Day 6- 
I expected a day at sea to be far less interesting or busy than a shore day. Not so. I attended Shreeyash’s second lecture today. His use of technology and clearly organized presentations are easy to follow and quite informative. His topic, the deities and images of Hinduism, was a constant presence in our childhood. Even so, I found the lecture interesting and pulled out several topics I am interested in delving more deeply into. In particular, some gods pre-date modern Hinduism and may have been incorporated from previous religions.
I had an exciting site today. While on the aft deck, something splashed in the water. Having just learned about a “zero overboard” policy (regarding waste, but people are not allowed either… so no sea burials!) I wanted to know who was throwing something in the ocean. A silver figure gracefully broke the surface of the water and smoothly entered again. It appears that we had crossed paths with a pod of dolphins. The largest was no longer than 2 meters.
One calf broke the surface, spinning a full circle and disappeared into the ocean again. At that moment I sincerely hoped that the calf was playing. Bottle nose dolphins have been known to engage in “calf tossing” where adults grab the young and attack them, throwing them from the water. Some die from their injuries. Biologists believe this is some form of culling and may be common in dolphin societies. I never saw the dolphins again. Some on deck reported flying fish and a sea turtle. My thoughts are with that dolphin calf.
I expected a day at sea to be far less interesting or busy than a shore day. Not so. I attended Shreeyash’s second lecture today. His use of technology and clearly organized presentations are easy to follow and quite informative. His topic, the deities and images of Hinduism, was a constant presence in our childhood. Even so, I found the lecture interesting and pulled out several topics I am interested in delving more deeply into. In particular, some gods pre-date modern Hinduism and may have been incorporated from previous religions.
I had an exciting site today. While on the aft deck, something splashed in the water. Having just learned about a “zero overboard” policy (regarding waste, but people are not allowed either… so no sea burials!) I wanted to know who was throwing something in the ocean. A silver figure gracefully broke the surface of the water and smoothly entered again. It appears that we had crossed paths with a pod of dolphins. The largest was no longer than 2 meters.
One calf broke the surface, spinning a full circle and disappeared into the ocean again. At that moment I sincerely hoped that the calf was playing. Bottle nose dolphins have been known to engage in “calf tossing” where adults grab the young and attack them, throwing them from the water. Some die from their injuries. Biologists believe this is some form of culling and may be common in dolphin societies. I never saw the dolphins again. Some on deck reported flying fish and a sea turtle. My thoughts are with that dolphin calf.
On a lighter note, I took some time to give the kids' Webkinz a tour of the ship. We took pictures with a replica terra cotta warrior, a sea lion statue and on deck. The Webkinz also got to meet an on board puppeteer, with puppets in hand! Everywhere we went, people understood and had stories of friends bringing their childrens’ toys on travels.
We attended a lecture given by another lecturer that came aboard in Singapore like we did. He is Persian and offered perspective of his life in the United States as an immigrant. While it did feel a bit like a stand-up act, I believe he is taking great pains to connect with the audience before discussing the social problems of the Middle East, which will begin two lectures from now.
I rounded the day out with a lecture on navigating by the start by the ships first mate. He stated that this vessel navigates with the use of three different satellite navigation systems. They did not solely rely on the US DOD system because the US can turn it off when it is necessary. Even so, should his systems fail, all officers have the skills to bring us in to port safely. Given that we are running just north of the equator, at about 10 degrees, Polaris should be visible ten degrees above the horizon, and I could not locate it from here. They were kind enough to turn the vessel 90 degrees to view the big dipper, and it was visible just above the horizon.
My day ended singing show tunes with a group of new friends, many from the Los Angels area.
Had no idea dolphins did the calf tossing. We don't tend to think of dolphins as being capable of something like that. Hope the one you saw was not being tossed. Got a kick out of the Webkinz boat tour. I can just picture you wandering around the ship carrying a bunch of Webkinz and a camera looking for just the right spot for a good photo shoot! I'm sure the kids will be thrilled with the results.
ReplyDeleteYou are a good writer.
ReplyDeleteWho is Shreeyash and when was his first lecture? What does he lecture about? You didn't introduce your character (unless I missed it).
What are the Webkinz?