On the day after Mauritius, October 5, 2011, the ship hosted the 107th sea Olympics, they do this on every voyage. Sea Olympics is a day where each sea (each area or section of cabins is part of a sea, I am part of the Yellow Sea) compete in a series of activities and cheers. The prize for the winning team is that they are the first to get off the ship in Fort Lauderdale and they got an ice cream social (a night where we get ice cream) in the Glazer Lounge (the very exclusive faculty and staff and lifelong learners ONLY zone on the 7th deck). It is like Spirit Week and Field Day combined into one day.

The day started with an opening ceremony, where the main organizer came in wearing a toga and held a paper made Olympic torch. This was where each sea was judge on their cheer and spirit. Then came the series of events:

Musical chairs, make me laugh, game room (Taboo and Guessture), banner contest (each sea needed to make a banner, and even though we didn’t win, my sea had a killer banner, and no bias intended), pull ups, volleyball tournament, scavenger hunt, Simon says, dodgeball tournament, human knot and lap sit, face wars (face painting), popcorn eating contest, T-shirt medley, chopstick challenge (use chopsticks to transfer ice from one bowl to the other), SAS Trivia, food face (get a cracker from your forehead into your mouth without using hands), tug-o-war, synchronized swimming!, crab soccer, relay race, and reverse spelling bee.

I participated in the T-Shirt Medley and the Trivia. The T-Shirt medley was where a team of 4 people had one t-shirt, and each person needed to do two laps in the tiny tiny pool and come out and wring the t-shirt and we needed to fill the bucket up to a certain height. My sea won this event and we were so happy! My sea’s trivia team did not win sadly.

In the end my sea placed 4th which was great because we did not look very good at the start of the day. It was a pretty fun day despite some organizational flaws.

Another thing that made it great was that dinner was the 2nd Taco Night of the voyage. The ship’s food is getting very repetitive and these days it’s actually not tasting as good anymore, so it was a huge relief and gift to have Taco night on this night.

And then there was the closing ceremony, where the victor was announced and the organizer closed the 107th Sea Olympics on Semester at Sea. Sea Olympics along with Neptune Day are two of SAS’s most famous traditions.

-Garythegastronomictraveler.