June 16th Day 9 on the ship
Wow, today was one of those days that you know you'll look back on
when you're at work and wish you were there. I worked my night shift last night, grabbed 2-3 hours of sleep, and then Jordan and I hit the ferry for some island time. The day started out rough. My laundry bag was stolen, my swim bottoms disappeared completely, and then my sunglasses plopped into the ocean. Then I got on the ferry and realized I was in for a sickening ride and all the chairs were taken, so I had to sit on the floor. Of course when we got up we realized our entire bottoms were covered in black oil speckled stains that we had to walk around with for the rest of the day. Luckily things improved from there. We went on our snorkel tour and I was blown out of the water completely. I thought all the coral was dead from pollution, but I was wrong! We only went out a short ways and found an incredible bright, healthy coral reef! There was cobalt/neon blue starfish, pokey coral, swirly coral, really just coral of every shape color and size, anemone, sea urchins, swirly shells, crabs, Nemo fish, angel fish, every color and size of fish, and so much more. I saw tentacles creeping out of crevices and single coral plants bigger than my entire body. It was an experience that must be had in ones lifetime. Our guide was a nice Australian man who was nice enough to give me some tips on free diving when I wanted to swim down and get closer to some of the reef. Oh I tried so many times to stay down there, but wow it's so much harder than it looks. He dives for competitions sometimes, and I wouldn't have believed that he can hold his breath for 6 minutes until I saw him swim down for several. It was incredible. What a way to see the ocean. My biggest limitation was trying to equalize my ears. They didn't seem to want to pop right. Jordan had a nice water camera so I'll put in some of the pics she took when I get them, although it was really very difficult to get any good ones.
After that amazing adventure we got back in the bus and they took us to the local Tais market.
I was wary of buying anything earlier because all of of the stuff the boys sell on the street seem kind of like made in China type stuff, but this market was fabulous. I watched a woman sit and weave a Tais on her loom, and it looked like a long process.
Timor is known for its traditional textiles, and I was excited to buy some remembrances from the island for our new house. We realized when we got there that there were only 30$ in cash between the two of us (we both had 15 left) so I bought one rug, and my hope is that I can return to buy 2 or 3 more. They were so beautiful! They were the exact type of textiles I wanted for our house and hoped to find. These would be expensive in America, but they're very cheap here. They also had some neat placemats and little passport size purses that I would like too. Even though we didn't have much money we had a good time haggling between shops and playing with the small children that were all over the place.
It rained for a while and it all felt like an island dream. After we went to the mall to get gelato and dinner, and were too tired to make it to the bar to meet up with HN2 Antonio and friends which I felt kinda bad about. I was going on too little sleep after my night shift. It was a full, fun day.
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