Day 5 at Sea: THE SLYMPICS (SEA OLYMPICS)

ue to the importance of the Sea Olympics, classes are not scheduled for this day.  We had the entire day off to participate in these games and cheer our seas on.  It's somewhat like Sportsfest in Miami, but way bigger.  Literally everyone participates.  And for those of you not at UM, it's like field day.The games started at 0930, so I got up early and got ready.  I cut up my yellow shirt and put on a bathing suit.  I was going to go around with Becca all day and cheer everyone on.  I didn't have an event until the very end of the games at 1630.Nic and Tania came with us once they were done getting ready and Tania finished up practicing her routine.We watched hula hooping, family feud, crab soccer, limbo, picking ice cubes up with chopsticks, you name it.  I was originally supposed to participate in the Pirate's Pull (aka tug of war) with Tania and few other people.  But when we started seeing the other Seas and who they had doing this we decided to give up our positions for girls who are bigger and stronger.  Tania's the same height as me and smaller.  So you can imagine us going up against some of our friends who look like linebackers.Needless to say we still lost.  We don't have many guys on our floor who are big and strong like that.Lunch was so good, it was mac and cheese.  They brought out the good foods for the Slympics.  The 4 girls ate out on the 6th floor deck shaded from the sun.It was so hot out.  I couldn't believe it.  We were so close to the equator.  It was hot and humid and so sunny.  We really couldn't have gotten a better day for this.  They had the ship stopped for a while just chilling in the middle of the ocean to conserve fuel and because we're ahead of schedule.After lunch was the lip syncing.  Becca, Nic, and I went up to the Union early to get front row seats to see Tania.  Our Sea went first.  They did so well.  All of the acts were really good.  I was impressed.  My favorite was by far the Adriatic Sea's song.  They did Say You'll Be There by the Spice Girls.  But they had 5 of the boys do it and they were the Spice Boys.  They were so funny and knew all the words and even dressed the part.  I got it all on film.  I'll have to post those.  Another group did Thriller and their choreography was awesome.When the lip syncing was done everyone went out to the 7th deck pool to watch the synchronized swimming.  These were also hilarious as most of them included boys attempting to be graceful.  They weren't as good as the lip syncing acts, but everyone seemed to enjoy them.  Our Sea did Wannabe by the Spice Girls.  I thought they did awesome and definitely thought they'd place in the top 3.After that was the Gun Show where one guy from each Sea was doing pull ups.  For each one they did they earned an extra point for their team.  Our Global Studies teacher, part of the Sea Monkeys (the team of teachers and families), went first and got 13.  I was impressed, he's older and was going up across the frat boys, some of whom are huge.Jeff went from our Sea and tied for the most in the competition with 30.  He shocked everyone.  Doing our Sea proud.  We weren't really doing too great in terms of points all day.  Oh well.Then was the LLC fashion show.  They played music and each LLC came out dressed in their costumes.  They were so funny.  The people that dressed that announced them and what their look was.  Everyone that announced was a girl and sounded like they were narrating a real fashion show.  Our LLC was last.  Mason narrated.  He got up there and shocked all of us.  He sounded like he was announcing the start to a WWE fight.  it was so great.Out on the 7th deck everyone was hanging out, cheering their teams on, chilling in bathing suits.  It looked like Spring Break.  it was absolutely ridiculous.  Especially once you got everyone cheering people on in different events.Finally the events were winding down.  Nic and I were part of the final closing relay that had a bunch of components to it and went around the entire ship.  We were part of the leap frog team.  There were 4 of us.  We met up on the 7th deck port side and practiced.  Nic and I had been practicing down the hallways throughout the day.  We practiced doing 4 person leap frog, which I'd never done before.  Not that I've even done 2 person leap frog recently.  Kareem was having trouble with the concept of keeping his head down.  And one of the times I got caught on his head and took a major digger and somehow took Nic down with me.They had to do 2 heats of relays.  We went second, we were the start to the relay.  We did alright, it was really funny.  Everyone was so close together that we all ended up with some bruises from running into each other.  And everyone seemed to fall over at some point during the race.Everyone was exhausted by this point.  It was just about dinner time.  They had pulled out grills, from God only knows where, and cooked up ribs and burgers.  They were so good.  The family ate out on the 6th deck and watched the sunset.After dinner we all cleaned up from the sweaty messes that we were and it was time for the Closing Ceremonies where they announced the winners.We placed 3rd in the lip syncing event.  The Spice Boys didn't even place!  Everyone was shocked.  They were by far the best act.  I think it was because the judges were all parents of the young children on the ship and this one was pushing it.  They boys were dressed sexually, well sexually as girls.We didn't place in anything else.  I was surprised we didn't get anything for synchronized swimming.  The winning team was the Red Sea.  Adriatic got second and Mediterranean got 3rd.  The winning team wins bragging rights and they get to be the first off the ship when we get to Ft. Lauderdale.  It's a bittersweet prize.  Most people don't want to win it.  I was pretty indifferent about it.  I'd love to get off, but it'll be hard to say goodbye.I don't think I've ever been so happy to lie in bed.  I worked on my midterms some more and read a few chapters for Anthropology.  My teacher was giving a test the next day.  A little bit unfair.