Day 62 – Neptune Day

Today was Neptune Day, the traditional SAS celebration for crossing the equator. The main attraction is that people shave their heads. In honor of Neptune Day, we are given the day off from classes. Naturally, I had decided to sleep in. But at 7:30 am, crew members went through the halls beating drums. I suppose it was to kick off the celebration early, but I would much rather have gotten a few extra hours sleep.

Anyhow, I was at breakfast with friends when we saw the crew drum brigade in all their glory. They were dressed up as the Greek god Nike, and were followed by the Academic Deans and Don, all of whom were dressed up like kings. So that was cool.

After breakfast I went up to the top deck and saw people shaving their heads. It was nutso to watch; hair really has such an effect on one’s appearance. To my surprise, many girls decided to shave their heads. Now I’m sure many of them thought over the decision thoroughly, so they likely won’t be too upset over the result (though maybe after a six months they’ll be sick of their hair STILL being short). However, my biggest qualm with Neptune Day was that it seemed to encourage the impulsive decision of shaving one’s head. Now it isn’t too bad for guys, in a couple weeks they’ve got a short buzz cut. But I know of one girl who made an extremely impulsive decision to shave her head, probably cutting off five years worth of length. I honestly feel bad for her.

After hanging out on the top deck for a while, I locked myself in my room to work on my journal. To my delight, I finally finished Vietnam. That left me with only my India post and some days at sea to be all caught up. So I decided to call it quits for my journal the day.

With some time before dinner and the talent show, I decided to give Megan a ring and see what she was up to. She wasn’t doing anything, so I invited her over to watch Flight of the Conchords. We hooked up afterwards. 2 for 2 on sea holidays, baby!

For dinner, we were treated to a delicious barbeque with grilled steak and bbq chicken. To top it off, there was strawberry ice cream with chocolate sauce and sprinkles for dessert. To make the dessert even better, my buddy Michael turned 21 and had a chocolate ice cream cake. So I had a delectable chocolate and strawberry ice cream mix. Covered in sprinkles. Which, in my humble opinion, are an underrated ice cream topping.

After dinner I got ready for the Talent Show, which started at 8:00 that evening. I headed over to the Union, and while I was waiting for the show to start I got an extremely flattering comment from a faculty member. He said to me, “you’re Max, right?” I told that I was, and he said “man, you and Tolan are very, very funny. And not just in the immediate sense. Your lyrics are really clever, so they make me laugh over and over again.” He then asked if Tolan and I planned to keep playing together off of the ship, encouraging me that we ought to. “I could really see you guys going places,” he told me. So that was a great confidence boost.

Overall, the show was just stellar. The show opened with a band featuring drums, piano, a ukulele, a tambourine, and headlined by bagpipes. That was awesome. And the energy continued from there. One of the highlights had to be Tolan’s act, where he sang a three part harmony with Derek and a girl named Karen, who has one of the most beautiful voices I have ever heard. Derek and Karen each had great acts as well.

Tolan and I left near the end of the first act to rehearse a bit before our performance. We were not due on until the middle of the second act, so we took a half hour to knock out the final kinks. When we were called out, we got a big applause. That was sweet. As for our act, people seemed to like the banter we came up with, and we nailed the song. I really just wish we had been able to perform something we’d written.

There were probably six more acts after ours, but my favorite, bar none, was Earl’s standup. He is really gifted; standup comedy is not easy. I consider myself to be a pretty funny guy, but I’m awful at it. I hope he pursues it off the ship, because he could go places.

After the talent show, I was approached by Marcus, Michael’s roommate. Marcus has made a video in honor of Michael’s birthday, and he wanted to gather a group of friends to surprise Michael. So we gathered in classroom 4, and gave Michael a great surprise. We could tell he was blown away, which was awesome. After the movie, which was really cool, we broke into an iPod dance party. Everyone was dancing on the tables, it was just awesome. Great end to the night.