India and Mauritius Update.

We are currently in India and it may be a little while before I post anything about India. There's so much to take in about this country and it'll take a little while to process, plus after India there are only 3 days until Malaysia!! and I have a ton of work that I need to do for school (or that I should do anyways). But in short India is Awesome (with a capital A). The homestay that I did in Erode was everything I wanted to be plus tons more. The city is busy, insane, and the rickshaw rides are possibly the funnest thing ever (and the scariest thing ever). I also went to the Mother Teresa (spelling?) orphanage today and volunteered for a few hours, which was....................... good. More to come on all that plus more at a later day (after I've processed and realized what I've actually done in this country).



MAURITIUS:

There were a few things that I was waiting to post on about Mauritius until I found out the legality of the situations. During out stay in Mauritius there were some incidents involving some students the most severe were the destruction of villa property and one girl also got raped. All of which result in poor representation of the program and it only adds to the stereotype of Americans that other countries have of us. The destruction of villas makes it a lot harder for future SAS students to actually rent out the villas. AS I UNDERSTAND IT, the raping of the girl was due to being obscenely drunk which resulted in being taken advantage of by one or two of the locals. Whether that is what happened or not I do not know. But she had to stay in Mauritius for a court hearing and what happens after that no one knows. As a result of this behavior the faculty has implemented more STRICT alcohol requirements for behavior on the ship as well as in the port. The consequences of even being a little drunk and making a scene (on the ship or in port) can now result in immediate explusion from the program. And that's my daily rant for now. On a lighter note.............INDIAS AWESOME. If someone is reading this that is thinking about doing SAS in the future don't let these little incidents result in you not going on this program. There are some risks in going on this, but if your just make smart decisions you won't have any problems. This is an AWESOME program.