Sea Olympics

One of the most anticipated days at sea is the day we hold the Sea Olympics, in which the different Seas compete in various events. The "Sea" that you belong to, as I mentioned in an earlier post, depends on what deck you live on, which side (starboard or portside), and whether you are towards the front or back of the ship. The events include a lip sync, syncronized swimming, crab soccer, tug-of-war, musical chairs, Simon Says, "Dress your LLC" (LLCs are basically like RAs in mornal college. My LLC's name is Rob and he's fantastic), and a shipwide relay race. The Sea with the most points at the end of the day gets, well, bragging rights for the rest of the semester, and they are the first Sea to get off the ship in Fort Lauderdale.Sooo, yeah. Best. Day. Ever.

 

Our Sea captains held a meeting a couple of days before the olympics to discuss strategy and come up with a good cheer. As we are the Bering Sea, which is up near Alaska, and our team color is black, we decided we would be the Ninja Crabs (because of the Alaskan King Crabs). The cheer that we came up with went with the theme song of "Men in Black," and went a little something like this:

 

"Here comes the Sea in black,

Gold medal defenders!

We are the Ninja Crabs,

Other seas surrender!

 

Be-RING!" (everyone simultaneously raises hands up like we have crab pincers and makes a hissing noise. Think about the Purple Cobras' cheer from the movie Dodgeball and you'll get the right idea. Pretty lame, yes, but SO much fun to do!)

 

Needless to say, we were all pretty pumped up by the Opening Ceremony, so we all dressed up in black, convened in our hall, and walked to the Union together, clapping and cheering and intimidating the hell out of all the other seas!! Okay, so we weren't that intimidating, and all the other seas had amazing cheers also, but let's be honest, they just did NOT have our enthusiasm. Anyway, we were all given the run-down of the rules and regulations about the following day, like no running on the ship, no fighting, blah blah blah, you get the idea, and then we were all given a chance to perform our Sea cheers.

 

The next day was just a blur, with events going on simultaneously all around the ship starting right after breakfast. My favorite event was the lip sync, which, of course, I took part in. Seven other girls in my Sea and I made up a dance to "Bad Romance" by Lady Gaga, and got a guy from our Sea to wear a wig and a bedazzled outfit so he could be our Lady Gaga. Our dance was a pretty big hit, I think everyone really liked it, and some of the other dances were hilarious as well. I think my favorite dance (besides ours) was when five guys dressed up like the Spice Girls and danced to "If You Wanna Be My Lover." I was crying from laughing so hard by the end of their routine.

 

The only other event I participated in was the last one of the day, the relay race. It was so chaotic, with people running (uh, I mean walking quickly) from deck to deck, room to room, to pass off the t-shirt to the next member of their team. I was a member of the flip cup squad along with three other people from my Sea, and even though we were chugging water instead of beer, we still rocked the competition! I think overall we came in second in the relay race, which is pretty good, if you ask me.

 

The day ended with a barbecue dinner on deck seven, which was incredible. The burgers, ribs and corn on the cob were such a nice change from the dining hall food. After dinner, my friends and I decided it would be a good idea to jump, fully clothed, into the tiny pool on the deck, and before I knew it, it seemed like everyone around me had the same exact idea. Everywhere I looked, more and more people started jumping into the pool, regardless of whether or not they were wearing a bathing suit. Somewhere along the line, we all decided that we were going to try and fit as many people in that pool as humanly possible, so we started chanting "WE NEED MORE PEOPLE!" and tried to convince more people into the pool. At one point, you could not even see the water because the pool was so packed. I don't know how we did it, but somehow we even managed to get Cindy, the Dean of Students, into the pool with us. It was absolute insanity, and so much fun.

 

The closing ceremony took place that night to reveal the winners of different events, as well as which Sea had won the day and would be first off the ship in Fort Lauderdale. Unfortunately for my Sea, we seemed to get shafted in a lot of the events, including the lip sync, which we did not even place in for some reason. Oh well, NOT bitter, it was still a lot of fun. However, we came in third for Sea Spirit, which I think we definitely deserved! The Red Sea ended up winning overall, which I thought was funny considering they were the one Sea that didn't seem to care about the Olympics at all. In fact, no one had even signed up for any of the events until the night before, which meant that they had no lip sync, no synchorized swimming routine, nothing, until a few hours before the olympics. Go figure! I can't say I'm really jealous, something tells me I'm not exactly going to be eager to get off the ship on May 5th.

 

Anyway, the Sea Olympics was hands down the most fun day at sea up to that point. That was, of course, until Neptune Day, which could definitely give the Sea Olympics a run for its money. I'll be sure to blog about Neptune Day soon.