Take music boxes. And aux cables. You won't regret it during watch and cleanings. Oh, and earphone splitters. 

Want to know what else? Read this :)

There is a song. A song that Emília introduced me to, somewhere in the very beginning. She asked me if I knew the band. Gave me an earpod, listened to it together. I remember trying to pay attention to the lyrics, but dozing off with other thoughts. It was only much later that I came to love the song with all my heart. It became our song. Cabin two, later five. The song that tore my heart apart by feeding me memory after memory as I sat alone in the living room, playing it loudly on that bleak Sunday afternoon. Tears rolled down my cheeks how I prefer them: unseen. I didn’t belong here anymore; I was a bird that had learnt how to fly, but was now being forced back into the golden cage. I was supposed to move forward, not back. I just knew: nothing was going to be the same ever again.

We went to our cabins, took our bags. I cried for the first time, in my cabin with Amelia. We just couldn’t imagine life without SaS. The first people came to hug goodbye, some were just suddenly gone. My cabin was the last to be there. A hug for the crew, a hug for the teachers. The ship was just so… bare. Finally we left, Emília with me. It was weird to drive back, along the roads I know so well. My house, the smell, so much space. Yet everything was smaller, like pots and pans. A few things had changed, but not much. So clean.

We ate fries that evening. It didn’t feel like we were back. It felt like we’d stay for a few days, and then go off again. Everyone went into a kind of mourning state. A lot of people gave school the finger, because enjoying the last days was more important. I’m one of them.

On Monday the tenth of April 2017, about twelve o’clock, the dreaded message sounded through the intercom: “Land Ahoy!” Far in the distance, Zandvoort could be made out next to a windmill park. That windmill park, that’d seemed endless that first night, blinking red lights to starboard. That was six months ago.

Where we could wear a t-shirt during the day on the way to Bermuda, thermal clothing was produced from bags now. There wasn’t time to stay in bed till five minutes before watch, because the layers had to be piled on. 1-5 luckily goes very fast, and has its privileges; we’re allowed to eat almost anything from the fridge, and get left some of the leftover four o’clock once in a while. During the night you clean the salon, during the day you check the fridge. Pretty ok, in my opinion.

Once, during a calm night watch, we could see Miami’s skyline on the horizon. All those people over there, living their busy lives, with beliefs and friends and lovers, problems we will never know of. And they’ll never know that one night, around midnight, a few students marveled at their city, a small ship on the everlasting ocean.

The first thing you tend to come across when you visit a country, are customs. In one place they’ll take a bored glance at your passport, in the other they’ll measure your temperature with a laser on your forehead. As you might guess, Cuba belongs to the second category. We had to stand in line, and have our temperature taken by a doctor with a white jacket and a clipboard firmly in his left hand. Next we had to walk twenty metres to the office in pairs, where they made a photo and placed a stamp in your passport with a swift press. Next came the officers, who inspected the ship, followed by a drug dog. Luckily, she didn’t find the cocaine (jk).

Off we went to the supermercado, and emerged with spaghetti and tomato sauce with a few veggies and a bottle of coke. Could be worse. Nikki and I cooked that day, and everyone gobbled it up. But not before we’d come back to Thalitha’s group sitting on our couches. A moment of discussion, a bit of frustration, then it settled quickly.