Nassau - The republic of Pirates

As to compensate that we didn't get our spring vacation while we went to study in Florida, we went on a cruise in the end of the stay. It was a 5 days cruise, 4 night from Miami Beach to Nassau (The capital city of Bahamas), Cococay and Key West.

We went with Royal Caribbean's Majesty of the Seas which is a 268m long beautiful ship with a friendly crew and awesome food. Read more about the whole cruise experience here (coming soon).

As the history geek i am i started to do some research as soon i knew which islands of Bahamas we were going to visit. It is a good idea to start the resarch at home and bring it with you, because the internet on board is crazy expensive and the roaming deal you can get is often only in the US which do NOT include Bahamas, even though some think that Bahamas is a part of US.

Nassau
The capital city of Bahamas is known for pirates. Lots of them! Popular movies like Pirates of the Caribbean actually takes place in Nassau at some point  because the area was once called the Republic of Pirates between 1709 to 1718 before the brits came and claimed it back. Lot's of famous pirates have been living there! And just to mention one that everyone knows; Blackbeard was one of the pirate captains to live in Nassau.
I found a lot of stuff to see but sadly we didn't have enough time to see much of it. I wanted to see Blackbeards Tower but it was simply too fare away from the port so we went to see The Queens Staircase instead. It was kind of hard to find because they don't have any sign that says "This way!" and when we passed a hospital we were sure that we were going the wrong way. Then suddently there was a guy in front of us. He was a voluntary guide and told as a long story about the place and how it was made my hand of slaves. He was really sweet and funny and we gave him a few dollars for the guiding.

When you reach the top of the stairs you end up near the water tower and Fort Fincastle that was build in 1793, same year as the Queens Staircase and build by the same bastard. As far as i remembered was the staircase build by slaves so that they could flee from the Fort faster when you got attacked, but they never got attacked! So it was kind of a waste of the slaves lives. The british queen freed the slaves and that's why they call it The Queens Staircase today. Simply to honor the queen. If you are going to visit the place one day, i hope there will be a guide that was as interesting as the one we had. He also told us about the best photo spots and showed us where you could see where the slaves used picks to make the huge gab into the rocky hill.
The one thing that annoyed me about the place was the market stalls when you get up the stairs. Some of the locals was selling god knows what and everyone was yell at you to come buy stuff. I'm the kind of person that just get scared of that kind of them and runs past them all, not even looking at their stalls. At least they didn't grab you like they do in some other countries.

Our guide at Queen's Staircase

Fort Fincastle

Shopping
Nassau is the place where every cruise ship in Bahamas ends up and that does show in the kind of stores that are in the "main street" Bay Street right at the port. When you get past all the crazyness of people that want to sell you all kinds of souvenirs as soon you leave the ship, you get to a lot of shops only with jewelry, handbags and shoes. Even though it was cheaper than in the US - and everywhere else i guess - it is still not something that i could afford.
But at Bay Street you can find a huge old building called Straw Market which is kind of like Camden Market in London. It's a huge hall with small stalls that sells pretty much everything and the sellers are sitting in front of their stalls and calls people over. I think i got called Sweetheart a dozen times in there because they are not overrunning you like at some markets but they do want your attention.

A thing i want to add is that you can actually use your American Dollars in Bahamas but when they give you money back it is often Bahamas Dollars which you can't use i the US. They are really pretty though so if you collect coins it's worth just buying a small thing to get your hand on them!

Straw Market and Bahams cents

A fun little nerdy detail!
If you (like me) like to play video games, you may have run across the Assassin's Creed games. The fourth game called Assassin's Creed: Black Flag is about a pirate called Edward Kenway. The whole game is about the area and the Republic of Pirates. In the game you meet Blackbeard and he becomes your companion in the battle against the spanish and brits that want to take over Bahamas again. In the game you are running around Nassau and even though The Queens Staircase wasen't made at the time of the Republic of Pirates, the game developers placed it in the game anyway because it is such a big part of Bahamas history. Many of those who live there today are related to the slaves that was freed back then.
The Pirate King aka Henry Every that is now known from the game Unchanted 4, did also come across Nassau in 1696. He kind of made it a safe place for pirates to trade goods already back then.

My own picture vs my screenshot from Assassin's Creed: Black Flag

SOBE Wine & Food festival

Back in when i was in Florida we were so lucky to work at the South Beach Wine and Food Festival. We lived at the SoBe hostel and hat to walk from 2th to 16th where the volunteers tent was but i was working at the south tent so i had to walk almost all the way back again, just inside the festival walls.

The first day we were standing around a lot because they didn't really know what to do and (sorry) but the communitation was really bad between the leaders. We were all under a teamleader and mine kept disappearing? I only saw her the first day so i was kind of lost the next day but i ended up under another teamleader. We started to get the tables for the exhibitors and was not doing much anyway. The first day of the festival was also kind of slow because we could now really do anything. There is a low in US that says that we could not handle alcohol as volunteers so we could not ever lift the exhibitors boxes for them.

Saturday was the day where everything happened. It was more food now that wine and alcohol but they took me from the South tent and and put me in the welcome center. So i used my whole Saturday by saying hello to people and give them giftbags. There were so many people and we were running around and did get a really late lunch. I was a little pissed that i didn't get to be inside the walls and experience the festival because that was my job at first. There was a lot of awesome things happening inside that i really wanted to see and help with but the leaderes was sooo confused and ran around. Because those who send me in the Welcome center did not talk with my new teamlader in the South tent, so they thought i wasn't there at all. It was really confusing.

The last day i RAN into the festival and to the South tent so i did not miss it that day. There was not at much activity as Saturday but there was A LOT of people anyway. It was fun and i became somehow friends with some of the exhibitors i helped out. We had a lot of fun and i got to talk with some of the other students from FIU that volunteered. We talked about the different way we studied in Denmark vs US which we on the trip experienced. It was funny to hear someone else's opinion about random stuff and how different it is, just because you live in another first world country.

All in all a fun thing to try and academically we felt our models about working environment on our own bodies. You understood it much better, instead of just reading about it all.

Been away from the blog..

...for quite some time actually. I have had so much stuff to do because of the exams but they are over now and i passed 2. semester with awesome grades, so now i'm hopefully back to update from time to time. 

I have some old drafts laying around for this blog, so the things i will be writing about are stuff that happned looong time ago (not done with the Florida trip) and lots have been happening after that as well that i want to share with you guys.
One of my exams was actually about blogging/writing about the topics in the traveling industry so i did write about the topics like Sharing economy, terrorism impact on tourism, outbounding tourism and the ethics about traveling. You can find my small assignments HERE if you want. I got 12 for them (highest score in DK) so i guess they must be good. 

Teambuilding at FIU

While we were in Miami we went to a teambuilding exercise that i honestly think that we should have had in the start of out trip.
It was out at the FIU as well and was right by the sea. They had us do a lot of different tasks you could only do if you were working as a team. You were forced into communicate with people you didn't really know and ask for help or listen to a stranger.

We had tasks where we had to do it without speaking and only use our body language. We had to make a huge "ship" balance so it didn't tip over with any of us.
The instructors challenged us on time in many different physical tasks and i can tell you that my legs hurt so much after that day. The fact that we lived on seconds floor at the hostel was killing me. But i have to say, that there was not a challenge we didn't complete! We were quite awesome!

In the end of the day we had to climb. Many from our class was dying a little inside when they saw the "tower" when we arrived at the place. I am very glad that i'm not afraid of hights because our journalist had a Go Pro camera with her that she placed on my head so i could film my whole journey up the tower. I hope her video will be released at some point because the view was amazing up there. Something that wasn't too fun was to be the one on the ground that has to hold on tight so the person climbing didn't fall down. You get a pretty serious wedgie when they have to get down and you have to put in your weight against theirs.

Florida International University

So we went to Miami after a week in Orlando to visit FIU (Florida International University). The fist day it was raining like crazy and we actually got lost on our way there, because it was raining so much that we could not see the roads we had to turn on. So people! IF it rains in Miami, it freaking rains in Miami. OK!
When we finally got there we ran from building to building to find our class and Professor Tanke. We were soaked when we finally sat down and i'm pretty sure that the american students were laughing at us. We could have come right up from the ocean and we would have looked the same. We soon found out that people in Miami are crazy abou the aircondition, so note to self; bring a sweatshirt next time you go to school and have to be indoor. They told us that there is a lot of aircondition on there schools because their professors have to wear kind of nice and formal clothes and it would be too hot for them. The University was so kind to us and gave us free dry shirts with the schools logo on.

In Professor Tanke's class we had about Multicultural Diversity. They take it much more serious than we do in Denmark and i do believe they think about it more than we do. It's not just about race but also age, religion and gender. It was kind of weird at first to discuss at first because we had about service and toursim? But as a lot of examples came on the table it all made sense.
One in particular i remembered was that one of our danish students said something like "All elderly people don't like to see people with piercings and tattoos behind the counter in a supermarked" and the american students all gasped. How could we say "all elderly people"?! It was too generalizing and mad to say. Im sure that if you said that in Denmark not anyone would see it as offensive in any way or you would just shrug. And not to be rude or anything but it sounds like that americans are easier to be offended and if you work in the tourism industry and world with people you have to be extra careful about what you say.

We went to the University the rest of the week and had the opportunity to really see how it was to go there and enjoy campus. It was so awesome and i'm a bit jealous about it.They had a pool right at campus and their canteen was a freaking Subway. Simple 6 menu, yes please! Give me all them cookies! Their library had a starbucks because... why not. I could really get use to it!

Universal Studios Florida

The day after spending the whole day i Disney we took a trip to Universal Studios. We bought a Park-to-park ticket so we could go from Universal Studios and Adventure island as we wanted and well.. take the Hogwarts express from park to park.
I have to admit i was there mostly because of the Harry Potter World which was spread out in both the parks. In the Universal Studios park we saw Crustyland like in The Simpsons, some kind of Dapper land with blues drummers and Shrek. We went to find the Hogwarts Express. We met a guy working near "the Kings Cross station" and he told me that i could take the train, or i could continue down the street we were on. Sure thing and we saw the Nightbus and all but then... we went into something that looked like a wall? It was a little weird but on the other side... Diagon Alley! And i have to say... I cried... a whole lot. It was magic and i couldn't take a picture that described how awesome and beautiful it was to see, if you are a huge Harry Potter fan. And i am very sorry Kristina, that you had to witness that. But i went into every single store in Diagon Alley even though most of them had the same things. I tried the Gringotts ride which was with amazing 3D effects. I can't describe how awesome it was. If you are just a little fan of Harry Potter DO IT.

After that we went to the Adventure Island with the Hogwarts Express whivh was crazy awesome as well. Instead of having the view of just trees on the way there, they showed the sceenary that are showed in the movies and Hagrid flies pass on his motorcycle. And on the close to see through doors we got a visit from the Dementors but was saved by the shadows of Harry Potter and his friends. You could hear them talk as well.
As you step out on the Adventure Island you step right out in Hogsmeade and this time i DIDN'T CRY ok. But it was a snow landscape and i bought a Pumpkin Juice to go (not good though) and went through the street until i came to Hogwarts. We were there on Valentines day, so there was long queues everywhere so you could stand there and see everything and take pcitures of all the magical Harry Potter things that was around you. The portraits were talking and Dumbledore was in his office and Harry and his friends were in the classroom which looked exactly like in the movie. The Hogwarts ride again was amazing. You were fliying through a quidditch game, had a dragon chase you and you went through the forbidden forrest before you fly over the lake to the castle again. It was beautiful!
All in all a really good day for me and my Harry Potter heart!

Disney World Orlando

So! One of the things I was looking most forward to DISNEY WORLD! I am a huge disney fan it was magical! Team there was a huge amountof people so the characters could not go around us so I didn't really get to meet any of the characters, but it was really good anyway. The whole disney world was one big fairytale and somehow what I expected. When you get there you have to take the train or the ferry which is actually really clever because it is basically waiting time but when you are being "active" by being on the ferry.

The food we got there was not the best and you have to know where to go and you have to reserve a table as soon as you get there, if you want to eat at the best restaurants where the disney characters are walking around. So it would be a good idea if I'm going another time.

The fireworks and the parades were the best about it all. The lines was very long because it was Saturday, so we saw most of the parades instead of trying all the rides. The one in the evening was especially good. It was a big lightshow with all the well-known characters. Personally I loved Peter Panasonic even though it was not the famous Peter is have seen around on Tumblr and YouTube. It was also interesting to see the characters in real life now that I went to an audition myself to be one of them.
The firework was the best though. It was with all the classic songs and Tinker Bell actually flew from the top of the castle to start it aLloyd.  It was quite a show. I will recommend everyone visiting to stay and watch the fireworks even though it is quite late. It's almost impossible to get bad pictures there!