Breathe

 

Its been simple life.
No essence of time, days, weeks.
I just am.
Me & Ocean

It has just been our crew and the ocean for days without an end. Wherever we look out on deck we can only see a sparkling blue ocean filled with magic and mystery, surrounding us 360 degrees. This blue ocean constantly reflects our universe, our sky, our land, ourselves. We have been tasked to learn about this constantly changing body of water since the first day of Stanford at Sea to engender change and conserve its beauty. We have learnt about the ocean through all kinds of scientific research methodologies, such as hydro casts, transects, videos, meter net toes, etc. However, through my endless staring competition with the blue body of water and my deep gazing trying to understand all of its layers, I certainly have grown my curiosity and my ambition to understand: Who are we? Why are we here? What is our place in this world? Why have we become out of touch with our ocean and land?

The blue magical waves have been a constant reminder of how we have complicated our lives as humans and have not had a moment to just stand still and respect our planet Earth. On land there are moments where life gets so busy that we forget the essentials of life. We have become dependent to our advanced technological tools and have lost ourselves within it. We have become numb to the beautiful and dark parts of our world, where we have never been satisfied with what we have and who we are. We have quickly lost touch of our planet earth to a point where we have even forgotten to just breathe. However, on day 28 I am reminded once again by our ocean to stand still on this rocking vessel and just breathe, slowly, becoming one with the moving water.

I steered the boat at the helm sailing across the Pacific Ocean at a course order of 005 at 7 knots. I marked the ·2000· nautical mile that the Robert C. Seamans has traveled throughout the Pacific Ocean during our Stanford at Sea journey. We all cheered as we reached this great milestone, making it feel like the change of the 20^th to the 21^st century. This was a mark of change where we have been growing into a new skin, as scientists, sailors, and inhabitants of this planet. We have been facing many ups and downs literally and figuratively where at the end of the day all that we have is us and the sea, leaving us to think about a lot of things.

To sail the open seas, we constantly interact and think about the wind, the water, the sun, the moon, the currents, the birds, and marine animals. This constant state of consciousness, brings us back to our center, connects us to nature and our emotions, helps us find our balance, but most importantly it creates a state of love and gratitude–as Nate (the chief engineer) would say–it is the essence of life. I am reminded that we are part of nature and that we must find balance with ourselves once again. We have been able to connect with ourselves and with each other by getting grounded to our roots and respecting where we came from: the ocean.

We have begun to live in the moment on this boat, free of technology and other external stresses making us appreciate the little things. Truly creating time a verb that is relative, that stays us away from living in the moment. I have finally fallen in love with simplicity and being timeless, letting go my necessity to be busy all the time. But then…. there was gally. Oh, “what a day!” The sensation of simplicity quickly went away.

I had been looking forward to this day since the day that I got slightly homesick, as my mother, Yésica, is really the best cook. Yésica can magically make everyone fall in love with food, turning any bloomy day into a heavenly day. I was woken up at 5:15 am to prep for our cream of wheat breakfast with slices of a few apples–our last fresh produce. Ashley, our hero on the boat, quickly warned me of the busy day we had ahead of us, since we had to feed 40 mouths with 3 meals and 3 different snacks. Ashley taught me how to make the most out of every produce, grain of salt, and drop of oil we had access to. I learnt how to efficiently create a delicious meal, balancing speed and quality. Most importantly, I learnt the magic of cooking: how one can puzzle together random broken parts of a recipe into a sublime masterpiece. Everything was going quite smooth for us in the morning until dinner came around.

We caught a fish the day before to learn about the anatomy, realizing nature is the true teacher to any engineering mystery. We decided to use what was left from the fish to create a delicious Asian meal. However, this quickly became one of the most hectic days at sea. We had five cooks, Ashley, Dr. Barb, Shaili, Tanvi and myself in a 3x3 meter kitchen with less than an hour to provide a delicious and nutritious meal for forty people. We all had to move quickly around the kitchen and be on the same wavelength with every cooking motion. The pressure was on. We all had different visions on how to marinate the fish and the salad, so we all had to swiftly come to a compromise. We were able to quickly get our acts together and work as a moving team. I sprinkled out all of my mom’s special Asian recipes to create a sesame aioli, a soy dressing for the salad, and a marinating sauce for the fish. We became silly as we grilled and chopped, laughing together as Barb transformed the skin of the fish into an artful wearable fashion piece. At the end of cooking this meal I rang the bell for dinner, dancing my way across the boat singing for people to reunite for our Asian fusion dinner. I had a permanent smile on my face, since my favorite part about the day was to gather and talk to everyone (we never really get the chance to be all together and chat due to our standing watch rotation).

Sitting down to eat with my everyone quickly got rid of every inch of my homesickness I had been dragging, as we laughed about the smallest things and were present with each other. It was love and gratitude present in the air, making everyone feel blessed to be together in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. I was reminded once again the value of cooking that mi madre always alluded to: bringing people together. It was again, the simple things that brought us joy.

This vessel has been a place of challenges, transformation, and growth; however, most importantly it has been a place filled with pure magic in the middle of the Pacific Ocean allowing us to grow in every direction. The ocean and I have slowly become one as the days have gone by.

I have embraced the simple life.

I just am.

Finally breathing once again.

Stop.

Breathe.

P.S.

1. Acknowledgment: This blog was inspired from many of my beautiful conversations with Nate Bears, our chief engineer. He kept reminding me throughout this sea journey to get in touch with oneself, appreciate every moment, find harmony with nature, and to stop and breathe. But most importantly be filled with love and gratitude.

2. Thank you to all 39 members who have pushed my growing and helped me grow into Anna@Sea. Thank you for becoming my home away from home.

3. Feliz Cumpleaños mami. Te extraño muchísimo. Estoy pensando en ti cada día y soñando en abrazarte pronto. Agradecida cada día de tenerte en mi vida.