Statesman

Issue date: 10/15/08 Section: Student Life

Senior Crystal Johnson posing for a picture on the Great Wall of China.

Cape Town's Table Mountain is one of the many destinations students visit during their semester at sea.

Two UMD seniors, along with 700 other students from around the world, explored the four corners of the earth through a Semester at Sea Program.

Semester at Sea is a non-profit organization aimed for an international education that is academically sponsored by the University of Virginia. For 109 days, Crystal Johnson and Katie Feia embarked on this voyage that enriched their lives and shaped their future.

Meeting in the Bahamas, the students were given two guidelines that if they didn't understand at first, Johnson said, they would by the end. First, the ship is not to be mistaken for a boat and their voyage should not be confused with a cruise as these students got not only a world-class education by notable professors but also life lessons that will be carried with them forever.

Their education was not comparable to one earned in a classroom.

"We learned things you cannot experience in a textbook, one week in Hiroshima and the next you're at Pearl Harbor," Feia said.

Johnson got the opportunity to eat lunch with one of the founders of the Peace Corps and both students received a V.I.P. tour of the Taj Mahal.

They saw the direct effects of Agent Orange in Vietnam, wine-toured at Robben Island in South Africa, experienced the greatest party in the world at the Carnival in Brazil and witnessed poverty firsthand in India.

Feia said "it was the best, most life-changing experience of my life" and expressed the relationship on the ship as a family with a "connection that's strictly from Semester at Sea."

These are memories money can't buy.

The voyage costs roughly $21,000; however, financial aid is available just as it is through UMD. Half of Feia's tuition was covered by financial assistance.

This experience is open to all students upon applying and meeting admission requirements. Information is available through the Semester at Sea Web site, www.semesteratsea.org.

Both Johnson and Feia said they had always wanted to study abroad but could never agree on a country. Semester at Sea allowed these two to experience 14 countries over a four-month period.

Study abroad programs allow students to earn worldly educations that give new and enlightened perspectives on the way we and other cultures live.

"Everything you see or do, you look at differently and it means more," Johnson said on returning to the States and experiencing reverse culture shock. "It puts you in your place."

Johnson was so inspired by her trip, she plans to move to Italy straight after graduation and also set a new goal for her travels: 50 countries before the age of 50.

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