Je suis tres content...j'adore moorea

The past three days have been absolutely crazy. Going in to extensive detail would probably not only bore you with the science lingo but also might be impossible for me to recall...luckily i have my field notebook.  im going to give you the rundown of the past couple days in the simplest form possible.  So i left off with one of our class projects (collecting Galaxora).  One of our TAs Ranjan is in charge of this class experiment.  The goal is to look at growth and herbivory assays in coral or algae dominated areas in relation to high and low topographical complexity.  After lunch, we took our bags and drove to Oponohu Bay to distribute our 80 treatments.  I snorkeled and free dove the bags to divers who attached them to rocks.  We did this for about 3 hours and called it a day (more like night). We only got through about half of the treatment bags...the reason it took so long is because we had to assign different treatments to different topographical locations that were chosen solely by Ranjan.  During a brief hiatus, I stopped and looked around (something I can't help but do frequently) and on the left side of my view was blue sky and light gray puffy clouds and to the right hung a beautiful rainbow in front of lush green mountains and dark ominous clouds that clearly alluded to heavy rainfall elsewhere on the island.  As we were climbing out of the bay, we heard it.  Buckets and buckets of water pouring from the sky.  But we were still dry (well relatively because we had just exited the ocean...more like free of fresh water).  We looked across the street and saw the sheet of water right in front of our eyes. Truly remarkable.  Within 60 seconds we were drenched...hooting andx hollering for the first tropical rain of our stay.  We drove home to a bountiful dinner and hot showers. My group had dishes duty which was probably the absolute worst night to have it because we supposedly had an invertebrate test that included over 100 hundred organisms that must be memorized by the next afternoon...no one was prepared.  We rushed through the cleaning process (such messy boys) and finished to run across the street to the lecture room for a "review."  Dr. Jacobs really likes to hear himself talk sooooo the review was rendered useless...I snuck out early to work on my flashcards.  After about an hour of fervent flash card making, Jackie (one of the girls I am actually a fan of) came down to the lab to tell me the test was moved to Monday.  Hallelujah. Off to bed :)

The next day was greeted with more French bread with nutella or jam.  I couldnt stomach the white bread anymore...i like my bread grainy so I have since resorted to my pre-packed Odwalla Super Protein bars for breakfast.  My group got rotated to another class project by Dr. Jacobs' TA, Chris.  This day was completely devoted to sediment collection and separation.  The first task was to go out to two sites and collect sediment...Im actually not really sure the point of this experiment except the sheer torture of undergrads.  I did get to go on my first scientific dive and shovel the sediment into bags! After we finished our task the prof said my buddy and I could cruise for about ten minutes...saw a massive Acanthaster and gave it the finger (these crown of thorns sea star is responsible for the majority of coral death here).  Once we returned, the torture ensued.  We had to sort all the sediment sizes in to categories: bivalves, gastropods, urchin parts, worm tube parts, coral, decapod parts, etc...and these arent whole pieces...all fragments the size of a pin.  This was carried on all afternoon until 5pm.  Needless to say, sediment is not my favorite thing in the world.  After dinner, the majority of us had a plan...party.  The only relaxing time we have had from waking up to going to sleep.  Nick and Tim went and got Tahitian rum Rhumba (later to be called roombah in a drunken stupor) for us.  The night started with King's cup and ended with laying in the water looking up at the stars and laughing and talking (drunkenly elated with our current fortune) to taking a 12:00am shower (yes, at that exact time...hard to explain haha).  After I climbed into bed, I just smiled to myself. Pure bliss: a hard long day of work followed by the most fun in a long time with some of my closest friends and new ones :)  Im not exactly sure how long I was asleep (no more than 20min) but I was shaken awake by Nick who ushered me to his room.  And to our non-sober delight laid Casey, passed out on his bed so hard that he didnt even wake to a good shaking. So out came the Sharpie.  He got chiefed with initials, phallic images, and lame sentences. Epic. Then back to bed after hugs from my best buddies.

This morning was more french bread and nutella and jam. Out cam my trusty Odwalla bars. Im seeing a theme here.  Again my group was rotated to another class project, this one belonging to our third TA, Tonya.  Her experiment is twofold...we started the second part today.  So the gist of the experiment is to look at the growth of a cyanobacteria and a macroalgae relative to nutrient supply and the two interactions of the organisms.  My role today was probably the biggest out of the whole bunch....Tonya likes me now haha.  I did all of the inital set up while the rest of my group collected the specimens.  My tasks included prepping the water table and making the nutrient solutions (+Nitrate, +Phosphorus, +Nitrate & +Phosphorus) on a larges scale (20L solutiuons).  Once my group returned, they cleaned the specimens while I dried and weighed over 180 sample sizes.  It was a long day on my feet and a lot of tedious work: including continuous fights with a scale and a salad spinner (used to dry the algae).  After we finished at 5:30pm, I just chilled with Nick in the dining area while loosely studying for our inverts test on Monday.  Dinner rolled around and now we are getting a debriefing on a new experiment that Dr. Jacobs developed in the last couple days that will begin tomorrow.  Then studying and bed time :)

I love you all. I would post more pictures but we are not allowed to upload or download things on this shotty internet.  I may try to sneak one every now and then for your viewing pleasure. More scuba for me tomorrow..doing percent coral/algae cover surveys at a TBD location.  Basically our class projects are a way for our TAs (grad students) to get little minions to do all their work in an offsite location haha. It is cool because the projects are interesting and we get to learn experiment technique before we begin our own projects.  But they are super long hard days of tedious tasks.  But how can I even begin to complain...this is what I love and im in Tahiti!!!!!!!!!!