The Promise of a Pencil: How an Ordinary Person Can Create Extraordinary Change Read Online Free PDF Page B

out a distress call to the coast guard, and rescue crews were on their way.
    Meanwhile, the crying, prayers, and screams continued as we waited for instructions. I stationed myself outside the dining hall.To keep from moving across the floor, students grabbed on to poles, railings, and each other—hoping the vessel wouldn’t capsize entirely. The boat tilted to one side until we were practically parallel with the water, and then did the same on the other, as cutlery and broken dishes screeched ominously across the dining-hall floor. I’m not sure what was more frightening—knowing we were at the mercy of the sea, or watching the portholes fill with water or clouds based on which angle we leaned toward.
    After several hours, a group of students decided that we needed to explore how we might abandon this death trap. We knew we had to get the boats down from the davits, which were outside. A wooden door opened to a ten-foot-wide walkway, with a sturdy railing. Maybe if we held on tightly enough, we could make our way to a lifeboat? Someone suggested we try. A shipman cracked the door, and the wind’s brute force flung it wide open.
    “Close the door! Close the door!” students screamed.
    The ship was midtilt as this occurred. We were lifted into the air at a steep incline. The open door hung below us, like a gaping mouth to the deadly waters below. Students began sliding toward the door. If they fell, they’d slip into the freezing ocean waters. The screams got louder.
    We grabbed each other to keep from falling, and when the MV Explorer rocked back onto her other side, a shipman was able to grab the door handle and close it. We collapsed, exhausted.
    After several hours, the tossing eased, and Captain Buzz regained power to the first engine; five hours later, the second one began to work. The engines didn’t exactly purr, but the shakes and shudders were progress. We grew optimistic. Ship workers began passing out dinner rolls, and the day-old bread helped settle our stomachs and our nerves. Finally, after we’d spent seven hours in our life vests, the Voice returned.
    Bing bong.
    “Ladies and gentlemen, it is now safe to return to your rooms. Please be patient with us as we figure out what to do about today’s events. The ship is badly damaged, so be careful around broken glass, and please stay tuned for further updates.”
    Walking back to my room, I surveyed the wreckage in awe and apprehension. Library shelves that once held Frommer’s travel guides and atlases of the world were empty or splintered in half. Tables were smashed to pieces, and jagged shards of glass covered the floor. The historic grand piano in the Main Hall had flipped over and shattered.
    I had a fleeting vision of the shaken student body rising in mutiny—vandalizing their rooms, calling for Captain Buzz’s resignation, and demanding an end to Semester at Sea. Instead the day’s events brought us all closer together. Adversity bonds people more often than it breaks them.
    Nobody talked much about the storm in the twenty-four hours that followed. We fell into a state of silent introspection. If someone started crying, another would stop to comfort him. Some students quietly self-organized to repair the library and collect the broken glass. Others wrote in their journals or called home on satellite phones to make sure their parents knew they were safe. The following day, I passed two guys playing a board game and heard the person ahead of me say, “Are you fucking kidding me? You’re playing Battleship? Seriously?!” I laughed harder than I had in weeks. It was such a relief to let the anxiety go.
    *  *  *
    Days later we docked in Honolulu, since the engines were too damaged to reach our initial destination of South Korea. As soon as my feet touched land, I dropped to my knees and kissed thehot pavement. My heart leapt at the sight of waving families and beaming hula dancers. I was safe.
    But I was also forever altered because I now