first day on Zuiderdam

February 15, 2013
I don’t think I’ve had a first day this crazy since I started ships. It was really insane. The morning went fine, I was up and ready and breakfasted and downstairs to meet the shuttle. One of the girls from the front office on the Maasdam was getting on Zuiderdam today as well, so I knew someone! Quite a lot of people were getting on today, but most of us weren’t new to Vista class, and no one was brand new to ships. Once on the ship, I set off to find my room. I went down the nearest elevator to B deck only to find the watertight doors were shut, thus I couldn’t go beyond the area to see where my room could be. I went back up to A deck and asked someone who told me to go all the way to the front of the ship. When I got to the elevators there, someone asked me what I was looking for and then told me to go back to the other elevators. So, confused, I started walking back down the hallway confused and tearing up slightly. Two other crew members (I think they were about to go do some kind of maintenance) took pity on me, and took my suitcase and showed me where my room was, even carrying my suitcase down the stairs for me (it was almost directly on the other side of the watertight doors). At the bottom of the stairs, there was Jacob, who had just gone to the room to look for me because the HRM told him I’d gone to the room when he went there to meet me. Such a confusing morning. I’m rooming with the librarian in… probably one of the smallest rooms on ship. We kind of have to do some weird sort of dance to do things if we’re both in the room and out of bed. There’s about two feet between the beds and the wall, the end of the bed kind of overlaps the space where the wardrobes are on the opposite wall and there’s about two feet at the foot of the bed where the door opens and the bathroom door opens. We’ll make it work somehow. Although, they may move me next door for the next cruise since that’s supposed to be my cabin, but for some reason they put an upholsterer there instead.

Anyway, first meeting went fine, I got there a bit early and talked some with the HRM. After the meeting, I just went back to the room and read. Charlotte, the librarian/my roommate came in not long after and we talked until she left to open up the library and I had to get ready to go to lunch/open house. Jacob was at open house with me for the first hour, only two families came in during that time. I was alone for the next half hour and then a few more families started to come in. Jacob came back to help for another little while, then it was time to close. I went down to the room where Charlotte was and we talked and she lent me a book (JK Rowling’s book that I haven’t had a chance to get yet). We talked and then both read until the emergency drill. She’s a traffic director so had to go up, but I continued reading. I read until dinner, Charlotte came back and read until dinner as well. I met some of the cast there, and the lifestylist. Lot of interesting people here, but it’s nice.

Club HAL time. I can’t entertain a child that doesn’t want to be entertained. That was kind of the theme for the night. There were three kids (two siblings and a cousin) that were not content to do anything. They were miserable the whole night and when I didn’t let them call their parents on the walkie-talkie (for the 100th time that half hour, after the parents told them to stop and let them eat) they got even more upset. I did my best to try to engage them in some activity, but they wouldn’t have it, so I hung out with the other kids that were there and who were perfectly content with doing whatever. It was extremely frustrating because the three kept trying to leave on their own, so I had to leave what I was doing with the others to tell them they couldn’t go. They were hungry, but refused to eat the snack that had been brought up. Eventually, the dad came and was frustrated with ME because they had been calling. He actually tried to pay me off to make them stay. I attempted to explain to him that they didn’t want to be entertained, didn’t want to be there; he didn’t believe me until he talked to them about it and they admitted that they didn’t want to be there and they’d given up playing the games and refused everything I’d suggested. It got a bit better after that. He got the youngest girl to start playing apples to apples with me and the other kid there (who was amazing, she never once complained about my attention being torn, and she helped me by letting me know I wasn’t imagining their being impossible). The other two weren’t having it though, so he took them on a walk. She actually continued playing Apples to Apples with us! Then, she said she didn’t want to leave; much improvement. I feel like that’s a small victory, despite the other two kids not wanting to come back. Hour forward tonight, so I’m off to bed early-ish to get off in Half Moon Cay tomorrow.