January 7, 2014: Grand Turk
We had a general drill this morning, those are never fun as they mean none of the crew members can get off the ship first thing in the morning. First, there was a fire drill, so I had to go to the front office and sit until they called for the general drill and then we were dismissed to our raft stations, where we stood for long time waiting for everyone who didn’t have an excusal form to show up. Finally, it was over. I was one of the many who all but ran downstairs to change and head off the ship. Amanda, and Courtney (librarian on another ship, she is currently friend on board) and I headed off to the beach. It was a nice day in the sun, but cut way too short as all aboard time was 2:30.
January 8, 2014: San Juan
I had the morning and night off since I volunteered to work port day, so I slept in a bit, helped out in Club HAL for a while before lunch and port day. No one called so I just sat in Club HAL watching Star Wars and reading The Hobbit. After I got off work, I met up with Courtney and we wandered around town together until we had to come back and get Sam (the engineer she’s a friend on board with), and the three of us headed out to dinner. We wandered around for quite a while before we finally decided on a place to eat. We had a nice dinner of appetizers and pizza. It was fun. :) Afterwards, we went to the bow and watched as we sailed away.
Saturday, January 11, 2014
Sea Day
January 6, 2014
I admit, it’s not easy being away from home for so long. It’s a strange life I lead; when I’m home, after the first few weeks when I’ve finally gotten to spend time with my family and some friends, I’m more than ready to head out to sea, and then there are days like this at sea when all I want to be is home, getting hugs from my family and dogs and not having the stresses of living with the same people you work with and see most every part of every day.
As easy and amazing as I usually make my life sound, I have to admit that it isn’t always so. I struggle with a lot of things. Sharing a room with someone I work with, or not having a roommate at all and being very lonely for it. I struggle with being social when I know I need it but am just feeling so anti-social that it’s all I can do to go to the OB and sit there hoping someone will make an effort to include me because I’m not feeling secure enough at the time to get involved in conversations of my own accord. Nights like that come along more often when I have my own room, but only if I manage to convince myself to go out and talk to people instead of sitting on my bed watching a movie.
I struggle with keeping up with my land-locked friends. Sometimes I get the feeling that I’m “out-of-sight, out-of mind.” Sometimes I try so hard to keep in touch with people that when they don’t respond in a timely manner (Internet is available most all the time and is easily accessible on land! So, it shouldn’t be difficult to send a “hi, I’m good. How are you” to me) I get frustrated and give up for a while. Even with this blog, I try to make sure to write something about every day, but when I know about half my friends don’t keep up with it, and few people mention anything I’ve talked about in it. Sometimes it’s hard to keep going with it, I don’t know what in particular anyone may want to hear about, I feel now like I’m just starting to repeat everything I’m saying anyway, it takes up internet time (thus money) to post if I’m on the ship, and it takes some time to type all this out. I’m not giving it up of course, but if I don’t seem to post as often as I used to, this is probably why.
And then there’s the faith aspect. Most people on this ship know I’m a Christian, I’m a rare category of crew member and it’s very obvious if anyone watches me, listens to me, or pays a bit of attention to how I life. But it’s not easy. Because those of us who actively live out our faith are so rare around here, we have to be extremely careful and vigilant. It’s hard to find others to fellowship with, it’s easy to get caught up in the daily grind and collapse into bed at the end of a day without reading the devotional you placed on the shelf above your head so you wouldn’t forget. Praying has always been easy for me to remember to do, but on the random day here I may find myself climbing into bed and realizing that I haven’t talked to my Father all day. It doesn’t happen too often, but it happens enough that I’m not happy about it. Thank you Mom for all the church music every Sunday! Mondays have become my Sundays because I can take the afternoon to sit and listen and read my Bible. :)
I admit, it’s not easy being away from home for so long. It’s a strange life I lead; when I’m home, after the first few weeks when I’ve finally gotten to spend time with my family and some friends, I’m more than ready to head out to sea, and then there are days like this at sea when all I want to be is home, getting hugs from my family and dogs and not having the stresses of living with the same people you work with and see most every part of every day.
As easy and amazing as I usually make my life sound, I have to admit that it isn’t always so. I struggle with a lot of things. Sharing a room with someone I work with, or not having a roommate at all and being very lonely for it. I struggle with being social when I know I need it but am just feeling so anti-social that it’s all I can do to go to the OB and sit there hoping someone will make an effort to include me because I’m not feeling secure enough at the time to get involved in conversations of my own accord. Nights like that come along more often when I have my own room, but only if I manage to convince myself to go out and talk to people instead of sitting on my bed watching a movie.
I struggle with keeping up with my land-locked friends. Sometimes I get the feeling that I’m “out-of-sight, out-of mind.” Sometimes I try so hard to keep in touch with people that when they don’t respond in a timely manner (Internet is available most all the time and is easily accessible on land! So, it shouldn’t be difficult to send a “hi, I’m good. How are you” to me) I get frustrated and give up for a while. Even with this blog, I try to make sure to write something about every day, but when I know about half my friends don’t keep up with it, and few people mention anything I’ve talked about in it. Sometimes it’s hard to keep going with it, I don’t know what in particular anyone may want to hear about, I feel now like I’m just starting to repeat everything I’m saying anyway, it takes up internet time (thus money) to post if I’m on the ship, and it takes some time to type all this out. I’m not giving it up of course, but if I don’t seem to post as often as I used to, this is probably why.
And then there’s the faith aspect. Most people on this ship know I’m a Christian, I’m a rare category of crew member and it’s very obvious if anyone watches me, listens to me, or pays a bit of attention to how I life. But it’s not easy. Because those of us who actively live out our faith are so rare around here, we have to be extremely careful and vigilant. It’s hard to find others to fellowship with, it’s easy to get caught up in the daily grind and collapse into bed at the end of a day without reading the devotional you placed on the shelf above your head so you wouldn’t forget. Praying has always been easy for me to remember to do, but on the random day here I may find myself climbing into bed and realizing that I haven’t talked to my Father all day. It doesn’t happen too often, but it happens enough that I’m not happy about it. Thank you Mom for all the church music every Sunday! Mondays have become my Sundays because I can take the afternoon to sit and listen and read my Bible. :)
Friday, January 3, 2014
Reunions!
Jan 2: Grand Cayman
I’m glad I’m getting to the point now where I know at least someone on every HAL ship, it makes days like today fun! We were in port with the Amsterdam today (in addition to three other, non-HAL ships) and Emily (librarian from last contract here/my roommate) is there now. We’ve been messaging over the past few days to make plans and today was the day. I had to work until noon, but she got on the ship as a visitor and came up to Club HAL to see me for my last hour, I kept an eye on the kids as they watched a movie and we started our catching up. Phil came to take over at 12 and said he didn’t need help with the four kids for lunch, so Emily and I set off to my room to change and head ashore. We’d planned on going to the beach, but that was before we realized how early the Nieuw A was leaving, so we altered our plans and decided to grab lunch and a drink instead. I hadn’t really forgotten how much I missed having such a good friend around, but it really hit me when we never had more than a second’s pause in conversation the whole two hours as we ate. It was really good to be able to catch up with Emily, it was weird for me when I came back and she (as well as a lot of other people) had left.
Anyway, my all aboard time was alltoosoon, so we parted ways and I caught the tender before the last crew tender (good timing!) I spent quite a lot of time wasting my internet card because the internet was extremely slow and I really wanted to try to upload a few of these blogs.
I’m glad I’m getting to the point now where I know at least someone on every HAL ship, it makes days like today fun! We were in port with the Amsterdam today (in addition to three other, non-HAL ships) and Emily (librarian from last contract here/my roommate) is there now. We’ve been messaging over the past few days to make plans and today was the day. I had to work until noon, but she got on the ship as a visitor and came up to Club HAL to see me for my last hour, I kept an eye on the kids as they watched a movie and we started our catching up. Phil came to take over at 12 and said he didn’t need help with the four kids for lunch, so Emily and I set off to my room to change and head ashore. We’d planned on going to the beach, but that was before we realized how early the Nieuw A was leaving, so we altered our plans and decided to grab lunch and a drink instead. I hadn’t really forgotten how much I missed having such a good friend around, but it really hit me when we never had more than a second’s pause in conversation the whole two hours as we ate. It was really good to be able to catch up with Emily, it was weird for me when I came back and she (as well as a lot of other people) had left.
Anyway, my all aboard time was alltoosoon, so we parted ways and I caught the tender before the last crew tender (good timing!) I spent quite a lot of time wasting my internet card because the internet was extremely slow and I really wanted to try to upload a few of these blogs.
not such a bad way to start the year
Jan 1: Jamaica
I worked after-hours yesterday for New Years, it was a bit odd. Christine kept me company and we talked while the kids played video games. We did get them to do the 15-second countdown with us though, that was kind of fun; the kids immediately went back to their games as soon as it was officially the New Year. They stayed until around 1, and I got down to my room around 1:15 with the intention of changing and going out to find my friends and join in on the celebrations. It was not meant to be though, I got back to my room and discovered that my key had been deactivated. I called Christine and got the number to call for someone to let me in. When I called, they said they’d be waiting at the door (the nearest phone was upstairs), but when I got down to the room no one was there; I waited 30 minutes for someone to come and by that time had realized that there was no way I could go out now, I’d have to change and then go, but then when I was ready to come back to the room, I’d have to call them to let me in again.
Anyway, I woke up this morning, had some breakfast and got ready to go out with Christine. We weren’t really sure what to do, so wandered in the terminal for a bit before looking into the hop-on-hop-off bus tour, which we then discovered was too expensive, especially compared to the $5 taxi ride into town (it turns out that everything on the hop-on-hop-off tour is within walking distance of town). We decided to go to the beach, and stayed there for a few hours before we walked around town a bit, did some souvenir shopping and headed back to the ship. We were back early, and I ended up taking a nap instead of doing anything productive.
It was Camp Night for my tweens. Not a very good theme for this group, they wouldn’t focus on anything for long. It was frustrating, and by the time they finally finished up making up their own camps, we didn’t have time for any of the other activities.
After work, I needed air, so I changed and went up to the bow. As expected, it was empty (everyone was still recovering from the New Years party). It was a perfect night to stargaze! There was practically no wind, it was somewhat warm and there was hardly a cloud in the sky. I saw 5 shooting stars in the hour I was laying out on one of the picnic tables. A very good way to end the day!
I worked after-hours yesterday for New Years, it was a bit odd. Christine kept me company and we talked while the kids played video games. We did get them to do the 15-second countdown with us though, that was kind of fun; the kids immediately went back to their games as soon as it was officially the New Year. They stayed until around 1, and I got down to my room around 1:15 with the intention of changing and going out to find my friends and join in on the celebrations. It was not meant to be though, I got back to my room and discovered that my key had been deactivated. I called Christine and got the number to call for someone to let me in. When I called, they said they’d be waiting at the door (the nearest phone was upstairs), but when I got down to the room no one was there; I waited 30 minutes for someone to come and by that time had realized that there was no way I could go out now, I’d have to change and then go, but then when I was ready to come back to the room, I’d have to call them to let me in again.
Anyway, I woke up this morning, had some breakfast and got ready to go out with Christine. We weren’t really sure what to do, so wandered in the terminal for a bit before looking into the hop-on-hop-off bus tour, which we then discovered was too expensive, especially compared to the $5 taxi ride into town (it turns out that everything on the hop-on-hop-off tour is within walking distance of town). We decided to go to the beach, and stayed there for a few hours before we walked around town a bit, did some souvenir shopping and headed back to the ship. We were back early, and I ended up taking a nap instead of doing anything productive.
It was Camp Night for my tweens. Not a very good theme for this group, they wouldn’t focus on anything for long. It was frustrating, and by the time they finally finished up making up their own camps, we didn’t have time for any of the other activities.
After work, I needed air, so I changed and went up to the bow. As expected, it was empty (everyone was still recovering from the New Years party). It was a perfect night to stargaze! There was practically no wind, it was somewhat warm and there was hardly a cloud in the sky. I saw 5 shooting stars in the hour I was laying out on one of the picnic tables. A very good way to end the day!
nice day on the island
Dec 30: HMC
A very nice day :)
We arrived somewhat later this morning (scheduled actually, not just a ‘we are running late’ late arrival), so I managed to get upstairs and eat some breakfast before changing and getting on the tender to head to shore. Only one of the kids signed in, so it was Phil, Ethan, and me helping one kid build a giant sandcastle/city complete with highway, bridges, lakes, a town hall, and a ‘guardian’ of some sort (the boys called it a gorilla, but it looks nothing like a gorilla to me. What does it look like to you?). Our hour ended, and I stayed later to rinse off the toys and put them back in the bag, and to see if any families showed up for the family sandcastle contest. No one showed up, so after 10 minutes, I made my way down the beach, lugging my beach bag plus the bag of wet kids beach toys (heavy bag!).
I set up camp on the beach, alternating between swimming and laying out to read. Alex and Fillipo joined me for a bit and we played Frisbee in the water. That was fun, that Frisbee definitely was a good investment! Somehow in our playing, we moved pretty far down the beach, so when we were done, we had to swim back when we got tired. They left me not long after we got back to our chairs, and I was left alone again. It was a tad lonely, but not too bad, I finished a book and swam a lot before I finally decided I should head back to the ship before the tenders started getting too crowded (we left late today, 5 instead of the usual 3:30ish, it was around 3:30 when I got back to the ship this time).
Sports Under the Stars night went much better this time than last week, though I was thoroughly bored. I let Royce take charge since all the kids wanted to do was play dodgeball. I entertained the 4 girls that didn’t like sports, but it was still a long time to spend outside not really doing much.
A very nice day :)
We arrived somewhat later this morning (scheduled actually, not just a ‘we are running late’ late arrival), so I managed to get upstairs and eat some breakfast before changing and getting on the tender to head to shore. Only one of the kids signed in, so it was Phil, Ethan, and me helping one kid build a giant sandcastle/city complete with highway, bridges, lakes, a town hall, and a ‘guardian’ of some sort (the boys called it a gorilla, but it looks nothing like a gorilla to me. What does it look like to you?). Our hour ended, and I stayed later to rinse off the toys and put them back in the bag, and to see if any families showed up for the family sandcastle contest. No one showed up, so after 10 minutes, I made my way down the beach, lugging my beach bag plus the bag of wet kids beach toys (heavy bag!).
I set up camp on the beach, alternating between swimming and laying out to read. Alex and Fillipo joined me for a bit and we played Frisbee in the water. That was fun, that Frisbee definitely was a good investment! Somehow in our playing, we moved pretty far down the beach, so when we were done, we had to swim back when we got tired. They left me not long after we got back to our chairs, and I was left alone again. It was a tad lonely, but not too bad, I finished a book and swam a lot before I finally decided I should head back to the ship before the tenders started getting too crowded (we left late today, 5 instead of the usual 3:30ish, it was around 3:30 when I got back to the ship this time).
Sports Under the Stars night went much better this time than last week, though I was thoroughly bored. I let Royce take charge since all the kids wanted to do was play dodgeball. I entertained the 4 girls that didn’t like sports, but it was still a long time to spend outside not really doing much.
just another embark day
Dec 29: Ft. Lauderdale
I got off rather early because I had to work Open House starting at 12. The shuttles took forever to come, there were at least 100 crew members all trying to get on the first four shuttles at once, I didn’t even bother because there were so many people opening the back doors and climbing over seats just to get a spot. After a few more shuttles came, most people left and the shuttle I ended up in wasn’t even full. I chatted with one of the dancers until we arrived, and I made my way to Publix while she had some shopping to do at Ross. I got everything I needed and was wandering around trying to decide if I wanted to have more snackfood when I ran into Christine. We talked for a bit, checked out and then headed our separate ways, me to get Moes to take back to the ship for lunch, and her to GameStop to get xbox games that we’ve been trying to get for a few weeks now with no luck in port. Turns out that Moes didn’t open until 11; it was about 10:30, and I wanted to make sure I was back on the ship at the very latest 11:30, so I had to give up hope of having non-ship food this Ft. Lauderdale.
Open House went pretty well, quite a few families came, and we didn’t really have too many complaints about the required parent sign-in, the age groups, or the fact that we can’t allow 2-year-olds in. Success!
Anyway, after Open House, I went to the Bow to call Mom, and stayed there through sailaway, almost until our Entertainment Department meeting. The EM and Cruise Director were impressed with how well we’d done with the Christmas cruise, and that was really all they had to say that applied to Club HAL. It’s always rather unproductive for us to go to these meetings every week; most of what they talk about has to do with shows. After the meeting, Amanda and I decided to just head straight up to the Lido and get tea before dinner, we met Johan on the way and he joined us. We were actually there so early that we managed to reclaim our old table in the fishbowl (the big round ‘family’ table in the middle.) It was fun to finally be able to sit at the same table as our friends now, we just know too many people to sit at the smaller tables nowadays.
Welcome aboard party. I really prefer not to talk too much about that actually. To sum it up, it took at least 45 minutes to complete our “Contract of Fun.” (Normally that takes 10 minutes, if I’m writing really slowly that day). Not the best first night, it kind of makes me dread the rest of the cruise with these kids.
I got off rather early because I had to work Open House starting at 12. The shuttles took forever to come, there were at least 100 crew members all trying to get on the first four shuttles at once, I didn’t even bother because there were so many people opening the back doors and climbing over seats just to get a spot. After a few more shuttles came, most people left and the shuttle I ended up in wasn’t even full. I chatted with one of the dancers until we arrived, and I made my way to Publix while she had some shopping to do at Ross. I got everything I needed and was wandering around trying to decide if I wanted to have more snackfood when I ran into Christine. We talked for a bit, checked out and then headed our separate ways, me to get Moes to take back to the ship for lunch, and her to GameStop to get xbox games that we’ve been trying to get for a few weeks now with no luck in port. Turns out that Moes didn’t open until 11; it was about 10:30, and I wanted to make sure I was back on the ship at the very latest 11:30, so I had to give up hope of having non-ship food this Ft. Lauderdale.
Open House went pretty well, quite a few families came, and we didn’t really have too many complaints about the required parent sign-in, the age groups, or the fact that we can’t allow 2-year-olds in. Success!
Anyway, after Open House, I went to the Bow to call Mom, and stayed there through sailaway, almost until our Entertainment Department meeting. The EM and Cruise Director were impressed with how well we’d done with the Christmas cruise, and that was really all they had to say that applied to Club HAL. It’s always rather unproductive for us to go to these meetings every week; most of what they talk about has to do with shows. After the meeting, Amanda and I decided to just head straight up to the Lido and get tea before dinner, we met Johan on the way and he joined us. We were actually there so early that we managed to reclaim our old table in the fishbowl (the big round ‘family’ table in the middle.) It was fun to finally be able to sit at the same table as our friends now, we just know too many people to sit at the smaller tables nowadays.
Welcome aboard party. I really prefer not to talk too much about that actually. To sum it up, it took at least 45 minutes to complete our “Contract of Fun.” (Normally that takes 10 minutes, if I’m writing really slowly that day). Not the best first night, it kind of makes me dread the rest of the cruise with these kids.
two ships in Half Moon Cay
December 28, 2013
I had a somewhat busy day. I got off ship this morning to help with Island Activities and to see who I could find that I knew on the Zuiderdam since we were at Half Moon Cay together today! Turns out that a few people were there, not just Kayleigh (who actually couldn’t get off today). One of the HAL Cats singers from this summer on the Nieuw A, and Tristan, who was on the Eurodam with me last New Years. I talked to the HAL Cats singer for a few minutes while walking down the beach, and Tristan and I caught up as both our groups waited for kids to show up, and we combined the kids and made sandcastles and stuff together.
I had to leave before our activities finished so I could get back to the ship, shower and get to work on time. It was a bit crazy though, because a tender had just left as I came up, we had to wait about 10 minutes for another one, then another 15 minutes for people to get on (I think they wanted the tender to fill up before sending it back, but that was impossible, and finally they resigned themselves to the fact that no one else was getting on aside from the 20 of us that were already waiting. And of course, the tender ride itself took 15 minutes. I thought I had left with plenty of time to at least take a somewhat decent shower and get there on time, but no luck with that. I had just enough time to rinse off, throw on clothes and run upstairs.
The afternoon was quiet for the first half, I watched Pocahontas and read some, then started Lilo and Stich. It was 2:30 before any of the kids showed up, and then they all came at once. So, it was a busy second half of the afternoon with some kids being perfectly fine just playing video games, and a few others with no idea what to do, and rejecting all the suggestions I had for them. That was an interesting combination. It was just a long afternoon. I actually had a parent comment on how tired I looked, especially in comparison to the beginning of the week when I was an elf and running around happily taking pictures with people.
Pajama night went fine, we had quite a few kids, but they were all rather calm and contentedly watched Wreck-it Ralph. I helped Christine number and order the first two days programs for the kids that embark tomorrow while the other three watched the movie and refilled drinks for the kids.
I had a somewhat busy day. I got off ship this morning to help with Island Activities and to see who I could find that I knew on the Zuiderdam since we were at Half Moon Cay together today! Turns out that a few people were there, not just Kayleigh (who actually couldn’t get off today). One of the HAL Cats singers from this summer on the Nieuw A, and Tristan, who was on the Eurodam with me last New Years. I talked to the HAL Cats singer for a few minutes while walking down the beach, and Tristan and I caught up as both our groups waited for kids to show up, and we combined the kids and made sandcastles and stuff together.
I had to leave before our activities finished so I could get back to the ship, shower and get to work on time. It was a bit crazy though, because a tender had just left as I came up, we had to wait about 10 minutes for another one, then another 15 minutes for people to get on (I think they wanted the tender to fill up before sending it back, but that was impossible, and finally they resigned themselves to the fact that no one else was getting on aside from the 20 of us that were already waiting. And of course, the tender ride itself took 15 minutes. I thought I had left with plenty of time to at least take a somewhat decent shower and get there on time, but no luck with that. I had just enough time to rinse off, throw on clothes and run upstairs.
The afternoon was quiet for the first half, I watched Pocahontas and read some, then started Lilo and Stich. It was 2:30 before any of the kids showed up, and then they all came at once. So, it was a busy second half of the afternoon with some kids being perfectly fine just playing video games, and a few others with no idea what to do, and rejecting all the suggestions I had for them. That was an interesting combination. It was just a long afternoon. I actually had a parent comment on how tired I looked, especially in comparison to the beginning of the week when I was an elf and running around happily taking pictures with people.
Pajama night went fine, we had quite a few kids, but they were all rather calm and contentedly watched Wreck-it Ralph. I helped Christine number and order the first two days programs for the kids that embark tomorrow while the other three watched the movie and refilled drinks for the kids.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)