Typeset – Cartagena, Colombia – [05/02/2014]

High-Tech-Retro-Pin-Ups-4It’s really so odd to look around the library during a port day and find it completely empty. Y’see, during the GWV the library is busy (well busy-ish) even on port days because there are a great many guests who have been all around the world before and now choose not to get off the ship.

There are still a handful of people of course, especially in a short port like this there are always people who prefer to stay in rather than venture out, but for the most part my port days are back to being dedicated to reshelving and admin. Much as they usually are, and as they were at the beginning of the GWV when everyone was still racing off the ship to see what there was to see.

And I do have a fair bit more admin than I used to. But, I’m discovering that this…centralized…system really works. I mean yes, at first it was a lot more work, and it’s still a lot of responsibility staring me in the face, but at least now when a guest comes to me with an issue I can at least take the first steps towards resolving it then and there rather than having to call a half-dozen different people who may or may not be available in order to take the next steps. Before this I couldn’t even disconnect people from the internet if they’d gotten stuck online!

I’m not…exactly my own boss. I mean I’m still very much part of the entertainment team, and I definitely still have to report to the same series of people I always have. But this is…well, it’s definitely different!

At the moment it seems like every ship is taking this whole changeover thing in a slightly different direction. The “inter-Librarian Distress Network” keeps trying to work together to established some kind of centralized set of guidelines so that when we go ship to ship we know what’s going on, and so far we’re doing a pretty good job of keeping each other afloat until something properly official comes down the pipeline. We’re a surprisingly independent bunch, having operated for a long while without a shore-side supervisor before Toffy came along.

In the meantime, I just kind of keep my head down and do what they tell me…

And continually surprise myself by actually having fun with it….

 

This entry was posted in Panama Relocation Cruise. Bookmark the permalink.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.