Gypsies Don’t Do Well Inside Stone Walls – [03/30/2020]

Posted on March 30, 2020 by GypsyShaughnessy

Note: The below is a bit…well, it’s a bit of a downer. And I’m sorry for that. That’s why I spun it out in short story form. It *has* been exaggerated as a result. We really are all safe, we’re all fine. Some days are just stranger than others…this is one of them.

*~*~*~*~*~

They were safe, she kept reminding herself. Not stuck. Safe. One word could change your outlook. One word could change everything.

Safe. Not stuck.

All safe. All healthy. Not in one of the multiple other situations where things could be much much worse. Be grateful, you’re lucky, people on land would probably prefer to be where you are now. She kept repeating it, but it was one of those days where the words sounded hollow.

She hugged her arms around her knees and stared out at the water. The same water that she had been looking at for the last 9 days. The same ships, the same wave patterns. It was even the same temperature. There was a world out there, somewhere. A world where her loved ones were frightened, and strong, and alone and isolated and careful and foolish and heaven knows what else. There was a world out there…

At least she was pretty sure there was.

“You’ve chosen a wonderful prison. But it is a prison none the less. And gypsies don’t do well inside stone walls”

The phrase kept bouncing around in her head. She had never thought she could feel trapped in a space that was intended to hold at least a thousand people more than it did now. There were 600 of them, rattling around in this ship like gumballs in a half-empty machine. 600 people all alone together. The last time they’d set foot on land was two weeks ago. Things had been so different then. Cautious yes, careful, but not like this. Never like this. She could look in the mirror and try to find the carefree woman who had laid on a lounger in Barbados and find not much trace of her. She was pretty sure that girl had run for cover when home started to close its borders.

She wondered if the rest of the world even remembered that they were here at all. And if they did, if they realized what it was actually like. She kept trying to explain it to people, to explain it to herself – yes, this was a luxurious place to be trapped, but it didn’t change the fact that you were trapped. Yes, there was a pool, there was a hot tub, there were bars and activities and hey she was pretty sure she even stood a chance at placing in the onboard photography contest – mostly because at the moment she was the only one who had entered. No one seemed to even have any energy to choose a picture to submit. If she won, that would at least give her and her husband a night in a better cabin. Maybe even one with a window. But it didn’t change the facts…and the facts were that she was surrounded by 599 scared and stressed people who didn’t know if there was a home out there waiting for them, and had no idea how or when to get it if there was. It didn’t change the sick spouses or the frightened families or the constant not knowing what was happening to them. It didn’t change the fact that she worked for an industry that it felt like half the world had turned against and that she didn’t know if that was going to stop her family from getting across her own border. It didn’t change the fact that if so much as one of them developed even a sniffle, their whole situation could change.

She tried to imagine being locked into their comparatively tiny cabin, unable to leave, unable to even see outside. She couldn’t even picture that.

Even mealtimes had become strange: each department allotted a half-hour slot to eat together, and only two people allowed at a table. No sitting with groups of friends – even though they were all healthy – no eating with friends from other departments.

She tried to remember when she’d slept properly last and found that she couldn’t. The last time she’d tasted food properly (without the vast amounts of salt that seemed to coat everything onboard at least) and found she couldn’t really remember that either.

Only 9 days, and it felt like they’d been out here for a month.

Scared to stay, scared to leave. More just…scared of everything. Scared of the world making no sense. Scared that her friends wouldn’t get home. Scared that there wouldn’t even be a home to get to. That nothing would ever be the same, ever.

Was this how it was supposed to end up? You work all this time to get a plan in place, to make up for past misjudgements and mistakes, you finally get a plan in place that works…and then it’s Mother Nature that tosses you on your back and stomps on you?

She took a deep breath and turned away from the window. Trying to remind herself that everyone in the world felt this way now. Everyone in the world was scared and stressed. That was the new normal. She tried to remind herself of all the random acts of kindness she saw every day. All the good that was coming out of this terror…

But she was just too tired to focus on much of anything…

So instead she picked up a needle, and watched as the coloured thread pulled through the cream of the cloth pattern. At least this was something she could do.

“Grab a Needle, grab a thimble if that’s all that keeps you sane…”

 

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Stardate #03252020 – News from Aboard – [03/25/2020]

Posted on March 26, 2020 by GypsyShaughnessy

Once again there were hundreds of people around her. But [she] was alone…
~ Pick Me Up At Peggy’s Cove

Strange does not begin to explain the atmosphere on the ship while we’re stuck out here. It really doesn’t. It never really leaves our minds how lucky we are, how fortunate we are to be safe among friends with access to resources that many on land can only dream of just at the moment.

I mean for heaven’s sake we have a hot tub!

But under all that there’s still the pulsing knowledge that we don’t know when we’re going to go home. I was talking to a barista this morning who has a three year old son at home, and she’s both desperate to go home to him and terrified to leave because she doesn’t want to risk him getting ill, and because she’s the only current working member of her family. Without her? How would they eat? And she’s far from the only one.

It makes one think really. All those numbers on paper that the government is so quick to slash red lines through? All those nameless corporations that everyone is so quick to blame (and don’t get me wrong, the mentality of a lot of big corporations is to blame for a lot of problems in this world); those numbers and statistics are real people, they’re lives. Real lives. Lives that have been totally upended and left to drift about until someone tells them its safe to return. There’s so much emotion out here that everything ends up feeling slightly numb.

For the most part, everyone is also fighting boredom. It sounds nuts doesn’t it? Here we are on a ship, with all these activities planned to keep us out of trouble, and no one feels like doing anything. We’re all still just, processing. Waiting for someone to tell us what to do next.

And as for me personally? Well, I never thought I could feel claustrophobic on a ship built to hold over 1,500 people. This morning the knowledge that I cannot leave this vessel even if I wanted to (we’re 20 miles off the coast of anywhere, there’s not anywhere to go!), hit me hard. It’s hard to explain what it feels like to suddenly realize that you are surrounded by endless miles of water and the end of your accessible world is the railings surrounding the promenade deck. It’s a creepy intense feeling that borders just on the edge of a panic attack before you reel it back in again.

Thankfully for me, we do have access to the pool (I know, a luxury that is definitely not on many people’s available list right now), so I was able to spend a little while flat on my back in the water, with nothing in my ears but the sound of my own breathing. And that helps. That always helps.

So, we keep on keeping busy. And allow ourselves the bad days, because we haven’t even been out here a week and some of us are already starting to go stir crazy.

Every night at (almost) exactly 7:30pm, there’s a low rumbling ghostly whistle that echoes back and forth across the waves from ship to ship as every vessel anchored in the area sounds its horn in unison. That gives me hope, that sound. It gives me an anchor. It reminds me that no matter how alone Amras and I may feel out here, we aren’t. A few miles across the water are 600+ other people (per ship), looking back and us, looking back at them, wondering the same things…

We’re still here, those horns say, we’ll get through this.

We will all get through this.

(As always, standard disclaimers apply, please check the “disclaimers” section at the top of the blog page for details)

 

Posted in "Hotel California" layup updates, Below the waterline | 1 Comment

Finding the “New Normal” – News from Aboard – Cruise Ship Parking Lot, Day 3 – [03/23/2020]

Posted on March 23, 2020 by GypsyShaughnessy

I got out of the institution on the day of my sister’s wedding. I had started to get used to the place. Breakfast at 8, classes at 2, therapy at 4, and asleep by 10. Inside life was simple
~ Secretary

As I suspected, life goes on. In a strange, start and stop kind of way. The ship is a very strange place to be right now. One thing that is for certain: it teaches me how to be a minority. The vast majority onboard the ship at the moment are Filipino and Indonesian (and they are awesome), so the ship has naturally shifted to fit their cultural tastes – let’s just say I’d best get used to spicy food, because eventually we have got to run out of pasta!

But everyone is very kind and supportive of everyone else. Underneath the somewhat “party like it’s the end of the world” attitude, there is still that uneasy shell-shocked feeling of “when do they let us go home? What are they trying to distract us from? Is my family okay? Do I have to be here forever? What if something happens?”

That never goes away, no matter how cheap the chocolate or the wine or the availability of a pool (and yes, we do have access to the pool).

Amras and I are slowly working out kind of a schedule. The captain wakes the whole ship up with an annoucement at 9am (and it goes into all the cabins so we’re awake whether we want to be or not), and if you want to eat, you’d best be up before that annoucement because breakfast closes at 9am. After that we check in with home and then get a couple of hours work done in the make-shift recording studio we have set up in my office (we’re working on a couple of pretty cool projects right now), and I usually get some sewing done. Then lunch; followed by our daily walk before returning to the studio. At 3 we usually go relax somewhere.

Let’s just say I’m getting a lot of cross-stitch done.

There are evening activities, like movies and karaoke. I teach a class every other day. Most of the crew are in some way still working, even though it’s reduced shifts. We are all desperately trying to find ways to keep busy; because the moment we stop being busy…reality sets back in and you start to feel a little shaky…my stomach knots up and I can feel the tears start to gather behind my eyes. If I don’t stay busy, I’ll start thinking…and thinking right now might not be the greatest thing to do.

But other than being a little bored, a little bit maladjusted and a lot confused, we are all fine out here. We’re lonely, we want to be with (the rest of) our families, but we’re safe. And we still know just how very very lucky we are to be so.

Until next.

 

Posted in "Hotel California" layup updates, Below the waterline | Leave a comment

Welcome to the Hotel California – News From Abroad – Fort Lauderdale/At Sea – [03/20/2020]

Posted on March 20, 2020 by GypsyShaughnessy

[When it was all over] we just rolled the Zamboni over the ice and we played hockey. […] and then I went home. And I cried. I realized, I hadn’t let myself cry the whole time.

~ Come From Away

or

Mirrors on the ceiling
Pink champagne on ice
She said “we are all just prisoner’s here of our own device”
[…]
Relax said the nightman, we are programmed to receive.
You can check out any time you like. But you can never leave.

Last night, on the final night of our Grand Voyage, we sailed through what is coming to be known as “the Caribbean Cruise Ship Parking Lot”. The Captain told us we were going to do be doing this, and he approached it with a great deal of respect. “This is a once in a lifetime sight, that I hope you never have to see again. I hope you never again have to see this many passenger ships out of service.”

It was an eerie, eerie sight. At least 14 vessels, sitting there at anchor, only half lit. As we passed, each ship of our own fleet flashed its signal light in solidarity. The passengers didn’t completely fully understand, as they were all focused on getting home in the morning. The crew though, most of us just stood there at the windows and railings in silence. Some of us cried. Because for foreseeable future – that stretch of ocean just off the coast of the Bahamas, that is our home. Each set of lights that we saw, represented at least 600 crew, which meant that we were sailing past about 7000 crew members from different lines, all feeling the same as us: scared, confused, stressed, homesick and trying to find ways to keep ourselves distracted.

Amras and I stood there at the observation lounge window, and I heard the words come out of my mouth without really realizing I’d said them:

Honey….?

Yes?

When are they going to let us go home?

I don’t know honey. I don’t know.

And then we went back to silence again.

This morning the guests debarked the ship as planned and on schedule (thankfully), Amras successfully went through his brief immigration check (mega-thankfully!) and then that was it…the ship was ours. You would think that would be a much cooler experience than it actually is at the moment. It feels extremely surreal. We are all still working, but you can’t shake the feeling that we are all still working because if they didn’t keep us working there would be no semblance of normality; and we would probably all go more than a little bit nuts. As it is, we have full access to one deck for dining and recreation, including the use of the pools, and our communication costs have all been lowered so that we can easily talk to home. They’ve limited the purchase and consumption of alcohol onboard, not because they don’t trust us, but because well…the Captain put it best (I may be paraphrasing here)

This is not because we’re trying to tell you what to do. It’s because when there is a change or a loss in purpose, along with a difficult situation, it’s easy to fall into a bottle and we really want to avoid that. All of us.

So yeah, I get that.

They didn’t limit coffee, tea or chocolate though, so hey I’m good!

It feels strange being the only ones onboard, our entire purpose onboard is supposed to be to serve the guests. Now we have no guests to serve. Most of us are used to having a strictly scheduled routine, and not having that feels…well it makes some of us jumpy. The ship feels like a ghost ship, with all the background music off in all the areas except the pool deck that has been recruited as our recreation area. I’m sure we’ll all relax and start to unwind a bit in the next few days. I’ll start offering classes to the crew, we’ll have movie nights, the cast will probably do at least one show. And because we’re being kept to certain areas rather than being allowed to spread over the whole ship, it is a chance for us to finally get to know each other outside the segregation of our own departments. One way or another, our days will return to as normal as they can given the circumstances. There will doubtlessly be at least one party.

Which brings me to something else. I want anyone who reads this to know that I am fully aware of just how lucky we are to be where we are.

We are in a position where we are fed, paid and cared for. We are in a situation where we are in basically no danger. While we have to be careful of social distancing still, the ship itself is uncontaminated so we are still able to have gatherings, see our friends, get fresh air, we are still able to hold onto that semblance of normal. We know that even though this version of normal is strange for us, it is much much more than the majority of the rest of the world has right now. We are 600 people effectively quarantined together in a very big, very luxurious space, and I am not for one moment taking that for granted. There will not be very many pictures posted on any social media of our time onboard from now on, because it would be neither fair or respectful to show of pictures of us well…being pretty close to normal…when so many others don’t have that option. So for those of you who follow my facebook, know that that’s why it will likely be somewhat quiet.

As I type this right now, we are on our way to that same parking lot we sailed through last night; where we will become ship #15 to join the silent, half-lighted ranks. We’ll get there at somewhere around 7am, and there we will stay until we have to either go out into international waters to process water or head the other direction to pick up supplies.

I have no idea when this will end. I have no idea when I will come home (my contract is due to end May 6th, hopefully I will be long home by then). I don’t know or understand much of what is happening with the world right now. Despite my knowing that Amras and I are somewhere safe and secure, there is a large part of me that would rather be back in the real world, despite it’s current fear and insanity, would rather be with the rest of the people we care about than out here alone among 600 other people.

But I do know this. Eventually this thing will end. Eventually everyone will be able to come home. And the best anyone can do until then is to, as the British say, “keep calm and carry on”. And like I, and many others keep saying, when all else fails – be kind.

Talk to you all as soon as I can.

Keeping all of you in my thoughts and wishes.

Posted in "Hotel California" layup updates | 2 Comments

A Glimmer of Light – News from Abroad – At Sea – [03/19/2020]

Posted on March 19, 2020 by GypsyShaughnessy

Happiness can be found in the most unlikely of places. If only one remembers to turn on the light.
~ Professor Dumbledore

It has now been confirmed that none of the crew can go home in Florida, except for a handful who actually live there and don’t need flights. Some of us are also stuck for other reasons, Canada is not the only country that has closed its borders. Several of our crew members couldn’t get home even if they wanted to. And many, many of us want to. Amras and I are in a fairly good position: We are going to be here together, and we don’t have anyone at home depending on us to be there. The majority of our housekeeping and bartending staff are not in such a lucky place – many of them have children and spouses at home that they desperately want to get back to. So all we can do at the moment is be there for each other as much as possible.

Just at the moment, I suspect we are all very much in ‘game face’ mode. We still have guests onboard, and our priority is getting those guests home safely. They are, after all, still on vacation, and they deserve the best service we are able to give them.

The day after tomorrow we dock in Florida, and the guests debark, and then we don’t have to worry as much about ‘game face’. We can be honest. At least with each other.

I suspect that the moment we pull away from Florida, a lot of us will burst into tears, a lot of us will sleep for at least a day and a half, there will probably be at least one massive party to release the built up pressure, and then the cycle will repeat itself for however long it takes.

The world is pretty crazy right now, but – in the midst of all this chaos – I am continually amazed by the sparkling points of golden beauty I still see that give me hope for the human race:

  • Rogers’ wireless and Fido Wireless have waived all international and overseas roaming calls, including on the maritime cruise signal until the end of April. Meaning any one of their customers can call home without having to pay hundreds in roaming charges (as a side bar, this means that Amras’ and I will be reachable through my cellphone for the duration).
  • WestJet providing rescue flights to get Canadian citizens home
  • Stores offering “seniors only” shopping hours all throughout Canada so that those who are more vulnerable have better access to supplies without risking their own wellbeing
  • Entertainment venues offering streaming services of previous live productions because their current seasons are gone.
  • Disneyland and Disneyworld giving away all their surplus food to foodbanks and those in need. An act that would normally be pointlessly illegal, finally being allowed.
  • Resteraunt giving away any food they have instead of letting it spoil during forced closure
  • Thousands more people giving blood across the world, especially in Italy
  • Whole communities of spontaneous “balcony opera” in quarantined Italy

And many many more.

Times are hard. Times are scary. Really scary. Horribly, terribly scary. But in the seemingly endless darkness, there are glimmers. This is the time when we need to take Mr Rogers’ famous advice to the next level – it’s time we stop looking for the helpers, that’s advice we should give our children – for us, it’s time for us to start being the helpers.

Find the good my friends, stay strong, and find the good.

 

Posted in Below the waterline | 1 Comment

Relief Efforts – News from Aboard – [03/17/2020]

Posted on March 17, 2020 by GypsyShaughnessy

Live at 5 and CNN, keep us all abreast
Of breaking stories that contend to make us anxious and depressed
Problems with no answers hang on like some chronic cough
And every day some brand new issue, rears its head to piss you off
[…]
Human spirit needs to be, leavened by a little levity
So take those blues and bounce them off the wall
Keep your humour please
‘Cause don’t you know it’s times like these
That laughing matters most of all
~ Bette Midler

It’s no secret that the world is a pretty scary place right now. But at least with this latest update – I do have (tentatively, because everything about this whole mess is tentative until it actually happens in which case it stops being tentative and something else becomes tentative!)…good news.

This afternoon our Captain made an annoucement ship wide updating the guests on the disembarkation expectations for Florida. In that same annoucement, he also stated that no crew would be disembarking the vessel at that time, only passengers. There are a variety of reasons for this, which I don’t fully understand (I think it’s mostly to do with flights?), but what it means is that I definitely, barring some radical change, can’t leave the ship. Even if I wanted to.

A few hours passed, a few more emails were sent. Because at this point we did not know if Amras was going to be included in the list of people who had to disembark. More than anything, we do not want to be separated at this particularly trying time. Especially not with the situation at the border being so fluid. I was almost having nightmares about him getting stuck on one side and me on the other.

So we were incredibly relieved when our manager came up to us at lunch and told us that she had sent a request to Amras’ boss, and to her boss, requesting that Amras be allowed to remain on board with me. Citing the fact that his wife is required to stay on board, and that we truly feared being kept apart at this time, among other things. She received one single word in response:

“Yes”.

You can imagine what a tremendous relief this is for us. As it stands right now, Amras and I will be among the ones staying here onboard until further notice. We will be fed, protected and cared for and amongst friends and colleagues. Now, please bear in mind that this situation is very very fluid. This could all change, we could get another email tomorrow that alters everything. I think, in truth, we won’t really feel secure until we’re sailing away from Florida! But for right now, we are not going to be counting the teeth on this particular gift horse.

In the meantime, I have volunteered to open up the studio computers to assist people with their flights during an extended daily Q&A. It may not be my most favourite thing to do, but I have 5.5 years of librarian experience where I had to do exactly this for a long time at the end of every cruise, the least I can do is step up and pitch in.

The overall vibe on the ship remains positive but strange. Every department is being handled differently and there is still that sense of no one being quite sure what is going on because there is no universal answer.

We still have no idea how long this entire situation is going to last. No one does. The best we can do is keep all our loved ones informed as much as possible.

Brightest of blessings from the high and confusing seas. Please keep being safe and kind.

 

(the same disclaimers apply as always, I just didn’t want to type them all again)

Posted in Below the waterline, Transitions | 2 Comments

If One Only Remembers to Turn On the Light – News from Abroad – Barbados – [03/16/2020]

Posted on March 16, 2020 by GypsyShaughnessy

Disclaimer: The following is once again only the opinion of the author, it does not represent the views of the company that employs me. It is not an official statement. It is not to be shared, quoted or otherwise referenced as an official statement

This is an update for friends and family as much as I am able to provide it. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Please do not share the link to or content of this blog without checking with the author first.

When I was in high school my Gramma went into a nursing home, and I remember bracing myself for having to go to see her. Some years later, my other Gran passed away and I was asked to speak at her funeral, despite the fact that I adored my Gran, I did not cry. Because tears were not in the script, this was not the place for tears.

Many years after that, my father was very very ill. Ill enough that we feared he would not come back to us. Ill enough that ambulances had to be called. I remember that night in flashes, but the thing I remember the most, is my mother handing me the phone with the 911 operator on the other end, and suddenly having all my panic dissipate like someone had turned off a tap, I had a job to do…I could lose it later, I could cry later. This was not the time. I had a very clear vision of little 5-year old me tugging insistently at my skirt, and big me taking her by the hand and putting her behind me where she would be safe, because I couldn’t help her right now…big me had things to do.

Now, I need to be that girl again.

Since my last update there have been some fairly major developments. True to my word, I am providing as much information as I am able to here, please keep in mind that these truly are only my person opinions and speculations, I am not speaking for the company, I am merely relaying what little we know.

As of about an hour ago, Canada closed its border to all non-citizens/permanent residents. This puts us in a difficult position because Amras is currently neither, but is half-way through the immigration process. However, because we are married, and can provide proof of our relationship, he is exempt through me.

The wrinkle is that if I, at this point, self-terminate my contract and disembark the vessel, it is highly likely that I will not get paid. I am supposed to wait for official word from the company as to my options. As it stands at the moment, both of us losing our paycheques isn’t really an option. So we are waiting to see what options we do have. Thankfully I have a boss who is 100% on our side and who has told us that there is no possibility that whatever action I choose to take will be held against me. Even if I somehow flew home tomorrow, I would be welcome back when all this was over.

We have been in touch with the immigration lawyer who is handling our case and his advice was to come home together “now”, however, for various reasons, one of which is that our call in Jamaica has been cancelled and we will now be heading straight to Florida to dock on the 20th …. this is not possible. It is looking more and more as if I will have to remain onboard and Amras will have to stay in Florida with trusted friends until the worst of this blows over.

Understand that this is not what either of us want. What we want is to be able to go home, self-quarantine for two weeks and generally hide from the world and try to recover from all of this.

However, this is one of those cases where what we want and what may be necessary are possibly not going to line up.

As of right now, we have no idea when that will be.

Please keep in mind that this is all currently conjecture. At the moment there are only a few solid facts that we actually do know:

  • Amras’ contract has officially been terminated. Since the border closure and airport restrictions mean that he can’t actually fly to his home airport, we are in the process of talking to onboard management as to what our options are as a result of that.
  • Because I am crew, my contract remains in place as long as I stay onboard. At the moment that’s the holding pattern I am in. We are, again, waiting to see if we have other options on that.
  • We have people in Florida who are willing to take one or both of us in should it be necessary.
  • We will be debarking guests in our next port.

That’s it, that’s all the solid facts we have.

Truth is, it’s a little bit chaotic out here. In a way that’s very difficult to explain. Everyone we see has the same shell-shocked “what’s going on” look.

A lot of us may be coming home in the next few weeks. We will be tired, and frightened and confused, and sick to our stomachs not from the virus but from the insanity and the stress we have had to live through for the last few days that is difficult to understand or explain. Some of us may be stuck in limbo potentially far from home. Please, remember that this isn’t our fault, remember that we have families to care for and bills to pay and people to get home to, people who are worried about us. People who miss are dearly. Remember that we are human, we are individuals, not clockwork dolls or numbers belonging to some faceless corporation to blame for everything that’s currently going wrong. And the last thing any of us, ever, want to do, is cause pain to anyone. We will do as we are told, we will self-quarantine, we will stay isolated, we will respect shut downs and barriers.

But please…remember we are people, and we are just one of many thousands that are hurting from this insanity.

I have said this before, and I will go on saying it: this is a “9/11” moment. Times like this can tear all of us apart or they can bind us closer together. Now is not the time to turn on each other. It is not the time to be suspicious of each other or blame one another. It is a time to be cautious yes, but it is more than anything a time to be kind. To bolster each other up as much as possible. The world is a complicated scary place at the best of times, and right now it is more complicated and scary than ever. Please, be kind to each other.

When I know more, so will you.

In the meantime, stay safe, say kind, and stay human….

 

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The “Final” Countdown – News From Aboard – [03/16/2020]

Posted on March 16, 2020 by GypsyShaughnessy

Disclaimer: The following is once again only the opinion of the author, it does not represent the views of the company that employs me. It is not an official statement. It is not to be shared, quoted or otherwise referenced as an official statement

This is an update for friends and family as much as I am able to provide it. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Please do not share the link or content of this blog without permission from the author.

As doubtlessly most of you know by now, all major cruise lines temporarily suspended operations late last night. Unfortunately, there is very very little I can tell you about this. For one, in situations like this, we as employees have to be very careful what we say as we absolutely cannot be seen as speaking for the company. The industry is trying very hard to present a united voice right now, and I am not going to be the one to disrupt that. If you need or want official updates, I urge you to keep an eye on the official channels. If you don’t have or know those official channels, drop me a line and I’ll tell you where to look. It just won’t be here.

Moreover, however, is that we actually do not know anything. We know that the announcement does affect our line, because it effects all lines. We know that we will not be taking on any more guests for the next month. We know that our shipboard staff has told us to remain calm and that this is temporary. That’s all we know. We do not yet know how this effects crew, we do not know if we are going home, we do not know if we are staying. We know, literally, nothing.

The only information I have is the same as what everyone else has access to: our ship will be disembarking guests as scheduled in Florida.

That’s it. That’s the only official information anyone has.

I will tell you this: I am frightened. I am not frightened of getting sick. I have never been frightened of getting sick. If I were to catch this thing I would be stuck in bed for a few days and then I would most likely be fine. My only fear about getting ill is that I might pass it onto someone that actually would be in trouble if they contracted it. I fear that I would make a loved one very sick; that’s why my hands always smell of anti-bacterial soap these days, and why I have never complained about having to clean everything I touch. Protect the herd.

So no, I am not frightened of getting sick myself. What I am scared about is what this temporary shut down could mean for my family. Right now, we still do not know what’s happening, but the worst case scenario is that they could send Amras home (as he is technically service staff and is on the guest manifest instead of the crew list, and his upcoming contract on this vessel has officially been terminated) and then keep me on board. If they allow us to leave voluntarily then that’s fine, we could leave together and cross the border home as a unit. However, if they mandate keeping crew members onboard while we wait this out he may have to fly on ahead alone. And that is a whole other layer because of our ongoing immigration application.

I do not even want to think about the possible outcome if something went wrong at the border and I wasn’t there to help.

But it’s not just me, or even just us, that I am frightened for. It’s every one of the people that’s on in my shipboard family. Even the ones on different lines, the ones I’ve never met and might never meet. It is very possible – though again not official – that a lot of crew members will be coming home soon. They will be coming home through possibly your airports, to your towns or your cities. Our industry has taken a great amount of heat lately, despite the fact that we are truly not the bad guys. I fear that if and when we come home, we will be shunned by society; scrutinized or even feared just because we have come from a ship. Please before you jump to any conclusions about anyone, please know that we are stressed, frightened and in many cases mentally exhausted. I cannot stress how difficult it is for many of my colleagues to lose a month or more of employment; many people who work on ships are from very different cultures and a month without income is a very scary thing no matter what; but when you live paycheque to paycheque on a contract basis, it becomes even more impactful.

So please, be kind. To us. To yourselves, to each other. To the whole world. Keep us in your thoughts if you can, and we will – as always – keep you in ours.

The long and the short of it is, that as soon as we know something official so will all our friends and all our loved ones.

For now, I beg you to be patient, be kind, and carry on…

 

Posted in Below the waterline, Transitions | Leave a comment

Fear Is the Mind-Killer – [03/11/2020]

Posted on March 11, 2020 by GypsyShaughnessy

Please note: The views contained here-in are the opinion of the author (that would be me) only and are not reflective or endorsed by the company by which I am employed. These views are not to be taken as any kind of an official statement or quoted, reproduced or otherwise referenced as such.

Before you read any further. Please stop and re-read the above. Twice. Take that in. Let it sit. Then continue. That’s how important that statement is.

In other words, this is just my own personal musings and it is incredibly important that that be made obviously acknowledged.

Right. Now that we’ve all got that.

It occurs to me – possibly too late – that I should step up and inform everyone that may be concerned that we are all fine out here on our small floating hotel. There is a lot of fear and paraniod glances floating around the news right now, and some of it may well be legitimate, but from our end – we are fine.

But I have been thinking a lot lately about fear.

Fear is the ultimate means of control really. Whether you are a street thug or a politician the easiest way to get someone to do what you want is to frighten them, and right now the world is very very frightened. The other thing about fear is that it feeds itself, until the small voices of logic are drowned in the tide of self-perpetuating and self-fulfilling terror.

It is the fear that is sweeping the world that concerns me far more than the bug. Please, don’t think that means that I am in any way disregarding COVID or that I don’t think it is something to be concerned about. What I mean is that, if you strip this situation down to the facts: yes it is terrifying that a new disease has taken such swift hold of the planet, and yes it definitely does need to be contained before it does any more serious damage. But the rest of the truth is that the vast majority of individuals who contract this disease will make a full recovery quite swiftly; in fact a large amount of people who contract it will not even know that they have done so. This is not, thank heavens, Ebola.

The reason that the fear and overreaction is of such concern is because it takes away the attention from the comparatively small portion of the population that would be in true danger if they contracted it (or, come to think of it, if they contracted any other infection) – the “weak” members of the herd, those who are very young, or very elderly, those who already have compromised immune systems (I have one family member who has been told they will die if they catch the regular flu!) – are the ones that are ultimately going to suffer from this; and more so because those of us who are perfectly healthy and risk little more than a few days in bed are shoving them out of the way to get to the supplies they need, the hospitals that need to treat them. Not us. We will shove someone out of our path for that last bottle of hand sanitizer, without thinking that maybe, just maybe, we might not really need it. We are turning on our own in an utterly pointless display of self-preservation without showing much in the way of thought through logic. And this is being fed by the media, who – true to form – are holding to the old adage of “if it bleeds, it leads”.

It’s not exactly society at it’s best out there right now.

Which brings me to a very careful, and very general statement. The cruise industry has been hit hard by this. Through – as far as I can tell – no real fault of our own, we are being painted as some kind of a pariah. Now, there is a lot that ‘my’ industry gets wrong, there are a lot of things that I am not remotely proud of and a lot of ways we screw up. I have never been less than honest about the fact that my job is way less flash than it sounds and that often all I want to do is go home, hang up my gypsy-wings and learn to cook a proper meal. But in this case, I feel the need to softly stand up in a corner and say: we are not evil. We take nothing more seriously than the health of our guests. Every crew member I have ever worked with is trained in how to deal with an outbreak of illness onboard, possibly more so than in most other aspects of the hospitality industry, and as we speak everything is being sanitized and double washed more times than you could possibly imagine. If someone so much as touches one of my computers, I sanitize it.

I am not a company representative, I cannot and will not speak for the company, there are proper official channels for that and if you want accurate information, I suggest you look there. But I still feel the need to quietly defend my place of work and simply say this: we are not the bad guys here. We want to help; we are trying to help.

But all of that aside; I think we all know that this is going to get worse before it gets better. Please remember that fear is the worst disease of all. Keep a level head, wash your hands for at least 20 seconds every time it’s necessary (and even if you think it isn’t)…

And above all things…be kind to your fellow humanoids.

Posted in Below the waterline, Grand South America/Antarctica 2020, Travel | Leave a comment

Welcome to the Jungle – Boca De Valeria – [03-08-2020]

Posted on March 10, 2020 by GypsyShaughnessy

The story goes that several years ago (I don’t know the exact date), a ship in our fleet had some kind of minor engine trouble while traversing the Amazon. Seemingly stuck in the middle of nowhere for several day until repairs could be made, one of the ship’s officers took a single tender ashore to explore the coastline (carefully I would hope!). And that is how we came to find Boca De Valeria.

This is not like any of our other ports of call. The village exists in a state of mutual curiousity – two completely opposite cultures trying to smoothly interact wit h each other with the minimum amount of damage. The only nod they really have to what we might think of as a tourist infrastructure is the handful of locals (usually children under the watchful eye of relatives) who dress in traditional costume and the families who offer you a picture with a sloth.

The locals do not beg, they do not haggle or hassle, they do not act aggressively in any way. They are, in fact overwhelmingly polite and kind. The first time I called here I was frightened by the small crowd of local children who reach out to touch your hand as you alight on shore – but now, several calls later, I realize that those soft touches are the exact opposite of threatening. Yes, they will politely ask you for a dollar if you except their offer to guide you around the village, but they will not get angry if you don’t have it, they will not try and press you – they simply want to show you their home.

Ramshackle houses stand on stilts teetering above the reach of the – even the gardens are built in suspended canoes well above the reach of the water. The humidly hangs over the whole area like a blanket.

Not everyone who roams the village while we’re there is from the area, a great many boat in from other, bigger settlement further down the river – but there is never a sense that the village is false. People do live here all year road; those are real houses sitting up on those stilts and that I a real school and a real church. Yes, some photo opportunities are staged, but they are very honest about being so (a cheesy smile is a cheesy smile, in any language).

$5 got us the services of a local “motorized” (er…sort of) canoe for a half an hour tour down the river itself.

Oh. My. Goddess.

When I first came to the Amazon several seasons ago I was terribly disappointed. My imagination had painted it into an impossible jungle-scape with monkeys dangling within arm’s reach of the ship’s bow. Imagine how crushed I was when it turned out to be a vast, seemingly endless, stretch to taffy-coloured water without a monkey or an alligator in sight.

Well, I still haven’t seen any wild monkeys – or any alligators for that matter – but today I felt like I actually saw the ‘real’ Amazon.

The canoe puttered up the tributary for a while before turning and veering into a channel that you couldn’t even identify as a channel until you were practically on top of it. It actually looked as if we were going to steer right into the bank…and then it opened up into a whole other world.

Trees growing directly out of the dark water, their branches interweaving above us like nature-made lace. And toucans! Real toucans swooping overhead like small flying gems. And the lily pads! The most enormous lily pads you have ever seen! Stretching from bank to bank like a softly rolling road drawing you into the jungle. When the boat engines stopped you could hear nothing except the lap of the water and the sound of your own breathing.

Truly, I have never experienced anything like it.

This port, is unlike any other…and a little piece of our hearts always stays behind when we put it behind us.

 

Posted in Grand South America/Antarctica 2020, Ports of Call | Leave a comment