Ship life

Being on a ship

When the sea is calm, the ship sails smoothly, and when you are downstairs you'd hardly know that you were on a ship at all. So far, it's been like this about 80% of the time.

When the sea is rougher - even little, choppy waves will do it - the ship rolls from side to side, left to right...

At the moment it's such that if you walk port or starboard (left or right) on the ship, you have the impression of either running downhill, or of trying to walk uphill, depending on the ship's angle at that particular second.

You have to guard glasses so they don't slide off the table. Coins or small objects might fall off the couch onto the floor. Curtains hang at an angle. Look at the wine glasses and see the level of the wine changing with each roll of the ship. And waiters never fill your glass anywhere near the top.


Time travel

We are constantly travelling through time. Every few days we get another hour, and as we are generally travelling west, we will have (I think) 23 days of 25 hours. When we cross the international dateline, we will have one day of 1 hour. That is, when the clock ticks over to midnight, it will become 11pm of the next day.

So far we have changed the clocks four times. At the moment we're travelling kind of southwest. The sunset time has changed quite a bit.

It's lovely now that we've started teaching classes, because we get up quite early, but we are having two days in a row of an extra hours' sleep. ^_^


Ports

So far we have been to three ports - Xiamen, China, Da Nang, Vietnam, and Singapore. It is a strange thing to carry your home around the world with you. You wake up in the morning, have a shower, get dressed, grab your handbag, go outside and - bam! - you're in a new country that wasn't there the night before.

Each port was good fun in its own way, and we went around in groups of teachers; forming bigger and smaller groups throughout the day, as we happened to meet up. It's nice to go with a group as you can get cheap taxi rides etc, but nice not to be in a huge group when it comes to making group decisions on restaurants etc.


Food

I can't say I'm a big fan of the ship fare. Lunch is probably the best meal of the day, since it's a buffet and there's usually a couple of good dishes, and not all Japanese food. Dinners are kind of B-grade Japanese 'washoku', lots of little dishes of tofu and pickles and rice and such things.

One thing we all do in port is stock up on goodies. I was happy to find BBQ Shapes in a supermarket in Singapore. What more do you need? ^_^


Arrr

We're travelling through pirate-y waters. We've just come through the Strait of Malacca. No problems. Later we will be going near Somalia, through the Gulf of Aden, and at that time we will have some extra safety precautions. We get to sail up the Red Sea! Very cool.

So far we have passed through the South China Sea, the Strait of Malacca... we saw parts of Sumatra yesterday, and I think we passed part of Sri Lanka today. I don't always know what I'm seeing, but you do see the odd glimpse of land...

Sometimes you can see little markers in the ocean, which I think mark the shipping route. I never thought of there being a marked shipping route before. We have seen a number of other boats over the last two weeks.


Events

There've been various events on the ship. I'll give you some examples:
-every day there are random 'fun' events like dancing workshops, percussion workshops, Wii gamefests, painting, shamisen, etc
-there are lectures by guest experts about topics related to the theme of our journey, like the Palestine issue, nuclear weapons, etc
-there are language program events, like parties and festivals that we will organise

Last night there was a full moon party, which I didn't attend, but oh! The full moon was absolutely stunning over the water. It shone for miles, and formed a kind of rainbow in the clouds surrounding it. And in the distance we could see lightning making the clouds golden.

Yesterday, since we just left Singapore, we had a big tropical fruit party. There were commonplace ones like mango and pineapple, as well as more unusual ones like dragonfruit, rose apple and durian (which I don't recommend ^_^). I had the good fortune to volunteer for it, and apart from its being very hot outside, it was an easy stint and resulted in some free fruit. ^_^


Highlights

There's a lot going on all the time, so what are some of my highlights so far?

Riding on the back of a bicycle around city streets in Vietnam

Standing and staring out at the night sky with the full moon over the water

Eating awesome Indian food in Singapore

My first classes - nice groups of people ^_^

Scarfing down some free tropical fruit at the fruit party

Sitting in the jacuzzi on the back of the ship, watching the ocean.

Getting a dress made in Vietnam

Competing in the international Mario Kart championships ^_^

The nice thing about working with nice people is that work doesn't completely feel like work. Yes it will get busier and busier - we're still just starting - but when you have meetings and stuff, it's not a chore.

Big update from the ocean

Hey all! Here's my diary from the ship so far. Probably the longer we sail, the less time I will have to write, but for now...


April 16

Today was shukkou no hi - departure day! We've just set sail.

I am sharing a room with two other girls. Later in the journey, there will be four of us. Needless to say, we have already filled the room to capacity with all our stuff! Actually, the cabin is not that small - I've certainly lived in smaller spaces in Japan - and there is just enough storage space for us to keep most of our things without too much hassle. We do not have a window, and right now a couple of the lights don't work, so it is a little dark, but this should get fixed soon.

Our first job on the ship was to greet customers coming in, help them find their rooms and answer any questions (the blind leading the blind!). I used a lot of Japanese (poorly). We had our first buffet lunch.

The ship departure was at 3, so just before that we all gathered for the 'shukkou shiki' (departure ceremony). We staff passed out drinks for a group kampai, and outside on Osambashi pier, heaps of family and friends braved the cold and rain to send off loved ones. From the deck were screams of 'itte rrasshai!' and from us, 'itte kimasu!'

(This is a kind of standard Japanese 'aisatsu', or greeting. Both of them mean, like, 'see you'.
'Itte kimasu' is used when someone is leaving, like ducking out the office, or leaving the house in the morning. It could be translated as 'I'm off!' or 'I'm going and coming back later!'
'Itte rasshai' is said by the person who stays behind.)

Later, we had a party and dinner.

The party was on the pool deck. Unfortunately, today was really cold - maximum 8, and in the evening it would have been more like 5 or 6 - so it wasn't ideal for formal clothes. I was sooo cold, especially passing out the ice-filled juices, and champagne! When people started dancing, that was much better. But it was very un-spring-like weather, about the coldest departure they've had.

Some observations:

I think I will definitely lose weight on this ship!

The food is quite decent (so far; I heard some of the fresh ingredients are a bit thin on the ground the longer we are at sea. And that's a nice mixed metaphor for you!). But it's fairly healthy food, and there are a LOT of stairs on this ship! They do have elevators but they are small and slow, and this ship has 11 floors.

The bottom 3 floors are, I guess, for storage and crew and so on. The fourth floor is where some of the other teachers and staff have their cabins. The fifth floor is where reception is, as well as the gangway. The sixth floor has a big restaurant. My cabin is on this floor too.

Also, I will be stressed or busy a lot, which will keep my appetite down, I think, not to mention seasickness...

Seasickness! Now that we are properly out in the open sea, the ship does roll from side to side. At times it's worse than others. I was fine at first - walking was a bit strange, like you are a bit drunk or something; you don't go in quite the exact direction you were aiming for.

After I sat down for dinner though, I started to feel a bit queasy and couldn't eat everything. I know it is good to eat when you are seasick; it's when your stomach is totally empty that you feel worst. So I managed to eat a bit. One bad thing was that I was with a group of Japanese people (we were supposed to distribute ourselves among the Japanese passengers who were travelling alone, so we could help make small talk and get to know people). And for half the meal I couldn't feel very lively.

I feel somewhat better now though. It is easier when you are up and moving around. Sitting down reading or (as now) looking at a computer screen is not the best...

I am not the only one though; another teacher was feeling worse than me, and I saw a few people going to get seasickness pills from the reception desk. I picked one up for good measure but haven't needed to take it yet.

Being on a ship... there are various small details that are interesting when you first notice them. For example, I had some coins on the couch, but when the ship rolled, the coins fell onto the floor. Good incentive to be tidy! At dinner you could see the level of the wine in the glasses tilt with the movement of the ship. Doors also tend to shut themselves, given time.


April 19 (Mon)

Where did the time go? Oh yeah, I was in the infirmary with a drip in my arm!

So, after my post on Friday, on Saturday I got my first proper brush with seasickness. Apparently it's particularly common in the seas around Japan, because the water is rather choppy. Though it doesn't look terribly rough, the choppy waves make the ship roll from side to side.

I wasn't the only one affected; quite a few of the teacher were looking a bit green in the teacher's meeting.

I tried various strategies:
-try to eat something - and then I threw up
-take a seasickness pill - and then I threw up
-go outside - I did so - and then on my way back inside, I threw up
-look out the window - I did so - and then had to run out twice to throw up

This was also during our fire drill, where we all had to assemble on the deck. The ocean was quite beautiful - there were rainbows periodically dancing over the waves, an effect I've never seen before - but I did have to leave more than once. I wasn't the only one, though - several people were also vomiting in there, and there was a steady stream of people through Reception getting sickness pills.

Later that day I felt better, enough to go and eat dinner, and even have a drink at the bar afterwards. It was one of the teachers' birthdays, so he got 'happy birthday' sung to him about a dozen times throughout the day.

Then I went to bed, and woke up in the middle of the night to throw up, and didn't stop for the next several hours. I think I threw up at least 13 or 14 times. After the first two times I decided not to sleep on my top bunk any more, but moved to the couch underneath, since I had to keep getting up.

Come morning time, I couldn't get up; my roommate fetched the teacher coordinator and brought me drinks, and then organised to take me to the infirmary. The infirmary had the merit of having windows - natural light! - and being a bit cooler than my own room. The doctor had me lie down and put a drip in my arm for a couple of hours.

You have to be careful looking through portholes if you are feeling sick. If you look up through one, you can only see the sky, but if you see the reflection of the porthole on the ceiling, you can see the ocean racing past, and it can make you feel dizzy.

After having the drip, I staggered back to my own room and slept for about 24 hours.

I don't think this was seasickness, as the ocean had really calmed down, and the reaction was disproportionately strong. Probably food poisoning or something.

I missed several meetings and events, including our team presentation (when we were supposed to introduce ourselves to the ship by doing a kind of performance). I am kind of relieved I didn't have to dance, but I couldn't even sit up for more than ten seconds, let alone practise dancing for an hour...

Now I am feeling a bit more human, though still not perfect.

Today was a 25-hour day, as we set our watches back an hour.


April 20

We are at Xiamen, but we cannot dock yet because the weather is foggy. Some of the scheduled tours have been cancelled. I don't mind too much because Xiamen isn't one of the ports I was most looking forward to anyway - I don't know much about it, to be honest, and we should still have a few good hours to poke around the city, have something to eat, etc.

Every day before arriving in a new port, we have a kind of staff 'port orientation' where one teacher tells the others about things to do in that port. I'm gonna do one for Piraeus, Greece.

Yesterday the sun set during our teacher's meeting, so we all took a five minute break during the meeting to go out on the deck and watch the sun set.

I have never sailed on the open sea before. One thing that surprised me is how calm it is. Of course, not all stretches are alike - the sea leaving Japan was quite choppy, and apparently the Atlantic can get quite rough - but mostly it has been quite still and quiet. I imagined the open sea to have a lot of waves. Most people have recovered from their seasickness as the ship isn't swaying so much.

I haven't seen any dolphins or animals yet - only a couple of swallows during the sunset last night, which seemed to me to be very far from land. We could see the shipping trail marked by buoys, and have seen the occasional other ship in the distance.

On our first day we stayed wholly in Japanese waters; I think we left Japanese waters early on the morning of the 18th, or at least they said we passed Kagoshima around midnight. After Xiamen we shall cross the South China Sea to Da Nang, Vietnam.

What else should I write about? Maybe the food. We have three set mealtimes during the day. I have attended mealtimes sporadically but I will summarise them:

Breakfast - too early. There are two restaurants open for breakfast; one has more Japanese food, one more Western-style. The food isn't all that fresh - the bread is like airplane bread, for example - but each day there is some kind of fresh fruit, a kind of salad, then pancakes, French toast, cereal, rice, natto... it depends which restaurant; it's a buffet. You can also get free tea or coffee. If you want juice or other drinks you can buy them.

It's nice to have breakfast upstairs, not only because it's more Western-style, but because you can eat outside in the light and fresh air of the pool deck.

Lunch - actually, I've only had lunch once, on my first day! I kept feeling too sick, and ordering to my room a kind of special rice porridge for invalids. ^^; Lunch is also a buffet.

Dinner - dinner is served in the big restaurant. Because there are a lot of passengers, this is served in two sessions - early and late. We teachers are always the late sitting. It can feel like a long time between lunch and dinner.

Dinner comes as a series of small dishes, and it's very Japanese-style. So far I can say there is usually pickles, tofu, a rice dish with flavourings like bento rice, broiled fish (which I have avoided ever since my tummy bug), a dessert, etc. There's also an 'extra' dish you can order if you like. I have to say I am not a big fan of the dinners so far and most of them have left me feeling queasy. I might start to eat 2-minute noodles in my room...

What else... because we are sitting around waiting to land at port, I have more time on my hands and I should get some of the initial 'about the boat' stuff out of the way...

The ship has 11 floors, though passengers cannot go on the topmost or bottom three floors. There is a big 'free space' area, a pool deck which also has tables for eating, and a few bars and restaurants. Lots of other rooms for events, seminars, meetings, classes, etc...

As I think I mentioned before, about half the passengers on this ship are over 60, but there's a big group of young people as well - like early 20s. We even have a few children, and a big children's play area. Actually, we have been told not to smile cheerily and wave in the little kids' faces, as you often do with babies, because they were getting a bit overwhelmed and distraught with all the attention from 800+ passengers on board, ha ha ha...

We have not started teaching yet, but we will soon be doing interviews to place students in levels. I already met a couple of my interviewees by chance. Since I have been sick and spent most of my time in my cabin, I haven't met so many new people yet, but I hope I can do this more as we continue.

When we left port in Yokohama, it was quite cold and rainy, but now it's getting warmer and we are in a near-tropical environment. Since it's misty today, though, it's not that warm today.


April 20 (2)

We finally got in to Xiamen. We were able to disembark around 3pm, where we had originally imagined about 9am. However, they pushed forward our departure time so we could stay later in the evening. That gave them time to still carry out most of the tours they had planned for that port.

We teachers went into small groups and took taxis to Nanputuo Temple. There were a lot of Chinese tourists there. We went around the temple and then some of us went onto the nearby university grounds. The security guards on the gate looked at us a bit askance but a random student came and translated for them. Somehow we managed to convince them we were not terrorists, and on we went.

The university grounds were really nice. We walked around the lake and there were some uni students breakdancing. A few small children decided to get in on the act, and they were going off. Really really cute.

We took a bus - 1 yuan! - back to the city, and went to Zhongshan Lu, the main shopping strip. The bit we went to had a bunch of food stalls. We did a little window shopping and for dinner got these veggie soup things from stalls. There's like 20 different types of vegetables, 10 types of meat and a few different types of noodles, and you can choose what you want put in your soup bowl, for about $1-2.

I had nothing but vegetables - glorious fresh vegetables of many different varieties - and it had a slight spiciness to it, and it was very nice and exactly what I felt I needed. ^_^

It was really quite surreal to go into port for just one day. On one hand, it felt like I'd never been off land - just felt natural to be out and about again. On the other hand, it felt weird to suddenly be - boom! in China. It was actually quite easy getting off the ship and through immigration, so that suddenly we were walking out into a new country, carrying only our handbags or whatever. So cavalier was I about leaving the ship that I even forgot my money. ^^; Fortunately I spent less than $20 anyway.

There was some very slight residual 'swaying' as we readjusted to being on shore, but that was about it.


April 22 (Thur)

I am already starting to forget the days of the week. Yesterday we interviewed a bunch of students. I got a cold, probably from staying in my hot stuffy room for so many hours. Constant succession of illnesses. But now I'm okay again.

I'll tell you about my day today. It's not exactly a typical day - not much work, and still haven't started teaching classes yet - but it might give you some idea of the ship.

Last night we gained another hour so I stayed up a little later than usual. I got up late, missing breakfast, and went up to the pool deck. It was sunny and really humid - so different from a week ago! - so I went for a quick swim. The pool deck also has all the outdoor tables and chairs for the restaurant, so after swimming I could get my lunch and sit out to eat it. Some of the other teachers came and went while I was there so I kind of ate with half of them.

The lunch buffet today consisted of:
-the usual salad - cabbage, lettuce, tomato, etc
-potato salad
-some other weird seaweedy salad
-the usual watery soup, today's with tofu and a slightly spicy flavour
-chicken teriyaki
-baked cheese-covered vegetables
-spaghetti with cod roe
-broccoli and shrimp
-bread/rice
-tea/coffee

After lunch we had a couple of meetings to plan events and look through the resources in the classrooms, etc.

Our last meeting finished a bit early so I snuck into the tail end of an Okinawan shamisen lesson that was happening in the kids' room. Lots of elderly Japanese people learning to play, and doing Okinawan dancing. They tried to teach me the dancing but I was a bit of a spaz.

All over the ship are different 'event spaces' that can be used for all kinds of random events. Any person on the ship can hold their own event. As teachers, our schedules conflict with most of them, but we can still attend a few.

Then we had our port orientation for Vietnam, where we'll arrive tomorrow, while the sun set outside our window again. (The sun set about half an hour earlier than two days ago, I feel...)

After the port orientation I went into the free space area and there was the end of a Mario Cart session (people were playing Wii Mario Cart on the big screen). Me and E, a fellow teacher from England sat hopefully in the audience hoping we'd be allowed to play, and sure enough, the commentator saw us and invited us to play in the final round. (There are advantages to being the only foreigners sometimes. ^_^)

It was pretty funny because the organiser of this 'event' had a microphone and was commentating like it was a real race. Once me and E joined, it became an 'INTERNATIONAL RACE' and the competitors were from Japan, England, and Australia, world championships. Ha ha ha... (For the record, I came second out of four. ^_^)

After that me and E migrated to the nearby go tables. 'Go' is a Japanese game using black and white counters on a board. These go tables are usually occupied solely by old Japanese men. E knew a simple version of go, where you have to try to get five of one colour in a row. It's like a fancy version of tic-tac-toe. While we played, a couple of old Japanese men watched us intently. I felt the pressure. ^_^

We went to dinner. Man, I don't really like the dinners on this boat. They're just... very Japanese. And they all feel a bit the same. Tonight's meal was:
-bok choy
-grated yam (I love sitting next to our Spanish teacher; every time she tries some unfamiliar Japanese food she makes very expressive faces of disgust)
-rice
-seaweed soup
-stirfried pork with ginger, burdock salad
-optional 'noodle with a lot of ingredient' (for the record, there were not *that* many ingredients. We were kind of disappointed, ha ha ha)
-custard cake for dessert

After dinner I did a couple of things for work, then came back here. I have my own classroom now. I put up a few photos and a map in it. I made a little boat picture for the map, which I'll move as we travel. We don't get much news about the outside world, but there is a map each day we can check to see where we are.

The nice thing about being on this boat with all the other teachers is that you have ready-made companions for meals, trips to port, etc. I've had a few meals chatting to Japanese people and other guests too, but it's nice to have a core group; already we have lots of things to talk about

Tomorrow we arrive in Vietnam pretty early so I'll try get an early night. Goodnight!


April 23 (Fri)

It's rather windy outside, and so the ship is rolling again, stronger than ever. The last few days we had calm seas, so that often you were not even particularly aware you were on a boat. At the moment it's such that if you walk port or starboard (left or right) on the ship, you have the impression of either running downhill, or of trying to walk uphill, depending on the ship's angle at that particular second. It is stronger rolling than last time. I think I took my preventative seasickness pill in time this time, so so far, so good.

Our clothes hangers are swaying back and forth, and there's a risk of glasses sliding off tables.

Anyway... we went to Vietnam today! It was good fun. Eleven of us shared a van to Hoi An, a kind of touristy town that reminded me rather of Bali. One thing that struck me about this town compared with Japan is - in Vietnam heaps of people spoke to us, asked us questions, called out greetings - because without exception they all wanted to sell us something. In Japan, people are much more reserved and very few people will try to talk to you, but people are really interested in knowing about you.

Hoi An is known for its tailoring shops, and so most of us girls got at least one dress tailored for us. They did them fast too - only 3 hours and we came back to fetch them. I got a dress, a top and some pants made for me.

Vietnam was a bit more expensive than I thought - ie, I spent more money than expected - probably because I wasn't very good at bargaining. None of my usual techniques (start low, gradually concede; argue; walk away and wait for them to stop you) seemed to work.

Another highlight, apart from the clothes, was one of the teachers, G, hired a bicycle for the day. He had a conical Vietnamese hat on when we met him by chance, and he gave me a ride around town on the back of his bike, zipping around motorcycles, hitching rides from rickshaw drivers, chucking U-ys with ease.

We had the same experience in Xiamen, where we were walking around a famous spot and came across a big Japanese tour group from our boat. But it's so much nicer to get around by yourself.

Actually, I found out today that both the tours I thought I had signed up for, actually were fully booked and I am not on them. Now I don't mind much because I do like going around freely with the other teachers and having fun. But I do have some tour 'credit' I can use, ie go on a tour for free. So I ought to 'spend' some of it if there's a good opportunity.

Double hanami

I've taken a lot of photos of cherry blossoms this past week. The weather's been cold, which has been good because it's kept the trees in bloom for a little longer.

On the weekend I had two hanami. Hanami 花見, which means 'flower viewing', are parties where groups of people gather under cherry blossoms in parks, bring lots of food and drinks, and have a picnic in the freezing cold in the beautiful fresh spring weather. The fact that it is legal to drink alcohol in many public places in Japan enhances the jovial atmosphere, and on the weekend, every good 'cherry blossom' spot is a sea of tarps and friends.

Hanami are all the more special because cherry blossoms have such a short life. The trees are usually at their peak for only a week or so, though they may bear flowers for up to three weeks or so. As luck had it, they were at their best late last week, so the revellers were out in full force.

As I mentioned, I had two hanami on the weekend.

The first was with just three friends. The weather was cool but sunny and really nice. There were lots of other people nearby. One of our group arrived there three hours before the party to hold a good spot for us, near the weeping cherry tree.



After that party, we went out for drinks and snacks at an izakaya, followed by (my favourite thing ever) karaoke. ^_^ I discovered that if you sing Hirai Ken's 'Pop Star', people will do all the actions along with the music video. Ha ha ha...

On Sunday we had a mammoth hanami. A couple of our group got to the park at 6am (!! It was like 2 degrees!!) to get us a good spot. Apparently when they arrived, there were some drunk teenagers who had been there all night and were still wreaking havoc, at least until 7am or so, when they got arrested by the police. ^^;;

The Sunday hanami was kind of organised by some of the group I used to meet up with every week or two, but lots of other people came; there were over 20 of us, including some of my old co-workers and lots of my ex-students from various classes. The weather was much less pleasant for this one, though it didn't actually rain hard, I guess, while we were sitting out in the elements. Ha ha ha...