Where we are

Tuesday, 26 February 2013


Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls, start your atlases:


we are

150 miles south of Yap

260 miles west of the Caroline Islands

deep in Micronesia, where people have hair like mine.

Depth under the keel = 3,660 meters or about 12,000 feet

As I write this, we have force 5 winds (breezy but you can stand upright) and have just come through a squall - very heavy rains and high winds.

The Equator sends its greetings.


While you are at it, check out the weather forecast for Northern Australia.  We are on the way to Cairns.

Dubai and Abu Dhabi

We were in Dubai for 2 days and the end of the first day was spent saying farewell to new acquaintances and friends.  Unfortunately, I had 3 appointments for the same time.  As you can tell, my memory is still not what it was before the accident and it’s imperative that I make a note and post it prominently.

On the second day, I took the shuttle bus to the Burjuman shopping center.  As I got on the bus, I met Mark who asked where I was going.  When I said the aquarium, he said that he was on his way there, too.  So, we travelled together.  He is a cheerful travelling companion – very funny, thoughtful and quiet at the right times. 

The “strip malls” along the way into town – the ground floor of offices and/or apartment buildings – had every American (1 Canadian = Tim Horton’s) fast food joint – KFC, Pizza Hut, Burger King, IHOP (I think) and of course, McD.

On the bus, I was lectured by a complete stranger about the wonders of the Metro – a form of transport I had not intended to use.  Mark, however, was convinced of the ease and efficacy, and after changing money at the top of the clean, clean, clean Burjuman over an endless supply of clean, clean, clean escalators, we headed out to the Metro station, also clean, clean, clean.  Day passes were about €3 / $4.

The metro is un-manned which un-nerved me at first but it was clean, actually clean and polished:  no trash (rubbish to some of you), no graffiti – none!, no plastic bits blowing into the corners – nothing, nada!   And, in about 10 minutes we arrived at the Burj Khalifa station, with a covered walkway to the mall. 

Once inside, after a long walk on moving sidewalks – go figure! – we got to the entrance of the mall, an enormous archway, very glitzy.  Just ahead of us was a young couple with a baby:  the man, about 25, dressed in deliberately worn jeans, Nike trainers, a tan, very expensive leather jacket¸someone at home in London or NY and his wife/sister dressed completely in black, with slits for her eyes, fashion-wise really only at home here, Saudi Arabia or Yemen.  I wonder if she can read and write and if the daughter she was holding will also be veiled.

The Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world, has an enormous mall with a gazillion shops at its base.  Most of the shops are well-known chains stores:  Gap, Banana Republic, Mango, Sony, Virgin Records, Sephora, and the upscale stores including Saks 5^th Avenue and Bloomingdales.

We walked in the direction of the aquarium, window shopping along the route – “look at all that gold”, checked out a jacket for me at Gap and a knitted jacket for him.  I visited the tourist “souk” inside the mall – a really silly idea but air conditioned.

When we got to the enormous aquarium Mark was rather blasé about it but I dragged him in past the giant windows into the tunnel where we stood surrounded on 3 sides by giant rays, sharks (one of which had a bit of flesh or thong dangling from his front teeth) and other fish which manage to live with the sharks.  For me, the rays were the most amazing – easily the width of my outstretched arms with the grace which belies their strength.  We were there for almost an hour, standing still, “ooh-ing and ahh-ing”, look up, look behind you, look at that!!!”

Abu Dhabi is like a restrained Dubai.  Perhaps that is why they were able to help Dubai financially – they did not overspend.  There is a beach, all along the road from the container terminal into the city and lots of trees and very green grass.  But, I never saw anyone swimming.  I did some shopping at the Carrefour (paper towels, post cards, contact lens solution, Pear’s soap) and hurried back to the ship.  Enough of oil money excess!

Shanghai, well not really

Last year, due to the ad hoc nature of my voyage, I did not have a visa for China so was confined to the ship.  This year, I first got the visa for India knowing that I would not be allowed on the ship without it.  And, then simply ran out of time as I did not want to give up my passport so close to the departure date.

So I called Cunard in Southampton, spoke to a lovely man who said that the pursers would get it for me on the ship.  He said that I should ask them as soon as I boarded in Southampton and they could apply in the UK, and it could be picked up on the return in January or it could be applied for in Dubai and picked up in Hong Kong.

I got on the ship, asked the pursers and no one had a clue.  So, the visa was never applied for and I am not allowed off.  There are worse things.  None of the American crew members is allowed off, but there are so many different stories about why that no one knows which to believe.

What I found interesting was a notice that China will not allow anyone who is coughing to enter and if caught in China, that person will be quarantined.  The word comes from Italian – quarantigioni – which means 40 days.  When the plague swept through Europe in the 14^th century, the Venetian Republic required ships to anchor away from the city and not unload for 40 days – enough time for the disease to be cured or for the sailors to die.  Forty days in a Chinese hospital jail – oh joy!

All ships under quarantine had to fly a yellow flag – a rule still in force today.  According to the daily program, a yellow flag is still carried aboard QM2.

During the Christmas holiday voyage, with the many cases of Norovirus aboard, there were fears among some of the passengers that the ship would not be able to dock in New York.  Let’s see – quarantine aboard ship, quarantine in a Chinese jail, quarantine aboard ship, quarantine in a Chinese jail – duh!!

Aside from the obvious of not wanting to do anything in a Chinese jail, an incident yesterday morning convinced me that I really do not want to do anything in China.

While walking through the Grand Lobby yesterday morning, I encountered a group of Chinese visitors, in their 20’s, dressed in blue uniforms with beautifully embroidered letters and characters on the back of their jackets.  I asked if I could photograph the characters and a young man graciously assented.  As I did; I noticed a “minder” photographing me so I then photographed him photographing me photographing him.  This could have gone on for hours – actually it did for 3 rounds of photographs but then the head minder, in a dark blue suit barked what sounded like an order and they all left, two by two.  The photo I took will end up on the blog.  What do you suppose will end up with the photo of me?  Yeh, I think so, too.

 

PS:  I know there are some stops missing and I will fill in the gaps starting tomorrow.  We will have 6 or 7 sea days – my favorite.

LECTURERS: the excellent, the good, the bad and the positively horrible

Cunard presents lecturers on many different subjects, most of which should be interesting, at least interesting to the presenter.  Many of the lectures are taped and shown on the tv, on a loop from 5 pm until, in some cases I am sure, the tape breaks.

My opinion, in reverse order:

Lecturers who use power point and read the screen verbatim – the “destination” lectures which should have been interesting but were mostly horrible

Lecturers who have been giving the same talk for years and are bored with the subject but, what the hell, it’s a free trip on the QM2

Lecturers who have complete disdain for the audience – arrogant snobs who feel themselves to be keepers of knowledge which, of course, no one else has.  Yesterday, the lecturer on Irving Berlin and his music sang over the clips he played, also neglecting to identify most of the singers on the clips.  It should be a crime to sing (gurgle) over Ella Fitzgerald and then not even mention her name. 

Perhaps it should be considered a “talent” to make a subject as fascinating as the role of women at the court of the Ottoman sultans so dry that it became painful but the lecturer managed it with apparent ease

Contrast that with the astronomers who have been, without exception , excellent speakers with a thorough knowledge of their subject and who lectured without notes and with presentations guaranteed to grab our attention and hold it long after the lecture was over.

In addition to giving fascinating lectures, Tom Boles took a group of us on deck, had the Commodore douse the lights and then showed us how to navigate our way around the sky as well as use the stars to navigate around the Earth.  He stayed much longer than planned, answered all our questions, challenged us with some of his own and insured that we will think of him whenever we look up at night.

Of course it helps that I have been interested in astronomy for most of my life.

My interest in the Middle East began in high school, with the International Relations Club, founded and supported by Mrs. Elsie Brown Smith, my 10^th grade English teacher and
family friend all my life.  We learned about different countries and were welcomed in many of the embassies over 3 years.

This interest was heightened when we lived in Turkey and watched the beginnings of the civil war in Lebanon as well as the Turkish terrorist group, the Gray Wolves, which blew up two of my former colleagues at the Turkish-American Association where I had given English lessons.

So, you can imagine my excitement when I saw that there would be lectures on the Middle East as well as the Crusades, and the connection of the 2.

Lt General Simon Mayall, Chief Advisor to HM Government, did what so few can – he made history come alive.  My grandfather always told us that history was a novel lived by real people and thanks to Simon, the real people involved in the Middle East, then and now, became real, warts and all.  I not only attended all the lectures and took notes,  I watched the lectures again as often as possible in the evenings.  Simon packed so much more information into the allotted time than the usual speakers that I am still working on some of the notes.  All of us emerged with a much greater appreciation for events in the news every day and the multiple answers to the question, “cui bono?”. 

Thanks, Simon.  You showed how it should be done.

 

 

TGT and the common cold

T,
Thanks for the postcard.  Your English was perfect - you must have had a good trainer!

I have a cold - not the worst of my life, just bad timing.  It ruined my stay in Hong Kong but it will allow me some time to catch up on the blog.  Watch this space.  Photos to follow.  In the meantime, lemon and ginger tea and honey - it's so horrible it must be good for me.

ELIO PACE

In all the months I have been on this ship, I have seen 4, perhaps 5 shows.  One of them was completely against my will to see a magician/ comedian who was neither amusing nor interesting.  However, I have seen 3 musical acts which were excellent – the best by far is Elio Pace.

He sang, played the piano, including Billy Joel’s ROOTBEER RAG, a very fast and extremely difficult piece, explained the songs he sang starting with Clyde McPhatter’s FOOLS FALL IN LOVE.  Elio is the consummate entertainer who carried us along for 45+ minutes on a wave of positive energy culminating in a spontaneous standing ovation at the end of each of his performances.

If you know the Terry Wogan show (unfortunately I do not), you will know Elio – he was music director, band leader, singer, pianist, arranger and, and and.

He would be perfect on a permanent or semi-permanent basis (the trans-Atlantic voyages, perhaps ??).  Are you listening, Entertainment Department??

 

The Suez Canal, Soknha and Safaga

 

If I had it to do all over again, I would be an engineer and design magnificent projects like the Bay Bridge or the Suez Canal.

In case you have never seen the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, it is long and high with very strong winds all the time.  Even experienced drivers (including my brother) preferred not to drive over it.  The state of Maryland provides drivers whose only job is to drive your car, with you cowering on the floor (or walking across??), to the other side of the bridge.

This was my dream job (as well as ballerina, vet, fashion designer and baker) when I was about 10.  My grandmother smiled and said, knowing that I would opt for another career, that once I had finished university I could certainly become a bridge driver.

At the Suez Canal, we waited through the night for a convoy to form and then the QM2 led the convoy through the canal.  Towards the end of the trip, the Commodore ordered the sounding of the ship’s horn, from the original RMS QUEEN MARY, to salute the crowds ashore who had come down to see us.

The canal scenery is lots of sand punctuated by watch towers and, occasionally, an oasis of grass, papyrus, palm trees and a mosque.

We had a commentary as well as lectures given by an expert, thoroughly knowledgeable, but one who reads his power point slides – verbatim.

Do speakers thin the audience is illiterate or senile – well, maybe senile and deaf on this ship.  But, it’s insulting and frankly (in case I wasn’t frank enough) stupid.  How much better to show a picture, photo and/or graph and explain it rather than to put up sentences and then read them to the audience.

The canal was full of small ships and …jellyfish – very large jellyfish.  They appeared to be white or gray, to have a large bell, then a thick stalk and a frilly pedestal on the bottom.  And, they were lying mostly on their sides.

Egypt is probably fascinating, especially the pyramids, but what I saw around the ship was distressing:  trash, dead animals, open sewers and children playing around all of the above.  All the tours on offer came complete with an armed military escort, not my idea of a holiday.  So, I stayed on board or walked across the dock to the merchants allowed in the port.

Safaga:  sounds like a skin disease.  Apparently this area is responsible for supplying flying insects to the rest of Egypt, or the entire Middle East.  Several of the little bastards woke me about 2 hours before I was ready to get up.

Thanks to wonderful conversationalists I met, my nights have been very long.  In this case, I trundled back to my stateroom about 3:30 am, was in bed about an hour later and so decided to leave the balcony door open.  Small, gnat-like flies which didn’t seem to land woke me about 7:30!!

So, up, shower, look at photos of the snow in Germany contrasted with the beautiful blue of the Red Sea.

 

 

Heraklion

 

„It’s an ill wind which blows no one good“

On the way to Athens, planning to dock as usual at the port of Piraeus, we ran into heavy winds.  QM2 maneuvers without tugboats but her sheer size means that many older harbors present a challenge even in good weather.

With strong winds, maneuvering can become dangerous to impossible.  So Heraklion/Iraklion, Crete was selected as an alternative port.  What luck!

The ship’s documentary tv station has recently presented a National Geographic program, “Planet Volcano” which included a speculative segment about why the very advanced Minoan culture on Crete vanished completely, leaving buildings but no bodies.  The authors think the massive explosion of the volcano, Thera, on Santorini island, just across the water, was responsible for the destruction of the Minoan culture.  The pyroclastic flow and ash cloud buried the cities and the best guess is that the inhabitants were evacuated, by ship but were then caught in a tsunami, which would also account for the Biblical story of the “parting” of the Red Sea. 

The change was apparently decided upon about 3 pm and within 4 hours, the daily program had been changed and printed, tours to Knossos had been arranged, shuttle busses had been organized to get us out of the port area.

Heraklion was also prepared for the maiden visit of the largest cruise ship to enter the harbor.  The shuttle bus carried us through the secure area of the harbor and then we could take a taxi or as I did walk to the city center. 

My ankle is temperamental – it doesn’t always hurt and the swelling goers down when I sleep so I assume that I am just too fat for my feet, and get on with life.

First order of business in the town – post cards and stamps.  I sat on a bench across from Starbuck’s (which I refuse to patronize until they pay their taxes) to write the inevitable post cards.  A busker playing rather a tired accordion began to play “Oh, Susanna” and suddenly there was a sing-along with the other Americans going up and down the street.

Visited a small orthodox church, an even smaller Catholic church, the fruit and vegetable market, the town square and passed by a gazillion souvenir shops:  large, beautifully embroidered pictures of ships, harbors, fish and more refrigerator magnets than I have ever seen in one place.

There are bits of history all overt Heraklion.  Crete has been home to the Dorians (of Doric column fame), the Romans, Saracens, Venetians, Turks and even a 4-year occupation by the Nazis.  The gene pool must be a geneticist’s dream. 

Parts of the harbor walls date from the 16^th and 17^th centuries but as I wandered through the side streets, I was astonished at the “3^rd world” appearance:  graffiti, rubbish, piles of cigarette butts (auto ashtrays dumped?) and plastic rubbish in all shapes and sizes.

One of the lecturers last year talked about plastic in the food chain.  Plastic in the water is eaten or nibbled on by fish, generally small ones which are, in turn, eaten by the fish we eat.  He suggested that we stop eating fish from 2015 because the oceans and fish will be saturated with plastic by then.  OK, tofu, here I come!

Greece

Wednesday:

Horror of horrors – the Commodore announced that (1) we might not be able to enter the harbour at Pireaus because of the gales we are currently sailing through, and (2) because we normally load fresh water there, we should be extra careful with the use of water.

Did I ever mention the launderettes aboard?  On several floors, there are washers and dryers, usually 4 of each, as well as 2 irons and ironing boards.  Normally this would be a cause for rejoicing unless your stateroom is near said launderette.  It can become the human equivalent of the animal watering hole only much louder as people hang around and speak over the noise of the machines.

 

Barcelona

Barcelona!!

If there is one thing I know, and I do, traveling with a man, almost an man, is infinitely easier than traveling with a woman, any woman.

In Barcelona, I was lucky enough to have Neal as my walking companion.  I sent an email asking if he could recommend a witty and intelligent man to accompany me, and lo and behold! he knew I meant him.

As we didn’t start until 1 pm, and as I needed to find a post office, we headed to Las Ramblas – a boulevard-sized street with a large island in the middle.  The island is broad enough for stands, especially for flowers, bulbs and seeds, cut flowers, plants and souvenirs.

Because I had bought souvenirs and a guide book years before, I refrained this time and just enjoyed the sights and sounds – a cool, but bright and sunny day.

Neal is an extraordinary musician with an encyclopedic knowledge of music so, of course, we looked at musical instruments but got chased out, very gently – siesta time.  There was a hunter-green trombone and any number of very good guitars – I was tempted but didn’t get one.  Instead, we went to FNAC, an electronics store and with his help, I got some very good speakers for my ipod and computer:  Mitch Ryder and The Detroit Wheels with lots of boom!!

 

 

 

Help??

For reasons I do not understand, I have not been able to post. Let's try this!