As you know Heidi and Kye were supposed to be with me this week, a week I fully had intended to spend with them and to enjoy some wonderful family time. I had booked a nice family hotel called The Loew’s and it was going to be just wonderful. Then Heidi had to go to Holland leaving me to argue with British Airways about refunds. And all of this resulted in my now well documented Grumpypants week.
When I was talking to James Charlton about being the cruise director on the Carnival Magic’s trans-Atlantic crossing I went through with him all the different things that I had learned during the three crossings I have done as CD. Things like you can never have too much trivia be as visible as you can and be ready to meet the one or two very cranky people who should in all retrospect be wearing T-shirts that shout loudly “Born To Moan.” That’s because while 95% of the guests will have the most wonderful time, ask any crew member who has done a crossing and they will tell you that they do tend to bring out one or two grumpy buggers. But so far, James has reported as has Calvyn that things are going well. Yes there have been the usual comments as Calvyn will report shortly plus the usual one about the lack of TV in the middle of the Atlantic. But overall it sounds like the majority of the guests are all having a great time.
Being here on Carnival Liberty has meant that I have seen people I haven’t seen for a long time both crew and guests. Yesterday I met a guest who last sailed with me on Carnival Triumph in 2003. “You look good,” he said. “I barely recognised you.” Er, thanks….I think. Then just this morning a guest who is an avid reader of the blog and a prominent poster on Facebook told me “You know what I really admire about you?” “What?” I asked, preparing to be flattered. “The way you don’t care about fashion,” he continued.
These comments are all brilliant examples of a lost art form………the compliment that really isn’t one and is in fact the complete opposite.
There is a group of 55 guests from Japan on this cruise and as always they have provided the rest of us with some fantastic sights, from their stunningly beautiful dresses and perfect makeup the ladies wear on elegant night. I think you might have to be Japanese though to understand Japan. It’s not like America, which you can pretty much understand with one mouthful of a Guy Fieri burger or understanding us Brits by learning how to cook Yorkshire Pudding.
Good morning from Cozumel, Mexico, and from the Lido Deck where I am sitting in the shaded part of the deck behind the brilliant new RedFrog Rum Bar. And bloggers, I have to say that sometimes I wonder how the heck we human beings have evolved as far as we have when almost every single decision we ever make is bordering on the insane. I will tell you specifically what I am referring to in a moment but how have we been able to get ahead of the animal kingdom? You do not see baboons smoking cigars like I did last night or sheep riding their Harley Davidson’s at high speed and not wearing a crash helmet. You don’t see penguins throwing huge amounts of salt over their fish and chips or a Gerald the Giraffe at Saks of 5th Avenue buying something he knows he can’t afford.
Apart from the odd bad diabetic low energy day and my bleeding hemorrhoid who has been with me since the Carnival Splendor’s delivery and whom I now call Horatio…….my time on the Carnival Magic was spent in relatively good health. Yes, my carpool tunnel thingy is ongoing and I will have more news on this shortly but overall I had a good four months. So it was then sod’s law that said the moment I stepped off the plane that would change. And it did.
It’s nearly time for me to go home and I shall talk about the ports and the ship herself in a moment. I will definitely miss the team here as they have been an absolute joy to work alongside. But as always they are younger than me and while we are friends and I would help them whenever asked, they will never become, well, you know…….best friends…..friends for life or BFF as spotty kids call it these days. Back when I was young, in the eighties, I spent every Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday with the same group of eight mates. We would go to the same pub together and drink, laugh, drink some more, laugh a lot more and at one point we even formed a band. We all knew that whatever life presented that we would all be friends forever.
This cruise is the first one for some weeks where we have very few children on board – 95 in fact. And while 94 of them are having a brilliant time in the ports of call and at Camp Carnival, Circle “C,” and Club O2, there is one 12-year-old here on the Carnival Magic who is doing none of the above…………and we shall call her Annie.
Here is a message from Annie’s mother.
JUST WHEN YOU THOUGHT IT WAS SAFE TO HAVE A MINUTE’S SILENCE!!
September 12, 2011 -
John Heald -
128 Comments
I do, now and then, talk about my friend and staff member Calvyn and indeed late in the blog I will be chatting about some of the other staff members here on the Carnival Magic. Calvyn is from another world. Now I don’t mean than he is from a strange planet like Jupiter or Uranus but from a world where fashion and behavior is strange to me………very strange.
In yesterday’s blog, we spoke about kids on our ships and I said how well behaved most of them are. Well, yesterday evening I went to Lido Deck for dinner at the alternative dining with one of the beards that is sailing this week and both she and I saw a child misbehave.
