Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Weeks 11 & 12

During our stops in India, many people bought some of the local clothing (including me). One evening on the ship, some passengers were celebrating their 30th wedding anniversary and hosted a cocktail party, inviting about 100 people. The dress of the evening and for the event was our India clothing so we all had a chance to wear what will probably go in the costume box when we return home.





Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia was our next stop which is an absolutely beautiful capital city. Here are the Kings’ Palace gates and the words here are his full legal name!






The street lights throughout the city are this floral design.










Petronas Towers, the highest twin towers in the world, are located here.





Then we were off to Singapore for a two-day stay. It is an independent, island nation which seems to be very well run. They are a mix of neighboring cultures and have housing requirements in each neighborhood and building that integrate their people. This helps them get along well and there are no “bad” neighborhoods created from poorer classes. There is very little crime here as they punish severely. Drug possession is punishable with death. Their philosophy is that they will take this one life of a drug dealer rather than let him live and take thousands of other lives. Even jay-walking is a crime here with hefty fines.








I tried something new here – in some of the salons, they offer the chance to soak your feet in a tub of water filled with little fish that nibble all your dead skin off. You submerge your feet for 10 minutes and hundreds of them eat away – it drove me crazy! I was squealing and screaming. Some friends got me into a conversation so I would forget about what was going on and that helped for awhile but it’s not something I’m anxious to try again even though the bottoms of my feet were like baby’s skin afterwards. We found out there are places where you can do a “whole body nibble” bath – that’s not on my bucket list!

We then headed to Cambodia in the South China Sea. The sea is heavy with small fishing boats. Here we visited the local markets then went on a tour in a “tuk-tuk” their local version of a taxi. It was quite enjoyable and I see this as an area with beautiful beaches that is quickly developing tourism.





Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Week 10

Our next scheduled stop was to be a two-day visit to the Seychelles on March 6-7. However due to safety/security issues, the call was replaced with a visit to the Maldives, nearer to India. As it turned out, there was a Norwegian tanker ship capture by pirates near Madagascar (that general area) on March 6 so it was good we had taken another route. Maldives are islands that are basically Indian heritage that are very flat – so flat that as our glaciers are melting and the water levels in the oceans rising, they may soon have to evacuate their 80,000 people to another land. They are considering purchasing part of Australia to move their country there. Some friends & I went to their man-made beach on the main island and after about one hour, some female police officers came and informed us that women were not allowed in bathing suits and we had to put some cover up on. We did so, then left as it was too hot to stay in the sun with more clothing on as we were not allowed to even swim in our bathing suits – we would have to go in with all our clothing on. This is a Muslim custom. A lot of corruption was evident here as we spoke with others who were taken to islands for beaches and then had to come up with more than the contracted money to get a ride back in time before the ship left. We learn a lot as we travel! Following two more sea days, we arrived in Mumbai, India – formerly Bombay. The name was changed in the 90’s however even the people here still call it Bombay. The newspaper is the Bombay Times. It’s a city of 18,000,000 people. 65% are homeless or live in shanties like the shacks we saw in South Africa. It is hot & humid. Cows are sacred and are allowed to roam freely outside the city limits but must be tethered to something when they are within the city limits. While here I visited the Ghandi Museum, Gateway to India, had lunch at the Taj Hotel and had some custom clothing made. Many pax and crew bought traditional Indian kaftans and such here so there will be an evening designated where everyone will wear their new clothes. I’ll post photos of that later. The laundry service in Mumbai is quite unique. Men do all the "beating" of the laundry. There are women under the bridges that do all the ironing. I'll let the video speak for itself.

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Week 9

Week 9

As we traveled north on the coast of Africa from Capetown, we visited the ports of Pt. Elizabeth and Durban. In Port Elizabeth, I visited the “Townships” as they are referred to however we might recognize them more with the term shantys. It was an unflinching look at the living conditions and present-day lives of Africans who are neither wealthy or privileged. Our guide had grown up in this area and reminded us that these people do not know life any differently and are content with things.



We visited a school, grades K-12 where they face such challenges as poor attendance which they have resolved by offering one meal per day. Since oftentimes the children go without, this is the incentive that has brought them to attend on a regular basis. The government is working very hard to improve the conditions but have a long way to go. The World Cup Football (soccer in our terms) is being held in South Africa in June/July 2010 so much is being done in preparation for that which has provided jobs and incentive for improvements.


In Durban, I went looking for my pet giraffe (statue) which is a common souvenir item to purchase on African trips. I found mine – they say the face(s) have to talk to you. Not sure what they said but I am working on names for them. One man bought an 8 ft tall one!


Weather is constantly getting warmer as we head north towards the equator. We had some island stops at Reunion & Mauritius which are French influenced islands. Mauritius has great local markets with wonderful spices for purchase. It was the home of the now extinct DoDo bird.

Judy Williams who just retired from being a Personal Cruise Consultant with Holland America which is basically the same as my job except it is on land in the Seattle office, is sailing with us this cruise along with her friend Warren. We had dinner in our fine dining restaurant, the Pinnacle Grill and shared lots of work stories!


Thursday, March 4, 2010

Week 8





After all our sea days, we finally arrived in Walvis Bay, Namibia, Africa. It is my second visit to this lovely part of Africa. I went ashore with friends to the town of Swakopmund which has ties to Germany. When this area developed, they needed women to develop a society and since Germany was oftentimes at war, there were many widows and orphans looking for a new life so much of the architecture and lifestyle here is very European. The area is desert with mountainous sand dunes. Sports are very popular here that include sandboarding – like snowboarding but in the heat and down the sand dunes, 4-wheeling in the dunes and parasailing.

Our next port of call was Luderitz, Namibia. In the past this was very famous for diamond mining. The industry has ceased now as many of the diamonds were mined and the industry was proved to be very hard, inhuman labor used to do the mining so the town is hoping to bring in some tourism to help their economy.

As we made our way south to Cape Town, the CEO of Holland America was on board so there were special events happening around the ship. The highlight was an African Barbeque called a Braai on our Lido Deck (pool area). The crew spent 24 hours transforming the area to make it feel like we were in Africa and they did a fabulous job. It was a really fun evening with African cuisine and free drinks! Many of us donned our African garb and felt right at home in Africa.




This couple with me on Safari Night are Rhiya and Herbert. She works near me in the coffee bar, he is a cook in the Lido. They call me Mom. I really enjoy them.



Next we had a two-day stay in Cape Town, South Africa which gave many people the opportunity to visit the Cape of Good Hope. Sailing around the Cape oftentimes is rough seas and can be dangerous as there are lots of coral reefs but we were fortunate to have smooth sailing and our excellent Captain got us through the area safely & securely. Here there were game drives in park reserves, visits to Table Top mountain, Cape of Good Hope. Another tour offered is to tour Robben Island, where Nelson Mandella was imprisoned for so many years however the seas were to rough for the tours to get to it this time.