Only 6 weeks after we got back, I’ve finally finished putting up all the stories written during our trip (there are some other notes, but I’ll probably save them for the book).
Looking back, I think I need to count how many words I wrote for this vacation – I think I’ve got a personal record here!
I discovered that when I first put it up, “The Cheescake Affair” had been cut off (it didn’t actually include any cheesecake). That has been fixed now.
Editor’s Note: There are sentiments in this post that appear to have been superseded by current events that originated in Amsterdam, where we flew out of; I have left it unaltered as a memory of what it felt like at the time – I also think it emphasizes even more just how sophisticated the latest attempt actually was
After touring the Mediterranean, returning to Barcelona felt almost like going home – it was familiar, we knew the layout. It also reinforced just how nice Barcelona and its quirks are.
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I’ll openly admit it – I underestimated Malta. From the start I had considered it the poor stepchild of our trip. I looked at the map before we started out and decided it was obvious – the reason why we were stopping there was to break up the trip home. After all what does Malta have? Aside from the fact that for some reason their Falcons are famous, and after 500 years they still haven’t forgiven Turkey for throwing their ancestors out, there doesn’t seem to be much.
This is why you take a cruise, you end up going places you weren’t interested in, then you wonder if you want to leave – Malta is beautiful.
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This ship is beginning to make me feel a bit paranoid. My stomach has been just slightly off for the morning, however between the way we were bounced around for hours on Egyptian roads for the last two days, and the fact that today the swell is producing whitecaps and the boat has definite movement, it is probably just a bit of motion sickness. It doesn’t keep me from worrying, though.
We were sitting out on the back deck last night talking to an older couple originally from Norway, now residing in Boston. They had spent the day exploring Alexandria, but had cancelled the trip to Cairo the day before, because the lady had been so sick they couldn’t do it. She told us she has never washed her hands so many times in her life, but still came down with the illness. She is beginning to wonder if it was the apple tea in Turkey, because she had talked to three other people who also got sick and also had apple tea (it sure makes our choice of Raki look smarter). Now I’m wondering if the coffee I had in Egypt was a mistake – you can never know if they boiled the water enough.
Anyway, enough about illness. There is a much more important topic to discuss these days: the cheesecake crisis. Ling is quite annoyed with the ship, she has given it several chances in case it was an off-day, but to no avail. Apparently the cheesecake is not cheesy enough here.
You have no idea how much it annoys her to have cheesecake available, but not good enough to eat. She’s actually turned to other deserts to try and work off her frustration, but it is no good. Only cheesecake will do, and she can’t have it. Our only hope is that Malta makes a good one.
I spent the entire night dreaming that our original flight to Amsterdam had been delayed by 8 hours, and I was trying to explain to Northwest Airlines that was unacceptable, because we were going to miss our connecting flight. It was a relief when the alarm woke me up.
We packed, left the room, and joined everybody for breakfast. I had a nice Egyptian omelette for breakfast, along with some Egyptian swiss cheese and a side of Egyptian country fried potatoes.
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Once in a while in a tour group you get that one person with a personality that brings the whole group to life. We had one of these people on our excursion through Cairo – Paul. We had actually met Paul earlier on the trip, during our tour of Athens. On that bus he and his wife had sat in the seats across the aisle from us. Boarding in Alexandria, he got on the bus, spied us and loudly announced “oh no, I don’t think I can tour another city sitting beside those guys,” then promptly sat down with his wife right beside us.
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I woke up this morning wondering how much getting sick on a cruise comes down to luck, and how much comes down to care and attention.
Walking through the corridors to get to the cafeteria I noticed a bad smell outside one of the cabins – later I realized I recognized that smell; it meant somebody inside was really, really sick. The cafeteria is still giving us “silver service” where the staff serves us – we aren’t allowed to touch anything. While lined up for coffee I had a guy in one ear telling me this was all to save money, while listening in the other ear to a lady telling the staff that they needed to cleanup the back deck, and her family had gone downstairs to call medical.
I never thought that heading into Cairo I would be able to relax a little bit about getting sick!
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I’ve always been a bit paranoid about health on a ship, but I have to admit that the current situation has really upped the ante. To make sure I wash my hands completely I find myself doing what we teach kids: saying the ABC’s while I do it. Then I leave the restroom and immediately head to a sanitation station, just to make sure I am clean. To be safe, I am also ensuring I regularly take a disinfectant internally, to keep my stomach clean (its a Chilean version of my favourite internal sanitizer).
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The phone to our cabin rang at 1 AM this morning. When I answered it, an operator said there was a call coming in for Ling Lu, would we accept it.
I was barely awake, but my heart sank – there was only one reason someone would be calling, something had happened. There was some disaster, I didn’t want to think about what.
I said yes we would accept it, and handed the phone to Ling. She told me later the guy on the other line was asking “do you remember me?” She was confused, kept saying this is Ling, and finally got out of the guy on the other end that it was a wrong number – he was looking for someone who’s name sounded like hers. I wonder if he’s been looking for a while – on the first night the phone rang as well, but we couldn’t find it in time to answer it.
I still don’t know what happened – I am sure the operator said the name correctly, I’m wondering if she sound the best match on the ship’s registry?
Once we found that it was a wrong number we both heaved a huge sigh of relief.
But it was hard getting back to sleep after that scare.
House of the Virgin MaryThere was a point today where I realized I was walking down the original marble main street in the Biblical city of Ephesus, carrying a jar of holy water I had just filled up at the Virgin Mary’s stream.
There is no conclusion I can draw from this – it is just a moment where you have stop and realize this is what you are doing. This is the city where St. Paul was arrested and sent to be executed. This is the city where Cleopatra and Mark Antony took their honeymoon. The City where Mary lived her last years. I am walking down its main street.
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