MARCH 31, 2008 – HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO DANI TOMORROW

We woke up after 8 am after going to sleep after midnight. I’m stuck on this new book; it shouldn’t take long to finish as it’s 200+ pages. Ed went to exercise and I’m finishing this so I can upload it. There isn’t much going on this morning except for Trivia at 11:15 am. It’s a slow day this afternoon too.

MARCH 30, 2008 – SUNDAY BRUNCH

We woke a little after 6 am and I got up and pulled together the laundry.
LAUNDRY: there were 3 people on one side of the hallway and two on the other when I arrived at the laundry room before it opened. The folks who were there seemed not to understand when I asked them who was the last one in line. “You” they answered. It took a while to figure out that two of them were only visiting with others in the line. When the door opened, the three in line ahead of me secured all the machinery so I worked my crossword puzzle until washers became available. Several folks dropped by and seeing the flurry of activity in the room, left. A few folks came only to use the ironing boards.
Ed brought the rest of the laundry for me after a while. I eventually secured 4 washers (3 devoted to dark clothes) and later 4 dryers. Ed went to eat and returned with the clean bags we put our laundry into; we folded, he ironed the shirts the way he wanted them, and I hung my permanent press to air dry in the room. All of this was accomplished by 9:15 am so while you all know how much I hate the laundry process on this ship (and others too), it wasn’t the worst. Well there was one peculiar thing that happened. I was sitting waiting for a dryer to finish; there isn’t any sound to let you know. A lady came in, and somehow saw that the dryer had just ended and asked me if it was mine. I came right over, and she said: you know we can take the clothes out when the dryer stops. I tried to explain to her that I was right there and it had just stopped. She repeated her mantra, this time with a smile, but the oddest part of it was that she didn’t want to use a dryer nor was there anyone else around who did!
There must be something in the air of that room.
CULINARY DEMONSTRATION: It is fun to watch him make all this stuff and give little hints. He will be putting all of the recipes he’s been using, and which aren’t already in the cookbook we purchased, into a book which we will get as a souvenir at the end of his demonstrations. We will get our certificates delivered to our cabins and we can bring them to have our photos taken with him by the ship’s photographer on the last day he has a program. He’s still working on the book of recipes from passengers and he’s clearly having fun with the recipes.
TRIVIA: 3 of us were in place and ready to go when the questioning began; the other 3 slid in and were in place by about question #3. One of the men was the scribe today and I think he developed a new appreciation of how annoying that task can be with everyone giving him instructions. As it turned out, he put down an answer different than the one the group had decided on. And as luck would have it, the answer the group wanted but he hadn’t put down, was the correct one. The perfectionists among us never have time to double check the answers before we turn over our papers for grading to another group. This last minute flurry of demands for their favorite answer to be put down for a question is crazy making. One person reminded us that they had the correct answer for one question and the group didn’t take it. That person seems to have forgotten those times when their answer WAS taken by the group and it was dead wrong.
Well the “nice people” won again today. This group is the one Fr. Austin tells everyone, “We’re all geniuses on this team you know.” I saw him on the stairwell and he gave me a good hint I’ll pass along: when going on a trip, put the address of your destination on your luggage tag. When returning home, change it to your home address. This team was allowed to choose the “prize” they wanted from a selection in a bag; Father chose a luggage tag. In the course of our conversation, he “donated” his luggage tag from today’s trivia to me. I’m delighted; we don’t have any of these and I’ll remember him each time we use it.
BRUNCH: Today is the Sunday brunch and Commandatore visits with folks in the dining room. The food is sumptuous and there’s something for everyone. We sat at a table with other trivia players and bridge players; one of our team members is the husband of a bridge player. She was going to be on our team but the bridge wears out her brain so she sent her husband to be on our team.
We sat and thought of all these trivia questions that haven’t been asked but would be good, such as: “What country in the world has the most camels?” It’s Australia: they export them to the Middle East.
LIFE IN SPACE; LIFE ON EARTH: this presentation by astronaut and Scientist Rusty Schweickart was well attended as you might expect. His photos are gorgeous and not easily found; many of them were of space within the past few days. I wonder what site he uses to get them. He talked about his experiences and the current program, pros and cons. For example, there’s no advantage to building a station on the moon to be a supply depot for other missions. Then he responded to some very interesting questions from the audience. Clearly this speaker is non-controversial. He will be giving one or two more speeches while he’s with us.
OTHER BLOGGERS: Here’s another blogger from this cruise: http://www.sbrmaim.blogspot.com . this might give you another perspective in our experiences. I haven’t checked it out yet.
PACIFIC PRINCESS BOOK CLUB: I went to see Amber, the staff person who handles the book club, returned the Kite Runner, the most recent book, and explained that I couldn’t attend today because the time conflicts with the two speakers this afternoon. She gave me a copy of the next book for the club, and it is one I’ve been curious about: Into the wild by Jon Krakauer. It is being made into a movie.
THREE OR MORE TENORS: This was a discussion about Opera again. He focused on Placido Domingo after discussing (and clarifying) his remarks about the castrati who were early singers of opera. He mentioned Pavaroti but I had to leave for trivia so I missed his remarks about him. His lecture will be on the ship’s TV so I hope to see the parts I missed.
NEEDLEPOINT: I’ve been making several needlepoint projects based on kits you can get here on the ship. Unfortunately, the only kits left are the ones I’ve now made 3 of. They may get some others before the cruise ends. I’m enjoying trying different stitches and as I’ve told you before, I do not put Princess Cruises into the stitches as the canvas shows.
TRIVIA: some folks stayed to finish the opera lecture so there were some groups with different compositions this afternoon. One of the members of the “Four Nations” group did the trivia today. I like this fellow and his was the least disliked of those done by folks other than the staff. Still, our group tied another group with a score of 9! (this gives you an idea of the questions we were dealing with). So there was a tie breaker: In 2002, out of every 10 businessmen interviewed by (I’ve forgotten the name of the men’s magazine), how many said they had cheated at golf. I said 7; one of our members said 9 and pushed for it, so we settled on that number though some thought it too high. The actual answer is 8 and since our group had the number closest to the correct answer, we won. One of the members of the newly constituted group, the same group with which we were tied, said to one of our members, something about remember, you won with only 9 correct answers. I hope this was kidding rather than a snide remark; I don’t recall ever seeing the speaker before.
We were given luggage tags, a first for us! So I asked Father if he wanted his luggage tag back. He laughed and said no, and asked if I wanted passport holders. I told him we’d always put them to good use among the family, so he gave me two more and asked me if I needed any baseball caps. I chuckled and told him we were OK in that department. We do have fun with him.
SABATINI’S TONITE: there’s a special restaurant on board that is supposed to be special to go to. It requires reservations and there is a charge of $20 per person for it. I told Ed I’d go once on this voyage since it’s important to him; I think the food in the dining room is just fine and very good. We joined Phyllis and Ralph, the couple who sailed for 6 yrs alone on a small boat and Ralph is the one who gave a talk on solar power. So this will gave us a change to really visit and talk about stuff we’ve been saving up.
The meal is several courses and all Italian. Even though the servings are modest, it’s still a lot of food. Since I’m not crazy about most of the seafood dishes, I had less trouble with the amount of food. The dessert was my downfall however. I had panna cotta (sp). A funny thing: the dessert tray is brought around and the portions are on the small side, so you make your selection. When your dessert actually arrives however, it is a much larger portion than you picked on the dessert tray. The food was good but I still like the dining room just fine. We had a nice wine with dinner; I couldn’t tell you much more about it.
This couple is a wonderful visiting experience. He worked as an engineer with NASA and Boeing; he still does some consulting. His wife is equally accomplished but I can’t recall the details. They have 3 children who all live near them in the Seattle, Puget Sound area; they actually live on an island there. They have two grandchildren there.
When they sailed for 6 yrs, their children became closer and began to celebrate holidays and special occasions in each other’s homes, a tradition which continues now. All of them have very responsible jobs and are in their late 40s, early 50s.
They also lived in the East Side of New Orleans for several years when he had a job related to the Saturn project (I think), so we talked a lot about that city then and now. Their years there were very happy ones and they lament the recent problems there.
He went to China in 1979 to consult and study the space related programs and equipment China had at that time. This was so interesting in view of how early it was, about 4 yrs. After Nixon was there, and how advanced much of their knowledge was at that time. The society wasn’t very advanced however, and the Mao suits were still the clothing worn by all. He went again in 1982 (?) and Phyllis went with him. The wives on that trip visited the soldiers in Xian and were allowed to actually stand among them, something I’m sure is unthinkable today.
Many couples have remarked that the conversation at their dinner table was exhausted long ago and they are hungry for what almost all spontaneously call “intelligent conversation”. We described how “active” our table is when all eight are present and what a miracle it is that someone hasn’t come to blows given our political split and strong opinions, some documented better than others. But they were a very bright, intelligent couple and we discussed such a wide range of topics; it didn’t hurt that our politics are similar.
ENTERTAINMENT: When you go to Sabatini’s, due to the number of courses of food (and the conversation!), you don’t leave early. We got there at 6:30 pm and didn’t leave until they almost had to kick us out after 10. The show tonite was something I would have enjoyed, a Billboard charted artist, but the conversation and experience more than made up for it.
Many of us have remarked on this trip about the fact that while we’ve had some illnesses and injuries that have required that someone leave the ship in an earlier port, all of the people have returned and are on board now. The rumor mill had the death rate during this voyage up to seven before it was discussed with one of the staff who assured all that there had been none; this is also quite unusual considering the length of the voyage and the age of the passengers. We continue to be amused by how much bigger, taller, older, etc. stories become as they traverse the rumor mill.
And they can accommodate almost anything in that medical clinic downstairs, which by the way, is never without patients waiting during it’s open hours. That doesn’t include the events that are responded to outside of clinic hours.

MARCH 29, 2008 – 4 MORE SEA DAYS

We woke up sometime around 8 am and drug around until later to get ready. Because of the lecture this morning, Ed said he wasn’t going to exercise.
UNDERSTANDING FOREIGN POLICY – MAYBE… This was presented by Robert R. Fritts, University Senior Fellow (College of William and Mary) and former US foreign service officer. What I found fascinating is that everyone with whom I spoken so far, heard him and folded his remarks into what they wanted to hear. Basically he presented a model for how to look at foreign policy. One of the components was morals, represented in his scheme by a large capital “M”. He then used the Iraqi war to demonstrate how morals were the guiding principle in the initiation of the war. Then he put a large slash through this M and said realism is what is now operating. I’m over simplifying his remarks. He presented as one would in the classroom where you provide the students with one idea, and then give them it’s opposite pole to consider.
He is not a defender of the Bush administration or strategy from what I heard, but the die hard Bush supporters seemed to have interpreted what he said that way. As an aside, one of this latter group was talking with another individual about Scott Ritter and she said she thought it was “reprehensible” that Princess had him speaking and she had complained strongly about him.
This speaker will be giving many more talks and so it will be very interesting to see how the “audience” responds to his other talks. I’ll keep you posted.
TRIVIA: We were all present. This was a tough one; we didn’t even fall into the top 3. As usual, there were some answers we had batted around but didn’t put down in the end. I really dislike the last minute flurry of changes in our group. Ed was the scribe today; he’s never really happy if anyone else is the scribe though I’m not sure he recognizes this fact. I learned long ago not to be the scribe if Ed and I are in the same group because I would kill him someday when he told me to write something differently, or just as often, hanks the page from me, erases and changes the entry.
Anyway, the prizes today were can covers again so it’s just as well.
LUNCH: Father Austin, Bill and Lea were at the table with us. We talked about undocumented immigrants, no fault car insurance, and much more. The time passed much too quickly.
AFTERNOON NAP: For Ed that is. I left to do some other things. I had asked him yesterday about reorganizing our luggage and he had said he wanted to go to the movie, South Pacific, which was being shown at 2 pm to 5 pm today. So I gave up on all that. I went to the movie at 2 pm and saved Ed a seat. By 3:15, I decided to leave. I went to the room where Ed had left a message about planning to do the luggage but I wasn’t there. I don’t know where he was.
INTERNET CAFÉ: I went up here to catch up on email and had to wait in a line. The first cubicle opened up and the mag stripe wouldn’t take my card. So I let the next person try it and soon enough I went to the next cubicle. Same story. Eventually, I got the card to work at the 3rd cubicle. The fellow who had been using this one had a wet bathing suit so I sat in that while I cleaned out my email. In the interim, Ed had come in to do his email also. By this time, it was time to go to
TRIVIA: We had a different staffer reading the questions today, a young lady from India. You can tell this was a hard one; the group that won had only 10 points; we had 9. One of the questions was interesting: true or false: a “rosary” is a place where roses grow. Fortunately one of our group asked her to spell it. R o s e r y so the answer was True. Many groups hadn’t listened to the spelling and so most got it wrong. There were other really tough ones. We consoled ourselves because the prizes this afternoon were again can covers.
DINNER: Everyone except Hank and Erna were here. We discussed the first speaker of the morning. This is kind’ve tip toe conversation because we are all across the spectrum politically. We also got into talk about Turkey and Atta Turk, Israel, Abba Ebin…well you can imagine. We might touch on anything.
ENTERTAINER: For tonite is a magician. Ed loves that stuff. I’m staying in to read more of Rashi’s daughters.
By the way, the show last night was the banjo player now from Thailand, originally from New Orleans. He was enjoyable enough. Wore a black tux with a bright red shirt and a red and black bow tie! Whoopie.
TIME CHANGE: Back one hour, again. We’re now on Arabic Standard Time and the city is Baghdad. Something kind’ve odd about that.

MARCH 28, 2008 – SIX DAYS UPON THE SEA

Ed got dressed and went to exercise. I got ready and went to hear the first speaker of the day. We got a new crowd on in Dubai.
OPERA GOES TO THE MOVIES: This presentation was done by Thomson Smillie, Opera Impresario, Writer, and Stage Director. In the 20th century, movies replaced opera as the great popular art form – yet the two have much in common, including passion, grand spectacle, and a taste for high drama. He illustrated his remarks with wonderful movie clips including some from Pretty woman, Apocalypse Now and many other. Dick, Beverly, and Nancy would love this. I told Ed he simply mustn’t miss any of the future lectures and he has to watch this one on the TV when it’s broadcast on the ship’s channel. He will do a total of 6 lectures and I’ll be there for them all. Folks now I’m hardly an opera buff but these talks are fascinating.
PERFUME SALE: I’m running out of my two favorite perfumes and they don’t have them in the boutique on board. Today they were having a sale on perfumes so I went down to ask the young lady there to make some recommendations. Eventually, I bought a box of six small bottles to try out; she threw in a sample of Chance by Chanel to try as well.
RTW VIDEOS: There was a showing of the videos to date with the goal of selling more of course. You can watch them in your cabin and there are two places near the photo area where they are shown continuously. Ed has decided to purchase them (there are 4 DVDs in the set) but is waiting until the next credit card billing cycle to order them.
TRIVIA: We saw whales very close to the ship; one sounded and obviously turned upside down because we could see the white silhouette for a long while down in the water.
Some of the questions were tough. I wondered if Nancy knows: What is a pig’s snout called? The answer is “gruntle”. I don’t know if anyone got that and we had a plethora of possibilities. Eventually, we put down grunt but we had no rationale for it. There were some other tough ones. Eventually, we scored 15 and we, again, #2. The winners scored 16. Unlike other times, however, there was no one’s who had felt their suggested answer was absolutely the right one to have the group settle on a wrong answer. We were all equally confused about the correct answer. The prizes today were the reversible Princess tote bag, something I’d love to get before the cruise is over.
LUNCH: We sat with Father and some of the trivia folks. It was a friendly political split. It’s funny to see Father assert strong Republican views.
We also heard that a contingent of trivia players had gone to one of the staff (who clearly doesn’t like doing this—and I don’t blame them—and who doesn’t do as “good” a job as the others do) and given him some pointers on what we want in trivia: a full 20 questions, read them slowly and give us time to discuss and answer, and I’ve forgotten the rest. Hummm I can hardly wait for the quiz this afternoon.
BEAUTY SALON PECULIARITIES: One lady today remarked that you could not get a permanent in the Beauty Salon here. Other lacks include waxing of legs or eyebrows. And while many have gone there for hair cuts, they are clearly not what we get at home (or in some instances, off the ship in port). And we won’t even discuss the prices up there.
NEEDLEWORK: I’m keeping busy during the lectures with needlepoint—at least when they don’t keep us in the dark! My EZ slide ripped out a seam (this is the device I use to put my compression sleeves on properly), so I took two strands of the embroidery floss used in the needlepoint and did a quick repair. Let’s hope it holds at least until we get home where I have a back up. Each time I purchase one, the price has increased by $10! But I use it everyday and can’t position the sleeves without it.
THE HAZARDS OF 16TH CENTURY NAVIGATION AND INTRODUCING SIR FRANCIS DRAKE: Ed and I have gotten familiar with Drake, El Draco to the Spanish, and he was nothing more than a pirate with portfolio. He brought his booty back to England where supposedly judicial decisions were made about it’s disposition, and where he was knighted. He discussed the history of Magellan and why he legitimately is credited with the first circumnavigation of the globe even though he was killed in what is now the Phillipines. It turns out that he had reached the same destination(s) by traveling East from Europe; so he had indeed been around the world.
QUIZ TIME: We came in #2 again but when Elizabeth saw the prizes for today, can covers, she said we don’t want to win today. How prophetic. Some of the questions we missed were not because we didn’t have the answer among us, but because of some confusion about exactly what the question was looking for. When he didn’t have a clue about the answer and our guess is wrong, we really don’t care. It’s when we definitely had the correct answer but thought the question was looking for something else that is so frustrating. I won’t belabor today’s brain squeezer but we consoled our selves by knowing that we weren’t alone. And no whales graced the ocean so we could have a little break in the brain exercise.
DINNER: Dave and Twyla and us. Things were fine until Dave asserted that all female spies use sex to be successful. You can imagine how that went over with me. Still we left without any rancor. Aren’t you proud of me?
I’m sure there are more tidbits I meant to include in the blog but I’m brain dead at the moment. The entertainment for tonite is a banjo player. We met him last night after the comedian and he’s a nice enough guy but I’m not sure I care about banjo music tonite. He’s originally from New Orleans and left after Katrina. He now lives in Thailand.

MARCH 27, 2008 – DUBAI

We had an early wake up since we had to be in the Cabaret Lounge at 7:45 am for the tour. It was hard to wake up. As usual we had room service of a modest breakfast.
We were given a photocopy of our passport and a Dubai landing card to carry.
Our tour guide was from Sri Lanka; the driver from India. 80% of the population is workers from other countries. If you have a baby here, it cannot be a citizen. This makes sense given the amount of money available to citizens.
THEIR ECONOMIC FUTURE: They have oil until 2010, so they have built up their economy so that they don’t need to depend on oil. Right now the massive construction projects are probably what drives the economy. Tourism is building up (more about those plans later). Many citizens bring their families to hotels here for a weekend break (from the boredom of their mansions in the desert perhaps?) They currently sell natural gas which is also the source that generates their electricity. The flashy use of water and lights here is second perhaps only to Las Vegas and with many of the same problems. Drip irrigation is visible everywhere; we ought to use a lot more of that in the US.
This place gives “conspicuous consumption” a new meaning. Money is no object to any desire. There is no middle class.
CONSTRUCTION: 16% of the world’s cranes are here in Dubai. It rivals if not exceeds China in the look of construction. The massive numbers of apartments, villas and hotel rooms that are being built here boggles the mind.
THE PALMS: We were taken to a sales office for the apartments and villas of the first of 3 enormous projects where land is reclaimed from the sea to make these island neighborhoods. They stretch a long way out into the sea; I’d guess miles. This first one will have living places for 250,000 residents and a monorail to travel around the area including highways as well. There is easy access to boat slips for this form of transportation and then, with this amount of money, there’s always helicopters.
The models for the projects are beautifully done and help you to visualize what we later saw on the yacht ride. The building is very modern and you see folks in here dressed in the very hip clothing of Beverly Hills and Hollywood, to the stereotypical man in a white abaya (?) with the head covering. I’m always impressed with how white these clothes always are.
One man on our tour said they should have done everything in video to show us rather than the models. I disagree. Furthermore, they did have some computer simulations of certain future creations.
HIGH TEA AT THE AL BURQ HOTEL: This is a seven star hotel; I didn’t know there were any above five stars! Because we were 30 in the bus, they drove us up to the front door, just like the local Sheik Rashid. This place is sumptuous and gorgeous. This is the hotel where it will cost you $100 just to go in and look around. You MUST have reseervation for anything in this place and it must be secured with a credit card though Ed surmises that most people here use cash. Speaking of which, many if not most places accept USD. As it gets more devalued, this may change. Prices in many places are shown in USD and Dhirams, the Dubai currency. Luncheon begins at $120 USD. Since our high tea was included in the tour cost, we have no idea of the cost
The women who serve you are dressed in a gorgeous long dress of dark blue with gold; those who follow up delivering items have a shorter dress but of the same colors and general design.
We were seated in a special part of the hotel similar to a balcony that looked out toward the front of the hotel and into the atrium, which is purported to be one of the tallest in the world. When I get our photos reduced, I’ll try to post one of it. There was a four piece local quartet who played Arabic tunes throughout. There were four of us to each “table” which was actually a coffee table with a table cloth surrounded by couches and chairs. You were given your choice of tea or coffee. There wasn’t a selection other than this but the tea was very good. Sugar and Splenda were offered. Butter and strawberry and apricot jam, organge marmalade, a special honey and I think one other condiment were served in the little jars you often see on room service trays.
We were brought a three tiered serving plate with muesli with dates and nuts, yoghurt with a blackberry sauce on top, dragon fruit, pineapple, watermelon, and cantelope slices. The bottom layer had cherry tomatoes, a teeny sweet pickle, and something else squered (sp) on a long toothpick, along with two types of miniature (about silver dollar size in circumference), sandwiches, one with wheat bread, salmon and fillings, the other with turkey and mayonnaise. There were 4 servings of each so no fighting amongst us.
The folks who did the afternoon tour (same as our morning tour) said that the food at the tea was disappointing. Later, I talked with a couple who had gone privately to tea, were in a different area of the hotel and they had 7 courses. The cost for that alone was $107 plus $10 each way taxi costs.
I went to the ladies room and I took photos as well. It was gorgeous as you may imagine. The attendant had positioned the hand towels into a pyramid with a star lily in the center. There was a hose to the side of the commode (we’ve seen this in several of the better places in Asia) with which you can spray your perineum when you’re done. I warn you though: the water is usually cold and can be quite a shock. And you don’t have to pay for the bathroom here.
As an aside, one of the comedians was saying that he had helped an old fellow up some stairs and he had a pocket full of coins from various countries. Why? Because he had to go to restroom a lot and he wanted to have the right change to go in any country.
All of the rooms here are suites; the Arabs bring all their wives and children and there are connecting rooms in all the rooms so that the women never have to leave the suite. They are also two story! That way the various “households” can be separated. The doors are absolutely gorgeous with a dark blue mosaic with a sun burst type design in the center. As a result of all this the architectural divisions between floors are 2 story. The atrium joins at the 26th floor because there’s a huge ballroom on the 27th and the top floor is a restaurant and another ballroom.
We found out later that there is a tennis court that juts out the side of the building somewhere at the top, as well as a helicopter pad. Rooms here begin at $2,500 per night to $28,500 per night and that doesn’t include meals! The parking lot outside is full of later model MB, Lamborghini (I swear it was), and other top end cars, mostly black but now and then a white one. The old Sheik here drives a hummer with the license place No. 1. He drives alone and takes no body guards with him. His son who is the current recognized day to day leader, Sheik Rashid, arrives with a retinue and the usual bodyguards.
WANT TO BUY A VILLA? HOW ABOUT AN APARTMENT?
Villa: 4.5 million USD for a beginner; Apt: $450,000 USD for a studio.
YACHT RIDE AROUND THE PALMS: This took several hours and we got to see the real life construction of this monumental project.
SMALL SOUQ SHOPPING: As you enter the ship’s terminal, there are several small shops. Ed purchased a gift for someone, something he had been looking at in every port to find just the right one, and so he bought one in the shop here. The problem is the size of this damned thing: larger than a box of reams of paper at Costco! It isn’t so heavy but it’ll take up 75% of a suitcase. I am not a happy camper as you can imagine. I keep thinking of the couple who bought the enormous wooden ship on our last round the world cruise and had to hand carry it home; I have no idea what they did on the plane. Furthermore, there’s no room in our cabin for anything else!
I picked up a small pillow case with a desert scene on it; almost without exception, everything we’ve gotten to this point will lie flat for transport.
We also found some diet Cokes. They asked if we wanted a case and we said yes, but they were out in their back room, so we took all of them out of their cooler, ten in all I think. So we’re portioning them out again. There was also a little post office, probably a private provider because the cards cost as much to mail here as they do on the ship. Nonetheless, we purchased a few cute ones and mailed them out. I also found some free internet in their business center there. 30 min was free and they were gentle but clear that there were repercussions if you didn’t observe the limit on the honor system. WiFi connections required a credit card but were still cheaper than the ship. So I cleared out my roadrunner emails without worry about time and still had lots of time left in my 30 min. limit.
DUBAILAND: By 2017, they will have built the largest theme park in the world. Mike’s comment about the Taj, pyramids, and Eiffel Tower are on target. The plan is to build exact replicas of these two wonders of the world and more. One guy remarked that he was very happy with the Luxor hotel in Vegas.
SHOPPING MALL: There was a free shuttle to one of the local shopping malls. Clearly there weren’t going to be any bargains there. There was a gold souq there and Bill and Lea were seen there by Dave and Twyla and Bill was giving his credit card to the clerk for some bauble for Lea. Apparently the shuttle quit running at 4:30 but the ship didn’t leave the port until 8 pm. We didn’t get back from our tour until after 3 pm and we tried to settle things down and go out again but that wasn’t meant to be.
We did watch a part of the process of leaving the pier. Again the tight maneuverability of this ship (and the captain who drives it) are astonishing at times. The skyline in some ways reminded me of Hong Kong harbor. One day it will exceed that nighttime skyline I’m sure.
DINNER: Just Dave and Twyla and us. Dave should be able to take the bandage off his still-black and blue pinkie finger sometime in the next few days. He’s concerned about it hurting but it’s going to be uncomfortable simply because of the immobility so he’s got to get moving.
ENTERTAINMENT: We had an Irish Catholic comedian who had a terrible audience since there was only a handful of folks there, the rest having turned in early after this “strenuous” day. We visited with him afterward. He’s fun and we all felt sorry for him as the crowd was tough; the woman in front of us had a bobbing head the whole time: clearly she wasn’t able to stay awake.
Valerie Boorman is a singer with a duo here called digital hitch. She was moved to the Casino Lounge which is a better venue for their music. Her accompanist has won a grammy. She has a lovely voice and Ed is one of her greatest fans. I listened to some of it but I’m more easily bored when the singer begins to do irregular scales with some of the music so I came back to the room and read some more of Rashi’s dtrs.
YIPPEE (AGAIN): Turn back the clocks another hour. I’ve forgotten what town I’m using now for the time.

MARCH 26, 2008 – TOMORROW DUBAI, UAE

I woke up to Ed’s tap tapping in the bathroom around 8 am. He got dressed and went to exercise. I got ready and saved him a seat at the Commandatore’s culinary demonstration.
TAJ MAHAL OVERLAND TRIP: I’ll divide the remarks into the good and the bad.
GOOD: Didn’t have to think about anything; everything was taken care of. Le Meridien Hotel for the first night was terrific. The Taj was open when they were there.
Those on the non-Princess, independent, tours, had rooms that faced the Taj so you could see it from your hotel room.
Everyone was glad they had done the journey even if it was hectic and had a lot of wait time or travel time.
All universally lauded how awesome (and I use this adjective not in the cliché it has become) the experience was; Many said they knew if they didn’t do it now, they’d never have another opportunity to see it.
BAD: Had to get up much too early. Long lines at the Taj: men and women divided into separate lines and the women’s line was longer. Apparently, these lines were a function of when you went to visit. Those on private arrangements had no problems, the tickets had been purchased in advance and they went right in.
Lots of confusion and change in plans because it was a triple holiday and Nancy Pelosi was in the area. Those on private arrangements had no more problems than what might be expected since their guides adapted their itinerary to reduce the delays and waiting that the Princess tour group experienced. Actual time around the Taj was about 4 hrs max.
Many people were horrified with the lack of sanitary conditions in the areas they went to. Like typical Americans, they comment about why they can’t do things –fill in the blank – and the unspoken part is “like we have in America.”
One guy broke an arm during the journey and one women had some injury to her foot. This is probably not extraordinary in my opinion for a large group of this age range.
Hotel beds the second night were hard as a rock. While the food was good, one person came back with GI problems and is again on isolation, antibiotics, and a liquid diet.
Some busses did not have air conditioning, and the seats were hard and pretty hard to take for the six hours you were riding from Agra to New Delhi for the 2 hr flight to Bombay.
No opportunity to see much of anything in Cochin or Bombay. Tours in other locations along the trip, were not comprehensive. There’s probably much more but I want to move on.
Overall, I still think Ed and I made the right decision though I am glad that the folks who did go are happy with the experience.
COOKING AROUND THE WORLD: He is collecting recipes from attendees; we were given this as homework before he left for his hiatus. So he needs 100 to make a cook book which he will then give each contributor as a thank you. So we’ve been rustling up recipes from various folks. I submitted my recipe for Slumgullion (the kids will know this right away).
The commendatore did 3 recipes from the cookbook and there are two in the handout he gave us. He makes it all look so easy. The dessert was tiramisu which did look simple as he made it. As usual, he forgot one ingredient, and he had problems with something (this time the bottle of Worchestershire sauce: it was new and he couldn’t get all the wrapping off of it and open it. His remark was something along the lines of “why do they always give these to me?”), but he is fun to watch and learn from.
At the end, he had the ship’s chef draw recipes from a basket for a prize; the chef had drawn out 3 recipes written on various types of paper; mine was the 3rd one he pulled out (I know because I wrote it on Lunesta advertisement paper and you could see the blue border from where we were sitting). At this point some woman jumped up and complained that they weren’t picking any recipes on the cards (I never did see any cards to write on but some had them), so they put mine back into the basket and drew cards from then on out. Ed was really pissed at this. The prizes were bouquets of flowers which I didn’t really care about, but I was upset that they didn’t retain the one they had in their hand when this woman jumped up.
TRIVIA: The other two ladies were in the spa today for a beauty event and they recruited the couple I joined with the other day for a threesome at trivia when my group had swelled to 7 (teams are limited to 6 members and I’m glad to hear the staff reiterating the rules each time we meet). They are a very pleasant couple. The dynamics are palpably different. And we won! The prizes today were can covers: one blue and one red for us.
LUNCH: We wound up with Bill and Lea and some other folks and did our rambling discussions principally focused on India and what we saw there. The filth and poverty are astonishing to many and there were many comments about why the government didn’t take care of sewage, trash collection and clean water. I wonder what the Brits did when they were here because there’s no evidence they did any of this either except for themselves.
SEXPIONAGE: This was a special request and Nigel West did not disappoint. He did say that the CIA does not engage in using sex to compromise agents. And he said CIA stands for “Catholics in Action” due to Casey and Al Haig being devout Catholics. I had never heard any of this before. He discussed many projects most of which were new to me, but he also discussed some we knew such as the Profumo affair. You can imagine that this was a full house today. He explained why women are better spies than men as a rule and of course I found this fascinating.
IRAQUI ENDGAME: This was Scott Ritter’s last talk; he leaves the ship tomorrow in Dubai. The room was full which rather surprised me given how some folks are really reacting negatively to him, mostly because they don’t want to believe his data and consider him unpatriotic for saying such things. However, this talk was more respectfully received. Still I’m astonished at how ignorant some folks are about the history of our involvement in Iran and the current situation there. His remarks are too complex to do justice to here, but basically he discussed the tribal issues and the relations with adjacent nations. Fascinating.
TRIVIA: Our two regular ladies, back from the beauty treatments were with us again. Again we had someone in our group with the right answer and the group settles on the wrong answer. This happens to all groups. We came out #2 again. I’m aware of how much more tense the environment is within our group this afternoon compared to this morning. What a difference personalities make in the composition of a group.
SUPPER: A full table tonite: everyone was present. Rod had to avoid arms as we all talked animatedly about Scott Ritter’s lecture and the whole Iraqi situation. We have several diverse views at the table and while that’s a minefield, it was interesting. I think everyone is mature enough to not take anything personally but you never know. While it was fun, I wouldn’t want this level of “differences of opinion” at the table every night.
ENTERTAINMENT: It’s a pianist tonite. I think I’ve heard him practicing all over the ship so I declined; Ed did go.
DUBAI TOMORROW: We are currently in the straits of Hormuz and in Iranian territory. We were all trying to see land as long as the sun was still shining but then the fog came in. 30% of the world’s oil supply goes through here. Traffic lanes are 2 miles across in this area.
Ed said I had to put in the blog that 16% of the world’s cranes are in Dubai. Our tour begins at 7:45 am and ends around noon. The ship doesn’t leave until 8 pm so there’s time to do things in the pm assuming it isn’t all too expensive or hot for our tastes. I have to choose my clothing for tomorrow carefully. Interestingly, sneakers are not allowed. Thank goodness I did bring a pair of black flats with me.

MARCH 25, 2008 – STILL IN ARABIAN SEA

We woke around 8 am and took our time getting ready. I tried once again to upload the blog and was able to do that, plus sending out a few emails from the lap top. I did have some problems with uploading some photos, so I finally quite after cleaning out some of the older photos and uploading 4 new ones.
PORT TALK: DUBAI: This was given by Stefan Ovelgoenne, a German national who lives and works in Dubai for German entities. He did a nice job but you had to listen very carefully to block out the accent. He is 6’7” and that is unexpected as well. We have some idea of what to expect; all flash without regard to cost. Thankfully, we are on a tour that has high tea in the hotel where they charge you $100 just to go in and sit in the lobby. No, our cost isn’t nearly that much. I should have Ed write up the visits in Dubai since this has been one of the high points for him.
TRIVIA: We were all present; changed some correct answers to the wrong answer. We wouldn’t have won in any event. It was a tough one. We came out #3 or #4, I never got it straight.
We have seen dolphins several times in the past few days. Today many were very close to the ship and you could see fish jumping out of the water as well, trying to escape the dolphins I presume. The Pacific Lounge where we have trivia is a great location for observing their play.
LUNCH: One of the ladies at the table is a UC Berkeley graduate and she saw the UCLA lanyard I use for my cruise card. So we had a long discussion about UCs. They also discussed the arrangements they made to see the Taj through a Bombay travel agent which turned out extremely well. So Ed asked for the details.
HOLLYWOOD’S MASTER OF SUSPENSE: this is Barry’s last lecture for us; we lose him at Dubai. He discussed the life of Alfred Hitchcock and illustrated points with the movie clips he selects with great care. I’ll miss his lectures; I’m not that much of a movie buff but his lectures were so interesting.
OUR ENERGY FUTURE: this lecture was given by Ralph Nansen, a fellow passenger and rocket engineer, author, and internationally recognized authority on solar power satellites. He is the husband in the couple who sailed around the Pacific for six years. They are both very pleasant people. Ed was excited by this lecture and it was clear he wouldn’t be leaving it early for trivia.
TRIVIA: Boo Hoo: only 4 of us: Ed and Elizabeth (who forgot as we later found out). We didn’t do bad all things considered; I think we were #3 overall. We gave it our best. It is funny to see when our logic helps us with the correct answer when we don’t have a clue, and when it leads us astray. The prizes this afternoon were luggage tags.
FORMAL NIGHT: I wore my blue, sequined, brazen hussy dress with the gorgeous blue topaz jewelry Ed got me. I got many nice remarks about the dress. We avoided the formal night photos but Ilana caught us at the table. She’s one of our favorite staff members. Ed loves formal nights because lobster and giant prawns are on the menu.
ENTERTAINMENT: A ventriloquist. We decided to pass.
ANOTHER 30 MINUTES! We are now on Islamabad, Pakistan time. Tomorrow night we turn back another hour before we reach Dubai. Yippee!

MARCH 24, 2008 – First day toward Dubai.

We woke up a little after 8:30 am and got ready for the first speaker. The weather today was warm and sunny and the lounge lizards are all over the upper deck near the pool. I agree with the Malayasians who see dark skin as a sign of the lower class peasants who work in the fields and sun all day. To have light white skin is a sign of luxury and higher class. So they say why do these people come to our beaches and grill?
WAGING PEACE: THE STATUS OF THE ANIT-WAR MOVEMENT IN AMERICA TODAY. This was Scott Ritter again, and he generated a lot of push back with his remarks. The old vets, not all but many, were outraged at what they consider unpatriotic remarks from Ritter. And of course, this was exactly the point that he was making: the Constitution protects free speech. How many folks could pass a test on the Constitution? We are giving away our rights.
One questioner had googled Ritter’s name and was asking him about some of the quotes and comments he had found. The main point of Ritter’s answer was right on target: consult several diverse sources of data, regularly, and then make your own analysis. He observed how many different newspapers one finds in foreign cities such as London, all with their own biases. At least one gets a broader perspective on what’s going on that we have in America with most cities with only one newspaper and news media who are often owned by the same entity. I can’t do justice to his remarks here, but it was nice to see some of the complacent shook up a little; they believe what’s told to them and don’t look any further.
One man in the audience said that he had worked hard all his life and now he wanted to enjoy the fruits of his labor. He wasn’t interested in doing all this work to be a good citizen. I’m paraphrasing of course but that is the essence of his remarks, and a few heads here and there bobbed, but I was stunned. Ritter’s response was respectful but firm in terms of the need to remain engaged and vote knowledgably.
TRIVIA: We came our #3 today. Our scribe for the day was upset because she put Jack Nicklaus when the answer was Jack Nicholson. She knew the answer of Nicholson was currect but as a golfer I guess her fingers were automatic. None of us double checked that. She was so upset by this error. We tried to reassure her that we’ve all done this and that it’s only a game. Even with that answer, we wouldn’t have won anyway. Though I will say we do this game of “if only we’d changed that answer back to the other one we thought….and so on.” The prizes this morning were Princess tote bags.
LUNCH: the padre was passing out quips as usual. He comes up with stuff out of the blue that is so unexpected but so funny. We talked with some folks who had gone to the Taj. I’ll write more about that after I talk with several more people. Clearly we have many folks on this cruise who have led a very sheltered life; many asserting they’d never come back to India again.
We did pretty much agree that Bombay is cleaner than it was on our last visit(s); many of us remarked about this. There’s still poverty and begging but it’s not so oppressive as before. Of course, we were out on a triple holiday (Easter and 2 others) and the traffic was (supposedly) mild for Bombay, though it still reminded us of China’s traffic congestion.
THE DELHI INTELLIGENCE BUREAU: Nigel West, the intelligence expert, wove a fascinating history of this intelligence bureau most of us had never heard of. According to his remarks, it is the only one never to have been penetrated by spies. I couldn’t do justice to his remarks but his analysis was certainly spellbinding.
BURNING DISCS: I’ve had a backlog of disks to burn; photos and videos of other folks who would enjoy having copies, many because they lost or damaged their own cameras. I double checked all of them this time and all were working properly. Ed tries to tell me how to do this and I try to humor him but sometimes I want to pop him in the mouth. He made two disks the other day and they were blanks, so who needs the double checking?
TRIVIA: We only had 16 questions today. But many were very hard. The dynamics of our group were funny (if it didn’t make you mad). The answer to one question about Obediah was bible or Old Testament. One of our group said there wasn’t anyone in the Bible named Obediah and I thought she was going to faint dead away when that was the answer. Another question was: what is the Australian Dugong otherwise known as? I said Manatee but our Aussie member hadn’t heard of that. He tried to describe it and finally “seal” was put down. It turns out I was right. He was very apologetic and I reminded him that he gave us New Caledonia (after much thinking and exercising of little grey cells—shades of Poirot) as the country whose capital is Noumea. We’d never have known that one had it not been for him. The other contentious question was: which animal has the largest eye? After much discussion, the group settled on the whale, but Ed had the answer which was Giant Squid. And I don’t know what the “prizes” were today.
FINISHING THE DISCS: So I finished them all and delivered those whose “address” I knew. I felt like a Brownie scout again.
DINNER: Dave, Twyla and Bill. They all went to the Taj Mahal but Bill and Lea went privately and the other two took the Princess tour. I’ll write more later about what we’re hearing about the Taj visit.
I really sinned tonite, but I had lots of company. The Head Waiters were making peach melba for everyone; then we saw peanut butter ice cream and we were all sunk. We all ordered peanut butter ice cream except for Twyla and she took a taste of Dave’s. We were lamenting the fact that Henry wasn’t with us this tonite and if we could have accurately remembered his cabin number, Rod would have had some delivered to him. I’ll have to climb a lot more stairs to pay for all the calories I consumed at dinner.
COMEDIAN: John Martin: world record holder for non-stop joke telling – 101 hours and 39 min. We didn’t go. I read and did some other stuff while Ed watched a Discovery Channel program about men climbing Mt. Everest and losing toes and fingers.

MARCH 23, 2008 – BOMBAY, INDIA

6 am we woke up and it was dark outside but there was a spotlight searching the water. Could have been the pilot boat? I keep wanting to see the pilot climb the rope or whatever they have, to get on board. As you may recall, the Aussie reef pilot said he’d quit when he couldn’t climb the rope ladders and then the stairs to the bridge with ease.
IMMIGRATION: It took longer than expected for the ship to be cleared so immigration didn’t start when it had been scheduled. Even with this, it went very quickly and it was back on schedule ahead of time. This process involves us taking our notice and our cruise card, along with the tour ticket, to the starboard entrance to the Pacific Lounge. The line, when we joined it this morning, was on deck 7; the Lounge is on deck 10.
When we get to the first table, we get our passport from ship’s personnel. Then we queue up again and eventually we are in front of an Indian immigration official who looks at our photo in the passport, then at us, then looks for a place to stamp the passport (this is becoming a real challenge in mine), and stamps the tourist card we’re given for the day and which we surrender when we are back on board for good. Then he signs the stamps and we are on to the next station where we again surrender our passport to the ship’s personnel and retain the yellow Dock Entry Permit.
Lovely ladies in gorgeous saris await us as we walk off the ship; they present each of us with two red rose buds. I put them in water when we got back to the room but I don’t have much hope for them after a day in this heat and then a/c on the bus.
TOUR: Our group was the smallest and the next to last to leave.
Still we were pretty much on time. This was to visit synogogues in Bombay. There is a man among the group with whom I’ve had some not pleasant for me encounters. He hasn’t figured out the religious status of me vis a vis Ed. His girlfriend is friendly enough, and pleasant though quite a know it all. He has figured out that I’m Catholic but hasn’t made anything else fit to suit him. I give him credit: his inquiries are tasteful.
We had to walk several blocks through a very poor area to reach the first synagogue. This tour is rarely done and so the tour guide, while he seemed to be fairly knowledgable about Jews in Bombay, though I he is not Jewish himself, seemed confused that the temple wasn’t open. One of the ladies strongly suggested that he rap on the door. Voila! A man appeared, and he in turn brought another old man down. So we were ushered into this very old temple. We were allowed to take photos freely and he opened the ark where they have 10 Torahs. The last prayer service only had 25 attendees, and it is obvious that the building is strapped for money.
There is a women’s section upstairs in the balcony and the entrance to it is from the outside. I wasn’t sure about women wandering freely on the ground floor but it seemed to present no problems. I think most everyone left generous donations as we left.
Synagogue #2 was free standing behind another street. Each of these temples were painted in a light powder blue and white. Paint was chipping and flaking away everywhere; the last one was in the best condition. We were given permission to take photos ad lib in this synagogue as well. It was larger than the first one, and in a little better neighborhood (but it’s all relative as Americans find these environments very disturbing).
Synagogue #3 was the largest and best maintained, but it has the largest membership too, which isn’t saying much as there are 4000 Jews in Bombay and many synagogues. Most of the population moved to Israel in the 1950s, and the remaining ones are dying off quickly. This synagogue has a Mikvah on the first floor; you mount steep stairs to see the temple on the second floor. This one has gorgeous stained glass windows. Madonna had visited last January and they have many photos of this in the hallway. The bathrooms in this temple were not squat, but not Western either. The commode looked like western but there wasn’t a seat. And after you were done, you pitched a pitcher of water into the bowl to flush.
Finally, we went to the required tourist trap where goods are lovely but no price breaks. Along the way today, we passed all the major sites in Bombay; we had seen almost all of them on our last trip. Because it is Easter, much was closed and traffic was less than usual. Still it’s worse than LA on it’s busiest rush hour time. There are 70,000 taxis in Bombay and that doesn’t count the carriages and trishaws (scooters adapted to carry 3 passengers—two Americans—and the driver).
I feel like I have really seen Mombai today because of the routes we took and the neighborhoods we went into. We saw men getting haircuts and shaves on the sidewalk, kids playing cricket with sticks and stones in the streets, cows wandering freely here and there, people living on sidewalks and curbsides, people bathing with water buckets on the roadsides, cooking in a single pot on the curbside, dye thrown into pot holes.
TAJ HOTEL: I had mentioned going to the Taj Hotel but Ed didn’t seem interested so I psyched myself up to forego it. Later at the last stop, he asked the guide how to get there and walked over there. He came back and got me, told the guide we’d be leaving the tour here, and off we went to the Taj Hotel.
I’ve forgotten to mention how much I enjoy the architecture in Mombai. It is all old from the British period, but they are gorgeous edifices. The older part of the Taj Hotel, called the Palace, is lovely. There are very upscale shops in this building; you can have suits, shirts, and saris custom made in 24 hours.
INDIAN FOOD: We had REAL Indian food in an Indian restaurant in the hotel; two other passengers we have met several times sat next to us and we helped each other out with the menu. We had leg of lamb ( I expected a full leg of lamb), a broccoli florets and potatoes dish, Nan bread: butter and garlic, and Iced Tea. When we got to the table, snacks were brought out: cucumbers, carrots, and turnips with several crunchy things and a dip, spicy, for all. We cleaned this up pretty quickly. There was some, but not much, food left over after we ate. We had two glasses each of this wonderful iced tea which I couldn’t possible describe adequately except to say that it isn’t American Iced Tea. We declined dessert. Our fellow passengers had curry chicken with rice, the broccoli and potatoes, iced tea, and chili nan. Their’s was also marvelous.
BOOK STORE: We hit the book store in the hotel where Ed bought a stock of Soduku puzzles (I couldn’t find any crossword puzzles), and two copies of the Economist. Now we’ll have to fight over the latter since we’ve both finished all our reading we brought along. I have started Rashi’s daughters: Miriam.
TAXI: the folks in front of the hotel got a taxi for us that was air conditioned and that would charge us $7 USD to the entrance to the pier, and $10 to the ship. It turns out they have to buy a permit for $2 USD for the latter; it was probably a bribe as no one asked us for ID though we had our cruise cards ready.
We got back about 2:45 pm and looked through the stalls in the terminal. It’s hard to know what you’re buying and it was hard for me to find things in my size. They want to insist that you look fine in something that Omar the tentmaker would generous. The fabrics are clearly gorgeous but it’s hard to know if it’s really silk, if it’s really 6 meters long (sari length), if the extra fabric inside will really make sleeves, if the decoration is sprayed on or somehow embossed because it isn’t woven into the fabric. And one lady quoted me $25 USD (special price just for you) for 6 meters of silk sari fabric; the other stalls were quoting over a $100 USD for the same. Something’s wrong with this picture and I wound up buying nothing in the end. If I want a sari or Punjabi style dress badly enough, I know where there are lots of Indian clothing shops a few miles from me.
DIET COKES: Oh dear. We’ve seen no cokes at all and India clearly doesn’t need Diet cokes! We’re down to one in the fridge (plus the two beers Ro donated to Ed) and we have 6 days at sea ahead of us.
PICKING PHOTOS: I download the pictures each time we go out. Between Ed and I we have so many photos and most need some work, e.g. lightening, contrast, etc. After this, I have to export them in a smaller size for the blog. Picking just the right ones is as hard as any part of it. I feel like an electrician sometimes: charging our cameras, hooking up the download systems (both are different), and then making sure I get them in the right files on the hard drive; I’m not doing so well with this but it’s a boring story to explain.
Assuming I remember, I’ll attach some long over due photos when I upload this blog.
DINNER: Just Ed and I. Rod visited with us for a while. They had a special menu and Rod gave us a copy as a memento.
EASTER DECORATIONS: the entryway into the dining room has a display of HUGE chocolate Easter eggs; you can smell the chocolate all over the place. Mauritzio, our head waiter, tells us that they will serve them for dessert tomorrow as it is Easter Monday. I hope they survive that long. When I say they are big, I mean big enough that I cold barely get my arms around them. Ed asked if they were solid and never got a good answer. Ha.
ENTERTAINMENT: the ship had a folkloric group come on board and they did a 1 hr show for us. We saw the tail end of the first performance, and then the full performance again. What great smiles they all had and the colorful costumes were amazing, rivaled only by the energy shown in these dances. We took a few shots with our cameras and I found that a night time setting with the little tripod works best for me.

MARCH 22, 2008 – ON THE WAY TO BOMBAY (MUMBAI), INDIA

We got our tickets for tomorrow’s tour of Jewish sights, of which there are many. Clothing directions were given and we were warned that there might be photo and videotaping charges. I don’t have a problem with any of this and I do get annoyed when visitors cannot observe these simple requirements.
Today’s is my mother’s birthday. She died at 68 but had she lived, she would be 83 today.
I woke up at 8:30 and I gather from Ed’s remarks that he didn’t sleep well last night. We got up, got ready and I saved him at seat at the lecture.
A DIVIDED WORLD: This is Capt. Irving discussing the Portuguese and the Spanish and their conquests. Along the way he discussed Magellan and some about Vasco de Gama. He has a done a very nice job of putting this content together and he observes all the tasks speakers should: tell then what you’re going to tell them, tell them, then review it and tell them what you’ll cover next. Given our traveling in the past few years, much of this history is very real to us.
TRIVIA: I never quite got it straight whether we were #2 or #3 but we didn’t win. This was a tough one. The group that won did it with 13 points out of 20 I think. I don’t know what the prizes were.
LUNCH: Sid and Elizabeth, two of our trivia partners, and a few other folks we’ve visited with around the ship, were our tablemates for lunch. If we had sat with Father, I was going to ask him if it’s true that it’s not a sin if you don’t enjoy it? That was a statement made this morning which I found intriguing. I have my own answer of course, but I’m always interested in Father’s Irish spin on things.
HOLLYWOOD’S BRITISH GENTLEMAN: Barry again did a bang up job, this time about the life of David Niven.
COOKIE TIME: We had been told that fresh cookies are put out in the Club Bar each day at 3 pm so I got two absolutely fresh, peanut butter cookies.
INTERNET CAFÉ: I took Ed a cookie and then checked my own email. I had over 40 emails, about half of which were junk mail, though I did find the AT&T bill in the Junk Mail box (Ed had asked me why I bother looking at it since it’s costing to do so). We heard from Carol, one of the Prinsendam colleagues from last year, who is retiring. Yippee! I couldn’t be happier for her and I hope she has as much fun in her retirement as she’s earned after all these years working for the state.
OVERLAND TO THE TAJ: One of the ladies on board has Indian roots and she stopped me to say that she was glad I hadn’t gone to the Taj. India is on alert (thus the policemen in cochin with automatic weapons) and the Taj is closed so you can’t go in to see the inside. She believes all the changes that were made to the trip were a function of this alert.
By the way, the alert is because of the turmoil in Tibet and Pakistan; India is squeezed in the middle of them.
Several folks have mentioned going to the Taj with Grand Circle Tours or Overseas Travelers (not sure about the latter), so maybe that’ll be a good option for us sometime.
FRANKIE & FRIENDS: Today his topic was: “Disasters at Sea.” I’ll bet it was pretty funny but I had other things I wanted to do.
TRIVIA: This was held in the Casino Lounge due to religious services being held in the Pacific Lounge where we usually meet. They have the nondenominational service first and then the Catholic Mass since we are in Mombai tomorrow. This change in location had been announced this morning. When it was time to start, one of our usual members was missing so we invited another singlet to join us. At about question #3, the missing member showed up saying that they had gone to the Pacific Lounge. This may be true but Gisela had gone up there to bring down any trivia folks and she hadn’t seen someone. So this person sat down and shortly after began participating in the answers. This is very unfair and so I moved to another group of only two, a couple who were an absolute delight to play with. The winning group had 15; the three of us had 10. But I met some new folks and I enjoyed them tremendously.
EMAILS FROM HOME AND ELSEWHERE: Mike wrote to catch us up on the family news. One of his bits of news is a howl though and so I share it (without asking for his permission I might add):
“It’s too bad you missed the Taj Mahal as it might not be there on a future trip…Word is that the United Arab Emirates have purchased it and will move it to Dubai as an added attraction. It will be reconstructed adjacent to the ski slope and become part of a three icon attraction which will, depending upon the result of ongoing negotiations, also include the Eiffel Tower and the Statue of Liberty. Too bad Dubai came too late…might have been able to save Ebbet’s Field.
“By the way…it may be cheaper to stay on the cruise…premium gasoline is pushing $3.90 per gallon and in fact we were in West LA yesterday and saw an over $4.00 per gallon price in several service stations.” I have to share this with the others on the ship; it’s too good not to pass on.
THE AWESOME CROCKS: Murray writes that he and Ro layed over for 2 days in the Dallas airport before they were able to connect for a flight. Val writes that they had a delayed flight, lost luggage, and then their ride to their house was either late or didn’t show up. And Val sends us a trivia question to practice our little grey cells: What was the name of the indigenous people on the island of Guam? I have to look it up. Some folks have said aboriginal peoples is answer enough – for them perhaps but not for the awesome crocks.
INDIAN IMMIGRATION: We recall that a few years ago an Indian immigration official came onto the ship in Oman and we had to personally appear before them before we got to Mombai. And if my memory serves me right, it was at some ungodly hour in the early morning. Before we hit Cochin, we had to complete Indian immigration paperwork, and had we gone to the Taj, we would have carried our passports. Apparently, there was an Indian immigration official on board prior to Cochin who had certain people come to be personally seen.
So in the morning, we have a tour that starts assembling a little after 8 am. We must appear before the Indian immigration folks between 7 am and 7:30 am to be cleared prior to leaving the ship.
TODAY’S WEATHER: Drizzaling, and outright cloudbursts several times today. On one occasion, the bridge came on the loudspeaker to warn folks to get off the promenade deck and the upper open decks because they were going to get drenched. As I write this, the railings on the patio have balls of water hanging off the bottom of them.
DINNER: Just Ed and I. With the folks on the overland missing, plus those with runny noses and other pulmonary problems, there aren’t very many folks present at the tables for tonite’s Indian cuisine.
TONITE’S ENTERTAINMENT: A singer who has performed before and which I missed. I think I’ll miss it again tonite. Ed and I heard a snippet of his performance and decided we’d watch the documentary about the Great Indian Railway at 8 pm and turn in early. Ed didn’t have any coffee for supper as he thinks that might be part of his sleep problem.
And speaking of caffeine, we are going to look for some tomorrow as we have six days at sea after tomorrow to Dubai. I’ve heard that there will be additional information in tonite’s patter about what’s likely to be open tomorrow and where we might go. After our tour, I do want to see the Taj hotel and do some other stuff near there. The ship is in port until 10 or 11 pm, so we have lots of time before curfew.
WATER FOR ELEPHANTS: I finished it last night; what an unexpected and an usual ending. But it brings a smile to your face and I could see this being made into a movie at some point. It is easy to read and holds your interest.

MARCH 21, 2008 – COCHIN, INDIA

We had a 8:40 am call for our tour so we had room service again. It’s nothing fancy: Raisin Bran, banana (when they have them) coffee, iced tea, and sometimes a half grapefruit. We saw the ship coming into the harbor, actually the mouth of a river, and berthing. There were several locals waiting: two to sell wares and one to give information. Further, there were several police types including two with automatic weapons who stayed posted on both side of the gangway all day.
Our weather for several days now has been rainy and/or overcast. Today was no exception with drizzle and sprinkles all day. It is so humid and wet here. The buildings are riddled with mold. It must cost a fortune to keep a building painted.
OLDEST JEWISH SYNAGOGUE: Last time we visited here, we couldn’t see it because it was Saturday; this time it was Friday so same problem. There are only 7 men left, all aged, so they have to collect others to make a minion. We saw photos of the inside and it must be very lovely. We were told that you must take your shoes off to preserve the semi-precious stones which are inlaid into the Chinese tiles on the floor.
This is in an area called Jew Town; there is evidence everywhere to demonstrate this, but today it is many small shops and no Jews.
DUTCH PALACE: We had seen this on our last visit; we had to wait for it to open up for us today. It was so humid inside. The Frescos on the walls depict Hindu sagas. They were painted many years ago with vegetable dyes and other local materials so they are fading fast. No photos are allowed because of this.
A Howda, the elephant chair the raja used, and a palanquin, the little hut the women rode in while men carried it on their shoulders, were on display as well. This time there wasn’t a snake charmer outside. You can bet I looked closely as I was almost on top of them last time before I noticed.
ST. FRANCIS CHURCH: This is where Vasco de Gama’s remains were buried for 14 yrs before they were returned to Portugal. The church is now a Southern India church; it has gone through Catholic and Anglican along the way. Good Friday services were being held so we remained in the back to watch for a while.
CHINESE FISHING NETS: This is a very unique feature to Cochin. Last time we were here, they were still being used. It is very labor intensive. Now it is not fiscally viable to do this.
As the ship was leaving the harbor, I saw the water and how yucky it is. As the ship turned in the basin to move out, the odor wasn’t very pleasant either. Yet I saw evidence of fishing nets along the way out. I cannot imagine eating something that came from these waters. There are water hyacinths floating down as there were last visit, though not as many this time. And the rains wash down everything from the interior to the ocean.
OBLIGATORY TOURIST SHOPPING TRAP: This was supposed to be high end products. Clearly their quality was better (though in some instances overstated), but the prices were ridiculous. Wool jackets, unlined, embroidered, that I can get through National Geographic Catalog for around $100, started at about $250 here. There are other examples too.
I did see something very special: a table cloth with a solid cotton backing and a top with cut work in it. It was all hand sewn. No I wasn’t interested in buying it because I knew in advance I’d never pay what it was worth. They also had bed spreads made like that. And other table cloths that can be used for twin bed spreads, many very beautiful.
LUNCH: We had lunch by ourselves on ship. Then we went to see the two stalls on the pier. Ed was dickering with a fellow for a brass (?) elephant with it’s trunk up, but they could never agree on a price. I looked at some saris, all exquisite but where would I wear one? The Punjab style, tunic over billowing pants with a scarf at the neck, might interest me but there were only 3 available, and none in a color combination I’d want to live with. Furthermore, I wasn’t sure that they wouldn’t be quasi-muslin after the first (hand) washing.
FRUIT PLATE: We are given fruit plates as we request them. Our cabin steward rides herd on the room service department for us so that we are rarely without any fruit in our room. The form we complete has choices of oranges, pears, apples, and something else I’ve forgotten. However, now I simply write something that says: “we like all fruits so a variety is appreciated.”
I had completed one anticipating that we would be gone to the Taj, so I wrote on it that it shouldn’t be delivered until 3/23. I asked Rodolfo if the date had been changed since we didn’t leave after all. He had already taken care of it and we had a wonderful selection of fruits waiting for us in our room. Ed says that the person who does this is the same guy who usually brings our breakfast when we have room service. We always tip (except for one time when he wouldn’t allow us to tip him for reasons we still don’t understand), and Ed thinks this is why we get such a nice selection. We do each at least 4 fruits a day between us and sometimes more.
LIBRARY: We hadn’t been to the library in a long while, so we read the USA Times.
WATER FOR ELEPHANTS: by Sara Gruen. It is a NY times bestseller. I’m almost done. I think this would be an excellent book for folks to read for fun (it reads very easily and quickly), but it is also superb in reflecting the experience of living in a nursing home. The story is of a 93 y/o man in a nursing home and it rotates from that experience to his early life. I won’t tell you more as it would spoil it. It was a book club selection on the ship earlier in the cruise. The current one is The Kite Runner which I have already read, so I’m using this time to get caught up on other reading. I finished Iberia and Dave is tackling it city by city.
Ed clearly was hung up on the TV. I feel shut out as once that TV is on, you can’t get his attention and you certainly can’t pull him away. So I went to the Casino Lounge and read while one of the pianists practiced. I watched the sail out of Cochin from our balcony.
DINNER: Hank and Erna went to see some folkloric dances at a theatre. The make-up and drama has much of the Peking Opera to it.
Hank also showed me one of his recent paintings. He made it with felt tip pens and colored pencils. It is fanciful and quite interesting. He said he was estimating it would sell for about $2,000. It is slightly larger than 8 x 10. Dave and Twyla were telling us that he has a painting in the Museum on the mall in DC. His name is Henry (Hank) Lyons if you want to google it. What a delight he is and Erna is a sweet lady. They are a cute couple.
Ed’s having an after dinner snooze. I suppose that’s what it could be called. I don’t think I’ll go to tonite’s entertainment. It is the dulcimer player and the singer Jamila we saw a few nights ago. I enjoyed each but I don’t have much interest in seeing them tonite.