I Saw Three Ships Come Sailing In... And I was ON ONE!

Celebrating Christmas away from friends and family and New York and Kentucky was one of the toughest things about deciding to do this contract.  I wanted to give you a good picture of life on board the ship for Christmas, though.  It's not all sad.  Of course it can be hard.  I can't help, but wonder what adventures the whole clan is having together celebrating back home or picture the Christmas party in my NYC apartment.  I can't help but miss the EPIC carol sing-along at my grandparents' house or crave my dad's holiday food.  (Why is it so hard to get country ham anywhere outside of the Southern United States?!)  That being said, being on board the ship has some fun points at this time of year, too!  The whole crew comes together to really make the ship come alive to celebrate the season.  

The first signs of Christmas come as decorations come out.  Little by little you start seeing more lights and garland around the ship.  There isn't a stair railing without garland and I would guess there are at least a dozen trees around the ship, including in the crew areas!  Just last night, even, the pastry chefs brought out the most amazing gingerbread houses!  There are about 8 of them that range in sizes up to 4 or 5 feet tall, made out of all edible ingredients.  Tomorrow we are caroling around the ship and we are doing Secret Santa among our department, which is a fun treat and the ship has been great at organizing some fun things for the crew.  We had a movie night where they showed "Home Alone" and we are having a big Christmas dinner and party later this week!

For the entertainment department, of course, this becomes a very busy time of year.  We are putting together a full show for Christmas day and it has been really fun to get some of our favorite songs together for the guests.  My contributions include getting the cast to sing "Carol of the Bells" a cappella (an Oldham County High School tradition, continuing on the high seas) and then I am playing piano while I sing "Count Your Blessings Instead of Sheep."  I can't stand going through a holiday season without watching "White Christmas."  It's probably my favorite Christmas movie and one of the best movie musicals of all time.  "Count Your Blessings…" is such a sweet song sung by BIng Crosby and Rosemary Clooney and I'm glad to get to share it with this audience.  It will be a nice gift.  

I got quite a great surprise in Ft. Lauderdale when I received 25 items of mail for Christmas.  I have been enjoying opening them each day.  One was from my mom.  She thought I needed a tree, so she sent me a paper tree to hang on my wall with pictures of the family on it.  Ha ha!  It's been great and as I have been opening the Christmas cards I have hung them on the wall around the tree.  It's been a great way to be reminded of so many people I love.  

My favorite moment of this time on the ship, though, has been one that didn't really matter much to anyone, but it did to me.  I was doing some pretty mundane work around the ship and went to the cruise director's office.  She was telling me about how busy she was and the work she needed to get done and she pointed to a big box and said, "And I have to get this train put together, too!!!"  I looked and there was a brand new Polar Express toy train unopened.  I asked where it was going and she said around the main tree in the atrium and I said, excitedly, "I'll put it together!"  She was shocked that I was so happy to do it, but I always liked doing that at our house in Kentucky, so I figured it would be fun.  There I went, down the stairs with my big box.  

The atrium was quite because it was morning and I went to work, cutting open the boxes and pulling out the train pieces.  Over walked the assistant maitre'd out of the main restaurant.  "What're you doing there?"  I told him I was putting this train together as I started snapping pieces of track together.  "You think it's going to make it around the whole tree?"  He was so casual, but concerned.  I told him, yes, I was pretty sure it would.  "You should probably use the straight pieces of track every once in a while to make the track bigger."  I assured him I would put them every 3 pieces.  He stooped down and started working alongside me a bit.  

A few minutes later a waiter walked out of the restaurant.  "Hey- what are you guys doing?"  The maitre'd answered, "Putting a train together!"  The waiter inquired, "You have all the train pieces there?  What about batteries?"  He quickly started unwrapping and putting the train together.  A few minutes later out came a sommelier from the restaurant.  "Hey guys- you putting a train together?"  "Yeah!  Look at this controller!"…Eventually there were 5 of us grown men all sitting on the floor of this beautiful cruise ship atrium putting this train together.  Once it was completely assembled and the train was lined up we turned it on, playing with the controller and seeing how we could make it ride forward or backward and with different speeds.  The maitre'd LOVED that you could push buttons to blow the train whistle or ring the bell.  When trying to figure out how to make it work best he exclaimed, "I'll keep the controller in the maitre'd stand!  That way when it's time for meals I can turn it on and make sure it's running properly!"  We were so excited for our successful  work and iI had a grin on my face the rest of the day.  There we were, 5 guys of all different nationalities ranging in age from 25-55 years old and we must have looked like 7 year old kids sitting around the tree on Christmas morning.  That's what this time of year does, though, isn't it?  

I'm really looking forward to another moment this year.  Our cruise director has come up with a really unique way to give us all some perspective to appreciate what we have this year.  She has set up a "giving tree" in a main area of the ship.  It's a Christmas tree with some gift tags next to it.  Guests have been writing the non-material gifts they want to give this year on the tags and hanging them on the tree.  It's really nice to read these messages and prayers of thanksgiving, hope, and peace on the tags hung all over the tree.  Thought it was such a great idea!

All the best to you during this special time of year!

Tripp