To the new piano person -
I add these pages to those written by pianoman JP Nadeau 3 months ago, perhaps the start of an interesting archive?
1) JP's comments on "no airconditioning in the Piano Bar" are true, unfortunately. For 98 days I was seen carrying the fan (which you now inherit) through the B Deck corridor and into the piano bar. (People will make dumb jokes abut your "Number One Fan"). The ship goes into drydock in January for a week or two, perhaps they'll fix the problem then.
2) If you attempt to grub food in the Indonesian/Filipino mess across the corridor, you may get resistance from the mess manager. Perhaps being "served" as an entertainer upstairs at the Lido Buffet disqualifies us from being "one of the boys" downstairs on B Deck. Or maybe it's just a tribal thing.
Last week the mess manager finally warmed up to me when we struck up a conversation about Islam. He's one of the many Indonesian muslims here, and attends services when the crew mess becomes a mosque on Friday Afternoons.
3) JP's comments on toilet paper are simply untrue, I can't understand how this was such a problem to him. The only thing I can figure is that he failed to tip his room attendant. The current room attendant for B058 is "Sandi", a perfectly nice guy. However, he doesn't seem to notice when the soap is reaching the size of a communion wafer. Write a big fat note to him when the soap starts getting too small.
4) Cabin B058 is right next to the Officers Bar, and also right next to the cabin of the lead singer for the HALcats -- Expect strange sounds from both places.
5) You STILL have no TV, for most practical purposes. Sandi brought the above TV out of retirement from a closet down on C Deck. In fact this TV should be thrown overboard. The only reason I retained this piece of junk was to cut down on my TV watching by making it less pleasurable. Any nighttime scene in a movie will be disrupted - no picture at all -- until suddenly it's a daytime scene again, or a well-lit scene, and suddenly you have a picture again.
On Channel 36, for 14 weeks, you can expect a constant replaying of the following movies - Gladiator, Wizard of Oz, Gone With the Wind, Gigi, Breakfast at Tiffanys, Rocky, Godfather, Top Gun, West Side Story, Tootsie, Field of Dreams, Grease, On Golden Pond.
6) Bartender Rey is a nice guy, and a real character. I utilized him many times - he has some funny schtick (e.g. YMCA and Margaritaville) which he enjoys doing, and people really enjoy. Good singer too -- not solo, but rather a nice harmonies voice - he was Garfunkel to my Paul Simon during "The Boxer"
7) Good luck with the Name That Tune contests, which you'll do once per cruise. The prizes are cheap trinkets, but these people compete seriously. Invariably you'll get old people complaining that the contest was too difficult. They stopped listening to the radio in 1956 and everything after that is arcane.
8) Use the back crew elevator by the marshalling area (red floor) -- go up to the 7th floor, walk up one flight to the back (crew) door of the piano bar. Although this back door is "crew only" it has a green "exit" light visible to people in the piano bar, in case of emergency. Guests frequently see this and attempt to use this door to get to the back of the ship. 98% of the time they see their error and back off. But occasionally a stubborn or drunk guest will forge ahead, go through this door, and disappear into another dimension.
9) The piano was tuned on July 18 in Norway, but you'd never know it. You'll quickly discover a rotten Aflat toward the top. Maybe you'll get lucky and someone will tune it again soon. Also, hope you like June Allyson and raspberry-colored pianos.
Enjoy the gig
Steve Lynch
Friday, August 22, 2008
Monday, August 11, 2008
Prince Christian Sound
If I said before that Dublin was the high point of this 35-day cruise, I now have to retract that. The ride through Prince Christian Sound on Saturday 8/2 was dazzling to just about everyone on the ship. That night in the piano bar, people just shook their heads in reflection of what they’d seen. We must have set some kind of record for most photographs collectively taken on a cruise ship in a six-hour period.
At the southern tip of Greenland is a group of islands, separated by narrow waterways, the longest of which is Prince Christian Sound. Completely inhospitable to life. As our very reserved tour lecturer would put it, the scenery was “extremely dramatic” -- mountains rising 1000 feet straight out of the water, with glaciers breaking through at certain points….. newborn icebergs recently broken off the glaciers…..long waterfalls back down to the sea……..
…….and it just went on and on, for many hours. Around every bend there was more magnificent scenery, and the cameras just kept clicking. The photos below are just a small sample.
At the southern tip of Greenland is a group of islands, separated by narrow waterways, the longest of which is Prince Christian Sound. Completely inhospitable to life. As our very reserved tour lecturer would put it, the scenery was “extremely dramatic” -- mountains rising 1000 feet straight out of the water, with glaciers breaking through at certain points….. newborn icebergs recently broken off the glaciers…..long waterfalls back down to the sea……..
…….and it just went on and on, for many hours. Around every bend there was more magnificent scenery, and the cameras just kept clicking. The photos below are just a small sample.
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Reykjavik Day
Wearing a 2-stripe uniform and sitting in a little office down on B deck is a young Russian lady named Kateryna. One of her duties is to provide activities for the crew, both fun and educational. She puts together a calendar of events, month-by-month, and it seems like there’s something going on every day. Ping Pong tournament, karaoke night, French class (?), Bingo night, Salsa class, athletic events, movie night, Wii night (Wii is some kind of Nintendo game), etc etc
….and occasionally an excursion. Many weeks in advance she started advertising an excursion to the Reykjavik hot springs tourist attraction called The Blue Lagoon, requiring a $30 advance fee.
The bus was almost full, 67 seats filled out of a possible 71. At 12:15 on 7/31, the bus left Reykjavik proper and drove through many miles-worth of an otherworldly landscape, a lava field with zero vegetation and a kajillion pieces of ugly volcanic rock strewn as far as the eye could see. Kinda reminded me of those photos taken on the surface of Mars, except that Mars is a lot prettier.
The Blue Lagoon is a highly-touted hot spring, “geothermically” heated, mineral-rich water which would make me look 30 again. Yeah right. After an hour of sloshing around in this Fountain of Youth, I looked at myself in the locker room mirror and alas, saw the same old face. Oh well, “Live slow, die old, close the casket“
Everybody visited the large Blue Lagoon gift shop and unloaded whatever Icelandic money they had left, since this was the last stop in Iceland (going back westward).
The ride back to Reykjavik was more spirited, since all of us were purchasing cups of Viking Ale while in the waters. A nifty plastic bracelet with a computer chip inside was able to a) open and close my locker and b) record my beer orders, so that they would get the money from me later on when I surrendered the bracelet while leaving.
Sitting behind me on the bus was two piano players -- Anthony the very trained and skilled sightreader in the orchestra, and Mortimer (not really his name) who has the job title “Utility Piano Player” -- Mortimer plays in a very florid, arpeggiated, Liberace-esque piano style, and he gets deployed to various pianos around the ship, in restaurants and public areas, playing solo piano.
Mortimer really likes to drink -- hardly a secret down on B deck. On this day he got started with at 11:00 in the morning with beers, and he burped a few times down my neck on the bus.
But he had a special reason to drink on this day -- for him Reykjavik Day was a Day Of All Days -- Only the previous night I found out that Mortimer a) was gay b) was a cross-dresser and c) would be participating in the Ms. Maasdam competition later in the evening.
He was scheduled to dress in drag, sing “Hey Big Spender”, and strut and wiggle in front of hundreds of crew people at a big late night party down on B deck, in competition with 3 other singing drag queens. Mortimer had never gone public before with this, so for him it was a Breakthrough. Leave it to a cruise ship crew to help a closeted person “be himself”
The Ms. Maasdam contest wasn’t even a new thing, Kateryna informed me later on. There has been Ms Ryndam contests, Ms. Volendam contests, even a combined Ms Oosterdam/Veendam contest on a day that both ships were in the same port. Now THAT’S serious Event Planning.
The party was actually a reward for Job Well Done, as we’d finished most of the 35-day long trip to the satisfaction of the guests. The Ms Maasdam contest was the icing on this particular cake however, and I was curious to see what the hell Mortimer would look like.
I finished up the piano bar work a little past midnight, apologized to guests and excused myself somewhat abruptly, saying Sorry Folks I gotta go downstairs and watch a Drag Queen contest.
I was too late for most of it. Each contestant had sung, the voting (by applause) was over, and Mortimer had won the $75 second prize. However, the four “girls” were asked to one last sexy slinking dancing, a final strutting of Their Stuff. I arrived just in time for that.
There was Mortimer, in a wig, makeup, short purple dress, 42 years old, and clearly not as young and pretty as the others. Did I say “pretty” ? Ugh.
The contest was followed by live LOUD music. Bass, drums, guitar, and a lead singer not singing in English. For lack of any real insider knowledge of this music, let’s call it Polynesian Punk. All these young room attendants, all male, jumping up and down in front of the band and crashing into each other. Sex Pistols via Sumatra.
Three of these tunes was enough for my ears, and Mortimer was certainly enough for my eyes, so I made my typical early exit. But not before stopping by Kateryna and congratulating her for a job well done on Reykjavik Day
….and occasionally an excursion. Many weeks in advance she started advertising an excursion to the Reykjavik hot springs tourist attraction called The Blue Lagoon, requiring a $30 advance fee.
The bus was almost full, 67 seats filled out of a possible 71. At 12:15 on 7/31, the bus left Reykjavik proper and drove through many miles-worth of an otherworldly landscape, a lava field with zero vegetation and a kajillion pieces of ugly volcanic rock strewn as far as the eye could see. Kinda reminded me of those photos taken on the surface of Mars, except that Mars is a lot prettier.
The Blue Lagoon is a highly-touted hot spring, “geothermically” heated, mineral-rich water which would make me look 30 again. Yeah right. After an hour of sloshing around in this Fountain of Youth, I looked at myself in the locker room mirror and alas, saw the same old face. Oh well, “Live slow, die old, close the casket“
Everybody visited the large Blue Lagoon gift shop and unloaded whatever Icelandic money they had left, since this was the last stop in Iceland (going back westward).
The ride back to Reykjavik was more spirited, since all of us were purchasing cups of Viking Ale while in the waters. A nifty plastic bracelet with a computer chip inside was able to a) open and close my locker and b) record my beer orders, so that they would get the money from me later on when I surrendered the bracelet while leaving.
Sitting behind me on the bus was two piano players -- Anthony the very trained and skilled sightreader in the orchestra, and Mortimer (not really his name) who has the job title “Utility Piano Player” -- Mortimer plays in a very florid, arpeggiated, Liberace-esque piano style, and he gets deployed to various pianos around the ship, in restaurants and public areas, playing solo piano.
Mortimer really likes to drink -- hardly a secret down on B deck. On this day he got started with at 11:00 in the morning with beers, and he burped a few times down my neck on the bus.
But he had a special reason to drink on this day -- for him Reykjavik Day was a Day Of All Days -- Only the previous night I found out that Mortimer a) was gay b) was a cross-dresser and c) would be participating in the Ms. Maasdam competition later in the evening.
He was scheduled to dress in drag, sing “Hey Big Spender”, and strut and wiggle in front of hundreds of crew people at a big late night party down on B deck, in competition with 3 other singing drag queens. Mortimer had never gone public before with this, so for him it was a Breakthrough. Leave it to a cruise ship crew to help a closeted person “be himself”
The Ms. Maasdam contest wasn’t even a new thing, Kateryna informed me later on. There has been Ms Ryndam contests, Ms. Volendam contests, even a combined Ms Oosterdam/Veendam contest on a day that both ships were in the same port. Now THAT’S serious Event Planning.
The party was actually a reward for Job Well Done, as we’d finished most of the 35-day long trip to the satisfaction of the guests. The Ms Maasdam contest was the icing on this particular cake however, and I was curious to see what the hell Mortimer would look like.
I finished up the piano bar work a little past midnight, apologized to guests and excused myself somewhat abruptly, saying Sorry Folks I gotta go downstairs and watch a Drag Queen contest.
I was too late for most of it. Each contestant had sung, the voting (by applause) was over, and Mortimer had won the $75 second prize. However, the four “girls” were asked to one last sexy slinking dancing, a final strutting of Their Stuff. I arrived just in time for that.
There was Mortimer, in a wig, makeup, short purple dress, 42 years old, and clearly not as young and pretty as the others. Did I say “pretty” ? Ugh.
The contest was followed by live LOUD music. Bass, drums, guitar, and a lead singer not singing in English. For lack of any real insider knowledge of this music, let’s call it Polynesian Punk. All these young room attendants, all male, jumping up and down in front of the band and crashing into each other. Sex Pistols via Sumatra.
Three of these tunes was enough for my ears, and Mortimer was certainly enough for my eyes, so I made my typical early exit. But not before stopping by Kateryna and congratulating her for a job well done on Reykjavik Day
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)