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