DAY 1 - August 14, 2004 - Miami, Florida

I always figured cruising was for old people.

Before we left on our Eastern Caribbean vacation, Derek had even said that he didn’t feel all that excited about the trip.

But as the days counted down closer towards the day we were supposed to leave, we all started to feel something: anxiety.

Hurricane Charley was cutting a swath across Florida and the Caribbean. Who knew if we’d actually be going anywhere in the end?

When we got to Terminal 2, we ran into another minor road block: it turned out that our e-tickets weren’t allowed. We had to get actual tickets printed out and for some reason, the lady who was going around with the West Jet tags needed to go all the way to Terminal 3 just to have them printed out.

While we were standing in line, waiting, I started to think, “What if she’s not even with Air Transat and we just gave our tickets away to some con artist?”

When I mentioned this out loud, Aunt Ying, Uncle Wei Kuo and Theresa started getting paranoid — especially since we were getting closer and closer to the ticket agent and we still didn’t have our tickets.

“Forget about the hurricane,” Flo said. “Let’s just get our tickets back first.”

Time was ticking away and we were going to need to board soon. And it seemed like the Air Transat woman had decided to take a leisurely stroll to Terminal 3 instead of taking the “quick” shuttle bus like she’d said she would.

The West Jet agent explained that Air Transat charters their planes to take passengers down to certain destinations. The guy seemed a little irritated that the Air Transat woman was taking her sweet time and tried to help us along by having the West Jet people start the boarding process. As we started getting things done, the woman came sauntering back with our tickets.

We wound up being one of the last groups of people to board the plane and we were all split up.

For the most part, the plane ride was uneventful. Daniel later mentioned he felt a little queasy and tired because he hadn’t gotten much sleep the night before. I think most of us slept through the 3 hour journey because we’d all had to get up so early that morning. Later, Daniel would tell us that he and Derek were both feeling queasy and had to rush to the washroom in the airport, where they tried not to laugh as they sat in side by side in neighbouring stalls, pretending not to hear what was going on next door.

Mid-way through the trip, they served us lunch — which none of us were really expecting. Aunt Ying almost decided to pass up on eating it. I’m not sure if it was in anticipation of the gorge-fest that we planned on indulging in the minute we set foot on the ship, but ultimately, I think the food came at the right time.

Besides, we wouldn’t really have a chance to eat until much later in the day, and when we finally did eat, we’d over do everything and stuff ourselves to the point of not wanting to eat dinner.

When we arrived at Fort Lauderdale, we had to take a 40-minute transit ride to Miami, where the ship was docked. For the most part, there wasn’t much to see during the bus ride and I think some of us dozed off. But as we neared Miami and crossed a bridge, a kid in the back started to get all excited, jumping up and down. (Not a good idea, in general, when you're on a moving bus.)

The excitement was infectious. Despite all attempts to seem blase about the whole affair, it was hard not to feel a sense of possibility pulsing its way through my system.

The port loomed ahead of us and as the driver navigated the twisting and turning streets and over a bridge, we eventually saw the Navigator of the Seas sitting in the dock.

It was a lot more exciting than I expected it to be.

The Navigator of the Seas is the second largest cruise ship next to the Queen Mary and it’s almost three times the size of the Titanic.

As we walked into the glass terminal, tropical music was playing in the PA systems as attendants in bright floral shirts directed us into the right lines.

There was a festive atmosphere to the brightly lit place. Sunlight filtered in through the green-tinted glass windows of the Port of Miami and already, you could sense that the cares of our routine lives were melting away as people looked forward to a week of adventure, rest and relaxation.

When we finally got onto the ship, we automatically went to our cabins to put away most of our things.

We all met upstairs on the eleventh deck at the Windjammer café, which is a buffet-style restaurant.

Later that night, we’d watch a comic named Hank McCauley, who said that the way we attacked the buffet-table, you’d think we’d never seen food before. It was like we were all refugees, eating for the first time in years.

We probably ate more than we should have. You just wanted to try everything.
We sat at one end of the café, eating two full plates of food that had everything from pilaf to pizza to roast beef to French fries to pasta. There were glasses of freshly squeezed lemon juice and iced tea. Aunt Ying, Uncle Wei Kuo and Theresa all had glasses of sweet white wine and the rest of us decided to try out the dessert platters.

Since we finished before the adults, the rest of us decided to take a quick tour through the boat and check out what was on each deck.

We made our way onto the Royal Promenade on the fifth deck, which is where all the shops and the Guest Relations desk are. On one end is the top floor of the grand dining room (which actually consists of three floors) and at the other end is the Ixtapa Lounge, a bar-style venue with an Aztec motif with hieroglyphics and interesting tiles.

As we roamed around the Royal Promenade, we saw a small band playing steel drums and Daniel decided to stick around and watch while the rest of us walked up each flight and walked around.

On the third deck, you have an art gallery which is converted into the photo gallery after the first day. Pictures taken of the guests at either the dining room or around the ship or at ports of call are displayed and people are encouraged to buy them.

Since it was the first day, all they had were interesting celebrity photographs done in black and white.

Sitting in the art gallery.

You also have the first floor of the dining room, which opens up into a really grand-looking ballroom with an impressive staircase and a statue of a ballerina. The whole motif is the ballet and there are costumes and pictures displayed throughout the room.

When you look up, you see an absolutely huge chandelier, which is anchored by four metal posts that are attached to surrounding columns.

We soon discovered that Theresa, Daniel, Flo and I were booked to be seated at one area of the dining room while Derek’s family were seated at another area all the way across the other side.

Unhappy with this arrangement, Theresa and Aunt Ying went about trying to change our seating arrangement while we sat around and nibbled on some freshly-baked cookies and coffee.

After talking to the head waiters, we did a quick inspection to find another table that we wanted to sit at.

Daniel reasoned we should sit closer to the balcony so that we could still get a great view of the sea but also of the interior, in case there were any performances.

We’d noticed a baby grand piano and a cello set up on the very top of the dining room and assumed we’d be listening to some live music while we ate.

After all of that was straightened out, we continued our tour.

As we walked out, Studio B was directly across from the first floor of the dining room and next to the photo gallery.

Studio B houses the ship’s ice skating rink where you can either do some ice-skating yourself or you can catch their ice dancing show.

Like in most of the venues on the ship, it comes equipped with a bar and stadium-like seating.

On deck four, you have the second tier of the dining room on one end and then a lounge that leads into the Mardi Gras-themed casino.

There’s a staircase in the casino that takes you straight up into the Royal Promenade of the fifth floor. We made our way upstairs ‘cause we heard some noise going on up there and soon realized they were doing the raffle.

Standing up at the bridge in the Royal Promenade was Dave, the shopping guide. As part of the first day, there’s a free raffle where they draw names and give away various things like Sea Trek excursions or dinner at one of the speciality restaurants or a gift certificate to one of the shops.

Of course, we didn’t win anything that first day. Later on, though, Derek would win $133 at Bingo and his parents would score a gift certificate to Portofino’s, the Italian restaurant near the Windjammer.

It wasn’t until we got up to the eleventh floor that there was more to see. Besides the Windjammer Café, which takes up a huge portion of the rear end of that deck, you also have all the pools and the gym.

Right next to the café is the main pool area where you’ve got two small salt-water pools and four whirlpools — two of which have nice little shade covers that make it nice to sit in during a hot sunny afternoon if you don’t want to turn painfully red.

This area was a little more shaded and had a Tuscan-style theme that seemed to cater to older guests. You could walk a little further and come across the gym, which had its own whirlpool inside but also a studio for various aerobics classes. Next to this studio was a wide range of work out machines.

There was a nice view of the sea from the gym and we soon realized that the gym had a set of winding stairs that led up to the spa — a place we didn’t exactly plan on spending any time in considering you had to pay extra just to get in.

On the fourteenth deck was the sports area, complete with a basketball court, a mini golf course, an in-line skating area and the rock-climbing wall.

You had to skip down to the twelfth deck again just to cross over to the other end of the fourteenth deck, which had the Cosmopolitan Club, an intimate jazz club, and also a wedding chapel.

We’d already noticed one couple on board get married.

Derek decided then and there that he wanted to get married on a cruise, too, and would say every day that we would all be invited, but we’d have to pay our own way.

“Just think of it as a vacation,” he said.

“If we go, though, you’d get no gift. Us coming would be gift enough,” I told him.

As the ship left the port of Miami, it seemed like everybody on board went up to the 12th deck to watch the Florida coastline slowly drift past as the Navigator headed out to sea.

We had to head back to our cabin to get ready for the safety drill at 4:30 p.m. Our life jackets had been laid out for us on our beds and we had to strap them on and check out where we were supposed to head if the boat hit an iceberg and went down like the Titanic.

They were bulky and uncomfortable and felt like we were wearing neck braces. As we all waddled uncomfortably onto our designated areas, we were told to line up while someone read out our cabin room numbers to make sure everybody was there.

“7487!” a black staff member who looked like Morgan Freeman yelled.

You were supposed to yell back the number of people in your cabin and he’d mark it off. We were instructed on where to go and which lifeboats to get into. The key, they said, was to stay calm and move in an organized manner.

Yeah right.

If something really happened, it’d be mass pandemonium and we’d all be running like crazed lunatics or even leaping straight off the boat.

Theresa had booked all of us in for the early seating at 6 p.m. in the dining room.

We were all feeling too stuffed for dinner, but when our head waitress, Hera, presented us with our menus, we decided to go all out and order appetizers, entrees as well as dessert.

Derek had actually gone back to the Windjammer café for a “snack” right before dinner, yet still managed to wolf everything down.

After dinner, around 9 p.m., there’s usually a show in the Metropolis Theatre, which is sort of reminiscent of some of the Broadway theatres that you get back home. It was more along the lines of the Princess of Wales theatre back in T.O., with a huge stage and a second tier.

We met our cruise director, Becky, during the show.

Becky is a British woman who would come out each night in a great gown and kick up her heels as she cried out, “Hello, luv!” It got to a point where everyone would automatically shout out, “Hello, luv!” (like the slap happy seals we are) as soon as we saw her — no matter where she was.

She tried to rouse the crowd, but she only got a lacklustre response at first. (Like, how lame do you want to seem?) That would soon change to enthusiastic applause and hooting and hollering as the week wore on. (There was something in the food. I swear it. Some mad chemical that would make us behave like the garish idiots that we eventually became.)

The Royal Caribbean singers and dancers came prancing out to give a sneak preview of the two Broadway-style productions they would be putting on later in the week and then they had “The Gentleman Juggler” do an opening act. The guy is from Budapest and is in the Guinness book of world records. We watched him juggle all sorts of things and the most interest bit was when he kept tossing these hats up in the air and having them land neatly on his head.

After the juggler was done, the first comic of the cruise was introduced.

The guy, Hank McCauley, was hilarious.

“So, you’ve all checked out your rooms?” he asked. “Do they look like they did in the pictures? Bet you didn’t know the picture was the actual size of the room.”

He made some crack about how there were tons of little old white ladies on board and that when he got onto an elevator with two of them; they looked at him worriedly and clutched their purses a little tighter.

“Where the hell would I have gone if I’d grabbed them?” he wondered aloud. He pretended to snatch the purse and ran around in a little circle, acting like he was in the elevator. “I got your purse! I got your purse!”

After the show, Flo and I wandered upstairs to the Ixtapa Lounge to check out the ship band, Adam’s Rib.

Daniel was already sitting there; one of the few people who’d bothered to turn out to listen to them.

It turns out Adam’s Rib is a Canadian band from Mississauga.

When the band took a break, we noticed a commotion outside and we wandered out of the lounge to find a parade was kicking off. There were several people in costumes and on stilts standing right outside of the lounge.

After the parade, we headed back to our cabins. Flo and I always tended to head in earlier than the rest of the crew and the three boys would stay up the latest.

There was no clock in the room. You had to program your wake-up call through the phone and we soon realized that without windows in the room, the darkness that envelops it is so complete that you could go 24 hours in a coma-like state and still wake up exhausted, feeling like it was still the middle of the night and you’d only had a couple of hours of shut-eye.

The next day, we were headed for our first port of call, Nassau, Bahamas.

DAY 2 - August 15, 2004 - Nassau, Bahamas

When we got off the boat the next morning, I don’t think any of us really had any idea how big the boat was until we were standing next to it on dry land and looking up.

As we walked down the gangway, there were tour operators gathered at the end of the pier, eager for some business as they spent part of the day showing off the island of Nassau.

Aunt Ying is the master of bargaining. Nobody can do it better and when she saw us all beginning to giggle, she said in Hakka, “Don’t smile. Don’t smile.”

She talked down the price from $25 to $20, though at the end of it all, she only gave the guy $18 for each of us.

She pointed at all of us. “Do you know these are all my kids? You have to give me a better price.”

There were two other middle-aged couples from Canada already sitting in the van and they’d apparently paid $25.

One of the women asked Aunt Ying how much she paid and Aunt Ying said, “Oh, the same.” She managed to keep a straight face through it all.

The bus driver took us through the city, pointing out various government buildings and places. Everything seemed to be colour coded. I think most of the government buildings were in bright pink, while all the schools were yellow with white trim.

I know we’re in the Bahamas and it’s supposed to be paradise, but it actually looked pretty run down.

When I turned around to look at the guys, I noticed Darren was fast asleep.

Aunt Ying pursed her lips and shook her head, mumbling something about how her sons really knew how to put her money to good use.

The first place the guy took us was the Water Tower, which was the highest point of the island and where we could take a picture of our ship by the harbour and look down at the rest of the island.

Walking down the Water Tower wasn’t the greatest idea. It had a long spiralling staircase that wound tightly around the elevator. It was stifling inside and if you weren’t careful, you could wind up slipping and breaking your neck.

Outside, there were markets set up with all sorts of junk you could buy.

There were the usual 3 T-shirts for $10 and scary African masks and colourful bobbles.

There was also the remnants of a miniature fort right at the base of the tower, which we walked up to and managed to take a picture of the Water Tower.

There were two main things Aunt Ying said we had to do. The first was to visit Atlantis, a posh resort where a room can cost you upwards of $25,000 a night, and the second was to have conch salad.

“The conch is for making babies,” he said, probably thinking Aunt Ying and Uncle Wei Kuo shouldn’t be thinking about eating any conch since all of us were apparently their kids.

“That’s good,” Uncle Wei Kuo said, nodding, as he sat up front with the guy.

Atlantis is a gorgeous, sprawling resort that stretched out in hues of red brick and loomed impressively from the distance. When we arrived along the palm-tree lined road, we pulled up to find a fountain with golden flying horses.

There were giant wall murals hanging on either side of the grand entrance and ushers waiting by the doors to open them for you. Everything was in perfect symmetry and what you saw on the left, you saw mirrorred on your right.

As we walked across this little balcony towards the front doors, you could see the huge salt water reservoir that was a part of the aquarium that you could view from inside.

Walking into the cool interior, we found an amazing aquarium where we saw all sorts of fish and huge sting rays.

If I’m honest about it, though, I think I would have been terrified if I’d seen a huge sting ray floating ominously by.

Daniel had done something similar last year and said that if you make any sudden movements, a whole bunch of sting rays will swim right towards you and if you’re not careful, you can get stung by the tail.

So maybe it was a good thing we never managed to get in on the sting ray excursion that the cruise was offering at the Nassau stop.

There was a shopping concourse that we walked around and we went through the casino.

Outside of the casino was this huge chair that everyone seemed to want to take a picture in front of. There was a huge camp of people there and instead of waiting around for our chance, like Theresa and Daniel did, the rest of us decided to explore the resort’s grounds and take pictures.

We were all pretty exhausted and tired by the time we finished touring the place. The driver said he wouldn’t be back until 12:30 but we were ready to leave at 11. We wound up sitting in the lobby and we all dozed off.

Flo snapped several pictures of us in various states of sleep, all looking wilted and sad.

While we were sleeping, Aunt Ying was busy lining up in front of the giant Atlantis chair, thinking we were right behind her. When she got to the front of the line, she turned around and discovered she was all by herself. She came marching back to find us all sleeping.

There was this one annoying family that took half a million pictures on that stupid chair. They took one with the daughter and parents and then with all the female cousins and then one with the boy cousin lying on top of their laps.

Just take one for God’s sake! After they finally left, Aunt Ying and Uncle Wei Kuo bolted for the chair and were busily squishing themselves in place when we realized we needed someone to take the picture for us.

The stay in Nassau was relatively short. We had to be back at the ship by two and once the tour ended, Derek’s parents and Theresa decided to tour the little shopping area while the rest of us hoofed it back to the boat to get something to eat.

That evening, we would have the first of our formal nights.

One of my favourite experiences from the trip was having dinner.

Our waitress, Hera, and waiter, Ramon, were both from the Philippines and it turns out Hera is my age.

She was really sweet and had this habit of always addressing us as “nice people.”

“Hello nice people!” she’d greet us whenever we sat down. By the second day, she’d already memorized our names and always addressed us directly when she took down our orders and draped the napkins across our laps.

Uncle Wei Kuo was the one to observe that they had a different table cloth and different way of folding the napkins every night.

It’s those little things that charmed me.

The appetizers and entrees were always presented in the most beautiful manner. Flo took to bringing her digital camera and snapping pictures of our food every night.

We ordered coffee with our desserts and most meals were really enjoyable as we talked about what we did during the day and just laughed over silly little stories. We didn’t always spend time together when we were on the boat and invariably, the boys would have one story or another to tell us about the people they’d met and the girls they’d chased after from the night before.

After dinner, we walked out onto the Royal Promenade where there was a real party atmosphere. There were waiters everywhere, serving wine and I walked around with some champagne, feeling the bubbles go to my head as I watched the other passengers dressed in their Sunday best.

That night was the first of the two Broadway productions. Before the show
started, the Kruise Komics, a wife and husband duo, came out.

The woman pretended to be a guest who climbed over people in the seats with a folding chair in tow as she made her way to the front to sit down. Her husband pretended to be an usher who kept telling her to sit down and go back.

It wasn’t particularly funny. Both Theresa and I took this intense dislike to them right away.

They seemed to be on forever before Becky came bouncing out, kicking up her heels and calling out, “Hello luv!”

She did her usual bit of saying, “The more energy you give to our performers, the more energy they’ll give right back to you.” (Blah, blah, blah.)

The production, “Now and Forever” was homage to several current Broadway productions like “Mama Mia”, “Fosse”, “The Full Monty” and “Cabaret.”

The production was surprisingly good and even Daniel was really impressed.

When we got to our state room, we found our attendant had made a little bunny out of the towels for us.

DAY 3 - August 16, 2004 - At Sea

Breakfast at the Windjammer doesn’t really offer all that much variety.

I don’t know what I was expecting, considering breakfast is the sort of meal that’s pretty limited. You had your standard eggs in any variety you could ask for: scrambled, sunny side up, plain omelettes, omelettes with ham and cheese, or shrimp or tomatoes or anything else you could ask for.

There were hash browns, sausages, bacon, potatoes, waffles, pancakes, French toast, donuts, croissants, cereal, oatmeal, grits, porridge and any kind of bread you could ever want.

This was our first full day at sea and we all decided we should go to Studio B, where there was supposed to be a shopping talk where they’d be giving away free diamond charm bracelets.

It was freezing in there because it’s usually a skating rink.

Dave, the shopping guy, was there and he was going to be giving away some stuff. Most of us were there, but Daniel was still in his room, sleeping.

The shopping talk was actually pretty boring and they were pushing this VIP pass book which had all sorts of coupons and gift certificates for free stuff that you could get in St. Thomas, which was the next port of call.

Apparently, everything in St. Thomas is duty free and the place is known primarily for two things: jewellery and booze.

They kept talking about something called tanzanite, which was this blue gem that was special to that area.

Since I’d never heard of tanzanite before, I kind of thought it was the same thing as cubic zirconia.

Dave, who happens to be from Montreal, threw out some free stuff, which people started diving after like he was giving away money or something even though the gifts were mostly cheap things like Frisbees and t-shirts.

After lunch, the ice skating rink was open, so we went back to our cabins to change into long pants.

The ice dancing cast was on hand to supervise and we were each handed a pair of blue ice skates.

As we sat down to untie our sneakers, the stench of foot odour pervaded the area.

They blasted pop music from the speakers as we went around and around in the ice rink.

It was pretty tiring being on those skates and we hung out at the rink for over half an hour. The blades seemed to dig right up into the core of each foot, making my feet ache.

Derek hung back a lot and watched the girls go by while the rest of us continually went around and glided, carefully keeping away from the people who were flailing their arms wildly.

Later in the afternoon, we decided to head out of the cold ice skating rink. Flo and I wandered up to the Windjammer out of boredom and found Derek there looking for a snack.

We sat down together at the centre table by the window and just sat there, eating apple crumble with whipped cream and little cakes as we watched the ship floating through a huge expanse of sea.

Everywhere you looked, there was nothing but water and blue skies.

Years from now, when I think back on this trip, this is the moment I'll remember. Don't ask me why.

Dinner that night was a Venetian theme. Halfway through our entrees, music suddenly filled the air and the waiters all started filing past in a line, criss-crossing the dining room before they all lined up along the grand staircase and performed an Italian song for us.

People all crowded around the balcony to watch and it was really fun to see them all.

The waiters, without a doubt, are the hardest working people on the ship. They not only service the dining room but also take turns with the Windjammer café, too. They’re up at insane hours and the little time they get off, they spend sleeping to rest up for the next shift so they can be chipper and happy when they greet and serve us.

Aunt Ying said that the comic from the late night show had said that the guests on the ship are so nosy. We ask the waiters all sorts of questions about their personal lives and then act horrified when we hear about the long hours they work and spend away from home. But really, the comic reasoned, we don’t really care. One minute, we’re being nosy, the next minute we’re like, “Give me my damn bread.”

We learned that Hera was married to one of the bakers and that they wanted to have a child, but they didn’t know how they’d be able to handle it and who would look after their child if they did. Would they leave the baby with one set of grandparents in the Philippines while they both worked for six months straight on the ship?

At this dinner, we’d gotten more accustomed to ordering as many appetizers and desserts we wanted, instead of being afraid of looking like complete pigs.

Hera often said, “If there’s something else you want to try, don’t hesitate to ask.”

Daniel is a very selective eater. He doesn’t eat sea food and doesn’t like overly sweet things. He refuses to touch anything with his hands and I’ve actually seen him eat a pizza with a fork and knife.

“He’s like that old guy from the Seinfeld episode who ate a chocolate bar with a fork and knife,” Flo said.

Tonight was another comedy show with another comic named Troy Thirgill.

Flo and I noticed the 3Ds walk in with another guy and we joined them in the centre row.

The white guy was named Dale and he from Utah. Apparently, he was only 15. He looked about 35, though, with thick glasses and sideburns. He looked like a blonde Elvis impersonator. Daniel said they should change their name to the 4Ds while they were on the trip.

Troy Thirgill was hilarious. He was even funnier than Hank McCauley.

The bit that Derek and Daniel loved to repeat later on was the part where Troy said men were full of shit and that you always know when they’re lying ‘cause they say, “I’m serious.”

(Impressed by my memory? Yeah, well, some of it had to do with the fact that I had to listen to Derek and Daniel repeat --- verbatim --- things over and over again. I sort of think of it as brainwashing.)

He pretended he was in a night club and imitated one of those annoying guys who think that all of the women have come to the club just to meet him. He said they use corny lines like, “Baby, was your father a thief? Because I think he stole the stars from the skies and put them in your eyes.”

When people started laughing, he said, “Don’t laugh. It’s actually worked for me. I’m serious.”

He said women were a lot harsher than men when it came to the dating scene. (Which I think is true.) He said that women gather in groups and when they see an ugly guy approaching, they're the harshest creatures on the face of the planet.

He did a spot-on impression, pretending to bite his nails.

“Oh my God! Is he coming over? Oh my God. He is, like, SO ugly! Don’t look over. Is he coming over?”

(That's actually something I've heard a friend say before. Ok. I've actually said it, too. But women are shallow cows...don't let them even try to convince you otherwise.)

He said the reason why we see ugly men with beautiful women is because ugly men are persistent and wear out the women until they finally agree to go out with them. (Sad, but true.)

Derek seemed to enjoy watching me laugh more than watching Troy. He kept glancing over to make sure I was still laughing.

Troy kept this running gag about how he needed to do laundry. After each major joke, he’d mop his brow and say, “I gotta do laundry” and then say he was down to two items.

One time, he said, “I’m down to a nursing bra and a sea patch.”

Someone hollered out, “Oh, you get sea sick, too?”

Troy just stopped and stared at him. “And that’s what disturbs you about the whole picture? A man with a nursing bra and a sea patch and nothing else on at the Laundromat and all you can think is that he gets sea sick, too?”

There was an ice dancing show straight afterwards and it wasn't anywhere near as lame as it sounds.

When you think about it, what they do is no small feat. They’ve got a really small rink to work with and they ship is moving. It’s not easy to leap into the air and spin around or to throw your partner up and always catch them.

At times, you’d be watching with bated breath, hoping nobody fell and got hurt.

But everything was pulled off flawlessly.

They performed to one song from Moulin Rouge and the energy was amazing. The costumes were elaborate and the fireworks and special effects were impressive. One of the ice skaters came out onto the rink and performed with a whole set of hula hoops. Watching them leap into the air and do a cartwheel without arms was a breathtaking moment.

For some reason, being on the cruise wasn’t as relaxing as I thought it’d be. You’re constantly on the go, trying to cram in as many things as possible and then you’re off the next day at some insane hour trying to get an early start on things.

And when you wake up, the room is pitch black and it feels like it’s still in the middle of the night even if the sun has already risen and the ship has already docked at the next port of call.

DAY 4 - August 17, 2004 - St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands

Since we’d booked the snorkelling excursion for 8:30, we had to be up early again. (I don't remember what the logic was in booking insanely early excursions and forcing ourselves to get up when we were still drained and listless from the night before.)

We had to clear through U.S. customs and when we were making our way to the elevators, I peered down below and noticed that a huge line had already formed.

The customs line up for the non-U.S. citizens was mercifully a lot shorter than the U.S. one.

From my understanding of everything that I’d read, we needed our passports to get in and out of the ship.

When Flo and I cleared through customs, I even stopped to ask one of the ship’s staff and she confirmed what I suspected. But Theresa said she’d asked the Customs people and they said it was okay to lock our passports back into our safe.

Aunt Ying was wary of having us carry our passports with us because if we lost them, we’d be stuck and it’d be a huge mess to get out of.

So, reluctantly, we decided to give our passports to Uncle Wei Kuo so that he could run back upstairs to put them away.

But by the time we made it down to the gangway and saw Dave the shopping guy, he said that we absolutely needed some sort of photo ID. If you had your driver’s license, then great. Otherwise, we’d need our passports.

Theresa, Flo and I were the only ones stuck with that and Theresa had to run back to tell Uncle Wei Kuo.

As we got off the gangway, the adults said goodbye and prepared for their morning of sightseeing before they went shopping.

While we were waiting with the other passengers who’d signed up for the Catamaran Sailing and Snorkelling excursion, we saw a bridal party get off.

“Man, I feel so sorry for the guy in the tux,” Daniel said, shaking his head.

We were already sweltering.

Walking down the dock took nearly half an hour and when we got to the catamaran, we had to take off our slippers and dumped them into the bucket.

Daniel, for some reason, was wearing socks and running shoes.

We all got on. I wanted to sit in the shaded cockpit area near the washrooms, but Daniel led everyone out onto the sunbathing deck.

As the catamaran bobbed along the shore and headed out towards Ship Wreck Cove in the Marine Park on Buck Island, I started to feel sick. I could barely concentrate as the captain of the crew pointed out Jay Leno’s mansion and old fortresses and the island’s only water fall.

I fumbled in the bag for my Bonine pills and passed some to Flo as well.

“Look at the floor. Look at the floor,” I thought to myself as I tried not to think about the rising bitter taste in the back of my throat. But I knew if I didn’t move soon, I’d throw up right on the deck.

I walked on unsteady legs, trying not to step on anyone as I blindly reached out to grab onto anything that would steady me and not send me slipping right off and onto the water.

As I made it to the washroom, carefully making my way down the steps, I threw open the door just in time to puke up all of my breakfast. I stood over the sink, shaking as I watched the scrambled eggs and the bacon come up. I heaved and heaved until I felt like my stomach was completely empty.

At one point, some guy opened the washroom door by mistake and started apologizing. I didn’t even care. I just felt like I was going to gag and die.

When I finally finished puking, I sank down on one of the seats in the cockpit area and tried to close my eyes, but then noticed Derek looking at me from the other side of the deck and making these weird faces at me and pretending to puke. I looked at him, puzzled, wondering how he knew I’d thrown up. But then, Flo came wobbling down. She had puke on the front of her bathing suit and some on her camera bag and apparently, she’d left a mess on the deck, too.

I took her snorkelling gear from her gingerly holding out in front of me with my thumb and forefinger as I told her where the washroom was. As she made her way down, she slipped and crashed down the steps, landing awkwardly at the bottom.

Some of the other passengers looked at her in alarm and asked if she was okay, but she just winced and stared back at me looking miserable. Hobbling, she went over to the sink and hovered over it just like I did and puked her guts out. I think most if had already come out on the deck, anyway.

I had to hand her her things for her to rinse everything off before they could be used. She also had to go back up on deck to wipe up most of the puke.

When we finally made it to Ship Wreck Cove, we had to get up on the deck to listen to the instructor tell us how to put on our gear. Some women didn’t even notice the puke and just walked right over it.

We had to smear some baby shampoo into our eye mask and then rinse it out. We slid our masks on and put on the flippers. I was planning on using the stairs that led straight into the water, but one of the guys told us it’d be faster and easier to just jump overboard.

That was a lot scarier than I expected. Walking around with those flippers on was no easy task. I felt like I had gigantic feet and was surprised I didn’t trip all over myself and crash head first into the water. Taking a deep breath and squeezing my eyes shut so I wouldn’t lose my contacts, I jumped into the water and then put on my eye mask and put the breathing tube into my mouth, biting down tightly and not even thinking about the hundreds of people who’d probably used the mask before me.

Daniel had brought his own gear and kept saying it was so gross that we were using the rental gear.

I couldn’t care less. I figured I’d just barfed and that I was probably the grossest person to put that tube into my mouth, anyway, so everything was good.

It’s strange breathing only through your mouth. You have to remind yourself to do it and sometimes, you take in a bit of salt water, which always makes you gag.

I could hear Derek, Darren and Daniel laughing and I couldn’t figure out why. The sound alone made me laugh, which echoed in my ears while I was under water and made me swallow some more salt water.

Flo had put on her eye mask backwards and the nose part was on top. She couldn’t figure out why the mask was so tight and when Derek and Darren saw her, they bust out laughing.

While it’d been bright and sunny when we first set out, it’d gotten overcast by the time we got to the cove.

The water was cold but we quickly got used to it.

It was crystal clear and when you looked down, it was like being inside a giant aquarium. Everywhere you looked, there were little yellow fish and some brightly coloured, striped pink and blue and yellow fish. I was afraid to reach out and try to touch them.

The lifejacket that they gave us helped to keep us afloat, but using the flippers to push ahead was surprisingly hard. It felt like I had lead weights tied to each ankle and I could barely move. But as I floated around, it felt really calm and serene and I couldn’t believe I was actually out in the ocean, exploring coral reefs and watching as schools of brightly coloured fish swam past.

The guide that was with us kept sprinkling fish food, which made the fish rise up in the water and closer towards us. I actually got a little panicked every time she did that and I would kick my flippers madly, hoping the fish would swim away, thinking I was some large, dangerous animal they should steer clear from.

The guide swam down and plucked off a slimy star fish and then a prickly urchin which she held out for us to touch. I passed on the star fish because it was pulsating and moving, but I tentatively poked at the urchin and it was really sharp. It had all sorts of spindly points all over.

As we moved along, we actually saw a sea turtle swim past, which was really cool. We all turned around and swam madly after it.

As we swam around the cove, we came across the wartime shipwreck of the Catanza C, which was 25 feet below the surface.

It was around here that Daniel lost his snorkelling pipe.

From behind him, I saw the pipe slowly drop further and further below. And there was nothing any of us could do about it. It was already too far down below for us to chase after it and I knew I’d run out of breath if I attempted to do it.

Daniel bobbed along the surface, wiping his eyes and looking dejected and lost as he said over and over again that he’d lost his pipe.

The guide looked at him and asked him how much it was worth to him because it was really deep and she might not be able to get it for him. Daniel looked lost and wasn’t sure what to say.

The guide told him that it was worth at least a $10 tip. She didn’t really seem to want to do it, but she dove down anywhere and as she swam down, I realized just how deep it was. I found myself holding my breath and remembering all those times that I’d been in swimming class and the stupid instructors would toss a puck into the deep end and tell us to go get it.

It takes a lot to hold your breath for even a minute. When you’re underwater and you can feel the pressure beginning to surround you the deeper and deeper you go, you can’t help but feel the beginnings of panic because when you start to push your way back up towards the surface again, there’s always that moment where you think you have to take a breath or you’ll die — yet, the surface looks so far away.

And when you finally manage to break through the surface and manage to get air into your lungs, it’s the sweetest feeling in the world.

Unless you’ve actually done this, you won’t know what it’s like.

When she managed to grab the pipe and came kicking her way back up again, everyone broke out into applause.

I hung back with Daniel and we watched as she dove down again — basically to show off — as she made her way through the opening of the shipwreck and floated through one of the rooms and up again.

“It’s funny how she won’t dive down to get my pipe which isn’t as deep but she’ll go down into a shipwreck for free,” Daniel said.

He had a point.

I told him not to worry about and that if he really felt compelled to give her a tip as thank-you gesture that he should just give her $5, instead of $10.

As we drifted over the shipwreck, it was kind of cool ‘cause I kept thinking about the Navigator and thinking that if it ran into an iceberg like the Titanic and sank, it’d be surreal floating over it and seeing the stairs that we’d gotten used to climbing up and down every single day.

I could see the staircase and port holes and it was a little creepy, wondering what had happened to the ship and if people had died on it.

In retrospect, I should have asked.

As we swam back towards the catamaran, Derek whispered, “I peed in the ocean twice.”

Hey, if you gotta go, you gotta go.

I was a little wary about getting back onto the catamaran and sailing back. I didn’t want to barf again even though I didn’t really have anything in my stomach to barf up.

Flo and I decided to take the smart route and sit in the cockpit area instead.

The crew provided us rum punch and chex mix — probably the best tasting food we’d had all day because we were starving by then.

It took about an hour to sail back and when they mentioned tips, I wasn’t really sure how much we should give.

“What do you think about $5 for the both of us?” I asked Flo. I told Derek and Darren that’s what we were planning on doing.

Derek later told me that he thought $5 was too much and that he would have rather given $1 instead.

“Why didn’t you say anything?” I demanded. If someone had said $1, I would have agreed to it right away.

Daniel didn’t think it was enough. He wanted us to put all of our tips together so that it’d seem like he was giving more, but Derek nixed the idea, saying it would be better to give it separately so they’d know that we were all tipping them and it wasn’t all coming from just Daniel.

When Aunt Ying and Theresa found out, they lamented our stupidity.

“What? $5? Do you know how much that is in Canadian?” they kept asking over and over again. “So stupid! So stupid!”

We had to hoof it back to the Navigator to drop off all of our stuff and it was an insufferably long walk. We were bathed in sweat by the time we actually got there, because the Navigator was at the very end of the dock.

I told them we had to be back out of the ship by 1 p.m.

I wanted to take a taxi into town and then maybe ask the guy to take us to some of the more popular tourist areas. But in the end, everyone seemed to want to go shopping instead. While we waited inside the taxi, I decided to rifle through the bag to make sure we had enough money.

I’d exchanged our $100 bills for smaller bills at the Guest Relations desk earlier, but it turned out that I had walked right off the ship without my wallet.

Luckily, Derek had $80 with him.

We climbed into a taxi, which cost us $3 per person (that was drilled into our heads by Dave, the shopping guy, at his presentation the other day), and took it into the downtown shopping core.

It was blistering hot by then and the sunlight was so bright that the water shimmered with sparkling white light.

The ride was about 20 minutes and when we finally hopped off, the downtown area was unlike what I was used to seeing. It was actually pretty run down with the cobble stone streets lined with little shops that sold exactly the same thing.

The buildings had a somewhat tropical look and feel to it with leafy overhangs and narrow spaces between the shops that led into secluded little watering holes and street cafes.

There was jewellery shop after jewellery shop and liquor store after liquor store.

There were a couple of cheap souvenir shops that we ducked into, primarily to escape the heat and get into a nice, air conditioned place.

Darren and I went into one shop that looked really pricey and had these really cool, marble globes that cost a fortune. We ran our fingers along the smooth surface and tried to find St. Thomas on the globe and then pick out some of the other places we’d be stopping at.

At one corner shop, we found all sorts of cute little knick knacks, but we didn’t really buy anything until we found this liquor store that had all sorts of booze for insanely cheap prices. We started looking around and Daniel suggested that we split the cost of one bottle that we all enjoyed so that we could share it in one of our cabins later on that evening.

We went around and sampled some of the drinks.

The lady looked Daniel up and down warily and asked how old he was.

“18,” he said automatically.

“You don’t look 18. You look 14,” she said with a sceptical snort as she poured him some of the rum-based drink.

Daniel was really insulted, though I have to admit that he looks really young.

The drink tasted like a diluted Bailey’s. It was really good. Derek, after tasting the drink, decided that this was the one he wanted to split, so he bought a bottle, too.

I had to sign for it because I was the oldest, and it was in my name.

As we lugged it back and we walked around, we realized there wasn’t much to see and it was getting hotter and hotter by the minute.

We’d run into the adults and they’d mentioned that the sight seeing tour wasn’t really all that interesting. It was just “scenery”.

Darren had been reluctant to go on the tour in the first place and suggested that he take the taxi back to the ship while the rest of us went on a tour.

When we all decided we’d rather head back to the ship, it was a bit of a relief to him.

Some sites along the way back to the ship:

By then, we were so hot and irritable, all we wanted to do was dive into the ocean or at least sit in the pool for a bit.

We didn’t realize that when we got back to the boat, they’d take our booze away from us and only return it to us the night before we were supposed to head home.

Stripped of our booze, Flo and I made our way dejectedly to our cabins and then decided to head up to the pool to cool off.

The problem is that, no matter how hot and humid it is outside, as soon as you get back onto the boat, you get cooled off right away and walking up to the eleventh deck in your swimming suit is a long, cold walk.

When we got outside, I gingerly went into the pool, sliding in a little bit at a time.

I got into the whirlpool and just sat there for the longest time, watching as my fingertips and toes shrivelled up.

Derek eventually came out and joined me. We sat together and talked.

“You know, the more I look at white girls, the more I want one,” he whispered.

I had to laugh out loud. He smiled and said, “I’m serious.”

While we were sitting there, I noticed Adam’s Rib come out and set up by the edge of the pool again.

After a lazy afternoon by the pool, we all headed back to our cabins to shower and get ready for dinner. When Flo and I reached the dining room, we found Daniel and his new friend, Dale, hanging out by the doors.

I decided to wander out onto the deck and watched as the Navigator pulled away from the dock.

The sun was already beginning to make its descent, but it was still bright out and the warm breeze outside felt a lot better than the cold blast of glacial air conditioning from inside the ship.

I leaned against the railing and watched the shoreline of St. Thomas slowly grow more and more distant.

Daniel and Flo joined me outside with several other like-minded passengers.

The head waiter, Krishna, was from India and when he asked how the food was, Theresa told him that the food was kind of salty.

“Never satisfied,” Daniel would murmur, shaking his head.

Before they served dessert, the waiters all performed for us again, singing along to Ricky Martin’s “Cup of Life” as they waved their arms in the air and did a bit of dancing as they made their way towards the grand staircase and assembled along the steps.

I clapped along enthusiastically and several people started dancing by their tables as the song, “Mambo No. 5” came on.

Hera pulled Uncle Wei Kuo up and started dancing with him before bringing Aunt Ying over and then linking Daniel up with his mom. Flo snapped several pictures and we all laughed.

The Love and Marriage game show was the main entertainment for the eveing and it was hosted by Becky. She pulled up three couples. The first couple were newlyweds; the second pair had been married for close to 25 years and the last couple had been together for 41 years.

The first two pairs were funny and the men were hilarious, but the older couple was completely boring and didn’t seem like they really wanted to be there.

They also happened to be Canadian.

One of the questions that Becky asked the men was what colour and size bra they would buy for their wife. The guy in the middle said, “46 D and red”, which made everyone crack up.

When Becky asked where was the wildest place they’d “made whoopee”, the newlywed groom readily answered, “Out on the balcony of our cabin.”

The guy in the middle answered, “There’s been so many places” and couldn’t seem to decide, much to the horror of his daughter, who was sitting right in the front.

By the time the show was done, the pool side buffet was already set up on the eleventh deck.

It seemed like we never had a camera with us when it was most important.

The buffet was amazing. All of the fruit carvings were out on display and there were all sorts of good eats out, though I wasn’t particularly hungry.

It’s amazing how much people will eat even if they’re not hungry. And usually, it’s the people who shouldn’t be eating who wind up shovelling food down like pigs at a trough. They’re also the same people who’ll get on the elevator only to get off at the next floor.

Flo was groggy and sleepy so she headed back to our stateroom, while I felt compelled to stay up as long as I could. I trailed listlessly behind Aunt Ying and Theresa as we surveyed the spread.

I didn’t eat anything besides a fruit kebab, while Theresa stood in front of one of the chefs and held out a bowl for him to dump a whole lot of papaya chunks into.

I walked along the edge of the deck and watched the heavy throng of people that were dancing by the poolside bar.

The staff had strung Christmas lights and there was a decidedly tropical feel to the whole evening.

In the distance, I could see the small twinkling lights of a city in the distance.

Aunt Ying mused that we were probably already at San Juan because she’d noticed Puerto Rico wasn’t all that far from St. Thomas. It was nice to just lean out and feel the warm sea breeze on my face.