September 10, 2007

And now for something completely different. We went on a cruise to Southeast Alaska. I know what you are thinking. Well, I know what I was thinking. I am not a cruise person. I suspected that going in and I know that coming out. It just isn’t my thing. I don’t like to be waited on. I don’t like having servants. I don’t like crowds. I hate waiting in lines. I am susceptible to motion sickness. Not really the resume of a cruise person.

The trip was far from miserable. It was actually a perfectly timed opportunity to relax after our exhausting summer. It also allowed us to explore some parts of the state very economically. And it was a great way to travel with my parents. The ship’s casino didn’t hurt either.

I didn’t gain any weight on the trip. Food was a prominent part of the ship’s offerings, but I don’t think I ate much more than usual, which is not the typical report from cruise passengers. We mostly ate in the dining room which reduced the temptation to overeat. Choosing a single meal option is far more limiting than a buffet.

We went to the buffet a few times. I never really liked buffets and I learned a little more about why on this trip. I have always been a little disgusted with the amount of food people put on their plates and I found no shortage of examples of this self destructive behavior. What I learned, though, is that I don’t like the way the choices are laid out. As I walk through the line, an unpleasant experience for me in itself, I have to chose each dish on its own merits. If something is significantly appealing, it is a little easier. When I come to a dish that is merely acceptable, I put a little on my plate just in case I don’t find anything better. By the time I get to the end of the line, I have a bunch of small piles of unrelated foods. Part of the character of a meal is the way the side dishes compliment the main dish. I realized that I could run through the line twice to examine my choices and then make a nice meal, but I can’t imagine any meal that is worth waiting in line twice. And the food on the boat wasn’t really tipping the scales against the hefty weight of my distaste for lines. The food was all very good, but nothing was of the class required to put a restaurant into our normal rotation.

The ship was nice enough. The room was small, but adequate. Our room steward was very pleasant and folded towels into creative animal shapes. The casino was small, but only seemed crowded a couple of times. In spite of the 1900 passengers and hundreds of crew members, the 900 foot, 14 story boat never really seemed crowded. A couple central areas could get a little congested and elevators were almost always a long wait for a full elevator. I survived with a little deep breathing, focused relaxation, and stair climbing.

The staff on the boat was mostly well trained to be polite and friendly. It was almost annoying, walking down the long hallways to breakfast and passing a half dozen room stewards who all gave a pleasant, “good morning”. I really don’t want to talk to anyone before breakfast, especially not pleasant people. It was also a little challenging as almost every crew member was foreign. This meant everyone spoke with an accent. I am pretty good at understanding people with accents, but I seem to have trouble switching between accents. I still don’t know how our Indian waiter gave direction to his Russian assistant, or took direction from the Portuguese Head Waiter. I could understand anyone of them, but it is almost like trying to switch between languages when one walks away and another walks up.

The weather wasn‘t very good. We had mostly rain, clouds, wind, and cold in Southeast Alaska. We did have a couple days of sunshine, the two days we spent in Seattle and the last two days of the trip. The weather wasn’t unexpected. The weather wasn’t much of a problem. It only limited our views of the spectacular scenery. We had 8 foot seas a few times. The first time, the slow rocking of the boat left me feeling a little off. I adjusted to this and ever since then, I only felt a little off when on solid land. I even felt like my office was rocking after returning to work. I thought I was going to get sick.

The casino seemed friendly. The machines paid off regularly. I hit for $100 a couple times. Overall, I slowly lost about half of what I brought to gamble with, but it was nice to regain position a few times.

Cruising into the small towns of SE Alaska twisted my mind. We were never the only cruise ship in town so about 8,000 cruise passengers were descending onto these small towns each day we spent in port. The tourist shopping districts were mind boggling. Most of these small towns had more gift shops than Anchorage. It was easy to see that once the tourist season ends and most of the seasonal workers leave, life in the towns would change dramatically. I began to wonder about the true nature of these towns. What I was seeing seemed somehow fake.

I finally realized that the reality of these towns was seasonal. The off season reality was no more or less real than the town flooded with 8000 visitors buying trinkets from hundreds of seasonal workers. The realities are just dramatically different.

I used to believe that if you looked in the right places, you could determine what a town was really like. This trip gave me a new perspective that any town has multiple realities. What is the real Cleveland? Is it the comfortable suburban reality? Is it the fledgling urban lifestyle in the heart of downtown? Is it the abandoned factories in the decaying depressed communities? Is it the lifestyle of the rich and famous living in the exclusive communities? Every resident has their own perspective of what life in their town is really like. Every visitor has their ideas based on the input that they obtain during their visit. If Skagway is a great place to buy jewelry to a traveler, but the perfect slice of isolation and quiet in the off season to a full time resident, neither individual’s perspective is more real. Neither holds a higher claim to the reality of the town. With this realization, I can stop looking for the right perspective and start looking for the different perspectives, even on my own town of Anchorage. I can stop trying to calibrate my perspective to the real Anchorage and accept that it works for different people in different ways.

Not exactly earth shattering realizations, but gaining perspective and learning more about myself are pretty good results from a vacation, even if it wasn’t my ideal vacation.