What’s It Like to Work on a Cruise Ship?
guest author Mackenzie Ames talks about his time working on a cruise ship...
Cruise ships: you like or em hate... or, if you're like me, you call em home. Since three years I have lived and worked aboard luxury cruise ships, and this single statement never fails to generate dozens of questions of folk of Earth. Here are some answers to some of te more common:
"What do you have on board, Mackenzie?"
I've been integrated broadcast management, which means what you saw on TV came to my office with my Wizard. I set the satellite dishes, input programming of Miami and organized embedded video shoots. It was a very good show for a 22-year-old straight out of University.
This is important because the work you have on board dictates a lot on the quality of life of your ship. You see, it all comes down to scratches how you have. For example, a captain has four strips, the cruise Director was three and I had a year and a half striped. These stripes are, essentially, your ranking and dictate your privileges on board. Some positions have no scratches and, naturally, they did some more hard work.
' how have you thousand books from delicious food all this!
Yes, the food in the guest rooms to eat is quite delicious, but guess what? This isn't the food they serve the crew. Not even close. According to the ship, as you are, there are several crew mess. In general, the food is disappointing. It is edible... If you can understand what it is. It's all buffet style with a sad salad as the first step section. There may be some vegetables, some Browning lettuce and salad dressings that I could never identify. There is a white man who tries to be ranch so I went with that one. Then were the buckets of rice. If nothing else, the crew always had mountains of rice. Followed by unidentifiable meat dishes - chicken? Pork? Maybe the beef? And finally you will find two day, bread and cake towel there the previous night. My plate was rarely full, and there were a lot of nights where I did just mini peanut butter and sandwich of honey on the lower pieces of French bread, I could find.
It wasn't really bad, however. Because of my position on board, I got the privilege to eat in the comment boxes. If I made the reservations, I could enjoy a dinner in the dining room. If the lines were short, I could have dinner in the buffet of comments. If there were promotions crew going on, I could spend an evening in specialty restaurants.
There was a specific strategy involved in search of food on board. The longer you live aboard, best get you to conclude your meal - or you simply exit at the port and like to be expected.
"Mackenzie, where do the crew live?
The crew cabins are hidden all over the ship, but most are close to the bottom. Yes, as in Titanic . Agents of living near the top of the ship where are all the controls, but most of us live on three of the bridge or lower. Again, your cabin depends on your working on board. captains have large cabins, the cruise Director has a cabin a little smaller but still large enough to have his own show and I had a simple cabin, measuring about six and a half feet by nine feet.
That was not always the case. When I started as an assistant, I was placed randomly in a cabin of the same size with a roommate. Yes, two girls lived in a cabin of 6 × 9 with bunk beds. It is cramped, stressful and you probably live with someone from another country if just wait that cross-cultural BREW. On top of that, your roommate is usually a person of your own Department because what could be better than to share a room with your colleague?
I maintain that I enjoyed my three years at sea, but I did not like living in a cabin.
'did you ever happen to get off the ship?"
Yes, Dang, I did it! If people go too long without getting off the ship, they begin seriously to turn into monsters. That's why crew really hate days at sea back to back, or, worse still, the transatlantic crossings.
again, I was really lucky in my position on board. I basically was my own boss and had almost total control of my schedule. When the ship is docked there is nothing to film and satellite channels are stable. So if I wanted to go to the beach, I did. If I wanted a ride to see the Norwegian sled puppies, I did. If I wanted to eat Pringles in my DVD of cabin and watching Mad Men of , I did.
Living conditions was may not be ideal, but the places I could see were beyond the sentence. In my time on cruise ships, I was nearly 36 countries in the Baltic, Mediterranean, Norway, Bermuda, the Caribbean East, Alaska, Central America, the Panama Canal and South America. This work has changed my life. I'm not rich. I have not grown up with money, but I grow with a passion to see the world. Cruise ships let me live this passion.
"Mackenzie, do the crew, like, hang out with them?
Nope. We do our work, connect to our time and then sit in our cabins until our next quarter. You laugh, but I actually get this question a lot.
Of course the crew go out with them. In fact, the crew spend a wicked time together. We are each and other best friends, worst enemies, lovers, ex-lovers and family. We live in a bubble driven by the strange phenomenon called 'time to ship. "
The crew have their own chocolate under the bridge. Once again, Yes, like in Titanic . We have a bar with an identical to the pub atmosphere and a bar with a nightclub environment. This is where are all the drama happens, and there's always drama. We are all locked with them for months at a time so that the drama tends to be our only entertainment.
The crew sometimes date, fall in love and lived with babies of ship. Sometimes they are, have breakdowns and strategically to find ways to finish ever on the same boat again. Relationship of ship happens - they are actually encouraged. They get dramatic, complicated and messy, but they can also be passionate and romantic. When an exotic outsider takes you for lunches in Stockholm and cafes in Naples, it can really start to feel like the whirlwind fantasies you've seen in the movies.
While the destinations were great, I can honestly say that most of my time on ships are the people I met. I always share cards Christmas, Facebook messages and phone calls with many of them. This eccentric work brings together interesting people from everywhere in the world and all walks of life. I consider myself very lucky to have worked with them for just a bit.
These responses word seriously are just the tip of the iceberg (probably not the best metaphor to use when talking about cruise).
guest author Mackenzie Ames talks about his time working on a cruise ship...
Cruise ships: you like or em hate... or, if you're like me, you call em home. Since three years I have lived and worked aboard luxury cruise ships, and this single statement never fails to generate dozens of questions of folk of Earth. Here are some answers to some of te more common:
"What do you have on board, Mackenzie?"
I've been integrated broadcast management, which means what you saw on TV came to my office with my Wizard. I set the satellite dishes, input programming of Miami and organized embedded video shoots. It was a very good show for a 22-year-old straight out of University.
This is important because the work you have on board dictates a lot on the quality of life of your ship. You see, it all comes down to scratches how you have. For example, a captain has four strips, the cruise Director was three and I had a year and a half striped. These stripes are, essentially, your ranking and dictate your privileges on board. Some positions have no scratches and, naturally, they did some more hard work.
' how have you thousand books from delicious food all this!
Yes, the food in the guest rooms to eat is quite delicious, but guess what? This isn't the food they serve the crew. Not even close. According to the ship, as you are, there are several crew mess. In general, the food is disappointing. It is edible... If you can understand what it is. It's all buffet style with a sad salad as the first step section. There may be some vegetables, some Browning lettuce and salad dressings that I could never identify. There is a white man who tries to be ranch so I went with that one. Then were the buckets of rice. If nothing else, the crew always had mountains of rice. Followed by unidentifiable meat dishes - chicken? Pork? Maybe the beef? And finally you will find two day, bread and cake towel there the previous night. My plate was rarely full, and there were a lot of nights where I did just mini peanut butter and sandwich of honey on the lower pieces of French bread, I could find.
It wasn't really bad, however. Because of my position on board, I got the privilege to eat in the comment boxes. If I made the reservations, I could enjoy a dinner in the dining room. If the lines were short, I could have dinner in the buffet of comments. If there were promotions crew going on, I could spend an evening in specialty restaurants.
There was a specific strategy involved in search of food on board. The longer you live aboard, best get you to conclude your meal - or you simply exit at the port and like to be expected.
"Mackenzie, where do the crew live?
The crew cabins are hidden all over the ship, but most are close to the bottom. Yes, as in Titanic . Agents of living near the top of the ship where are all the controls, but most of us live on three of the bridge or lower. Again, your cabin depends on your working on board. captains have large cabins, the cruise Director has a cabin a little smaller but still large enough to have his own show and I had a simple cabin, measuring about six and a half feet by nine feet.
That was not always the case. When I started as an assistant, I was placed randomly in a cabin of the same size with a roommate. Yes, two girls lived in a cabin of 6 × 9 with bunk beds. It is cramped, stressful and you probably live with someone from another country if just wait that cross-cultural BREW. On top of that, your roommate is usually a person of your own Department because what could be better than to share a room with your colleague?
I maintain that I enjoyed my three years at sea, but I did not like living in a cabin.
'did you ever happen to get off the ship?"
Yes, Dang, I did it! If people go too long without getting off the ship, they begin seriously to turn into monsters. That's why crew really hate days at sea back to back, or, worse still, the transatlantic crossings.
again, I was really lucky in my position on board. I basically was my own boss and had almost total control of my schedule. When the ship is docked there is nothing to film and satellite channels are stable. So if I wanted to go to the beach, I did. If I wanted a ride to see the Norwegian sled puppies, I did. If I wanted to eat Pringles in my DVD of cabin and watching Mad Men of , I did.
Living conditions was may not be ideal, but the places I could see were beyond the sentence. In my time on cruise ships, I was nearly 36 countries in the Baltic, Mediterranean, Norway, Bermuda, the Caribbean East, Alaska, Central America, the Panama Canal and South America. This work has changed my life. I'm not rich. I have not grown up with money, but I grow with a passion to see the world. Cruise ships let me live this passion.
"Mackenzie, do the crew, like, hang out with them?
Nope. We do our work, connect to our time and then sit in our cabins until our next quarter. You laugh, but I actually get this question a lot.
Of course the crew go out with them. In fact, the crew spend a wicked time together. We are each and other best friends, worst enemies, lovers, ex-lovers and family. We live in a bubble driven by the strange phenomenon called 'time to ship. "
The crew have their own chocolate under the bridge. Once again, Yes, like in Titanic . We have a bar with an identical to the pub atmosphere and a bar with a nightclub environment. This is where are all the drama happens, and there's always drama. We are all locked with them for months at a time so that the drama tends to be our only entertainment.
The crew sometimes date, fall in love and lived with babies of ship. Sometimes they are, have breakdowns and strategically to find ways to finish ever on the same boat again. Relationship of ship happens - they are actually encouraged. They get dramatic, complicated and messy, but they can also be passionate and romantic. When an exotic outsider takes you for lunches in Stockholm and cafes in Naples, it can really start to feel like the whirlwind fantasies you've seen in the movies.
While the destinations were great, I can honestly say that most of my time on ships are the people I met. I always share cards Christmas, Facebook messages and phone calls with many of them. This eccentric work brings together interesting people from everywhere in the world and all walks of life. I consider myself very lucky to have worked with them for just a bit.
These responses word seriously are just the tip of the iceberg (probably not the best metaphor to use when talking about cruise).