Cruise: Day One

Saturday, December 15: Our little ship was called "The Majesty". I thought it was pretty huge until we reached the Caymans and saw some of the other cruise ships. We embarked late in the afternoon, carried our luggage to our stateroom, unpacked, and went out to explore the ship. Don't be overly-impressed that we were in a 'stateroom'; that's just what the majority of rooms are called on a cruise ship, and unless the room is a suite or a penthouse, they are all about the same size as ours. Outside the room, er, stateroom, everyone was wandering around asking the same two questions: "What is this?" and "Is it free?" From this, you can see that the word 'complementary' is an important one to us and other cruisers. In fact, nothing is free on a cruise since you've already paid for it. And any time most Americans have already paid for something, we are likely to get as much as possible.
Out on deck, aft, we saw a long line and got in it, and after about ten minutes in the freezing wet wind, we were pleased to discover that it was a buffet line. Food! We were starving. The fare was stereotypical American: burgers, hotdogs, fries, pizza, salad and fruit. Since every line on a cruise ship is all-you-can eat buffet, we could have gone back for seconds (or thirds). You only have to pay extra for drinks other than tea or water.

We continued our exploration of the ship and discovered two more of the five total "eating venues" it is possible to eat in without paying extra. I overheard two women talking and learned that it is even possible to eat in more than one of the venues for each meal, and that at least one is always open 24 hours a day.
Nearly every single one of the cruise workers was foreign, with the majority of them being from the Philippines. An added bonus of the cruise was that I learned most of the polite expressions in Tagalog that I needed to interact with the stewards, waiters, bar tenders and others. Don't be impressed. Compared to Czech, Tagalog is easy. But, then, compared to Czech, what isn't easy?