DAY 13&14 ODESSA AND AT SEA

It’s very early in the morning and I was just dreaming that two kids that I don’t even have were killed in a car crash and I was phoning everyone to tell them.  It was so completely traumatizing that I woke myself up and I am NOT going back to sleep.

We were in Odessa yesterday.  Even though Odessa is in the Ukraine, the tour guide told us that they are all Russian, think of themselves as Russian, speak Russian,  essentially they have nothing to do with the Ukraine..except take their money to do business.

So, that became obvious immediately.  It was very much like Vladivostok, and that is not a good thing.  It was funny how she was going on about how beautiful, and serene and lovely Odessa was whilst we were driving past derelict, graffitied old broken down buildings.  Parts of Odessa were quite lovely, but not very much.  And she droned on and on and on about the history, with a decided Russian slant..God! I thought she would never quit talking. 

At around lunchtime the tour info said we would be having refreshments.  Now, this tour was called ‘Odessa...with less walking’.  We did this one because of Bill.  Everything we saw was within a ten to 15 block radius.  There was another tour we didn’t take called “Odessa:  walking tour”.  Both groups did exactly the same thing, and it took the same time.  We ran into them at each stop we made, the only difference being that we had to heave ourselves in and out of buses and they didn’t.   Up and down narrow, steep impossible stairs.  Once back on the bus we would drive about 2 blocks, stop in the middle of extremely busy roads, get down the horrible stairs right smack into traffic, walk another two blocks and stand around with the other group and listen to our respective guides talk and talk and talk.  Ridiculous.

Anyway, it was time for refreshments.  So we all left the last site we were at, walked a couple of blocks, heaved ourselves yet again onto the bus, a long process because we had 12 stick people, three walkers, a wheel chair and three extraordinarily obese wheezy people, and drove two blocks...all to repeat the process!

We then walked and walked and walked until we came to a park with beautiful little restaurants with outdoor seating.  Right across the other side of the enormous park we finally came to the one we were aiming for, squeezed into whatever seating there was left due to the other group having already arrived a while ago.  And the refreshment?...a small coldish cup of coffee...that was it!  All that frigging work for a cup of coffee..and not a good one.

By now people were beginning to grumble.  And I will say this about the Brits, they can definitely grumble.  Its so funny..its almost worth having a bad excursion just to here the indignity, the outrage, the ‘I am going to have to speak to Captain about this’!

Oh well we were brought back to the ship fairly early in the day.  We could have gone back out there but Odessa, sadly, was just not worth it.  We did meet some more fabulous peeps from the ship though.  We are beginning to make some friends here now, people coming over and talking to us as we walk about.  And these lovely folks are all unique and different looking, not like the passengers on the ships back home, so I remember them and the conversations we had.  This is such a unique experience for me...normally I just hate everybody by now.

There is one thing though that we are not liking....and that is the food.  I haven’t said too much about it because I like the people so much.  But the food is horrendous.  We were giving the dinners a number you may recall, but we realized we were judging them against each other, not with food you get elsewhere.  Once we brought past cruises into the equation we knew that what we are getting here is rubbish.

One example:  They theme their dinners.  The other night it was British Fare.  This will mean mushy peas, chips, fish, steak and kidney pie, fish pie, roast potatoes, one currie, roast beef, yorkshire puddink (as they say) and three puddinks at the end.  Mmmmmm.....sounds good, smelled good, looked lovely...taste?  nothing.  How can they make food that looks amazing taste like nothing?  The rich dark gravy? bland and we had to add a bucket of salt.  The mashed potatoes?  no taste and we had to add a bucket of salt.  The chips?  awful and the salt wouldn’t stick to them so they stayed awful.  The steak and kidney pie?  no taste and the crust on top was gummy and not cooked.  The fish was soggy and dripped oil..not good oil either.  We tried the coleslaw and its limp and rubbery.

Every night we hope for the best but it just never happens.  Even breakfast isn’t good and I have completely stopped getting lunch.  Actually I think I have lost weight.  When we get to Istanbul I am going to find a McD’s and eat something predictable and good...yes, I LIKE Mcd’s, no apologies here.  

Now we are at sea.  It is still early and I think I might take my book up and get some breakfast.  They make really good dry brittle scraped toast and boiled eggs.  Not soft, hard as hell and ice cold but an egg is an egg..they can’t ruin that one!  I shall check back in here later.

Not much to report.  We sat and had coffee all morning with a couple we met the other day.  Love them!  He has parkinsons and its been a real learning curve talking with him and learning about that awful disease.  Its the same thing Michael J Fox has.

At one point during the morning I noticed Bill, yet again, has forgotten his hearing aids.  How is it he can do this, repeatedly?  It makes me mad because he can’t hear properly and when people try to visit with him (not me, I refuse to talk to him or even listen to him if he hasn’t got them on) its just painstakingly agonizing for the other person.

So, I said I would go get them for him.  I hopped on an extremely full elevator to go up (its ten floor so I wasn’t considering walking).  We went up a couple floors and it stopped, but as we were completely full we all commented that we would tell whoever it was there was no room.

The door slid open and there stood a smallish, 60 something, man wearing almost nothing.  He had no shirt, no shoes and a teeny weeny speedo (with no bumps I might add).  And....here’s the bad part...he was completely glistening from head to toe with a thick layer of oil.  In his hand he had a largish bottle of Extra Virgin Olive Oil...We were speechless, which was unfortunate because he started to wiggle into the crowd of us before we could say ‘no room’!!

Now, have you ever seen that commercial for Joy or Dawn dish soap...you know that one where you see a sink of water with a layer of oil scum over the top and when a drop of soap is dripped down, all the oil scatters away from that drop leaving a clear clean ring of water?  Well that is exactly what happened in that elevator.  Turns out it wasn’t as full as we thought!   As one, we sucked in and stepped back, instantly making  space around him where none of us came in contact with all that oil!   He then proceeded to give us a lecture on how EVOO is better for you than the chemically loaded suncreams.  One lady asked about actual protection and he says “oh yes!  you see the shininess of it reflects the rays”  I couldn’t stand it so I did something my mom told me a million times not to..I contradicted him.  “No it doesn’t.  It magnifies the sun’s rays and makes them a lot stronger.”  He gave me a baleful stare and said “reflect”..I said “magnify”  he said “reflect”  I said “magnify...to the power of infinity plus one!”  He stared at me and then started to laugh as was everyone else.  “Okay, I just tell all the blokes it reflects so they won’t lecture me.”  Jeez!!  What a greasy little tool!  I got off and walked the rest of the way.  

Another odd thing that happened is that the cruise director has taken a shine to me.  He is a very gay thirty something and I could just sit and listen to him all day long.  Thats probably why he likes me because he loves to talk.  Well today he finally asked if I was American.  No, I told him, Vancouver Canada.  He jumped up and down and clapped his hands and squealed and asked “have you met Kathy the head purser?’  “why no I haven’t” I replied.  (I don’t even know what a purser is frankly).

He proceeded to tell me that she was from Vancouver and her whole family was here on this trip and their last name is MacKinley?  you know them?  they are from Vancouver.  Seriously!  I don’t think he realizes that amongst the 1.5 million people in Vancouver it would be the height of bizarre if I actually knew them!  But he took our room number and he is going to put us in touch with each other.  

As this cruise goes on it has become abundantly clear that all of these people don’t cruise on anything but P&O and getting any one from anywhere but Britain is extremely unusual.  It has actually caused us to be somewhat sought out by people.  We are never without people coming to sit with us and want to know where we are from and how the heck did we end up on this cruise!!!  And...they are really really curious about how this ship compares with its American counterparts.  I have to be very diplomatic and tell the truth as much as possible.  I usually just talk about how much we love the people...makes them proud and happy and that part is the total truth.

  So I shall post this now, this day isn’t over yet and if anything momentous happens I shall put on an extra leg.  I now have to do some research on Istanbul...apparently there are NO bathrooms!  Anywhere...panic!!  So I now have to find out where the McD’s is and launch all our activities from there!  TTYL