not all shits and giggles
Sep. 28th, 2005 11:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sanpaku_backupI keep pointlessly reloading my friendslist, waiting for substantive posts to amuse me... but no, all anyone is doing is memes that remind me that many of the people I read were still in high school when I turned 30... jeebus that's depressing.
As often seems to be the case, I am putting off updating because I have a lot to write, so I end up writing nothing until I forget it all.
We saw many things and places on the cruise. Brief overview: there were times it was tough, in the ways I imagined, but after a couple of days we settled into a routine that allowed us to do some moderately fun things.
Logistically things went more or less OK; the car left, the rental retrieved, the packing done, the driving completed, etc. I was surprised at how complete the language changeover is in Quebec; I guess I expected at least a few signs in English, seeing as the rest of Canadia is bilingual. (I think I'd be pretty pissed off if with it if I were Canadian, actually.) The one big problem was with returning the rental car: for some reason the location denoted "Downtown" was many miles of very slow, awful traffic away from the downtown hotel, and like a moron I had no Canadian money or real sense of where I was going... but obviously I survived.
After nearly herniating myself with luggage we got on the ship. It had some nice touches although the luxury aspect of it was perhaps overdone. Kind of like a three-star hotel; the food was good and there was a lot of it, but not the very best I've had in my life. Our room was certainly bigger than a room at the Hudson (in NY), and, miraculously, the folding crib fit (open) inside the bathroom, vastly improving everything. We didn't have a window, but they had a TV station with a camera looking out over the water, which helped. You could hardly feel the water in the early stages of the trip, but when we were on the Atlantic things gently rolled and bobbed just a little bit. I did actually wake up seasick the last night.
We settled into a routine. most mornings we ended up with the Jo because my parents were just too slow and she insists on motion. So most mornings we undertook a brisk perambulation on foot of whatever could be seen before we schlepped back to the ship for lunch/naptime. In the afternoons she napped while my mom sat in with her, so we did some other trips or did things on the ship like swimming. Since they gave us late seating for dinner, most evenings were occupied with watching her run around while us grownups drank from the copious amounts of alcohol provided by my brother. Long dinners, followed by Jo taking in the show with one of them. (Seeing some of it the first night was enough for me.)
So the trip was mostly a brief checklist of things I'd like to see in greater depth when we have more time. Quebec City did not disappoint; I climbed up hundreds of steps with the Jo on my back to get a view from the top of the citadel, and the rest of the city was like a little walled medieval village. Next time we'll just plan on staying at the Chateau Frontenac. Prince Edward Island was pretty but not that exciting, even with a cab ride to dunes that basically reminded me of Cape Cod. We stopped at Sydney, NS, a dingy little place that's basically a jumping-off point for day trips to Cape Breton; these were hideously expensive, so we didn't do them. Yet there was a frustrating near-miss when we got off the ship and there was a car rental desk willing to rent a car with a carseat. By the time I established that a) it was impossible to convince my parents to do this, and b) we wanted to do it anyway, they had rented the last car. (Typical of my parents: they rode around PEI and were unimpressed, so they figured they'd be unimpressed with Cape Breton as well. That's logic for you.)
Much walking around Halifax with the Jo on the daddy taxi, to the Public Garden and the Citadel. Jo liked the ducks. Last stop was Bar Harbor, where she had a complete meltdown not long after another near-miss of doing something interesting with my folks (taking the free buses around the island). But we've been there many times before, so no big deal.
I made sure to sit in the whirlpool a little every day and to go into the "pool," which was pretty tiny but contained warm sea water. Other than that, if you didn't drink or gamble, there wasn't a heck of a lot to do. They had a library onboard and I read a long book about the armies of the Roman Empire.
The staff was very nice to us and everyone fawned over the Jo quite a bit. They all had families home in the Philippines or Indonesia that they missed. Definitely the experience was meant to make you feel that these people were your servants, and it only hit us late in the trip that there was a weird thing going on wherein 100 percent of the waitstaff, cooks, chamber guys, etc. were Asian while the front office, officers, directors, casino staff, etc. were all 100 percent white. They had a Filipino crew show and an Indonesian crew show (my brother tried to wangle some of the crew's food instead of the bland dinners we were served, with unhappy results).
Anyway, I did get some chance to relax, and now that I am back home with no boss, I continue to be fairly relaxed. And left to ponder the many meanings of Canadia. To wit: TV shows like the Simpsons on all the channels, maddeningly dubbed into French; or showing strange sock marionettes going on drives in museums, while a background chorus just sang "Biduim! Biduim!" Our cab driver on PEI gave us an hour-long disquisition on living in what they consider the middle of nowhere. When we mentioned that the free health insurance must be nice, he told us, "You might think that, but Canada's not all shits and giggles, eh?" He also mentioned, several times, the interjection "wowsers," which I thought only Inspector Gadget ever used. Ah, Canadia...
It is time for bed. More personal ruminations in friends-only, if I get around to it.
As often seems to be the case, I am putting off updating because I have a lot to write, so I end up writing nothing until I forget it all.
We saw many things and places on the cruise. Brief overview: there were times it was tough, in the ways I imagined, but after a couple of days we settled into a routine that allowed us to do some moderately fun things.
Logistically things went more or less OK; the car left, the rental retrieved, the packing done, the driving completed, etc. I was surprised at how complete the language changeover is in Quebec; I guess I expected at least a few signs in English, seeing as the rest of Canadia is bilingual. (I think I'd be pretty pissed off if with it if I were Canadian, actually.) The one big problem was with returning the rental car: for some reason the location denoted "Downtown" was many miles of very slow, awful traffic away from the downtown hotel, and like a moron I had no Canadian money or real sense of where I was going... but obviously I survived.
After nearly herniating myself with luggage we got on the ship. It had some nice touches although the luxury aspect of it was perhaps overdone. Kind of like a three-star hotel; the food was good and there was a lot of it, but not the very best I've had in my life. Our room was certainly bigger than a room at the Hudson (in NY), and, miraculously, the folding crib fit (open) inside the bathroom, vastly improving everything. We didn't have a window, but they had a TV station with a camera looking out over the water, which helped. You could hardly feel the water in the early stages of the trip, but when we were on the Atlantic things gently rolled and bobbed just a little bit. I did actually wake up seasick the last night.
We settled into a routine. most mornings we ended up with the Jo because my parents were just too slow and she insists on motion. So most mornings we undertook a brisk perambulation on foot of whatever could be seen before we schlepped back to the ship for lunch/naptime. In the afternoons she napped while my mom sat in with her, so we did some other trips or did things on the ship like swimming. Since they gave us late seating for dinner, most evenings were occupied with watching her run around while us grownups drank from the copious amounts of alcohol provided by my brother. Long dinners, followed by Jo taking in the show with one of them. (Seeing some of it the first night was enough for me.)
So the trip was mostly a brief checklist of things I'd like to see in greater depth when we have more time. Quebec City did not disappoint; I climbed up hundreds of steps with the Jo on my back to get a view from the top of the citadel, and the rest of the city was like a little walled medieval village. Next time we'll just plan on staying at the Chateau Frontenac. Prince Edward Island was pretty but not that exciting, even with a cab ride to dunes that basically reminded me of Cape Cod. We stopped at Sydney, NS, a dingy little place that's basically a jumping-off point for day trips to Cape Breton; these were hideously expensive, so we didn't do them. Yet there was a frustrating near-miss when we got off the ship and there was a car rental desk willing to rent a car with a carseat. By the time I established that a) it was impossible to convince my parents to do this, and b) we wanted to do it anyway, they had rented the last car. (Typical of my parents: they rode around PEI and were unimpressed, so they figured they'd be unimpressed with Cape Breton as well. That's logic for you.)
Much walking around Halifax with the Jo on the daddy taxi, to the Public Garden and the Citadel. Jo liked the ducks. Last stop was Bar Harbor, where she had a complete meltdown not long after another near-miss of doing something interesting with my folks (taking the free buses around the island). But we've been there many times before, so no big deal.
I made sure to sit in the whirlpool a little every day and to go into the "pool," which was pretty tiny but contained warm sea water. Other than that, if you didn't drink or gamble, there wasn't a heck of a lot to do. They had a library onboard and I read a long book about the armies of the Roman Empire.
The staff was very nice to us and everyone fawned over the Jo quite a bit. They all had families home in the Philippines or Indonesia that they missed. Definitely the experience was meant to make you feel that these people were your servants, and it only hit us late in the trip that there was a weird thing going on wherein 100 percent of the waitstaff, cooks, chamber guys, etc. were Asian while the front office, officers, directors, casino staff, etc. were all 100 percent white. They had a Filipino crew show and an Indonesian crew show (my brother tried to wangle some of the crew's food instead of the bland dinners we were served, with unhappy results).
Anyway, I did get some chance to relax, and now that I am back home with no boss, I continue to be fairly relaxed. And left to ponder the many meanings of Canadia. To wit: TV shows like the Simpsons on all the channels, maddeningly dubbed into French; or showing strange sock marionettes going on drives in museums, while a background chorus just sang "Biduim! Biduim!" Our cab driver on PEI gave us an hour-long disquisition on living in what they consider the middle of nowhere. When we mentioned that the free health insurance must be nice, he told us, "You might think that, but Canada's not all shits and giggles, eh?" He also mentioned, several times, the interjection "wowsers," which I thought only Inspector Gadget ever used. Ah, Canadia...
It is time for bed. More personal ruminations in friends-only, if I get around to it.
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no subject
Date: 2005-09-29 12:37 pm (UTC)I've got a post brewing about work stuff I think. Might be sort of interesting. But the weather is so nice i just want to be outside all the time...
no subject
Date: 2005-09-29 01:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-09-29 05:16 pm (UTC)Honestly I had to drive through part of it and have lunch. I didn't even get to see the most beautifulest part, if that makes you feel any better.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-29 08:18 pm (UTC)