Shanghai: it Begins.

The past 2-3 weeks we have been sailing out of Singapore, with calls in Port Kelang, Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia, and Phuket, Thailand.  Singapore was an amazing experience and I definitely plan to go back some day and spend a decent amount of time there.  Everything is new, clean, and just done right in Singapore.  Plus the selection and quality of the food there is amazing.  I really only visited a handful of Singapore and quickly realized how I would easily be able to spend days.

While in Singapore I visited the Marina Square mall at the Esplanade, and it was a very nice mall with the kind of shops that I could actually afford to purchase things in.  We had some amazing Korean BBQ for lunch there, and the only way I could imagine that it gets better is to have it in Korea.  The next turnaround day myself and the theatre sound tech, Doug, went to explore the Marina Bay Sands complex, including the mall and hotel.  The Shoppes at Marina Bay Sands is the name of the mall and they had mostly high end brands of everything.  Not a lot there that I would be interested in buying but just going and wandering around is quite an experience in itself.  Everything in that mall is just beautiful and new looking.  I can't even imagine the cost.  Just the fountains and lighting displays must have cost millions of dollars on their own.  Upon leaving the Marina Bay Sands hotel we ran into the ship's Schooner Bar entertainer, Matt Yee.  We ended up spending the rest of the day with Matt and his cousin (who lives nearby).  The highlight of this day was the Singapore Cable Car which we rode end to end, stopping for Starbucks in the middle.  Then we made a quick trip to Chinatown and headed back to the ship.

Unfortunately I never made it to Kuala Lumpur  in Malaysia as the schedule during the day just never allowed enough time to get out there.  Luckily, in Port Kelang there was a little food court outside the terminal with delicious Asian cuisine and free (very slow) wi-fi.  I got fried calamari, Chinese fried rice, and a huge mango smoothie for only about $12 US which was very reasonable considering the portion sizes.

In Phuket Doug and I headed out with Matt Yee for an awesome meal at Tunk-ka Cafe.  The restaurant is located at the top of a hill, has spectacular views and the food was incredible.  We all shared about 7 different Thai dishes including curries, noodles, and a whole fish with lemongrass sauce.  If you only have a few hours to spend in Phuket, I would highly recommend visiting this place.  The view and the food, coupled with very decent free wi-fi internet ended up being a very worthwhile way to spend the little time we had free that day. 

Along the way to Shanghai, we had an overnight in Hong Kong.  The port time was a little unusual as the ship was to spend the first day from 4pm til midnight tendering, and then move to a pier and open the gangways at 7am.  I only had the first day available as I was to be on duty the next day, so I headed out at around 8pm, and Doug intended to take the next tender and meet me at the terminal.  Unfortunately he got tied up doing something onboard and didn't end up making it ashore until much later.  So I headed off with some other coworkers who happened to come off another tender.  We ended up going to the Temple Street Night Market.  We took a taxi over, and what an amazing place that was.  Vendors selling all manner of different things but there was something for everyone.  There were numerous electronics stalls for me to look at, and I did end up buying a few items to bring back with me.  We also stopped for a quick meal at a local seafood restaurant which was very tasty and also very very cheap. 

Anyway, here we are now in Shanghai, China.  It has been a very long time coming to get from New Orleans to our main home port for the summer.  Today marks the end (mostly) of any English-speaking guests onboard.  Now that we are in China, 98% of our guests will be Chinese and speaking mostly Mandarin only.  In fact, most of our cruises here are resale charters sold through various travel companies around China, so on those cruises especially it is going to be Chinese guests only, with a handful of guests from nearby countries such as Japan, South Korea, and Malaysia.  It's going to be a more challenging environment for sure but I think we're up to the task.  The ship now has about 75% Mandarin-speaking staff onboard, and they are filling the majority of the front-of-house positions. The best strategy us non Mandarin-speaking staff really have is to just avoid guest areas when we don't need to be there.

It is definitely going to take some time to get used to the culture over here.  We've all been through cultural sensitivity training for our cruises in Asia but of course actually putting it into practice is something completely different and that is what we are getting to right now.  There are some things Westerners are just not accustomed to.  To give a simple example, last night during the welcome aboard show (which was actually one of our production shows, Music in Pictures), the audience talked quite loudly throughout the entire thing.  In western cultures that is quite unheard of and of course usually would be considered rude behaviour.  However in China it is quite commonplace and this is the sort of thing where we (as the outsiders) have to take a step back and go "OK, this is normal, just accept it and move on".  There was also a constant barrage of flash photography, another expected occurrence.  It was like there were more flash bulbs going off in the audience than I had lights onstage.

Thus begins my Asian experience on a ship.  Hopefully there will be a lot more news to come.  So far I have had some incredible experiences here and I'm looking forward to what's still to come.