Missed the Target

Missed the Target

11th June 2011

Good Morning Istanbul!

This morning Stu was dressed up as the camel and on gangway at 07.00 along with Fabio (shooter). Jeni who was dressed as the dolphin was teamed up with Fede. David soon joined the others on the gangway shooting the rail.

As before, during our previous trip to Istanbul we had to get an image count of 1,200 images. If we hit the target we’d get the afternoon and next morning off until 17.00. If not, we’d be hitting the gangway the next morning to get the image count.

To change things around a bit and increase our chances of hitting target, I was scheduled for a late gangway. I was taking over from David on the rail.

Walking out onto the gangway Jeni informed me things hadn't gone too well and that I was their last hope. 

The costumes had nearly four hundred photos each while David was scrapping one hundred. I needed to get the rest of the image count, approximately 300 photos. We all knew that was going to be impossible. Jeni wanted me to try and get 100 or more. That was a challenge in itself. 

I started at 10.30 and most of the tours had gone. By 11.30 I was left to my own devices on the gangway. Slowly I started racking up images and then it suddenly dried up. After a couple of hours no one was getting on or off the Mariner of the Seas. 

Talking to security they told me 220 people were left on board. To make matters worse the heavens opened the rain lashed down. Two more tours were coming off the ship so I smudged as best as I could to get the image count up. I was 30 images off 100. Roughly, every other person from the two remaining tours needed to be photographed. How did that go? Well, I managed to get 5 shots. 25 images were needed.

Asking security to check again, there was roughly 170 passengers left of board. The rain was getting heavier and the temperature dropping. Picking up the rail and slumping it on my shoulder, I headed back inside to call one of the managers and put on another layer of clothing.

Checking the schedule Luci and Reuben were out on tour. Reuben was the man I needed to talk to. I was reluctant to call Ritesh but had to. With an hour remaining on gangway, Ritesh asked me to get the image counts from the other gangway photographers and let him know our current total. In total we had approximately 886 images - too far off the target. 

Ritesh reminded me we needed at least 1,000 to get the rest of today and tomorrow off. Even though it was raining I was sent back out onto the gangway for at least another half an hour. After about ten minutes of smudging in the rain and getting nowhere, Ritesh came out to see how I was getting on. 

As soon as Ritesh walked over to me he yelped “oh fuck man, it’s raining”…. Yeah, I did tell you that, Ritesh. He stood by me as I tried smudging people into the rail. I was trying to make a joke of the rain, especially with the English guests “get a photo in the rain… it’s not like you get a lot of it in England”, “it’ll be a great shot to send home… no one would believe you’ve travelled all this way to get rained on”, “why are you running away? It’s not like we don’t get enough rain in England! You should be used to this by now”. Plenty of laughs but no photos. Ritesh soon realized that I wasn’t going to get a single image and not by any fault of my own. No one wanted a photo in the pouring of raining. Grabbing the rail we headed back onto the ship. He did warn me however that we could be working tomorrow on the gangway as we didn’t reach out target. Now that ladies and gents is a first class, royal kick in the balls!!

Jumping into bed for a bit, my head was banging, chest sore from coughing and I simply couldn’t get warm. I grabbed my book, Pure Evil, which the mama had bought me for Christmas and started to read. I dropped off to sleep in no time. A couple of hours later Ritesh walked passed and woke me up. Looking at me as if I had two heads asked me if I always slept in my uniform. The way he said it didn’t go down to well “no, falling asleep in my uniform is what sometimes happens when I’m reading and tired”. He just walked off looking utterly disgusted. Maybe next time I should close my cabin door? I hate closing the door. The place seems so enclosed, the complete opposite to what I’m used to.

Just as I was getting out of the shower Jeni knocked on my door with Regina, David and Sandra in tow. They were all going out to the usual internet haunt. Quickly getting ready we all headed out. Hernan, Fede and Stu joined us later. Hernan’s been down about something recently but won’t tell me… he keeps saying “tomorrow, tomorrow”. I knew that was a Spanish attitude but I didn’t realize it was Argentinian too!

Not long after the other three arrived Stu stormed off because he couldn’t get online and the guys in the bar weren’t much help. He's been so snappy lately but no one can pin point what's wrong.

Returning to the ship at 8.30ish we all met up a little later in SOB. Some people were already half cut – I won’t mention any names! Zoran was in SOB looking for Stuart who promised he’d help him out with his competencies. 

I didn’t fancy going out with the other photographers. It was not because I didn’t want to spend time with them. Istanbul is so expensive and I don’t have the money. I’m trying to pay off my security deposit, uniform and camera as quickly as possible. Last payday all my money went to pay Image off… Reuben was nice enough to give me a dollar for a coca-cola though!

Zoran and I headed out to use the Internet at Nargilem. I knew roughly where Stu would be and let’s face it… trying to find someone who is 6’7 wouldn’t be too hard. Within five minutes we’d found where he was. I wasn’t sure whether I should stick it in the place were Stu was or to go to the usual place. In the end, I joined Stu and Zoran for a bit and got on with blogging. 

Stu called me and turned his netbook around to show me something… he was reading my blog! My blog isn’t something I thought the team would read or even find out about. It’s posted on my Facebook but I never thought they’d give it a second glance let alone read it from start to finish. Stu reckons he'll "understand me better". If Stu reckons he’ll be able to understand me better by reading my blog then so be it. One thing that pleased me was that he actually gave me a compliment telling me I was a good writer… and even asked when the book was coming out. I knew is wasn't sarcasm for the simple reason that he's South African! Three people today have asked me when the book is coming out. Is that a hint? I told him there’d be things in there that he probably wouldn’t want to read but he’d read it anyway and wasn’t offended in any way, shape or form.

Zoran got on with his competencies and it wasn’t long until he’d finished the Photog1 section. Photog2 is quite a bit harder so he’d have a couple of goes at the tests. If he failed Stu and I jumped in to help him out a little by explaining how things were done. No matter how long you’ve worked or studied as a photographer for, Image is completely different. It’s like starting from square 1 and doing everything differently.

By about 5am we had helped Zoran finish off his competencies. To be fair, he didn’t actually need that much help. It was mainly on the usual suspects: Studio lights and Quantum flash. 

Getting back onto the ship we spotted Regina and Jeni. Jeni couldn’t go back to her cabin as it was “occupied” for the night. Regina soon went to meet David and they disappeared off to bed. It was just Stu, Jeni, Zoran and me. 

We sat in the corridor for a while just chatting and having a joke. The plan was to go up to Deck 12 and watch the sun come up over Istanbul. None of us had done it before and this was Jeni’s last Istanbul. The idea went to pot as soon as Stu mentioned going up for breakfast at 6am when the crew mess opened. 

After breakfast we went back to the corridor. So I didn’t wake Luci up I was also going to be staying at Stu and Zoran’s. Jeni and me jumped into Stu’s bunk while Zoran climbed into his own. Stu got one of the blankets and a pillow from his bed and crashed on the floor. There was literally no space to manoeuvre then again, that’s what you get when you pack 4 people into a shoe box!

Dolphin Tuna

Dolphin Tuna

9^th May 2011

Chania, Crete

My complaining has finally paid off! Hernan has been dressed up on the gangway at least once every cruise. While talking to Reuben I joked that it wasn’t fair he got to dress up and I didn’t. I think he was shocked that I wanted to dress up as most people don’t. So today my wish was granted… I was going to be dressing up as a dolphin for gangway in Chania, Crete. To make things even better, Stu was shooting me on gangway. If Stu’s around on gangway, you instantly know it’s going to be a laugh. The first time I did gangway in Crete, Stu and I were shooting the wheel. It was my first cruise so he was trying to give me as much information and help as possible. The big question was, did it pay off?

After our little photographer’s corridor party I crawled out of bed at 06.30. Gangway was in 30 minutes. Luckily I didn’t have to look presentable so I climbed into the dolphin costume wearing my pyjamas and hair scrunched up into a ponytail. My ipod cable was threaded through the arm of my costume so I could dance to my music on the gangway.

At 6.50 I had no idea where Hernan was so I crept into his cabin and like usual, he was still asleep. This time he had someone wrapped around him. Waking him up wasn’t easy. That boy can sleep the sleep of the dead!! Accidently I managed to wake the both up. Luckily I didn’t wake Fede. Hernan finally flopped out of bed but while getting ready for gangway, laid on the floor and fell asleep... again.

Stu was supposed to be in the photographer’s corridor but was a no-show. While kicking Hernan to wake up I was calling Stuart. He  sounded anything but wide awake when he finally picked up. Security were late opening the gangway so things were going our way. To get in the mood I was blasting Paramore into my ears. A little while later I got a kick from Hernan… I’d fallen asleep! Once Stu arrived it was time for the show to begin.

With the dolphin head on it’s quite hard to see where you are going or what you’re doing. It’s great fun though. Dancing around the gangway, shaking your booty and the more ridiculous you look, the better: the more the guests laugh. Some people tried running away from me… so I ran after them, as you do. A couple of people dodged me and while walking away thinking they’d missed us, I’d creep up behind them and simply place my flippers on their shoulders. Stu and I were rolling up when a few people let out a shriek. The American’s were happy to pose with a dolphin. English just don’t like the cheese of it all. They are more reluctant to have their photo taken anyway, so you just have to put your arm around their shoulders and make them. That way they have no choice in the matter. One person barged past me and nearly knocked me over! Now that would have been funny!

Stu was shouting out to people “give the dolphin a hug… we all love dolphins – we all eat tuna don’t we?” He was also asking guests if they thought I was a dolphin or porpoise and whether they knew the difference. Everyone knows Stu is the camel on gangway so they asked why he wasn’t dressed up. Next came the “what’s the difference between a camel and a dolphin”… I would post the answer here but it’s a little rude and very crude.

Inside the costume was sweltering and sticky. In addition, the Velcro holding the costume together at my shoulders, kept coming undone exposing my pyjamas. Stu was forever doing it up whilst playing silly buggers with me. After an hour and a half on gangway we got 185 images, our target was 200. We didn’t do badly, next time we will do better but it could have been much worse. Natasha didn’t get close to her target shooting the rail.

After gangway it was time to have a snooze. There was no point heading into Chania (or Xania). The port is a bit of a way from Chania town centre and I didn’t want to rush around trying to contact everyone.

Tonight was formal night too so sleep was needed as it was going to be a long night. At 14.00 we were all setting up the studios – eight in total. My first two stints were in the gallery. There were two ressi sessions in between shooting Bars and Lounges. To finish off I was shooting on the Titanic backdrop.

Everything was going well until I went into the dining room. I was running late as I had to wait for Paco to get back from shooting Captain’s Table. The first table I approached, a couple, told me someone had already been around to take their photos. Scanning the room I spotted Fabio. I rushed over to find out what had and hadn’t been done. He told me Natasha had finished my side and her own. As she wasn’t the fasted at shooting Ressi I thought something was wrong. So I headed to the opposite end of my section in the dining room and went over to a table. I asked if they’d had their photo taken, they replied no, so I took their portraits. I did the same with the next two tables and both denied having their photos taken. It became obvious that my section hadn’t been done so I started working my way through the tables. Halfway through my section I had a look around and there was no one to be seen. Once I finished my section I left to find everyone was back in their studios. This annoyed me as the rule is you don’t leave anyone behind in Ressi. If you’ve finished your section, you go and help somebody in theirs and we all leave together.