Greek Goddess No More

Greek Goddess No More

17^th July 2011

Once again I’m gracing the gangway with my presents… as the Greek Goddess! Again I’m not wearing the Image Greek Goddess costume. Originally I was supposed to be shooting Hernan, the Greek God. 

Last night, when Luci handed out the schedules she told the couple of people present to “be prepared”. Looking at the schedule, Sanela was scheduled to be the Greek Goddess with Fede shooting her. Fede was far from happy. Not only did he want to shoot Sanela because she’s apparently boring on gangway, she doesn’t get a good image count. 

The previous evening Jomar was banging on about us not hitting targets and then he puts Sanela AGAIN on gangway. All the female costumes have been going to Sanela for the last cruise and a half. Luci said the exact same thing and I wasn’t disagreeing. 

Fede picked up the phone to call Jomar. He told Jomar they were switching the Goddesses as Sanela was scheduled for gangway and sail away with the same costume (something we don’t do and for a good reason!)

The entire morning schedule was completely rearranged by Fede. Sanela would shoot the rail rather than Zoran. Zoran would shoot Hernan, the God. I’d replace Sanela as the Goddess with Fede shooting me. Sanela would wear the Image Godess costume for return gangway and sailaway. That would give her a chance to practise smudging in costume. 

When Sanela was told about the changes she was far from happy to say the least and wanted to do both gangways. When she asked why, she got the honest truth, a response she really didn’t like and looked even more miffed! Not long afterwards, she stormed out the office. She honestly thinks there’s some sort of vendetta against her!

The next morning I dragged myself out of bed once again and climbed into my dress. Boy, was I tired! 

At 07.00 Fede and I headed up to the Savoy Theatre. Our orders were to “shoot as many children, blacks and Brazilians as possible”. This, as always, had us rolling up laughing!! Especially as during the meeting someone had to turn to David, fake having a gun in their hands and shooting him. David would start laughing his infectious laugh and shout “you’re all racist!” 

Once up in the theatre, it wasn’t long until we were on a roll. I was skipping about pulling people in for a photo with Fede snapping away. We got some great shots on the stairs leading down to the Savoy. The morning tours had gone and we had over 200 images. 

We decided to go outside onto the gangway for a while to join Hernan and Zoran before coming back in to go to the Lotus Lounge for the afternoon tours.

Walking outside and the heat hit you like a ton of bricks. It was so bright outside Hernan and I (the ones who couldn’t wear sunglasses) were having troubles keeping our eyes open. Fede even said that the heat today in Athens was similar to what he’d experienced in Jamaica. Apparently it was 38ºC and guests were asking if I had sun protection on! The poor guests were worried I was going to burn as I’m as white as a pint of milk (and that’s with a tan)! 

Fede and Zoran had to count to three to enable Hernan and I a chance to close our eyes, opening them only at the last second for the photo. It was an attempt to stop us from squinting. It worked a little, but not much. Without a doubt there are going to be so many dodgy, squinty photos!!

Going back onto the ship at 11.30 we had an hour of photographing the tours coming out of the Lotus Lounge. 

There’s a Brazilian Congress on board with their very own vicar. He was standing at the entrance of the Lotus with one of the Congress leaders. Fede kept asking me to go and get my photo taken with the vicar. I somply couldn’t bring myself to do it because I was wearing a relatively see through white dress with was exposing rather a lot of cleavage. I was looking far from virginal to say the least! “That’s exactly the point” Fede told me. 

In the end, after too much begging and pleading from Fede, I walked over to the Congress Leader and vicar and said in my very best Portuguese “Come, I want a photo with you both” and once the Congress Leader agreed, the vicar did too. Saying thanks I jogged back to Fede who was trying his best to keep a straight face.

12.30 finally rolled around and Fede and I called it quits. We had about 450 images and this gangway had proved to be a lot more difficult than normal. Most of the guests were already complaining that they were “pictured out”. 

Seeing Hernan and Zoran in the photographer’s corridor, we asked how they had got on and the response wasn’t a good one. They’d only managed to take 200 images. To be fair, I can understand where they were coming from and why they’d got such a low count. Outside, no one wanted their photo taken, it was too hot for them and all they wanted to do was jump on the shuttle bus and get to wherever they were going. It was incredibly hard for Hernan to smudge the guests in when he couldn’t even open his eyes. At one point both of us were standing on the gangway with our eyes closed rather than struggling to open them and squinting.

Quickly showering and getting dressed, I grabbed my things. Luci and Camila left a message with security for me saying they were waiting for me outside. They weren’t there. 

Regina, David, Hernan, Fede and I jumped onto the shuttle bus towards the port. It was a Sunday so there's no chance anything but a few coffee shops being open. Not even our local internet haunt was open. O’Connell’s (an Irish pub of all things) was closed for the first time ever. 

As we were heading towards another internet café we bumped into a few crew members who had an internet connection in a small coffee shop. It was too hot to move so we went inside rather than walking around to the other place. Unfortunately the internet was slow but I managed to upload a few photos of the crew party to Facebook for the parents to see. The other crew members were slowly leaving to head back to the ship for work. 

After a couple of hours, Fede, Hernan and I, the last ones standing, decided to call it quits.  Fede had set up at 16.30 while Hernan and I had work at 18.00 so we were going for a quick kip.

Once again it was another night in the gallery and studio for me. I’ve gotten to the point where I prefer working in the gallery, selling, rather than taking photos in the studios. There are some rude guests on this cruise along with some spoilt kids so there’s plenty of snappy remarks and getting ignored. 

Tonight I was shooting Bow for a second time. I didn’t make sense to shoot the same background twice when we have so many others. This time I had the ship’s wheel in front of the background. To make it a bit more interesting and fun, I borrowed David’s captain’s cap. I was aiming at kids… that’s if there were any awake during my 21.30h to 23.30h shift. 

Surprisingly enough, there were loads and it wasn’t long until I had a steady stream of people coming to have their photo taken. They loved wearing the hat and paying captain of the ship – even the adults!! I was only taking one or two photos of each guest and by the end of my shift I had 105 images! Everyone else had between 20-40 which was proving to be normal during these times. 

Back in the office, to download my images, Jomar asked how many images I got, when I told him he didn’t even batter an eye lid, carried on looking at the computer screen and said “that’s what we should be getting”. You can’t please everyone… especially a boss who obviously has a chip on his shoulder!

We are now sailing towards Kusadasi, Turkey. The Greek God and Goddess costumes can now be laid to rest. It was the last time we’d be using the costumes on gangway in Athens and with the way things are going in Greece at the moment, it’s unlikely we’ll ever return. It’ll most probably get dropped from the agenda. 

From now on, the Greek God and Goddess are no more… roll on the Matador and Flamenco dancer!

(Just found these photos from a previous Athens. Luci and I shooting Sailaway)

Checking Exposures for Sailaway

Athens, Greece Sailaway

Luci During Sailaway

Luci LOVES Romero Britto's Work

White Tent

White Tent

19^th June 2011

Some people were saying we wouldn’t and shouldn’t be stopping in Athens due to the demonstrations and riots going on. Against what has been voiced, we still arrived in Athens as planned. More demonstrations are planned for today and people were expecting violent protests like there have been for the past few days.

While working on the gangway, Jorge from Explorations! (the tours department), told us to be careful if we go out into the city, just in case we get caught up in any of the riots/demonstrations. Previously, according to Lee (remember we are stuck in a bubble where we don’t always know what’s going on in the real world) the ports had been closed off. Jorge said it was something to keep in mind in case the same thing happens again. Although he doubted it would happen today, you never know.

Getting kicked out off bed at 06.30 I had to wear the new Greek Goddess costume provided by Image. I’d tried it on the previous night and Stu did a bit of handy work pinning it in certain places. The costume was like a white tent on me!! Stu even had me bending down, lifting my arms up and out to make absolutely sure that nothing could pop out. The others girls here are smaller built than me so if I had room to spare than they’d bw sporting great big gaping holes. Once Stu had pinned the costume it didn’t look so bad but I still preferred the dress I’d been wearing for the last two visits. 

Going into Luci, I asked for her opinion. She liked the dress but agreed with me, my outfit was better. As Image wanted sample shots of the dress I had to wear it. One of Luci’s criticisms was that the dress was far too long and added that maybe I should take it to the tailor to be pinned up… bit late for that. Going into Stu he pinned the costume up again.

Stu in many senses had struck gold. During formal night he’d got talking to a large (and I mean large as in numerous) American family. They were going on a private tour in Athens. As they were talking Stu suggested they take a ship photographer with them. They’d have a private photographer for the day. They thought it was a great idea and wanted Stu to do the job. Spending most of his breaks from the stuido in the gallery or manager's office, Stuart was desperately trying to arrange something. At the last hour, something was planned by the looks of things. Every time I saw him, he had a phone stuck to his ear.

Later on, speaking to Stu, I found out that they are a family of twelve on Honeymoon. For a private photographer for the day, it'd cost them a staggering $700. Money wasn't an issue to the family. I nearly fell over when Stu told me, but I couldn't help smiling. He'd done a great job to get a private tour (it's not something I've seen or heard of before). No doubt he’s got some extra kudos from the BM to go along with his endless list of good comments.

Things in Athens were a little different this time. Normally, when I’m the Greek Goddess, Luci shoots me but as she’s been promoted to AMS, it’s out of the question – she has to be in the gallery. David was the one shooting me. Stu is usually the God but he was going on tour to the job got passed onto Hernan who has played the part a couple of times before. Sandra was shooting the rail but ended up coming back from the lab with the ring.   

Heading out to gangway, Hernan wasn’t around and guests were starting to come out. Stu and Fabio usually go up to the tour exit of the ship where it’s a lot more fast paced before joining Luci and I at the slower end. 

We normally get around the same shots but use different techniques. Stu has the personality and charisma to get people to stop, people are automatically drawn and love him. I’m not that way, so Luci taught me to just grab people, slinging my arm around their back or shoulder to pull them in for a photo. It works for me. 

Today as Hernan wasn’t out on the gangway and we didn’t know where the hell he was. David and I had to take his spot at the tour exit. We couldn't afford to let the tour guests go. Hernan finally got onto the gangway 20 minutes late. He’d been staying over at Eve’s and no one knew her cabin number to kick him out of bed or hurry the bugger up.

Smudging the guests going on tour was a lot harder than I’d previously imagined. I couldn’t really put my arm around them as they were all rushing to their tour bus as if it was going to leave without them – which it wasn’t! You try telling that to guests though! David and I were smudging like crazy but our image count wasn’t really going up. 

Finally, someone had their photo taken with me and a steady stream of guests followed suit. It’s strange, when one person has their photo taken, others follow. If the pattern breaks, someone refuses, the next will. It’s a domino effect. Once that happens, you have to smudge like crazy again to get someone in for a picture.

Later on, when the tour exit was closed we headed over to join Hernan and Fabio at the forward gangway. The sun was up and the temperature rising. Obviously the people dressed in costumes can’t wear sunglasses if it’s not part of the outfit. Hernan and I had been standing outside for about two hours without sunglasses. It’s incredibly bright outside anyway but the sun was also bouncing off the white ship making it even harder to keep our eyes open. There came a point where we were seriously struggling to keep our eyes open and not squint. Finally it became unbearable. Both teams were soon working together to trying and get people in for a photo. 

Being able to speak so many languages helps so much during gangway. Between the four of us were four languages, mostly provided by Fabio. Hernan and I speak English and Spanish, Fabio speaks English, Spanish, Italian and Brazilian Portugese while David only speaks English… unless you include Afrikaans. We were taking it in turns go back onto the ship for drinks and to get out of the sun.

At about 10.30 Fabio, Hernan and Sandra had to go in for a drill. David and I were the only ones excused from the drill. YES! Rather than the usual “Bravo Bravo Bravo” fire/ship’s sinking announcement the ship was doing a Charlie drill. It doesn’t happen very often but if you hear “Charlie Charlie Charlie” it’s because there’s a bomb on board or terrorist threat! 

Apparently a fake bomb/package had been hidden on board and each department had to search their area to find it. If your area has the hidden package and you miss it, you’re going to get a little more than just a slap on the wrists! 

For the next hour and a bit David and I were left on our own on gangway. The guests stopped trickling out and the heat was becoming unbearable. It wasn’t so much the heat but the humidity. At every chance I had I was hoisting my dress up to cool down! 

The Image costume was awful to wear. At least with my cotton dress it’s much cooler than the huge white polyester tent I’d been given. As I was smudging one of the pins on my dress came undone. I carried on, a little worried that something might get a lot more exposure than intended. One eye was on the guests coming out and the other was on my boob!! The costume has a banana neck line and the lower part was a way too low!! David came over, made a joke about putting my bits and bobs away while pinning the dress behind my back again. It was the third time they’d had to pin the dress back… not good, especially if there's a rush on.

Just as the sun was becoming unbearable Ritesh came out to see how we were getting on. He checked how many passengers were on board and called it quits ten minutes before we were due to go in. I don’t think we’ve ever been so happy to see Ritesh!

Popping up to the mess for something to eat I bumped into Regina. She asked if I was going out, which I was, so she said we'd meet in the photographer’s corridor. 

Waking Luci up as I walked into my cabin, she also asked if I was going out. When I said I was going shopping she jumped out of bed and scurried around getting her clothes on. She’s been complaining for weeks that she needs shampoo etc. By shopping I meant supermarket shopping… we aren’t lucky enough to go clothes shopping… we didn’t have long. That’s one for Rhodes and maybe Istanbul. 

It was a Sunday too so we weren’t sure what would be open. Walking around for an hour we soon realized that not even the superstores would be open. Making out way back to the ship there was only one thing on  our minds – sleep! I was desperate for washing powder as I had a stack of laundry to do but that would obviously have to wait. 

After Greece is Israel and no doubt I’ll be on tour so God knows where I’m going to get detergent and the time to do my laundry! Soon I’ll be going commando!!

Waking up from a well-deserved nap I headed over to the lab to fetch the prints. We were all on display. I needed more sleep and was desperately trying to keep my eyes open. After two hours of display I ran upstairs to the staff mess to get something for dinner before rushing downstairs to change into my evening uniform. I was shooting LSP and working the gallery for the night.

While getting ready I popped into Stu to see how the tour had gone. He had so many images it was untrue. It’s easy getting the image count when you have people who want their photo taken. The trouble we have is that most people either don’t want their photo taken or have to be enticed. Looking through some of the shots, he’d done a cracking job. I told Stu I was on LSP (his studio), his reply “have fun” (remember Stu’s South African so there’s no sarcasm involved whatsoever).

We have someone representing Image from Miami on the ship. None of the ships in Europe are doing particularly well and Mike (England) was here to find out why. While shooting LSP he came over to ask me a few questions. I was a bit nervous to say the least. He started playing around with my studio lights while I was trying to shoot a couple. Kind of annoying.

At the end of the night, I jumped in to the shower and pyjamas before grabbing my laptop to start blogging. It wasn’t long before Luci came into the cabin in a foul mood. She was having a rant and rave, her voice getting louder and louder. She was tired and fed up. Paco had left her a lot of shit to sort out and she was cracking up, to put it nicely. 

It wasn’t long before she had a go at me for making too much noise earlier on. I was in the corridor with Stu and Zoran and just having a giggle. It had woken her up. She told me we had no respect for her as she was trying to sleep etc etc. As hard as it was, I gathered my stuff up, told her to just get into bed and buggered off out the cabin. 

Going into Stu’s, which is turning into my refuge cabin, I explained what had happened and asked if I could sit in his typing for a while. I’d return to my cabin once it was safe to go in… basically when Luci had gone to sleep. Even my typing wakes her up and I couldn’t be bothered with getting my head bitten off or arguing at some ridiculous time in the morning. It wasn’t long before sleep got the better of both of us and I ended up drifting to sleep at Stu’s. 

Tomorrow was another sea day (casual) before the ship arrived in Haifa, Israel.

Quasimodo’s Sister

Quasimodo’s Sister

7^th June 2011

Okay, so as predicted I woke up at 6.30 with a face that resembled Quasimodo’s sister. Not only that but I felt like someone had given me a good hiding!! Seeing Luci, I showed her my face, the only advice she gave me was a shrug and “lots of makeup”. Still feeling like death warmed up, I had to get onto the gangway and work, there wasn’t anyone who could fill my position so early in the morning and the schedule was already set.

On the gangway I felt so sluggish it was untrue. Luci was bugging me to put my arm around the guests to stop them to have their photo taken. It’s what I usually do without a problem but this time my body was aching. The bright sun was making my eyes sting and water, keeping them open started to become impossible. I’ll have Chinese eyes in some of the photos – and those are the photos I have my eyes open!!

Stu was dolled up in his Greek God costume and working the opposite end of the ship where the tours were exiting from. Both he and Fabio later came up to join us. We took it in turns to have breaks. I was downing water as if it was going out of fashion!

Paco our AMS was signing off today and Luci would be taking over. She was looking forward to it but seemed a little nervous about things. She was more pleased about never having to wear the Image “scarf” (evening wear) again.

The rest of the day was a blur of sleep, sleep walking and working! Whatever happened, I really don’t remember.

Greek Goddess

Greek Goddess

14th May 2011

As you can guess we are in Greece today. After formal night and finishing at 1am it was a struggle dragging myself out of bed at 5am. The only bonus was that I was dressing up as a Greek Goddess. 

Tugging my bed sheets off at 6am and numerous failed attempts I managed to get the sheet to look something along the lines of a toga. In the end about three people were helping me as I wasn’t quite ready when the gangway opened. We used my belt to fasten the sheets around my waist. If there was a strong wind, the guests would be getting a glimpse of my very unflattering cow pyjama shorts. Lou from Spa lent me a wired head piece with white flowers and greenery wrapped around and a Greek style bead bracelet.

Stu arrived a little before we headed onto the gangway and helped me sort the sheet a bit more to make sure it was secure. Stu was also in costume – a Greek God. He was luckily enough to have a Greek God costume. A bed sheet was simply used to go across his back and drape around his arms. In true style Stu wore his dirty Converses which stood out like a sore thumb against the whiteness of his costume. This caused a few laughs amongst the guests.

Jeni was shooting the rail. David was photographing Stu. All were shooting at the back exit of the ship. This was where all the tours were departing from so the area would be busy. Luci was shooting me at the forward exit. This exit was for guests who were going out and about on their own. Our section was far quieter but most people were saying yes to have their photo taken. Having said that, we weren’t giving them much choice. As soon as they walked out I’d put my arm around them, literally trapping them into having their photo taken, while Luci took the shot. She was standing there ready so the second the guest looked up, she’d take the photo and we’d move onto the next. People were lining up to have their photo taken; what one does, the other follows. Most guests just joined the queue without knowing what it was for.

When things didn't go quite to plan or I'd freeze up a little with nervous, Luci was straight on my case. "Grab them!" and "Don't let them go!". Having Luci on your case can be hard going but it makes you push that little bit harder to get over your nerves, get the job done and get her off your back! Luci's a great teacher to be fair.

Towards the end of the 4 hour stint on gangway Stu, Jeni and David came up to our part. Stu had a moan at me for not smudging enough. That was kind of ironic as Luci and I had the quietest section yet double the photographs!! When I started smudging he told me to not smudge the guests he’d just had a photo with. This boy was doing nothing but complain and nag me and it was starting to get on my nerves. For a while we were both having our photos taken with the guests. Athena on one side and Zeus on the other.

After gangway Luci and I headed to a great little café to use the internet. The café makes its own pizzas and pastries. The food is absolutely delicious! The place was empty so we had a reasonably fast internet connection. Unfortunately the parents weren’t online. I’m used to not seeing them all the time but I do miss speaking to them every day or every other day. Maybe another day.

Back on the ship I was in gallery. Stu was displaying the prints from gangway so I thought I’d give him a hand. The gallery was fairly empty. It was great seeing the gangway photos in print! Again, everything that I did was wrong. Maybe I shouldn’t have done, but I pointed out that it feels like he’s now being overly critical. Some of the images were about half a centimetre out and he’d move them along so all the prints were directly in line. It was the small nitty gritty things that he's picking at. Stu quitely reminded me, rather needlessly, that I’m a Photog 1, he’s Photog 2 and it’s his job to show me how things are done and how to do it properly. He’s only trying to help. That may be true, but it still feels like everything I do is wrong and it’s putting a real downer on me. When Stu talks really quietly, you know he’s doing it to avoid an argument – not that I was looking for one! I just wanted to know why the hell he was on my case so much. Hernan doesn’t get the same amount of shit I do. Thankfully a couple of guests came over so I could get away from him for a bit. I have no idea what’s up with him at the moment. Normally Stu’s a great laugh and I love working with him but at the moment, that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Natasha left the ship today. As nasty as it may sound, there were a few sighs of relief. Before she’d resigned she’d been giving so many people grief and it only got worse when she handed in her notice. I’d quite frankly had enough of being spoken to as if I’m a servant and getting shouted at. David and Hernan were the same. On embarkation she had a go at Hernan for something that wasn’t his fault. He asked a couple to stop and have their photo taken and completely buggered up his English and took a couple of seconds to recompose himself and carry on. By then, two couples had walked past. She said he wasn’t doing his job properly etc. It’s easy for someone who only speaks one language.  Even though I speak fluent Spanish, I sometimes fluff my words and get muddled up. And yes, sometimes you do have to take a second or two to recompose yourself when you get nervous and/or embarrassed about not being able to get the right words out at the right time, and more importantly, doing it quick enough! Hernan’s English is getting much better – sooner or later he won’t have half as much troubles as he does now. It’s just a matter of time and practise.