Hair Drama

This is a small, small rant on the unexpected cultural drama that is hair:

After 7 months of having my hair in braids I have called it quits. This is a relationship that had to end. It was a tough decision because I was dependent. I was used to not having to do anything besides grab a hair tie and I was spoiled from the convenience. Plus it had become my look on board since few people were still here and remembered the 3 days when I first arrived and did not have braids.

I have gotten mixed reactions: "why?", "you look different", "you look older/ younger/ American"! And I have endured the five hundred conversations, to explain how braids work and why I was sick of them, that I have to give to all my not of African decent friends who are uneducated in the art of braids. It's funny that at home I haven't worn braids since high school so people wouldn't be shocked to see my straight hair, but here it is a slowly dying drama that my hair is loose.

The most common questions and answers are these:
Why did I end my love of braids? I just did. It was a phase that I have out grown.
Why did it take so long to go from braids to straight hair? I had to loose the braids (that took 2.5 hours), perm/ relax my hair, wash, condition, blow dry and straighten. In total 4.5 hours!

The end. I can now rest easy knowing a few more crew members are educated on how to deal with black hair :)

A Whale of a Tale

Living in an international community requires a lot of flexibility. Language barriers and a lack of understanding are a constant. Even though English is the official language for most of the crew it is not their first language, and every country differs on humour, conversation, etiquette, and customs. While this makes living in community difficult there are interesting moments as well. Holidays, traditions, and music are fun but one area that is always interesting is food!

I am a person who loves to travel, really experience cultural diversity and learn as many random facts as possible (I love trivia). So a week ago a crew member mentioned that in the Faroe Islands the people eat whale meat. This peeked my interest so, of course, I had to investigate. We have a few Faroese crew members on board and a couple of days ago I was in the laundry room with one. Debbie is actually an American (she’s from Maine) but she has been married to Jonhard for a number of years. So I asked Debbie if my whale tale was correct and if Jonhard or any Faroese person she knew actually ate whale meat. She assured me that people eat whale meat regularly, that their entire family (they have two children Stefan and Rebecca) eat it regularly and that they had some currently in their cabin! Yeah, they just kept it in the freezer along with some other parts of the meal that I will describe later. So I asked her to grab me the next time they were eating a traditional Faroese meal.

It Really is Time…

So we are back in Liberia and it is so much of what we remembered: it’s ridiculously hot and humid, the sky is hazing from the Sahara dust and the local city smog is ever so present. For the last month everyone has been saying the same word. The “T” word: transition. This seems to be a regular thing within missions, especially in an organization like Mercy Ships where our location and crew continually change.

The time in Tenerife was to allow dry dock work to happen on the ship but also to give the crew a break between outreaches. But, for better or worse, my job did not allow any sort or break. It actually got harder and more intense because I was preparing for new crew to arrive. So while the majority of the crew traveled around the island, Morocco, Europe or home on holiday I worked overtime (most nights and many weekends). To say that I am exhausted is an understatement but my work helped ensure that over 80 new crew members will come this month as the new outreach begins. Yet this is very hard to be happy about especially in key moments, like community meetings, when everyone is talking about being rested to start over and preparing for transition.

I have really felt myself dragging this last week as we sailed back to Liberia and even now when we are back in our host country. I look forward to most of the physical transition and doing things like returning to Fatima Orphanage and visiting the markets and beach. But I am struggling to mentally transition because there is so much to prepare for and parts of me really do not want to accept the need for transition and are simply burnt out. I will try to give you some idea of why this move is such a big transition:

The United Nations Development Programme releases an annual report called the Human Development Report. A major part of this report is the Human Development Index that ranks countries based on life expectancy, literacy, education, standard of living and GDP per capita. It is most often used to measure quality of life and determine if a country is developed, developing or underdeveloped. It is considered a limited way to measure, even by its founder who called it a “vulgar measure”, but gives a good idea of how countries compare to one another. The island of Tenerife, Spain where we have just spent the last month is ranked number 13 currently. We were scheduled to go to Sierra Leone this year, but our schedule was changed in November. It is ranked number 177 which is the last place in country rankings this year. Liberia is not listed in the 2007 HDI because it was unable to give the information needed to measure; which gives everyone a very clear reason why we needed to return for a second year in a row to Liberia. So we have gone from a country in the top 20 to a country that is not even ranked in 5 short days of sailing. It is time for transition.

* see Wikipedia's Human Development Index for more information, maps, and the 2007 list of countries and their rankings.

This is not a Drill!

Today we had a fire drill. Actually we had a fire, lifeboat, piracy drill all in one. It was going to be a long and chaotic afternoon. So the Captain went on the intercom announcing that the drill would begin shortly and reminding us that it was more than an at sea fire drill. So the Emergency Teams Alarm goes off and we all start moving. I am a Stairway Guide and in charge of Zone 3 cabin checkers so I went to Deck 6 to wait for the General Crew Alarm to sound. As we are up there, everyone in position, the Captain continues with the drill – ordering the fire teams around to were the “fire” is and to make sure power is secured. The General Crew Alarm sounded, a little sooner than normal, but we continued with business as usual.

Within minutes of the second alarm the Captain comes back over the speakers announcing that something was spotted overboard and that we were all to go to our musters immediately, including the Emergency Teams that stay behind. Then he said the words no one wants to hear, “this is not a drill”. So we all start moving to Deck 7 as all laughing was wiped from our faces quickly. As we get to the outside of the deck we head straight to our musters without our lifejackets because the drill is over. The Captain then announces that someone, possibly a dummy, was spotted in the water and we are turning the ship around. So we have to muster so that everyone is accounted for.

It was a bit scary: everyone was suddenly very serious. The noise of the water crashing against the ship as it turned was much louder than I imagined. Since my muster station is on the Starboard (right) side of the ship we were instructed to look across the water for any floating objects once the ship straightened. Luckily, all the crew were accounted for and nothing was spotted so the ship was turned around. We then continued with our very long drill. We had to get our lifejackets and wait in our musters while the officers and the International Operations Center “negotiated” with the “pirates” that got onto our vessel. It was a lot more than any of us expected and I hope to never hear the Captain say this is not a drill again!