Theres a storm out here.Thunder rolls overhead and the engines thrum on trying to hold our ship in place. The portholes light up every now and again to give stunning seascape vistas while Thunderhorse burns bright in the distance. And we pitch and heave and shimmy and shake- and then its dinner time! A few of us stumble in a lose line from our workstations, swaying with the floor which is surely drunk. Occasionally I bump off things just to make those poor bastards who arent used to the boat rocking feel better about their inability to walk a straight line. … Moving on. We get to the galley and the food line, and I can sense.. something amiss. A disturbance. My brain chews on it for a good few minutes before I realize that the Christmas carol medley, sung with a pretty heavy very distinct accent belting out from the sound system in the kitchen, has no end. Fish evolve into mammals and crawl out of the muck, dinosaurs come and go, Mash runs its full career and this song burns on. It just crashes from carol to carol cutting a screaming swath of holiday cheer and leaving all good sense and reason flailing in its wake! Song after song after song after song blazes cheerfully on while I stop chewing to try and work out how this could possibly be. Then ,parting the fog of my stupor like a Christmas colored lightsaber- the voices of the kitchen staff ring out. Loudly. Singing like they were each in their own shower far, far away from prying ears. I could only blink.
A side note. I love Christmas carols. And I like that people feel moved enough by anything to make music. All about that bass line, I promise. So I dont write this to poke fun at Filipino Christmas carolers. We should all be so lucky to feel so swept away in something to sing full out like that. Honest. But I couldnt help thinking about old friends bundled up back home singing the tunes the way I wish I could hear them now. While not eating the tuna steak of a man who has only had a vague description of what tuna should taste like. So. While I rock and sway and bump back to my room for a motion sickness pill smoothie, Ill have pleasant thoughts from Christmases past and the good friends I got to share them with.
Thanks, you guys.