Ship's life

We really love being back on board Logos Hope. It's so great catching up with old friends and getting to know new people, hearing their stories. Deck 4 is also an amazing place to go to, especially with Cedric, people just love him. Ben also likes taking Ned down there and Ned loves being down there, the ice cream might contribute a little bit to him liking being down there so muchJ. I love having to tidy up only such a small cabin and it's great to have so many available babysitters (hahaha). Going for the Sunday service is also so easy and no big act like at home, and Ced often just sleeps in the cabin and we take our baby phone along, very handy!! And one wonderful thing has happened as well, and that is that Ced started to sleep fully 10h a night... I LOVE IT!!! It's great to put him to bed at 9 in the eveing and then he wakes up again at 7 in the morning, what a blessing!!! And I truely hope that it isn't only here on the ship because of all the background noises like the airflow of the ventilation and the like, but that he'll continue doing it once we live like normal people back on land.

But I suppose that you suspected already that there is a BUT coming and here it comes: BUT there are many things I have to get used to again or anew.

I mean how often does it happen at home that random people clean your windows with a broom or a brush with lots of noise and water and in doing so waking up your sleeping baby???? At home you clean your windows yourself or you leave them dirty, like I do (ahm, I do confess, I do not clean my windows very often, only if I really can't see through them anymore, then it's about time to clean them again). So now I have a tired and screaming baby, who can't settle down again... hmmm.

At home you also wouldn't shower with swimming pool water, now would you??? Neither wash your laundry with it nor would you drink it, would you??? Well, presently the water aboard is so chlorinated that everything smells like swimming pool: the clothes, yourself, the drinking water, everything... at least we know for sure that there can't possibly be any germs left anywhere

J... hmmm.

Aboard I'm also kind of lost in time and space a bit, never knowing what day it is, mainly due to the fact that a normal ship's week is slightly different than a normal week in a normal life living in a normal house on land. In most countries the people are off work on the weekend, which is Saturday and Sunday, so our day off on board isn't the Saturday but the Monday, because people come to visit the ship when they are off so we have to work. Confusing, I know!! Sunday stays Sunday though with a Sunday service in the morning, but the ship's open in the afternoon. So Monday is the ship's Saturday and a work week is from Tuesday to Saturday. That alone is slightly confusing for me, and most of the time I have no clue what day of the week it is anyway, but I slowly got used to it again because Fundeck (which is Kindergarten in a "normal life") is also from Tuesday to Saturday, that's why I try to make an effort to remember. So! But now the ship is in a part of the world where the weekend is from Friday to Saturday, because the holy day is the Friday and not the Sunday so they adjusted the ship's week's schedule to this part of the world. so Friday is the Sunday and we have our Sunday service on Friday morning but the ship's open in the afternoon and the day off is... uhm, to be honest, I don't have a clue anymore which day is the official day off when most people are off work (of course there is always someone working on a ship, because people need to be fed and the engine room needs to be watched and so does the gangway and the bridge, they are manned 24/7). I suppose I just go with the flow and toddle behind all the other people who are suppose to know what's going on, at least I hope they do... Are you lost in confusion with me?? Well, I'm sorry J. Well, I don't really have a day off anyway because as a mum you're working 24/7 but apparently that often isn't really considered work. If you happen to be of the same opinion, I could give you my energetic two year old for a day or two and you'll know what I'm talking about J. (By the way, baby finally settled down again after lots of TLC and screaming).

Living on land you normally have a decently fast internet connection (okay, sometimes one even feels that is too slow and one complains, not that I would EVER do such a thing), whereas on board you open up a web page then you go and do some chores around the ship and once you're back the site might be open or it might say:

This web page is not available.

The web page at https://emailnet.org/ might be temporarily down or it may have moved permanently to a new web address.

Don't get me wrong, I am so extremely grateful that we do have internet on board, that I can blog and upload photos for the family (and maybe one or two other people who might be interested), but that particular page is the one to check my emails and although there aren't thousands of people writing emails to me, it still is my "link" to the world back homeJ.

Living in a small space like a cabin is really also a blessing, cleaning up can be done so quickly, unfortunately making it messy again is also done VERY quickly!! so I feel like I'm tidying up the whole time and it always looks slightly messy, sigh. It also seems that the laundry monster has followed me to the ship. How in the world are four people able to produce so much laundry???? Okay the puking and peeing might have something to do with it, but ... ou well... Becca, drop it

J.

It is nice not having to cook every day nor having to think of what to cook, but yeah, there is a lot of rice served on board, a LOT of rice!! I hadn't eaten rice in almost 6 months after leaving the Doulos, but luckily I started to enjoy rice again even before we arrived back on boardJ. And generally the food's quite nice, even if it is sometimes a bit "interesting" or also maybe something I wouldn't really choose to cook myself J.

Another thing which I really don't enjoy is ironing. Hate is a strong word but I would almost use it to describe my relationship with ironing. Ben's wearing dress shirt's and dress pants every day (which is quite a sacrifice on his side), and those shirts and pants want to be ironed, sigh... but I do it, because I really like that guy an want him to look his best J.

Well, I waffled long enough, I'll let you go and I get going myself...

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