ships life

Got a question about how life on board is... that's a good one.
Hm.. lets give it a try.

So far we like most parts of living on the ship. Of course, there's not a lot of privacy here... or lets say NO privacy.
Yes, we do have our own cabin, but every friday is cabin inspection, which basically means that a couple of people that are assigned to do cabin inspection can go into your cabin and check if everything is clean and tidy. The reason they do this is to make sure it's safe and for hygienic reasons (like no food or drinks that are open, so they attract all kinds of bugs). That is understandable, you don't want all kinds of stuff crawling around on the floors of the ship, but what I personally think is wrong is that f.ex. one of our friends got a note in her cabin that they had been there for cabin inspection and she got a 4 (on a scale 1-5 of which 5 is the worst) because she hadn't made her bed!!!!! Her cabin was clean and normal tidy, just her bed was not made, what a nonsense.
So far we haven't had a note in our cabin yet, so either they haven't been here or it was clean enough, which I doubt, since our bed isn't made most of the time and lots of toys normally are on the floor.
So, the only private place we have (our cabin) isn't really private either, since anybody with a master key could walk in whenever they 'want' or feel they need to do an inspection.

Next, we always have to wear shoes everywhere we go. Which is not easy for this family, as 5 out of the 6 members of our family normally are barefoot. The big kids and the mommy have already got used to wear shoes, but Krister kicks his shoes off wherever and whenever he wants, so we are often looking for his shoes and if we do find them, it's still a challenge to make him put them on, he's like mom.. doesn't like anything on his feet.

The next challenge is ALWAYS having people around you and having to work with people you just don't match with. It's a fact that you just can't be friends with everybody, although we try, but some people are just a bit harder to get along with then others.
Do you know the DISC system? If not, check here. In the DISC-system Herbert is a high D, and high D's often have problems working together with a high C. If you know this system and know what you and your colleagues are, it's actually easier to deal with it, because you know why there are struggles getting along.
Fortunately we get along with most people on board, there's just a few we haven't really talked or socialized with, and I can only think of 1 person actually who we really don't get along with and who I think doesn't like us either. But I know there are more people on board having issues with this person, so I know it's not just us.

A possitive thing, which - when we leave - will turn into something 'negative' is that we now have a couple of really great new friends, who we have to say goodbye to soon :-(((
I'm really going to miss a couple of people here, I'd just wish I could take some of them home!

For me there's also the challenge of being a fulltime mom on a ship. At home it's not always easy to be an @home mom, but at least I got to go out visiting friends, go shopping, having friends over, kids having their own friends and toys, me having my things to do in our home, Herbert being around a lot so I could go out without taking all the kids if I need to.
Here I'm even more fulltime mom than at home.
With Herbert working 6 days a week and us having a family day on his day off, it doesn't give me much 'time off'. On most islands I can't go out alone with the kids because of the safety. And, I don't even think I want to go out by myself with the kids, because it's quite a lot of work going to a beach for example with 4 kids, so that makes it more a outing for them and not so much for me. Easier for me to just stay on the ship.
Another thing is that I always need to be 'around'. The kids can't really go anywhere without me being there. Marthe and Eskil can go to the dining room or Herberts office without me, but
Krister has to stay with me, unless Marthe or Eskil is staying with him.
And then Bente, who we always have to take with us everywhere. I don't have a playpen or something to put her in, just on the fundeck where we have a bed she can lay down and play in.
Ofcourse I can put her on the floor, but she is rolling over a lot, so I have to stay close to make sure she doesn't hurt herself.
So most of the time... wherever I want to go, it means dragging the kids with me up and down the stairs. Even going to the bathroom can be hard, since Krister will normally follow me. Good thing Marthe and Eskil are big enough to take care of their baby sister for a little while if I have to do something.
The last 2 weeks have been easier for me, since a new chief mate with his wife arrived, and the wife (Eveline) loves being with the kids and has done school with them every morning from 9.30 - 12.00. She takes all the kids to the fundeck, where the little ones can play (Krister and Jean-Mari), Marthe and Eskil do homework and learn english from Eveline, and Bente plays and sleeps in her bed there.
The kids like Eveline, and she has already teached Krister some colours in english. Some days ago Krister showed me a blue pencil and told me that it was blue! In english! And yesterday he asked me in dutch-english "mama, waar is de yellow nou?" which means.. "mama, where is the yellow?" saying the word yellow in english, since he doesn't even know the colours in dutch or norwegian :-)
An everyday sentence for Krister now is also: "Jean-Mari, come on!" and since Jamaica he says things like "Ja mon!" :-)
So, with the kids in school in the mornings, I can do other things. I either help out in the bookfair, help out in the laundry, or do ministry like school programs.
This really makes life on board the ship a little less boring, because I've really had some days I wanted to go home.

Other challenges:
* family time when you live together with 90 other persons
* time as a couple when having 4 children and Herbert often working evening shift and having the cabin (where 2 small children are asleep) as your only private place.
* church.... we miss our own church! the churches here are just... well... different. In which different means: loud, bad quality music, looooooooooong meetings and just not our style. We would want to go to church every sunday, but just don't always have the energy to go there, but rather just stay on the ship having a quiet brunch when everybody else is in church.
* being on the ship without really having a possibility to go off without anybody else joining because of crime on the islands.
* trying to keep our cabin tidy when everything we own is in this cabin which has the size of a bedroom.
* entertaining the kids without friends their age around
* trying not to complain about the food :-) Our cook is really creative, but we have so few ingredients on board, so after 3 months on the ship we'd really really like something else to eat.

Then, something we're looking forward to. Tomorrow... sunday... we'll go to church and after church an indian family with 2 girls (12 and 9) from that church is taking us home with them, serving us indian food and spend time with us and giving the kids an opportunity to play together.
We haven't met them yet, the pastor of their church was here a couple of days ago and he arranged it after I spoke to him about us wanting to meet a local family with kids the same age.

Have a good and blessed sunday!