Sea Sore

So here we are on the Seabourn Encore on day eight of our ten-day cruise from Bali to Singapore. Amazingly, we’ve not killed each other. I’m always reading horror stories about lifelong friends who go away on holiday together and by the time they check in at the airport for the flight home, they’re on spitting terms.

            Saffy says this is probably because the Encore has so many distractions. “I mean, look at this place,” she said the other day in the Observation Bar as we watched the bartender shake up a Martini. “It’s empty!”

            I pointed out that this may have had something to do with the fact that it was just past 10am.

            “And yet here we are about to have some lovely Martinis!” Saffy said cheerfully, her impressive bosom straining under a thin tee-shirt that said ‘Look closer’.

            We took our drinks to a low-slung sofa by the window where we could watch the mirror-flat sea glide by. “See, this is really the life!” Saffy said, licking her lips appreciatively on the rim of her glass. “Wake up late, have breakfast, have a Martini, spend an hour in the sun, and then wonder what’s for lunch! I mean, what’s not to love?”

            “I especially love the lighting in my bathroom,” I told her.

            “Oh my God,” Saffy sighed.

            The en-suite bathrooms on this ship are about twice as big as the one we have at home. And there are three light settings: super dim for middle of the night pees, semi-bright for when you’ve just woken up, and super bright for when you’re getting dressed and need to critically examine yourself for facial flaws or sartorial missteps.

            Amanda says she can’t understand how we can be so obsessed with bathroom lighting when we should be devoting our energies to helping her meet eligible men on board.

            “Maybe they’re all put off by the way you’ve been tanning yourself on the pool deck,” Saffy suggested over a Greek-themed lunch on the outdoor terrace of the Colonnade.

            Amanda ignored the jibe. “I think it’s because everyone on board is a couple! They should tell you that on the website! So singletons like me don’t get our hopes up when we pack for the trip,” she said, resentfully jabbing at her French fries. But like a sun rising up over a storm cloud, she brightened. “And they should also tell you that this ship serves the best fries I have ever had in my entire life!”
            “Ever!” Saffy repeated through a mouth stuffed with said fries.

            See, that’s the thing I’ve discovered about cruises. Doesn’t matter what trouble you have, there’s always something to cheer you up.

            Like the last port we were at: Surabaya. It’s a place that’s never figured on any of our bucket-lists. Saffy said she had absolutely no interest in finding out more, whilst Amanda reasoned that it seemed such a waste to have come all this way and not tick it off, even if it’s to airily say at dinner parties, “Surabaya? Oh, you’ve never been? But you’re so well travelled. Well, it’s…interesting…”

            As it turned out, Saffy had a blast, not so much because of the city itself which is what we all imagined Singapore might have looked like 40 years ago, but because our coach was preceded by an official police escort the entire way. We went through red lights as traffic in all directions gave way to us.

            “Seriously, this must be what it feels like to be the President of the United States!” Saffy said, glowing with importance as we cut through the traffic like a hot knife through butter. “Imagine if we travelled like this on the CTE every day! I’d be in the office in, like, ten minutes!”

            Later, back on the ship, as Amanda glided off to the spa for a pedicure and an acupuncture session, Saffy decided she wanted to learn how to play mahjong. Which left me conveniently back in the Observation Bar, just in time for afternoon tea.

            “These are seriously good scones!” I told a complete stranger sitting at the next couch. In my enthusiasm, I may have sprayed some crumbs on him, but I figured it was my civic duty to spread the word about the caliber of the Encore’s baking team.

            Amanda says we need to reconsider our lifestyle options. “I could live on this ship. I really could!”

            When she heard about this, Sharyn texted to say that only single people with no children talk like this.

Ship Shape

This week’s column comes to you from the pool deck of the new Seabourn Encore. We’ve just left Komodo Island and are now sailing merrily along the deep blue Indonesian seas.

            Next to me, on a khaki-hued deckchair dressed provocatively in this season’s skimpiest Gucci swimsuit, Amanda is slowly rotating her body in her patented sun-tanning procedure. Generally, this involves a quarter turn every ten minutes to ensure an even burn. In certain positions, she contorts her inner thighs outwards.

            Every so often, Saffy will lower her sunglasses and glare disapprovingly. “Seriously, you need to do that sort of thing in the bedroom!”

            Once, Amanda waved her hands. “Oh, no one is watching!” she said airily, to which Saffy pointed out that the only way no one was watching her was if they were Friends of Dorothy, or dead.

            “Or both,” I said, as I raised my novel higher to cover my face from the blazing sun.

            “Or both,” Saffy repeated grimly.

            The usual round of squabbling aside, it’s been a very relaxing few days so far. The ship has 12 levels and there’s practically a restaurant or bar on every one of them, which might explain why the passengers are all so cheerful all the time.

            Yesterday, we anchored at Komodo Island. Originally, Amanda had wanted to see some actual dragons, but Saffy vetoed the idea after she read about how vicious they are. “The mothers sit around the eggs and wait for their babies to hatch and then they eat them!” she reported with the added horror of a newborn vegan.

            Which is how we found ourselves lazily snorkeling around the coral surrounding a pink-sanded beach. At one point, Amanda surfaced next to me, looking a complete vision as water droplets sparkled off her flawless skin. “This is the life, isn’t it?” she said, bobbing in the water. “Why do we spend our lives trapped in offices?”

            “So we can afford to take expensive cruises like this!” I hazarded, proving once again that even in the midst of an aquatic paradise, I’m a glass half empty kind of guy.

            Later that afternoon back on the Encore, over a lunch of mushroom lasagne in the white-washed Colonnade restaurant, Amanda leaned forward and whispered, “Is it just me or is this quite a senior crowd?”

            Saffy looked around. As someone who’s made a successful HR career out of being non-discriminatory, she rarely sees anyone through the lens of age, just potential. She returned her attention to her noodle salad and shrugged. “Maybe, but they look really rich! You’d just need to be married for a year, tops, and you’ll inherit gazillions by Christmas when he drops dead!”

            Amanda pursed her lips. “They’re all couples, though.”

            “That blonde guy who takes the morning pilates class is hot!” Saffy said suddenly. “He needs to wear less clothes.”

            “Oh yes!” Amanda sighed. “Did you see his thighs?”
            Saffy’s bosom inflated. “How could you miss them? Like smooth oak tree trunks!”

            Anxious to change the subject, I piped up and asked what everyone was planning for the afternoon.

            “I think there’s a mahjong session after lunch,” Amanda said.

            “Well, that’s one way to meet hot young men,” Saffy pointed out, sarcasm dripping from every syllable.

            “It’s how Barney meets some of his dates,” Amanda began and trailed off as she saw the error of her dating strategy. She tried a different tack. “Maybe I should sign up for a private training session with Mr Hottie Pilates.”

            “Yes, good idea,” Saffy said with approval. “If I was single, that’s who I’d do bench presses with!”

            And so, the days pass with idle, mostly harmless, games of mild flirtations, and long afternoons on the balconies of our rooms gently lulled to sleep by the slow rock of the Encore.

            This evening, in the Great Salon, there’s an after-dinner show with a mind-reader, which Saffy thinks might be a bit dangerous. “What if he asks you what you did this afternoon?” she asked Amanda.

            Amanda rotated her bronzing body on her lounge chair. “Well, my appointment with Mr Hottie Pilates isn’t till tomorrow morning, and I’ve got nothing planned except a massage.”

            Saffy lowered her sunglasses and looked around the sundeck currently filled with what she’s taken to calling Passion Card holders. “Well, a lot can happen between now and the show,” she pointed out, even as an elderly gentleman struggled by on his walker.

            Amanda says one of the things she loves about Saffy is her optimism.

            

Face Off

After much vacillation and uncoordinated timing, Saffy, Amanda and I are now all officially off Facebook and signed up to Instagram.

            “Oh my God,” Amanda sighed the other day, “I feel so relaxed now! Honestly, I didn’t realise just how stressful being on Facebook was!”
            Saffy’s magnificent bosom trembled. “I know! No more reading rants about how stupid people are, or watching clips of people screaming at each other!”

            “Or scary American politicians saying scary things!” Amanda added.

            “And no more to-the-minute updates of some bomb going off somewhere that we can no longer go to!” I said.

            We paused a moment to contemplate our news lives free of the negative energy of Facebook.

            After a while, a thought occurred to me. “I am going to miss those cute videos of dogs though.”

            Saffy swooned. “Oooh, yes! I love those! Especially the ones with sleeping puppies or playing in the snow!”

            “And pictures of my adorable baby niece. My stupid sister isn’t on Instagram though I’ve begged her to,” Amanda sniffed.

            “Oh, that’s a shame!” Saffy said, her lips pursed into a moue of sympathy.

            “I’m also going to miss all those inspirational TED Talks! Instagram doesn’t have them!”

            Leave it to Sharyn to douse our wavering commitment to leave Facebook.

            “Aiyoh, you all, ah! One day, cannot tahan Facebook, next day change mind. How liddat? Good ting you not in charge of army!”

            Saffy stiffened. “I’m not sure there’s a rule that says we can’t have regrets, Shazz!”

            “Aiyah, what for have regret? Life so short, orredi! Regret is if you don’t order another portion of durian chendol, right or not? Jason, hor? Dis sort of ting no need regret, one!”

            Amanda later said privately that with this kind of life philosophy, Sharyn would make the world’s worst marriage counselor. “What kind of food analogy would she use for a divorcing couple? ‘Don’t bother, just have another round of laksa!’”

            “She’d probably add a ‘lor’ in there somewhere,” Saffy observed.

            Meanwhile, I’ve been exploring my new world on Instagram. It’s a surreal experience to peek into the private lives of people you only know about from reading trashy tabloid magazines at the hairdresser. The first time I watched Cindy Crawford cook burger in her kitchen, I had an out of body experience of the kind normally associated with…well, watching Cindy Crawford cook burger in her kitchen.

            “I never thought of people like her being real, if you know what I mean,” I said to Saffy. “She was cooking a burger! And looking really gorgeous, too, I have to say.”

            “I know. I’m following Ricky Martin and I think it’s so weird to see his rumpled morning face! I feel like he’s actually Facetiming me!”

            Amanda says she’s completely addicted to Instagram and wonders why it’s taken her so long to get onto it.

            “We’re really really late adopters, that’s why,” Saffy said the other day at breakfast as she took a video of her French toast, holding her phone with one hand and dribbling honey with her other.

Amanda leaned in. “But do you think people will judge me if they look at the list of people I follow and they find Kim Kardashian and The Specky Blonde?”

“I don’t think anyone cares,” Saffy said as she put down her jug of honey and then scrolled through her filters. “Now, I’m thinking I should use Perpetua for this one.”

Sharyn says she’s massively in love with Team Brando. “I doh no who he is but, wah lau, eh, he so handsome! His boyfriend lagi handsome! I tink hor, if dey have chil-dren, sure grow up and become supermodel one!”

“I want to have Ricky Martin’s children,” Saffy sighed. “I want to wake up next to him every morning and have his children!”

Amanda is obsessed with Peepy and Mother Lee. Well, to be accurate, she’s obsessed with Peepy’s ever changing collection of Hermes bags. “Does he work, I wonder?”

Barney Chen, who is also obsessed with the mother and son team, says they make their fortune selling gold leaf to temples in Thailand. “Isn’t that just genius?”

“Totally!” Amanda said. “Money w0uld just pour in every second of the day!”

All of which leaves us all with very little time during the day to do any actual work. Saffy said she spent all of Friday afternoon watching Dr Pimple Popper. “If only there was a job where I could watch her all day! I’d be so good at it!”

“Yes, if only,” Amanda said, as she scrolled through Justin Bieber’s feed.