PromenadeDeckWriter

Many thanks to both of you! That postcard find is excellent - saving that picture and the stats to include in my great-grandmother's file.

It's been fun doing the research.- some other ships that other family members came on were the SS Neckar in 1913 and the Kaiserin Auguste Victoria in 1910. These photographs make it all more the real!

Found out my great-grandma traveled on the Noordam a year after the Titanic disaster (the Noordam is known for being one of the ships that warned her about ice in the area). Research did not yield the stats - length, width, number of decks, and which classes of passengers it carried. All I have to go on is the gross tonnage and pictures. Anyone know more about the Noordam? 

31 minutes ago, shipgeeks said:

Playmobil ship

I think it started with piracy first (which I had an interest in since "Peter Pan" and somehow piracy transformed into ocean liners... (So even if one was to ask my 6-8 years old self, I would still be able to show off my tiny Playmobil sextant and know what it was used for, thanks to my illustrated book on piracy!)

Still no announcement of what the new ship will be named? (I for one am hoping for a return to the -ia naming scheme... Mauretania or Aquitania, anyone?)

Following up as I recently received a response from HAL: 

"Thank you for reaching out. We’re happy to report that the ordering feature is one that we are currently working on and hope to have implemented in the near future. In regards to the request to chat with Guest Services, currently we have a “contact us” section that allows you to send a message to Guest Services, but it does not allow them to respond to you via the app yet. We have discussed this within the company and are still working on how this would operationally work. So although we haven’t started working on it yet, we are planning on working on it at some point."

So looks like they are taking steps to remedy those two parts. At some point I'll be able to order tea and cookies without using the telephone!

3 minutes ago, richwmn said:

E-mail us at navigator.support@HollandAmerica.com

Shot off an email, asking for the best strategy for a Deaf person to place room service calls if this is not possible by texting. See what they come up with! (Rather than complain which got me nowhere but kind friends in Ocean Bar, but it wasn't fun when I was sick and just wanted an order of chicken soup and tea). 

Thank you all for your input. Shame about it being passenger-to-passenger only... hmm *returns to the drawing board*

58 minutes ago, shipgeeks said:

OP, Who would you choose to play you in the movie?🙂

27 minutes ago, ldubs said:

Julia Roberts or George Clooney.

Good choices! Although both of them are old enough to be my parents - ha! I'd go with Anne Hathaway (closer in age, and we can pass for siblings/cousins). Specifically the Princess Diaries era. 

Thought of another one. On a ship with a sizable number of Deaf folks. I'm on Deck 4 of the atrium, looking down at the bar area at the foot of the glass elevators. A Deaf person on Deck 1 looks up, and signs "Hey! Love you!" 

Confused, I thought they were talking to me. I signed back, "Uh... love you too?" 

Nonplussed, the person waved the air as if to erase what they said, "no, no, not you - I'm talking to my wife! She's two decks above you!" He pointed to a spot above me. 

I craned my neck and looked up. Sure enough, the wife was signing down to her husband. Rolling my eyes, we all got a chuckle out of it, and coordinated instructions to meet up at a restaurant to meet in person. 

Benefit of ASL? Being about to communicate cross-deck from vantage points without needing to shout. Later, I told the "husband" "I love you too, but not the way you think...." Ha! 

On 2/9/2021 at 12:04 PM, CGTNORMANDIE said:

how 30 people, at 3 different tables, can all converse simultaneously without missing a word. 

It's an art form!

Have tons of those stories about Deaf/hearing interactions (including on ship too).  My favorite ones are when the crew/staff try to kick us out ( er, make that "shuffle us along") of a venue because they needed to close down for the night - but the "Deaf Goodbye" is LONG, and can last for an hour or more.

Ie a group of us in a closed-off venue (reserved for happy hour for us - so I guess it is dining related? We had snacks?) and they were trying to shoo us out without being too rude/obvious. Problem? Every time they'd tell one knot to "please exit venue', another 10 would move back in, so it became. a one step forward, two steps backwards situation. Remembering a similar situation at Starbucks on land (the Deaf Coffee Chats), I flagged an interpreter and whispered to a staff, "My suggestion, if you want us out, is to turn the lights off. Don't be wishy washy - just do it." 

They didn't believe me at first and continued to "herd cats" until one threw the towel in, headed over the light panel, and shut all the lights off. Guess what happens when lights are extinguished? Conversation stops. 

Like magic, the knots of Deaf passengers moved out into the interior promenade area to continue chatting and the relieved staff literally closed the doors on our back. 

The following night, word spread and they learned if they wanted us out a venue, "kill the lights" works wonder 🙂

But yes, we can not only talk across tables, but across atriums (even from different floors - I had a conversation from Deck 2 with someone on Deck 8 because we were too lazy to use the stairs to meet up), and through glass window partitions among other benefits. 

I'm thrilled to see that the Navigator app has been redone with the option to chat via shipboard texting (something that was missing and sorely needed on my 2017 crossing on the Nieuw Amsterdam). Hopefully that means no more schlepping myself to the Ocean Bar (one deck down from my cabin) to place room service orders? (The in-cabin TTY as part of the ADA kit didn't work, because nobody at Guest Services answered - my guess, nobody turned on the TTY there either, if there was one available). Hence the schlepping around. 

My question - does the texting app only apply for passenger-to-passenger, or would I be able to "call" (in my case, text) Guest Services or room service? Or will I still need to put shoes on and go downstairs to make my messages known? 

(For everyone else who haven't met me - I am Deaf, and can't use the in-room phone to place such calls). 

Even so, the passenger-to-passenger texting will eliminate the need to walk over to the ASL interpreter's cabin, knock and hope they are in to give my daily interpreting schedule needs, or if not, write out a message on a whiteboard we both had on our doors (and hope that nobody walking by would erase them, as was the case several times). So even partial benefit is still a great asset! 

On a Carnival sailing where we had a group of 30 or so Deaf passengers and six ASL interpreters, a few of us went to the evening show. Knowing how the crowd would snag seats early, the interpreters went even earlier to reserve a group of seats near the front, on one side so we could have good sight-lines of the interpreters when the show started. 

One woman ignored the "reserved for Deaf" paper signs on the seats and parked herself in the middle of the front row of reserved seats. Deaf folks showed up, and many people will attest to the fact that we are HIGHY visible due to our flying fingers and animated conversations. Two folks (obviously a couple) were late to the seating and not having any option, sat on either side of this woman and continued to chat over her. No idea what the woman was complaining about, but one of the interpreters standing in front of us approached her and kindly suggested that she might be more comfortable in a seat elsewhere in the theater as this area was reserved for Deaf so they could see the interpreter. 

Normal people would have taken the hint and moved elsewhere but not her. She refused to move, saying she was there first (technically the interpreters were there first, but I digress). Okay now what? 

The show begins, the interpreters stand directly in front of her and block her view of the stage (remember? She was sitting in the middle of the roped off area) and tried to stretch their arms to interpret around her profile as we Deaf folks were craning our heads trying to see around her. (Not easy as the woman was a seat wiggler - turning around and bending over and throwing head and whatsover, which necessitated constant movement on our part to maintain a unbroken sightline to see the interpreter. I know the lady continued to complain as I could see her mouth moving, and the hearing CODAs getting annoyed with her (they were sitting with family members who were Deaf). 

Finally the lady had enough and summoned a staff and yelled at them to "move the finger lady somewhere else!" The staff, bless them, shook their head and explained that she was sitting in the Deaf section for access and made the same suggestion to relocate elsewhere. Lady stood up and threw a scene (something about having the right to sit wherever she wanted to and that "those deaf and dumb people" should move, not her. Why should 10 people and 6 interpreters move for one person? I was impressed at how the interpreter continued to work and maintain their cool even though they were ready to strangle the lady.

A hearing person seated nearby (not Deaf, not part of the Deaf community, just a regular passenger) leaned over and told the lady "You have 500 other seats to choose from. They have 10. Do the math." That shut her up, and she huffed and packed up her stuff while sending us Deaf the death glare and made a racket moving up the aisle in search of better seats. 

(The other passengers were wonderful - they'd walk up, see the signs, nod, and move on elsewhere.)

This was several years ago on a Carnival ship, with a group of 30 Deaf and signers (ie ASL interpreters off-duty, family members, CODAs, etc). We were seated in the dining room, split amongst several tables. 12 of us sat at one window-side table, another 8 across two four-person tables across the main aisle, and another 12 at the table next to the first. Anyone familiar with the Deaf community will understand how conversations are not kept to individual tables, but rather, cross over (as we as signers have the benefit of not needing to shout to be heard across the room). 

Not being familiar with the protocols of interrupting the conversation waves, the wait staff were at a lost of what to do - how to politely interrupt us when it was time to place orders ("Sir? Ready to order? Sir?" followed by silence as the waiter spoke to the back of the person's head *facepalm*), how to navigate the aisle without blocking someone's sight-lines, and how to not panic among the flying fingers. 

One waiter stood off to the side, looked around, surveyed his options, and limboed through the conversation WHILE carrying a loaded tray, thinking if he walked down low, we could see across his belly. It was a VERY good limbo, going through 6-8 feet before returning to upright pose and walked on as if it was a normal thing to do. It had the opposite effect that he had hoped - the conversations stopped, fingers froze in midair and all 30 heads swiveled to the waiter in shock. Laughter soon followed. 

They did eventually figure it out (through observation, change of position when speaking to us, using gestures and mimes and pointing to menus, etc) and actually asking us "Okay, how do we do this? Hold up the menu? Wave to get your attention? Okay. Taps to shoulders okay? Yes? What's the sign for *point to object*?, etc)

For the record - the most polite thing is just WALK through. Don't stop, don't apologize, don't make a big show out of it, don't walk in and pause and apologize. Just walk through normally. Yes we'd miss a sign or two but we are good at figuring it out and asking for clarification when needed. 

But that limboing waiter.... that was a priceless scene. (We did ask for a reenactment to see if he could do it again without falling to the floor - he bent down SO LOW doing it). 

Found this old post, but cannot respond to that as it has been archived, so this is my next option!

Trying to order the photos in the right order, but alas the photos are not showing up. I'm trying to remember the order of the paintings as shown on (the front?) the stairwell of the Nieuw Amsterdam.

Hopefully someone can match the right photo to the missing ones in the link: Nieuw Amsterdam paintings by Captain Card.

I do have two snapshots I took, but unfortunately the others didn't turn out well. (I'm updating my journal and wanted accuracy in the details, hence the request, as I'm writing a fiction book based on it). 

I saw recently on the book of the faces, that HAL updated its Navigator app, and that it now includes shipboard texting! So excited about that (and glad they listened to feedback from me and probably others for the need of one). My question is: 

Can one text Guest Services or the room service department? (ie can I text someone "Please bring me tea and cookies to stateroom XXXX?" Or is that still somewhere in the future? 

What have your experiences been with the texting part on the app? 

Loving the colors of the dining room - very Deaf (and low-vision) friendly! Less backlighting from the windows (too much contrast between dark walls and bright windows makes it hard to see signing hands, especially if the friend sits in front of a window, thus the "shadow" is seen - even harder for folks with low vision like me due to RP.). I showed the picture to a few friends (all Deaf) and they exclaimed on how brightly lit it was and how excellent sight lines will be for conversing across the room in sign language! I may have to visit this ship (despite the inferior promenade deck without the teak deck chairs) for this and the Grand Dutch Cafe. 

On 1/30/2021 at 4:28 PM, rkacruiser said:

There was a time when I was able to almost always be correct in identifying a ship based upon appearance.  Now, more often wrong than not. 

Nowadays, it's easy to recognize the QM2 (nobody else looks like her), and then "general" line (ie I can recognize a HAL/Cunard/Disney ship from afar due to the colors of hull/superstructure and funnels). 

I remember standing on a beach (Cocoa Beach maybe?) in Florida and looking out into the distance. Saw and recognized either the Disney Magic or Wonder right away (hard to miss the Mickey Mouse funnels plus their unique color palette with red, white, black ship colors and yellow lifeboats), followed by two cruise resorts on barges, no idea which line they were with as (short) funnel colors weren't easily recognizable on-top the all-white hull/superstructure.) Compare this to when I was touring the Queen Mary (the original one with the museum in the engine area) and saw a ship model from across the room, and recognized it as the Normandie. Saw another one, and this time, it was the Lusitania. Didn't need to read the signs to know which ships they were.

Nowadays, as others say, it's possible to guess the "class" of ship (ie the Volendam/Zaandam, or a Vista class of HAL, for instance) but not the specific ship unless she had alterations made to her profiles. 

15 hours ago, rkacruiser said:

Panama Buns/Rolls are a sweet roll type pastry with a fruit filling served on HAL ships when particularly scenic events are taking place.  They are named after Panama Canal visits.  But, the pastry will sometimes appear on other ships sailing in other areas as well.  The fruit filling may be apricot or tangerine or....?  Served on the open decks and in the Crow's Nest with a coffee/tea/hot chocolate (in cold cllimes) and usually some OJ available station.  

Correct - they are a yeasty sweet bread/donut roll with a custard filling with bits of fruit (varies, clementines, apricot, etc) with a streusel topping. Best served hot right off the baking tray when they come in from the kitchens. Very light and fluffy, too easy to eat 10 of them! Downed with coffee or orange juice served, especially when they open the bow of the ship and set up a "tent" with the buns and drinks. Nothing better than standing at the railing at 5:30am with a bun in one hand and coffee in the other hand, waiting for the canal to appear in front of you while the sun rises on the horizon. Here's a photo of one from the crossing.

57 minutes ago, shipgeeks said:

RK, My question about Panama Buns was actually directed to Promenade, as he mentioned them in his post

Correction - I am a "she". I know - it's rare to see a young woman (and Deaf) remotely interested in ocean liners - I'm well aware that I"m a one-off from the typical profile of ocean liner aficionados out there. My love started at age 8 and hasn't waned over the years. Looking though my schoolwork memory box, I found deck plans that I"d sketched over the years, copying what I liked from ships at that time with older deck plans of ships now gone (mostly). I do have fond memories of dragging my friend (at the time, we were undergraduates in college) all over the Queen Mary in Long Beach, and acting as an audio guide for her (she actually commented that I gave her more facts and stories than was shared on the audio guide). Still need to travel on the Queen Mary 2 (have not found a companion willing to dress up and travel on Cunard, hence me settling for Holland America as a compromise, but it was a wonderful experience and would stick with HAL in addition to my goal of traveling on the QM2). 

42 minutes ago, CGTNORMANDIE said:

Where did you see Favorite Cruising Moment???  

 I think ShipGeeks was referring to a response to a post in "Ask a Cruise Question" about great cruise and vacation memories. This is my post about the Panama canal crossing.

Allocating more time to read then! 

53 minutes ago, CGTNORMANDIE said:

Have you seen Lowiepete’s...”RMS Caronia II Time Line”?  

That's now on my reading list to read on my iPad tonight!

Really enjoying all these stories! (As a Deaf person, I don't have the privilege of hearing those same stories shared onboard by fellow passengers, whether at the (assigned) dinner table, during cocktail happy hour, or in passing). So getting direct stories here lets me get a taste of what it used to be "back then", especially for someone like I who loves ocean liners. So I am appreciative at reading these stories and look forward to reading more!

Mine is sitting on the Promenade Deck of a HAL ship, all cozy on one of their teak deck chairs, and reading books while gazing out to sea. 

One particular moment I do remember, is from the Panama Canal crossing where I dashed down to the Promenade Deck after watching the first lock open from the bow of the ship. There, the canal walls were still rather high and as the lock flooded with water, the canal wall came down and we could see over the top of the wall - and TOUCH the wall. Amazing to see that feat of engineering, and be able to touch it. (An older gentleman sitting a few feet away glared at me and muttered, "You do that, you gonna get your finger chopped right off!" He probably was making a reference to one of the mules pulling the ship along, as we *could* have touched the mule tracks if we reached out far enough. But then, why come all the way and not swipe your finger on the canal wall? A hundred years worth of dirt and thousands of ships that passed before you? That's enough to bring on the goose bumps. That and the Panama buns they passed out - delicious and an excellent snack to mark the day. 

10 minutes ago, Copper10-8 said:

Which ship? Gotta know the Godmothers 😉 

Zaandam! 

Edit: adding the names- Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen. 

1 hour ago, Essiesmom said:

It's here, on the HAL (Holland America) board:

 

Thank you for doing that faster than I! 🙂

On 9/23/2020 at 2:55 PM, Taters said:

And I'm deaf...  Will this monitor thingie make announcements until I comply with what I cannot hear, irritating everyone around me? 

I'm sorry but I laughed at this, all knowing too well this feeling as I am Deaf myself too.

Case in point, me walking across the gym floor in high school when we were supposed to walk along the sidelines. Teacher screamed at me until a fellow classmate told them I was Deaf. Took 3 other teachers to convince her that yes I really did not hear her yelling at me and was not faking it. Me? Totally oblivious of it all until the classmate told me. So yes...