Invitations to dine with crew members

[English Voyager]

The title of this thread reminded me of the scene from 'Keeping Up Appearances'

 

 

[Bon.Vivant]

It isn't a matter of looking down on them ..... as you know ..... that was tongue in cheek! Good old fashioned British humour! ;) :D

 

What was the serious question I genuinely don't understand is why so many seem to look up to them as though somehow eating with crew, and in particular the captain is an honour. :)

 

Jeff

 

In our experience, the officers and staff generally have good manners, are friendly and interesting dinner companions, and rarely arrogant and self-important. We welcome dinner invitations from officers and staff, and hope this tradition never changes.

[drron29]

We also enjoy dinner with crew.Occasionally a not so successful night but due to other passengers not really being that interesting.though saying that we also wouldn't be the ideal dining companions of quite a few as well.We are after all all unique.

On some occasions these dinners have been particularly enjoyable going on well after the other diners have left.Was also great dining with an officer who had come up through the ranks from bartender to hotel director.

One of the most remembered is a dinner with the engineer on the Explorer.Yes his English is not good,his reputation was such that we were the only 2 to accept the invitation.But after a while he opened up.He has been the engineer on the ship before it was acquired by Silverseas and stayed on board supervising the changes made to become then the Prince Albert 2.Little he doesn't know of the ship.A very interesting night.

[Emtbsam]

Agree with Drron. One of the memorable dinners we had was with a Safety Officer. We were the only people who accepted the invitation. Although his English was not fluent (and my Italian is not fluent), we had a most enjoyable dinner and ended up closing the dining room. Several years later, he was promoted to Staff Captain, and we dined with him several times and enjoyed meeting his in-laws. He is now a Captain, and although our paths have not crossed, we hope to see him again some day.

 

We have had few awkward dinners and generally have enjoyed the invitations to get to know the officers and staff of the various ships.

[spinnaker2]

Drron,

We also had dinner with the engineer on the Explorer.I admit, we were worried about the prospect. I am not versed in the subject and I was worried the conversation would be forced and stilted.

How wrong I was!

I learned much about how the vessel operates and other topics. We had a great time!

Those preconceived notions sometimes are just that, and once again, life lesson for me.