School holiday in January?

[MKESail]

On 1/27/2023 at 12:21 PM, Ret MP said:

Totally agree.  But, you know it ain't gonna happen.  RCCL, et al, are in the business of selling cruises, not giving people excuses not to cruise.

 

The only answer is "live and learn".  For the amount of years I've cruised, I didn't now about this special holiday period and how it effected cruising, until now.  Now, I know and I won't book during that time frame and locations.  One of many reasons to be a member of board(s) like this.  I'm only surprised I didn't know or hear about this until now, this thread.

There’s an old trick of googling your ship name + sail date to see what special group(s)/event(s) may also be there. Which may or may not help of course. I probably wouldn’t have thought of Solarium Bistro being closed for the entirety of the cruise if I saw that add even.  

[Miloomar]

On 1/27/2023 at 4:26 PM, malba2366 said:

 

The United States has the largest Jewish population in the world, so most of the people on these Yeshiva week cruises will be Americans.

 
Except for Israel

[Ret MP]

9 minutes ago, MKESail said:

I probably wouldn’t have thought of Solarium Bistro being closed for the entirety of the cruise if I saw that add even.  

Exactly.  I didn't mean that I was totally ignorant of the Jewish Event/holiday.  I just didn't know of it's effects on the cruise industry and some of their activities/venues.  I have no problem with religious holidays, not at all.  I just would rather be on a cruise that has as few children (young and adult) on it as possible. 

 

That's why I try not to cruise on major U.S. holidays/U.S. summer and South American holidays and summers.  Not always easy and successful.  LOL

[MKESail]

3 minutes ago, Ret MP said:

Exactly.  I didn't mean that I was totally ignorant of the Jewish Event/holiday.  I just didn't know of it's effects on the cruise industry and some of their activities/venues.  I have no problem with religious holidays, not at all.  I just would rather be on a cruise that has as few children (young and adult) on it as possible. 

 

That's why I try not to cruise on major U.S. holidays/U.S. summer and South American holidays and summers.  Not always easy and successful.  LOL

I am Jewish and am fully aware of the holidays. This was not a holiday. Just happens to be when those Jewish schools have their break. I know all it takes to have a Glatt Kosher kitchen and I can see why they would want the whole venue to themselves with Rabbi present and no bacon in that kitchen and all. But I also saw people eating their kosher meals out of boxes in MDR as well as Windjammer. Not judging just making an observation. 

[Ret MP]

3 minutes ago, MKESail said:

I am Jewish and am fully aware of the holidays. This was not a holiday. Just happens to be when those Jewish schools have their break. I know all it takes to have a Glatt Kosher kitchen and I can see why they would want the whole venue to themselves with Rabbi present and no bacon in that kitchen and all. But I also saw people eating their kosher meals out of boxes in MDR as well as Windjammer. Not judging just making an observation. 

 

LOL!  My father was a Canadian Golf Pro, a teaching club pro.  He was the head pro at Hillsdale Golf and Country Club, just north of Montreal Canada.  The club was a Jewish only club.  I spent most of my pre-teen and teen years at that club and developed a lot of close Jewish friends.  We had sleep overs, me at there place and them at ours.  From my experience, sticking to the Jewish rules of Kosher food was a social one.  I had a lot of pork (bacon and sausage) products at there place and so did they.  I'm not faulting them for that.  I actually don't blame them.  Who can resist bacon!   I'm not an expert of Jewish Holidays or events.  I just happen to have experienced many of them, but as an outsider.

 

BTW, I did type "Jewish event/holiday".  

[Badatz2]

3 hours ago, Ret MP said:

 

 

 

3 hours ago, MKESail said:

I am Jewish and am fully aware of the holidays. This was not a holiday. Just happens to be when those Jewish schools have their break. I know all it takes to have a Glatt Kosher kitchen and I can see why they would want the whole venue to themselves with Rabbi present and no bacon in that kitchen and all. But I also saw people eating their kosher meals out of boxes in MDR as well as Windjammer. Not judging just making an observation. 

If you look at the small print in the ad you can see that there are really two types of Kosher options.  The first is the "Fresh cooked onboard" option which costs $60 per day per person extra above the regular fare and is served in the Solarium Bistro or another closed off location.  This is only offered on special group or Yeshiva Week cruises.

The second option is the frozen precooked meals which can be ordered in advance without extra cost and are served in the MDR or sometimes the Windjammer, with disposable plate and cutlery. This is a year round service. That is what your saw.

[Ret MP]

5 minutes ago, Badatz2 said:

 

If you look at the small print in the ad you can see that there are really two types of Kosher options.  The first is the "Fresh cooked onboard" option which costs $60 per day per person extra above the regular fare and is served in the Solarium Bistro or another closed off location.  This is only offered on special group or Yeshiva Week cruises.

The second option is the frozen precooked meals which can be ordered in advance without extra cost and are served in the MDR or sometimes the Windjammer, with disposable plate and cutlery. This is a year round service. That is what your saw.

When I was in high school and shortly after, I worked for Marriott-In-Flight at FLL.  We catered the airlines.  This was in the early to mid 70s.  That's back when almost every flight had a meal service.  There were special request options for religious reasons.  The Kosher meals were, like you said, pre-packaged and frozen meals.  They looked a lot like TV dinners.  

[Jasukkie]

On 1/26/2023 at 5:18 PM, toad455 said:

Sailed during Yeshiva week on the Anthem years ago and it was chaos. We're now aware of when this week is every January and avoid sailing then. If I wanted to sail with 2,000 kids, I'd go in the summer. I'm used to the January cruises being very light on children.

2018? I was on that sailing. I'm sure there's a long thread here somewhere. Never again. 

[time4u2go]

4 hours ago, Miloomar said:

 
Except for Israel

Not true. United States has the largest Jewish population in the world.

[MKESail]

2 minutes ago, time4u2go said:

Not true. United States has the largest Jewish population in the world.

Correct. Israel has higher ratio of Jews but its total population is a lot smaller. 

[Ret MP]

17 minutes ago, time4u2go said:

Not true. United States has the largest Jewish population in the world.

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jewish-population-of-the-world

[tokidoki]

The food served in the Windjammer on the Wonder was Glatt kosher, same as the fresh food in the Bistro.  

[lbow1984]

On 1/26/2023 at 4:38 PM, malba2366 said:

I think people are a lot more willing to pull kids out of school for vacations these days.  Especially during the younger grades, where the material is so basic and repetitive that if the children are somewhat intelligent they don't lose much from missing a week of school.

That is what we just did. We feel one week a year at least when they are young is okay for our kids.

[lbow1984]

19 hours ago, Jasukkie said:

2018? I was on that sailing. I'm sure there's a long thread here somewhere. Never again. 

We were on Harmony and brought our kids, but there weren't that many kids on our sailing.

[Jasukkie]

2 minutes ago, lbow1984 said:

We were on Harmony and brought our kids, but there weren't that many kids on our sailing.

Sorry for the confusion, I was referring to Toad's comment about Anthem. 

[Badatz2]

13 hours ago, tokidoki said:

The food served in the Windjammer on the Wonder was Glatt kosher, same as the fresh food in the Bistro.  

On the specia lYeshiva Week sailings they sometimes use part of the Windjammer for the overflow from the Bistro and yes, they would get the same fresh Glatt Kosher meals food.

[dahirsh]

On 1/29/2023 at 12:59 PM, Ret MP said:

 

LOL!  My father was a Canadian Golf Pro, a teaching club pro.  He was the head pro at Hillsdale Golf and Country Club, just north of Montreal Canada.  The club was a Jewish only club.  I spent most of my pre-teen and teen years at that club and developed a lot of close Jewish friends.  We had sleep overs, me at there place and them at ours.  From my experience, sticking to the Jewish rules of Kosher food was a social one.  I had a lot of pork (bacon and sausage) products at there place and so did they.  I'm not faulting them for that.  I actually don't blame them.  Who can resist bacon!   I'm not an expert of Jewish Holidays or events.  I just happen to have experienced many of them, but as an outsider.

 

BTW, I did type "Jewish event/holiday".  

I would be willing to bet these were not people sending their children to yeshivas.  Keeping kosher is not just "social" to them

[Ret MP]

1 hour ago, dahirsh said:

I would be willing to bet these were not people sending their children to yeshivas.  Keeping kosher is not just "social" to them

Probably not.  I didn't ask them!

[pittnh]

On 1/30/2023 at 12:49 PM, Badatz2 said:

On the specia lYeshiva Week sailings they sometimes use part of the Windjammer for the overflow from the Bistro and yes, they would get the same fresh Glatt Kosher meals food.

 

one thing I noticed on the Yeshiva week cruise I was on was that the pool deck/solarium was empty on the last Saturday/sea day, which I assume was due to many on the trip observing Sabbath and not out and about?  Never saw a sea day so empty by the pools.

[Badatz2]

9 hours ago, pittnh said:

 

one thing I noticed on the Yeshiva week cruise I was on was that the pool deck/solarium was empty on the last Saturday/sea day, which I assume was due to many on the trip observing Sabbath and not out and about?  Never saw a sea day so empty by the pools.

You are most probably correct.

The Sabbath is a day for longish morning prayers (2-3 hours), long meals, bible study and family time.

Swimming is generally not done but lounging around the pool if there is spare time is acceptable 

[#4'smom]

We were on this sailing with our adult kids and their families.  We all were horrified by the lack of respect a lot of this group of passengers had towards other passengers and crew.  Males old & young, constantly jumping to the front of long lines, packs of kids & teens running wild, we repeatedly witnessed several young boys treating the bar & restaurant staff atrociously. I could probably count on 2 hands, the number of times we heard “You have to give it to me, my Dad said so” & rarely with a please & thank you.  We were at the Boleros bar and the bartender told a preteen boy, “sorry I can’t make you a smoothie on this card as it belongs to your Father and our computer shows you do not have a Refreshment Drink Package.”  This boy told the bartender to “F off and make the smoothie, otherwise he would get his Dad!”  The worst was the young tweens throwing ice cubes down from Deck 16 onto the Boardwalk Deck 5, many of them landing onto our Balcony on Deck 11!   We got into an elevator on Day 5 with 8 other adults and everyone in there was talking about how fed up they were with this group affecting their vacation.  The crew should be commended for putting up with so much lack of respect.  
 

Our family are seasoned cruisers and have never been on a sailing where other passengers have effected our vacation as much as this did.  Never again sailing 3rd week of January!!!
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 2, 2023 by #4'smom