Israel meets Port Newark

Firstly, my apologies for the lack of posts lately - as is wont to happen in December, my schedule has turned absolutely insane, and I rarely have time to eat and sleep, much less blog. However, I've decided that the time has come to reward your patience with a particularly exciting ship visiting story from last Monday. 

It was an exceptionally busy day in port, and I had five ships to get to by the end of it. Consequently, I wasn't expecting to spend much time on any of the ships...but my intentions were transfigured from the moment I set foot on the Zim Mediterranean. I should preface with a note about Zim shipping lines: it's an Israeli enterprise but, as is the case with most lines these days, most ships that bear the name Zim are actually charters and have nothing to do with Israel. It became abundantly clear, however, that the Mediterranean was a real Zim from the moment I entered the accommodation block: the entire interior was a vision of blue and white. The ship's office was, if possible, even more Israeli in theme, with posters of the Holy Land covering most of the wall space, and Israeli flags draped over every available surface. I set down my boxes of Christmas presents (feeling kind of awkward about bringing Christmas gifts to an Israeli crew...), and settled in to wait for the captain. 

It's worth noting that I've been making a very haphazard study of the Hebrew alphabet, with the encouragement of my seminarian boyfriend and Old Testament scholar housemate. I've made very little progress, but can fairly reliably identify aleph and lamed (a whopping two letters, what success!). As I was sitting there, waiting for the captain, I made small talk with the first mate. At some point, I pointed to the Hebrew translation of the 'No Smoking' sign on the door, and made my linguistic efforts known. The first mate went ballistic with joy. 

At that precise moment, the captain finally walked in. The first mate nearly bowled him over with excitement, pointed at me, and exclaimed "SHE SPEAKS HEBREW!" Needless to say, having to correct this embarrassing piece of misinformation wasn't exactly the best way to start out the conversation with the captain, but no matter - he appeared to be a good-humored man and everyone had a good laugh. We continued to make small talk and, at some point, it was relevant to point out that I was half-German. Right on cue, he immediately began talking about the Holocaust

I can't begin to say how humbling of an experience it was to have a conversation with a man who could say: "I am only sitting here with you today because the Nazis missed my grandfather," and then proceed to list a terrifying number of ancestors whom the Germans slaughtered. All of the things that I might have said, like, "Well, you know, not all Germans were Nazis," or "Actually, my great-grandfather harbored Jews in his home," seemed horribly inadequate. On the flip side, I couldn't really say, "Gee, I'm sorry that my ancestors killed your ancestors; that really sucks." I mean, what do you say in a situation like that?? 

Just as I was beginning to think that my attempts at being as receptive and apologetic as possible were failing miserably, and that the captain was getting ready to forcibly remove me from his ship, he changed tactics completely. Leaping out of his chair, he threw open his arms and bellowed: "Come up and have lunch with me!"

It was hardly a request, and besides - who was I to refuse? An invite to the captain's private dining room is a rare treat indeed, and this particular occasion didn't disappoint. No sooner had we sat down to table, when the captain (I kid you not), rang a bell and shouted: "Steward! Bring the wine!" I thought Christmas had come early. The wine was excellent, the 3-course meal exquisite, the conversation fascinating. It was like eating in a 4 star restaurant. After the third time I refused to let the captain refill my wine glass, he ran off to the storerooms and presented me with a bottle of Israeli red to take home. We concluded the afternoon with a VIP tour of the ship including, but not limited to: the bridge, the outdoor nav deck, and the vegetable storeroom (of which he was far prouder than the bridge). 

It was a perfectly exquisite morning, and a good reminder of how multi-faceted the ship-visiting ministry is. Certainly, it's not all about gorging myself on Israeli food and having philosophical discussions with captains, but after weeks on end of seeing literally hundreds of seafarers who are dejected because they can't go home for Christmas, it was a refreshing change.  

On a much lighter note, all this ship-visiting has radically changed my restaurant preferences: I no longer have any desire to go out for ethnic food, since I can get the real deal aboard ship just about anytime I want it. Hooray for broadening my global palette!