Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Photo Update :)

I don't really have a lot of news as of yet.  I still haven't heard anything about my next contract, so as of now I'm just looking forward to getting back home and seeing everyone again! I can't believe in 14 days I'll be flying home!!! I got my flight info today and thankfully I got a direct flight to Atl. So, as of 7:10 pm on June 10 I'll be HOME!!!!! :)

Well, I guess the main reason I wanted to update my blog was so that I could post links to more photos that I've added to facebook.  So, here ya go:

Stockholm, Sweden:


Helsinki, Finland:


St. Petersburg, Russia: ( there are 2 links here!)



I guess that's all I know for now.  I hope you enjoy the pictures!  More to come!~ :)

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Sunday, May 24, 2009

The Baltic~

Well, it's been an absolutely amazing couple of weeks.  All I can say is that every port I've been to has been beautiful, unique, and amazing!  The people are beautiful...the buildings are architecturally stunning...the trees and flowers have some of the most vibrant colors I've ever seen...oh, and of course the food just rocks my socks off!! hahaha - .it's AWESOME!!  :)  I wish that I could describe everything I'm seeing, but you just have to experience it to really understand how different it is up here.  I LOVE IT!!  I have lots of pictures that I'm trying to post, but you know how the internet can be here...so, be patient and I'll do my best to continue to update them.

Cherbourg, France:
  
Harwich, England:

Copenhagen, Denmark:

Here are the pictures that I have been able to post so far.  I only wish the pictures really did these places justice!!

So, right now we just left Russia.  We had an over-night there which would've been great if immigration wasn't CRAZY here.  The only way we could get off the ship was either to have a tour ticket or a pre-paid crew shuttle ticket that specified the exact time you would be leaving and returning.  If you missed that time then you may or may not ever be able to catch the shuttle back.  WELL, we arranged to have a shuttle to take us to the Russian Ballet. We made the arrangements through the crew office and ended up having to pay extra money because the ballet runs later than the crew shuttles would be running....thus why we had to organize our own.  The office never gave us shuttle tickets because they were supposed to have it taken care of with Russian immigration/ the pier coordinator.  
SO - we get all dressed up and the whole cast gets off the ship with our passports, copies of passports, visas and a print out of our tickets for the ballet.  Then when we get there the woman at the counter refuses to let us out because we don't have a shuttle ticket or a Royal Caribbean tour ticket.  After several phone calls, one of the guys had to run back on board to get us shuttle tickets and then she finally let us out. By this point we only had 50 min to get to the show and then we find out that the shuttle never came.  Sooooo...5 more phone calls later we find out that the crew office took our money but never actually made the arrangements for the shuttle.  We all paid $75 for the show PLUS $35 for a special shuttle and then there was no shuttle and if we took taxis we could get arrested by Russian officials!!  It was TERRIBLE!!! We were all devastated.  Needless to say, I didn't make it to the ballet last night...All we can hope for now is that they refund us our money.  The crew office will definitely give us the shuttle fees back, but they aren't willing to give us the ballet money. We all feel that they should reimburse us though because it was THEIR fault that we missed the show!!  So disappointing...

On another note, we had a fire on the ship last night!  Now before you freak out too much everything is FINE.  It wasn't a huge fire, but it definitely could've been had it not been controlled very quickly.  The fuel tanker that was filling up our ship caught on fire and we were all up on deck 12 for a crew party when the 1st emergency announcement sounded.  All of the officers and the "Bravo" or fire team took off running! It was pretty scary actually. So, we all waited and prayed, hoping they'd take care of it and we wouldn't have to go into phase 2 which is getting guests to their emergency stations.  The only good thing is that this happened during our over-night in Russia, so it would've been a lot easier if we actually had to evacuate the ship.  Thankfully we never went to an official emergency because our bravo team is amazing and they took care of it before it got bad.  

Crazy story right?  Well, everything's been great since then.  Today was a nice day of rest for me.  I took it upon myself to catch up on some sleep! :)

Ok, that's all my interesting news so far.  I miss everyone! I can't believe I'll be home in a couple of weeks!! I'll see you all soon.  More to come!

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Thursday, May 14, 2009

Rocky Seas~

80's Party for the crew!! Andy, Lee and I!
Yes 80's!!! Lee, L.A., me, Amber, Andy & Morgan.
Bermuda...
Touching the tip of the Bermuda triangle! :)  


Well, first and foremost let me just say that Lisbon, Portugal and Vigo, Spain were absolutely GORGEOUS!!  My pictures just don't do it justice!!  The architecture was amazing...all of these beautiful old buildings with iron balconies and concrete statues....just great! Both days and just walked with good friends and explored.  We shopped and ate, relaxed and really enjoyed our time off the ship.  After 5 sea days in a row we really needed it!  

Here's a link to an album of a few of the photos I have so far:

Now onto show drama! haha  - 

During our 5 day stint at sea we were supposed to do a crew only show.  We decided to make it Tango because it's beautiful, and EASY for us!  Because of this, we planned to do our actual Tango show 2nd instead of ending with it like we normally would.  This way we could use our 12 a.m. crew show as a tech run for the show that would be the following day.  WELL - we had no work during the day other than that 12 a.m. run.  All of the sudden I get a phone call at 5:30 p.m.  "Kristian, we've been called in to do Tango tonight.  Our headline act is refusing to perform so we have to step in."  Keep in mind, show time is 7 & 9!  Talk about STRESS.  Shower, hair, makeup, sound check and pre-sets with less than an hour and a half until show time!  For me it wasn't too bad becaus I only have 1 song in the show, but for everyone else it was madness! AND this was the first show we'd done without having a tech run sometime that day.  Thankfully, everything went really well and it worked out just fine because the next night (when we would've been doing the Tango show) was very rocky. 

Well, unfortunately we weren't so lucky with tonight's shows.  We had City of Dreams and it is probably 1 of the rockiest nights we've had on the ship.  The problem is that this is also the most complex show we do - launching girls in the air, lots of lifts, silks (flying), harness flying etc etc.  The first show went well, but people were starting to get nauseated and several people came close to falling hard!  In between shows the waves are crashing so hard that it sounds like boats are hitting us head on or something...costumes are swinging all over the place....it's a mess.  We're all scared to do the show because the last thing we need is another injury with just 2 cruises left!  Then after lots of discussion between the production manager and cruise director, they call the hotel director to find out if we can cancel the show and perform a matinee the following day.  We find out 5 minutes before call time that he won't allow it and the show must go on.  
Let me just say that I'm truly blessed to work with such an incredibly talented cast.  There is NO reason that we should've performed that second show. It was NOT safe for the dancers by any means.  People were running off stage to throw up.  All launches and flying were taken out because it just couldn't be done.  Unfortunately the audience didn't get the very best show that we could've given them because the hotel director was too afraid guests might complain!!  The end result was a CRAZY show with an unbelievable amount of stress and emotion as well as re-blocking from number to number to cover for people who were either getting sick or didn't make their changes because they couldn't keep their balance long enough to make the change!! Over all the show still came off well. I can't believe we were able to pull it off, but lots of prayers were said and whenever anyone was off stage they were constantly screaming words of encouragement to everyone who was out there performing!  It actually brought me to tears in the end - just watching everyone work so hard to take care of each other.  Phil, our dance captain, was overwhelmed with emotion.  He broke down as soon as the curtain went down because he was SO stressed/concerned for everyone's safety. He said he's never worked with such an amazing group who could pull off a show like we did under the amount of pressure that was laid on us.    I am SO thankful for this cast!!! AMAZING!!  

After such a crazy night and a full day of exploring Spain, I'm EXHAUSTED.  So, I'm off to bed. More to come!! 
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Monday, May 4, 2009

Better late than never!! haha

70's Party - Meet Patrick (middle), the new B1!!
Dad trying to get a good picture in Aruba.
ATV's!!  We had a blast!
Mystery Theatre the night of my birthday! :)  From left - L.A., Morgan, Tait, James, me, Lee, Phil and Amber.


I'm sorry it's taken me SO long to update this thing!! WOW! I can't believe it's been a whole month!  

Well, where to begin.  I guess if I haven't had a chance to speak to you in the last month then you may not know some of these things:

I had Dad, Aunt Margaret, Uncle Henry, & Uncle Larry come and visit 2 cruises ago. We had a BLAST! It was wonderful having family on so soon after Mom and Paul were here.  I really enjoy having someone special to perform for each night!  :)  

We also got a new Boy 1 after Dwayne chose to leave us.  Patrick is here now and is wonderful.  He actually came to visit one of his friends in the cast around my first or second cruise, so we met then and got along like peanut butter & jelly.  Since then we've kept in touch via facebook. It was amazing to find out that he was actually going to be our replacement!  So, he's been here almost a month now, we have a blast hanging out, have a lot in common, and have a great chemistry on stage.  We went through a rough patch while he was trying to learn the shows, but things are much much better now.  

I had a birthday about a week ago!! I can't believe I'm actually 25 - 1/4 of a century! Hopefully this next year will be even better than my last - if that's the case then I couldn't ask for more from life! :)  

We began our crossing over to Europe May 4.  We had an overnight in Bermuda, which was AMAZING.  It was SO great just being able to have a nice dinner, after dark, on LAND!  Of course, they scheduled boat drill for 9 AM the next morning so that we weren't able to have a REAL overnight, but it was still great!  After 5 sea days in a row and losing an hour almost every night, we should be in Portugal in another 2 days. CAN'T WAIT!!! :)

By the way - I have videos up from the shows - so click on these links if you'd like to see some!

Here's Fighter from City of Dreams:


Every Time We Say Goodbye, also from City:


And The Power of Love form City:


I only have 2 cruises left.  Can you believe that?? It's crazy that I've already been here that long! And even more so that I'll only be performing the shows 2 more times each. I'm actually a little sad because I really love these shows and this cast is wonderful to work with. I couldn't have asked for a better situation to step into at the last minute.
Well I'm just going to enjoy the time that I have and not take one second of it for granted! I mean, I'm going to EUROPE guys!!!! AAAGGGHHHHH!!!!! Ok, I'm off to bed - this time changing thing is KILLING me. My schedule is one big ol' mess right now! It's actually 7 am here....technically... haha You know me, the night owl!  

More to come - promise! :)


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