Australia

Abandoned In Australia Coming Home

A cruise around the world sounded like such an amazing adventure to undertake, a perfect celebration of turning 70, and a safe and relaxing way to go places I have never been while being pampered along the way. The possibility that Holland America could force me off the ship in a foreign country, with 4 days’ notice and no assistance on how to get home, didn’t occur to me. A cruise ship would never treat its passengers this way, after all, they have a responsibility to take them safely back home. Apparently not.

After abandoning passengers at the dock in Fremantle Australia on Sunday, March 21st, the Amsterdam sailed back to Ft Lauderdale with our luggage, which will hopefully be shipped to us one day, but without the 1300 passengers who paid for an around the world cruise. I was completely on my own in a country 11,111 miles from home in the middle of a pandemic, with an upper respiratory infection diagnosed by the ship’s doctor the day before the Medical Clinic was closed to passengers, a deep cough that sounded like a foghorn and attracted a lot of unwanted attention, and no testing to prove that I didn’t have the Corona Virus.

The ship had not provided passengers with any information about how to answer questions from immigration, the hotel or airport about our time in Australia. Surprisingly, Immigration asked no questions, conducted no health check, nor took our temperature. I was relieved because my voice was hoarse, and I knew I would start coughing if I had to speak for very long to answer questions.

Nightmare At Sea Reveals Who We Are

We’re living during a time of radical unpredictability that causes greater degrees of uncertainty than we’ve ever had to cope with in the past. Who we are at our core as individuals, governments, and businesses are being revealed by how we respond.

Being told you must get off the ship and get out of the country as soon as possible without providing assistance to do so would create a stressful situation for anyone, but it’s ten times worse for those who are the most vulnerable.

A “nightmare at sea,” was how The Sun Sentinel newspaper described my Amsterdam world cruise in an article on March 18^th. I’ve included the link to the article, which is an accurate description of what has been happening on our ship for almost 2 weeks now. I never thought I would pay so much money to be treated so poorly.

https://www.havasunews.com/nation/nightmare-at-sea-cruise-line-forces-elderly-tourists-to-get/article_4ccc13da-6949-11ea-8ccc-43a19656926f.html

As I watched the behavior of my fellow passengers as the situation worsened, the unwillingness of Holland America to provide any assistance to the passengers they were abandoning in Australia with 4 days’ notice, and lack of empathy shown by Captain Jonathan Mercer, I was reminded of the quote by Robert McKee that “True character is revealed in the choices a human being makes under pressure – the greater the pressure the deeper the revelation, the truer the choice to the character’s essential nature.”

Living With The Question Mark — Part 2

Our captain announced today that the cruise is ending when we arrive in Freemantle, Australia on March 22nd. Passengers will be asked to disembark and make arrangements to fly home at their own expense. Even though the ship will be leaving March 23rd to return to Florida, there apparently aren’t enough ports allowing cruise ships to dock to provide adequate food for 1300 passengers. So, Holland America Cruise Lines is abandoning us in Australia.

Last week I wrote about learning to live with the question mark of not having an answer to the questions of where I’m going next in my life and where are we going on this cruise. This week I have an answer to the question about the future direction of the cruise, which has only resulted in more unanswered questions.

Our captain announced today that the cruise is ending when we arrive in Freemantle, Australia on March 22^nd. Passengers will be asked to disembark and make arrangements to fly home at their own expense. Even though the ship will be leaving March 23^rd to return to Florida, there apparently aren’t enough ports allowing cruise ships to dock to provide adequate food for 1300 passengers. So, Holland America Cruise Lines is abandoning us in Australia.

Living With The Question Mark

I brought a journal with me thinking I would write down my thoughts and insights about my future as I’m making this 128-day voyage around the world. I drew a question mark – a big one – ? on the first page to indicate that the next decade of my life is somewhat undefined.

In his new book “When,” Daniel Pink defines“9-enders,” as people in the last year of a life decade who experience a desire to evaluate their life, how they feel about what they have and haven’t accomplished, and how they want to experience life in the next decade. I, like many of my clients, fall into to the category of “9-enders.”

I’ve always had a vision of what my life would be like “next, ”but never really had a plan for how that would happen. I just had faith that my vision would become my reality and the details of “how” would take care of themselves, and they did. The question mark was never about what I wanted but instead about how I would achieve it.

I’m 64 days into the cruise and that question mark is all I’ve written in my journal. However, I’m beginning to think the question mark was an accurate indicator of my future because, not only do I not know where I’m going next with my life, I don’t know where this cruise ship is going next. The Corona Virus is wreaking havoc with our itinerary.

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