living on a ship

Now that I've been living on the Africa Mercy (AFM for short) for the past week, I feel like I am finally getting used to some of the nuances of living on said ship.  I'd like to share some of those with you now:

• Port is the left side and Starboard is the right side, which is fine except that currently the right side of the boat is facing the port.  
• While there are many staircases aboard, there are two main stairwells, Red and Blue.  Red equals my room and food.  Blue equals laundry and work.  
• Overall, the food is pretty great.  There are 3 meals on Monday through Friday and 2 meals on the weekends (you just pack your lunch at breakfast).  A lot of times, yesterday's dinner leftovers are refashioned into today's lunch...waste not want not!  We have a German baker on board, so breakfast is usually a smorgasbord of freshly baked breads, rolls, and croissants.  
• Also on the note of food, the snack bar and ship shop are currently featuring a bunch of South African goodies, since the ship was docked there for several months this winter undergoing maintenance.  My personal favorites are Caribbean onion and Balsamic vinegar potato chips and Stoney's Ginger Beer, which is basically like REALLY gingery ginger ale.  Also, Cadbury makes a wonderful chocolate bar called Dairy Milk Cashew and Coconut.  I did, however, pass on the egg and brandy scented shampoo.  
• All of you Young Lifers will be glad to know that A) Settlers of Catan is very popular on board and B) there are other Young Lifers on board.  I've met a former office manager from Saranac (Greta) and a couple from Australia who have been supporting YL in the Sydney area since the 1970s.  
• Garbage has never been so fun.  Like all other public services in Sierra Leone, garbage pickup is somewhat erratic at best.  So, when the receptionist makes a surprise ship-wide announcement over the PA that "The Garbage Truck is on dock," everyone literally stops what they are doing to run back to their rooms, grab the trash, and race down the gangway to get rid of it.  One day the "garbage truck" was just a big red tractor pulling an open trailer.  Only in Freetown.  
• I've learned a fun new card game called "Hand and Foot," which I now call Foot and Mouth Disease.  It is kind of a cross between rummy and canasta.  I was taught the "American/Canadian" version, while a lot the ship plays a slightly different version.  It is very popular on board and can take almost 2 hours to play a game.  Apparently, tournaments are even held every once in a while.

In other news, I never finished telling you the saga of actually getting to the AFM.  After the night in Brussels, we returned to the airport, where Brussels Airlines gave each of us 600 euros in cash (approximately $840 USD).  Elated with this treasure, we made our way onto the plane, which eventually took off only an hour late.  The flight was uneventful and we finally touched down in Sierra Leone around 8:30pm local time.  As we disembarked the plane onto the tarmac, the humidity literally smothered your face like a pillow (compared to the plane's A/C).  But, we had made it!  Once inside the airport, we filled out immigration papers, had our passports collected by a Mercy Ships representative, and were quickly shuffled past customs into the baggage claim area.  Slowly but surely, everyone retrieved their luggage and got it loaded onto carts.  Some of us changed into sandals to cope with our new climate.  We were then led outside and into a series of vans which transported us to a "beach resort" where we would meet the water taxi.  We were not allowed to handle our luggage from that point, which meant we waited under a thatched roof cabana-esque structure while 3 guys transported loads of luggage down to the dock.  Eventually we got the go ahead to go to the dock, which was wobbling up and down and up and down with the income waves. We precariously got on the boat and donned life jackets and soon set off.  The voyage took about 30-40 minutes and we were pretty much in complete darkness the entire time, except for the few lights of Freetown miles ahead.  I guess the drive just aims for the lights and hopes for the best.  By the time we neared the Queen Elizabeth Water Quay, we were in varying states of exhaustion, seasickness, and wetness.  We pulled up onto another floating dock, where we were greeted by a bunch of Mercy Shippers, and had our luggage loaded onto trucks and Land Rovers for a 2 minute ride to the AFM.  From there we led on board, had a quick orientation and dinner, and went to bed.  What. An. Adventure.