Cruising to Alaska (day 2)

Today was a day totally at sea, under gray skies and with very little to see outside. We attended a presentation about Alaska and what we were going going to see during the next days, then the captain and two of his officers talked about the ship and about their work. 

The afternoon we toured the ship from top to bottom and realized that the main activity, a day like today was for the passengers (most of them overweight) was to drink,  eat and accomplish very little to try to balance their calories intake trough physical activities. 

At least we climbed the stairs from floor 6  to 17 a couple of time! In the evening, for the first time, the main floors where restaurants and entertainment are situated felt a bit crowded, but that was okay. As I mentioned, the ship crew is 1,700 people strong with very few Americans on board. 

Most of the officers are Europeans or Latino and 85% of the staff is Filipino. This clearly brings up the gap between the haves and the haves not, masters and servants, something we found awkward to say the least. 

Since we notice that the majority of the passengers were white, with a fair number of blacks and Asians, it would be ideal to have a crew mirroring the ethnic groups of the passengers. 

This left us with the impression that the Filipinos are exploited and are forced to be very nice, etc, and this made us very uncomfortable. 

Later in the day, we wanted to see a Beatle’s re-enactment show but it was mobbed and instead we watch the band Siglo performing in a common open area…