Disney Cruise Day 1: The Melting Pot

One of my favorite parts of the Disney Cruise experience is the name tags.  Every crew member, from the Cruise Director to the janitor, wears a name tag with their name and their country of origin.  There are people from every corner of the globe working on the ship. People from Bosnia, Peru, and the Philippines served our food. People from Ukraine, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica, and Chile brought me drinks.  People from Scotland, China, South Africa, Australia, and Mexico checked Ella and Audrey into the Kids’ Club.

I was going to make a list of all the countries that I read on name tags, but I realized it would be easier to name the countries that I didn’t see.  The Horn of Africa and North Korea need to step up their Disney representation.

Our head server was Stefan from Bosnia. We asked him how he ended up working on a Disney boat. He said he needed to get out of where he was and ended up working on cruise ships. He eventually made his way to Disney and said it was the best place he had ever worked. And work he did. The staff on these cruises have a tough job. He works four months on, two months off, without a day off when he is working. And he was always on his game. Always a smile. Always a wave. Always a magic trick for Ella and a fist bump for Audrey. If he was ever tired or frustrated, it never showed.

I hope the staff of these cruises realizes the impact they have on children. Most of these jobs are menial and by no means glamorous. But it takes every person working on that boat to make a memory that the kids will never forget. If these people aren’t storing up treasures on earth, they certainly are storing up treasures in Heaven.

I think when God created the world, he imagined it as one big Disney Cruise.  A bunch of people from all walks of life helping each other and focused on making everyone else happy, especially children.

Michelle and I met a couple who have gone on a Disney Cruise every year since their daughter was two. She’s nineteen this year, and still loves going on the cruise. They said they have been on all the cruise lines, but nothing beats the Disney experience. They said they even came one time without her. Initially, I was surprised by the number of adults there without children, but now I get it. Either they want to feel young again, or they just want a good cruise experience. Maybe both.

If you want to restore your faith in humanity, a good start would be booking a Disney Cruise.