Carpe Diem at the International Date Line (Friday 27th) Day 0

Friday the 27th didn't exist on our ship as we crossed the International Date Line.   But Shabbat services must go on, so after a short meeting of the Synagogue at Sea Ritual Committee everyone agreed that Thursday night would be better than Saturday night to celebrate Shabbat.  My philosophy professor at HUC-JIR Dr Alvin Reines (who wrote Polydoxy) always said, you should celebrate shabbat on any day that was convenient for you.  He was right!  We'll gain back the day when we cross back from Japan to Alaska and get another day.  I recall two years ago traveling back from Japan enroute to Hawaii  where we observed two days of Yom Kippur--the Ritual Committee wisely decided to only observe the first day lest we have an incredibly slow fast!

Truly time is not only relative but plastic!

Bora Bora, French Polynesia "and a rooster in a breadfruit tree" 2/23/26 Day 51

Finally!  On the 2023 Volendam "Bali Cha'i, Tales of the South Pacific." cruise, we awoke at five in the morning to catch a glimpse of the cloud covered eerie Bora Bora that the captain swung by as a consolation for not docking. At last, we made it to the insanely gorgeous Bora Bora!

After visiting the Roman Catholic church with Tahitian disciples, we headed out for a lagoon snorkeling excursion on an island tour.

We saw a rainbow of tropical fish in a coral garden, including: one stingray, two giant mantas, three parrotfish, four butterflyfish, five clownfish, six damselfish, seven surgeonfish, eight angelfish, nine needlefish, ten reef fish, eleven eagle rays,  twelve black tip reef sharks and a rooster in a breadfruit tree!  

Our two guides blessed us with humor calling our fishing boat the Titanic and telling shark jokes as we nervously swam with the blacktip reef sharks (on a shore excursion, one congregant was bit and had a dozen stiches!).  They told us what its like to live on a small island on ten thousand where they know everyone and have difficulty dating  They shared with a smile  that before we're married we have to ask our grandpa, "Hey, are we related?"

They told us that their island Vavau as it is known among locals was misnamed Bora Bora from the island chief telling people to clap when Captain Cook arrived, saying Pora, Pora, (Clap, Clap).  But maybe the joke was on us, as Pora Pora is customarily translated as "first born" as it was the first of the volcanic archipelago or the legends describing this as the first island to rise when supreme god Taaroa, fished it out of the waters after the mythical creation of Havai'i, now known as Raiatea which we visited a two and a half years ago aboard the Volendam. 

A pearl in the surf, Mo'orea, Tahiti 2/22/26 Day 50

Mo'orea means yellow lizard in Tahitian, but it is really a black pearl in the surf.

We hitch hiked to a public beach for snorkeling and then walked to the stunning Hilton Resort for a day of snorkeling the pantheon of underwater colors underneath bungalows complete with glass bottomed coffee tables.  

The warmth of the people matched the warm turquoise waters.

Oh la la! Papeete, Tahiti 2/21/26 Day 49

Papeete greetings with the ukulele greeting band and coral ocean promenade,  after visiting the Marche municipal market brimming with stunning flowers and fragrant fruits 

We cooled off at the Tahiti Hilton resort pool thanks to white privilege and dined on a 50 cent French baguette bread with French brie  cheese for lunch.  

We walked around the charming French colonial architecture and visited the Robert Wan Pearl Museum. 

Chinese lunar year of the Horse decorations beckoned us at the Polynesian parliament buildings

Robert Wan Pearl Museum was a cool pearl of a visit on a hot tropical day.

We finished our day admiring the glorious sunsets, aromatic roulettes (food trucks) and energetic ukulele bands after the local Tahitian dance show onboard.

Bountyful Legacy on Pitcairn Island 2/18/26 Day 46

It is said that each remake gets more accurate 1935, 1962 and 1984.  I watched each of them on our ship in preparation for our fateful visit.   As a piece of entertainment, the '35 version is probably my favorite. For sheer spectacle, the '62 version.  From a dramatic and historical perspective, I think the '84 version is the best.

The Mutiny on the Bounty occurred in the Pacific Ocean on 28 April 1789. Disaffected crewmen, led by acting-Lieutenant Fletcher Christian, seized control of HMS Bounty from the captain, Lieutenant William Bligh, and set him and eighteen loyalists adrift in the ship's open launch.

Visiting cruise ships often arrange for a local lecture and Pitcairn Curio & Craft Market to be held on board--and as this was the first visit by the Volendam, an exchange of plaques and foodstuffs!  our visit blew me away from the eclectic sweet inhabitants who spent months preparing for our visit by bringing the purest honey on earth, picturesque philatelies, and postcards that will be delivered after we return when the New Zealand supply ship arrives in May to collect the mail.

I loved getting to hear the stories of the islanders, beginning of course, with the recently reelected mayor, Shawn Christian, He is a patrilineal great-great-great-great-great-grandson of Fletcher Christian. He graciously agreed to my request for his autograph as head of state for the 44 citizens of the smallest democracy in the world! Only later did I learn that he previously served a prison sentence after being convicted of child rape. Oy, the legacy of a band of mutineers!

The policewoman (the entire police department!) which includes a visiting NZ constable, does not carry a gun or a taser as she knows everyone and there is no where for anyone to hide on the island.  The jail is used for storage as it is not needed for prisoners.  She practices community policing.  I wonder how her 25 years of service were affected by the sordid rape trial and what it's like to police an isle whose legacy was mutiny on the Bounty and mass killings on Pitcairn in the 18th century and child rapes in the 21st?  No we know why there are no children on the island and the school was closed as the children were sent to NZ for their education--and protection!  

Gabe noticed that the $5000 of food and essentials donated by HALL and transferred to the longboat named Moss contained many cases of bottles which is indeed strange for a community that is 100% Seventh Day Adventist which avows drinking.  This is a case of historical or should I say hysterical fiction which prompts many disturbing questions as we leave the rocky shores.

Heads Up, Rapa Nui (Easter Island) 2/15/26 Day 43

Heads up for my bucket list destination of this world cruise and it certainly was not a disappointment!

The island is much better than the movie flop, indeed, I did enjoy the anthro-fi[ction] flick to give me some discredited interpretations similar to the ecocide classic Collapse 2005 by Jared Diamond!  We learned much and now know the right questions to debunk theories and to open up conversations about this most mysterious moa epic!

Our highlight was he visit to the quarry to see a hundred moa statues in various process of carving, such as the famous “El Gigante,” located near the Rano Raraku Quarry, which stands some 72 feet tall!

After our tour of the mystical moai highlights, we explored the village of Hanga Roa where we were greeted by gorgeous sea turtles in crystal clear waters, tasted some yummy banana bread, visited the local cathedral where the craved statues inside resembled the thousand moai statues dotting the isle, and learned of the Chilean occupation of this special region and the locals lamenting commercialization.

Rapa Nui was truly the Grand destination on our cruise so far!

I can't wait to come back to visit Orongo an ancient stone village and ceremonial center perched on the high, dramatic rim of the Rano Kau volcano at the southwestern tip of Rapa Nui. Famed as the, historic site of the Birdman cult (Tangata manu) competition, it features roughly 53 restored, low-walled, stone houses and extensive, petroglyphs overlooking the Pacific Ocean and offshore, Motu Nui islets. 

San Antonio, Chile (Santiago switch up) 2/10/26 Day 38

 The captain and crew left us a farewell note quoting the sage Anonymous who said:

"I would gladly live out of a suitcase if it meant I could see the world."  Hilary packed up and Gabe unpacked as segment one ended and segment two began.

Meanwhile instead of venturing far afield we explored the local port town of San Antonio, Chile's largest harbor.  We began with the sea lion dotted beach by the port's Paseo Bellamar, harbor promenade until El Faro the lighthouse, and then continued to the Humedal Rio Malpo Park, a wetland ecosystem filled with birds and critters like zorro chilote (Darwin’s fox), and finally ended up at the San Antonio Museo de Historia Natural e Histórico.

The museum's curator gave us a personal tour of the museo complete with showing us the jewel of a whale skeleton and then the stunning overlook of the port estuary.  She concluded the tour by asking to take a selfie with us--True Chilean hospitality showed me the way of service.

Puerto Montt, Chile a motley port 2/8/26 Day 36

Far from "Muerto Montt" " the slightly sarcastic nickname for Puerto Montt, Chile, which occasionally used to describe it as a sleepy or quiet town--it plays on the name of the city (named after President Manuel Montt) and the Spanish word for "dead" (muerto). I would call it a motley port referring to a diverse, heterogeneous, or mismatched collection of people or things, often implying a chaotic or clashing mixture.  We saw this mixture today on our shore excursion tour of Chile's Lake District where we visited gorgeous national parks of rapids and volcanoes, Petrohue Falls, encircled by towns of German heritage, Puerto Varas and Frutillar.

The national park forest bath at our first stop helped assuage the touristy look of Bavarian architecture in the midst of the Andes, not the Alps.  Strudel shops and beer taverns speckled the lakeside landscape of the towns originally settled by German colonists in the 1860s.  But assimilation has waged a flickering blow to the bicultural setting where the German flag flies alongside the Chilean, but only some of the old people speak German as their mother tongue and the German School, Colegio Alemán Puerto Varas, that formerly taught only students with German last names whose families spoke German in their homes, like our guide, Amelia Schaeffer, could attend, but now are open to anyone desiring a bilingual education and the necessary gelt to pay for it.  What's left of the German Club and cultural institutions is diluted as the rapids of modernity wash away decades of proud heritage--quite a parallel with the assimilation of North American Jewry where American Jews became Jewish Americans in just a couple of generations.  Reform and Conservative Judaism successfully helped integrate their constituents into mainstream society and now suffer the consequences with declining memberships and hapless mergers.  Intermarriage rates sky rocketed from a tiny percentage to the vast majority where non Jews are eager to marry Jewish spouses to embrace our rich heritage.  Will we end up with a spiritual Jerusalem in the goldena medina, Golden Land, or just another touristy caricature?  Time will tell, but Puerto Varas and Frutillar are ominous omens.

Sara's Sheep at the Fin del Mundo, Magellenes Pantagonia, Punta Arenas, Chile 2/5/26 Day 33

 

Such a gorgeous town with early 20th century neo classical mansions around the Plaza de Armas.

What was the secret to the boom?  Sara's sheep.  Sara, born in Latvia in a working famly where her dad was a tinsmith, fled the antisemtisim of Russian pograms to come to the last frontier at the end of the earth.  As a remarkable businesswoman and gregarias philanthropist, she transformed Punta Arenas into Pantagonia's fasted growing town as a wool baron.  Using hardy sheep from the Falklands and generous land grants to entice immiggrants, she delt directly with English wholesalers with voluminous exports.  She managed vast commercial, shipping, and livestock interests, notably consolidating 1.3 million hectares in land grants. She built her signature "palace" on the town square, but didn't stop with her economic success.  She helped establish the first hospitals, schools, Red Cross, firestations and toher benevolent organizations.

 

                                       Parents:  Sofía Hamburger and Elías Braun

Sarah Braun Municipal Cemetery, rated one of the top ten cemteries in the world!  She donated the gorgeous portico and has an imppressive copper colored tomb.

We found the Jewish "section" by the Hebrew writings,  ת.נ.צ.ב.ה (May their soul be bound in the bundle of life) QDEP (que descanse en paz) and tell-tale stones left on the tombstones.  After placing a stone on their monuments, I brought a stone to our Synagogue at Sea at Shabbat services and said kaddish for all those who no longer have anyone to say kaddish for them--may their memories be for a blessing!