Death Cruise

This story is about vomit.

Four years ago, during my BU orientation, I received a pamphlet of 101 things to do while in Boston. I love that list. Whenever people come to visit me I try to check a few more things off.  Of the 101 things I have done thirty-nine so far.  So I’m moving through the list at a speedy one new activity every five months. There are three things I just crossed off the list because I will not do them under any circumstance.  I do not, nor does anyone I know, care about seeing the Season Six MTV Real World house.  Also, I cannot imagine why the Big Dig Visitors’ Center even exists—if it still does.  How someone could turn a giant, annoying, slow as molasses, city construction project into a tourist attraction is beyond me. And I don’t need to take a tour of the BU Experience, a guide to life as a BU student, because I am a BU student and that would be redundant. In all, I have fifty-nine things left to do.  If I continue at my current rate it will take me a little less than six more years to complete the list.  I realize that’s ambitious but I’ve always been a dreamer. 

Anyway, this summer my mother and grandmother came to visit me in Boston and I once again had the opportunity to whittle down my list.  You would think, of the fifty-nine things left on the list, we could find a lot of things we’d all enjoy doing. However, eliminating things from the list that were out of season, cost too much, or have anything to do with alcohol or sports takes a big chunk out of our fifty-nine options. I like alcohol and sports. But Mom and Mimi are teetotalers who couldn’t care less about any team besides LSU or the Saints. They’ve been here a few times before so our mutually acceptable tourist activities list is getting shorter and shorter. So this trip we repeated some list items and did a few things off the official grid. But we did manage to check one new thing off the list:

Number 37: Cruise Boston Harbor.

Sounds so innocent doesn’t it?  We should’ve known something was up when we learned it was a “three hour tour.”  I seem to remember a long running television show all about that not going so well.  Sadly we ignored this omen. 

Of the many tours available, we chose the whale-watching cruise, which goes further out to sea than your run-of-the-mill historic tour. And because I wanted to go to my friends’ graduation on Sunday afternoon, we chose to go on Sunday morning even though it meant missing church—a fact that later lead my grandmother to shout over the ensuing chaos, “This is what we get for missing church!” 

On Sunday morning we got up at what I consider to be an ungodly hour.  As far as I’m concerned 7am is a mythical concept. But we were down to the docks by 8:15.  We looked in vain for a free spot to park until 8:35 when we gave up and decided to just use the parking garage that had a big sign advertising $15 parking. As we pulled in and the small print came into view we realized that deal was only good until 8:30am. We paid $35 for the most expensive five minutes ever. We were an hour early so we sat around in the cold, watched the seals at the aquarium and then made our way over to the appointed dock. On the way over we learned that New England Aquariums, which also offers whale-watching cruises, had cancelled their trip for the day because of rough seas.  Our company, Boston Harbor Cruises, (Oh, yes, I’m naming names.) did not cancel our trip. 

That would be omen number two, which we also ignored.  By 10am we were settled in on the upper deck of a small cruise ship enjoying a brisk sea breeze and I was thinking to myself—You know this would make a good date.  Since it was quite chilly once the boat began to move we decided to go down and make the trip in the closed room on the second deck.  It was crowded but we found a few open seats between a Chinese family and a group of middle-aged Pakistani men.  Within half an hour it became apparent that what we had taken to be an idyllic boat trip into peaceful whale country was in fact a death cruise through the seventh circle of hell.  I’m not sure I can accurately describe what it is like to be on a ship with a hundred and seventy-five vomiting people.  When the trip was over, all of the toilets and sinks on the boat were completely stopped up with vomit.  There were a few people who somehow managed not to throw up.  Ironically, one of them was my grandmother who normally gets seasick wading across a mud puddle.  She barely got nauseous.  Jerk.

At any rate, somewhere in the ten seconds between my mother projectile vomiting all over her shoes and losing my own Cheerios breakfast into a barf bag, I came to the conclusion that this would in fact be the worst date ever.  I’m still not sure if it was actually the waves or the sound and smell of fifty people vomiting in an enclosed space that finally got to me but either way I was grateful that I’d eaten a light breakfast. 

The Chinese family to our left was constantly dabbing some kind of oil on their faces and huddling quietly together.  They even vomited quietly which I thought was impressive.  The Pakistanis to our right were freaking. out.  I have never seen a group of grown men in such a panic over such a non-crisis.  Miserable as I was at least I knew I wasn’t going to die.  This truth seemed to escape the Pakistanis.  They spent the entire trip out to sea harassing the boat staff to bring them a doctor and sneaking into the bridge to harass the Captain into turning the ship around.  Occasionally, one of them would take a break from the loudest vomiting ever to shout things like, “These people are sick, can’t you see that?!” “Tell him to turn the boat around! We need a doctor!” and “SOMEONE IS GOING TO DIE!” One of these men was running around like the sky was falling when he suddenly face-planted. The Chinese woman on the other side of the room buried her head in her arms to hide the fact that she was laughing so hard, which was also funny.  I felt no such compunction.  I laughed out loud and then I threw up.  Maybe you’ve never thought about it but laughing is not something you should do when you are nauseous.  Now you know. You’re welcome. It was shortly after this that my grandmother loudly declared our misery to be divine punishment for missing church.  Luckily, she chose not to take the Jonah route and throw one of us over board to calm the sea.  

The sad thing, I realized, as I observed the stoic efficiency of the boat staff, is that this kind of insanity must occur with some measure of regularity.  Surrounded by misery and puke these men and women went about distributing vomit bags, collecting old bags that were full and cleaning the carpet and walls, as if this was all in a days work and couldn’t be more normal. How in god’s name do these people stay in business?!  The Pakistani man sitting next to my grandmother stopped one woman to implore her once again to turn the boat around before someone died.  She replied calmly, “Sir, we’re fifteen minutes away from where the whales are.”  And he replied in a desperation bordering on terror, “WE DON’T CARE ABOUT THE WHALES!  WE JUST WANT TO SAVE OUR LIVES!”

I laughed so hard I threw up twice.  The woman simply walked away without responding.  But that’s only because she was passive aggressive.  A few minutes later the same woman got on the loud speaker and said, “If everyone could please calm down the seas really aren’t that bad today.”  Oh, okay. Thanks for clearing that up I guess I was just vomiting because I was misinformed. She might as well have said, “Suck it up, pansies.”  I imagined myself throwing up on her and apologizing, “Oh, my god I’m so sorry. I don’t know why I’m so sick, the seas really aren’t that bad.”  This thought made me laugh . . . which made me throw up.  Again. 

Finally, we got to where the “whales” were. Unless whales are small white birds that occasionally dive into the ocean for fish, we saw no whales.  Mimi and I went outside to get some fresh air.  Then it started to rain and we were forced back into the barf box.  Thankfully, the trip back was less vomit inducing since we were not moving against the waves.  Since we didn’t see any whales, we were all given new tickets as we stumbled, white-faced, back onto the dock.  Of course we were all excited about the prospect of taking this trip again.  My mom wrote them later and complained so they sent her a full refund.  But I still have three tickets for whale watching stuck in a book somewhere in my room just incase I ever decide I need to throw up half my body weight again. Someday I’ll be ready to risk it again for the chance to see the whales; I doubt the same could be said for the poor Pakistanis.