BRIEF CASE: Life at Sea

What is a cruise if it is not about the sea? We — a group of mediapersons and people of the travel trade from South Asia, Asia Pacific and Europe — were on the English Channel for a couple of days on the occasion of the inaugural run of the ship, Liberty of the Seas.
A cruise ship is a five-star hotel that moves. And Liberty of the Seas, a colossal ship from the stable of Royal Caribbean International that these days sails from Miami to Mexico and the Caribbean, is essentially a good hotel.
It has restaurants, bars, yoga and fitness centres, a karaoke bar, swimming pools, a golf course, a shopping mall called Royal Promenade, a rock face for climbers, an auditorium for entertainment shows, a library, Internet, and of course, the casino and video games.
The meals were lavish and exquisite, the liquor abundant. The waitresses and bartenders were polished and radiant — their training did not allow a crease on their clothes, a shadow in their eyes, or a furrow on their brows. But for all this, the bare deck of a ship was the best place to be.
The sea, which cradled and rocked us for a day, was a sleeping beauty, at times stirred into mild petulance. The sun, as though to oblige an artist on the deck, would playfully touch the water surface with brush strokes of silver before disappearing behind the clouds, only to bathe the whole expanse of water with light in the afternoon.
The waves would smile and frown, shake and stir, composing with light and cloud an endless symphony that no music programme held in the deck or the auditorium could match.
Wouldn’t cruisers be okay with fewer facilities? Royal Caribbean’s representative in India feels Indians want ‘raunaq’ all the time.
They are not the kind who would curl up in their rooms or on deckchairs; they would rather divide their time between shopping, food, drink, casino, golf course, rock climbing and the gym to justify their holiday.
Today’s leisure seeker seems a disoriented sort — he wants a rock face in the middle of the sea just as he might want to experience the sea in an alpine meadow.
The more the distraction and clutter, the easier the escape from oneself, from the truth and depth of the ocean. Perhaps, that’s why austerity cruises don’t stand a chance — for that people have got to get saner.