Hidden secret’s here’s a few:

1 - USPH US health inspection and US Coast guard is a big deal. Be aware when booking a repositioning cruise towards US and Canada. First call of US port all the crew will be busy with drills and if USPH also decides to show up during the first call. Don’t be surprised the food offerings will be delayed and minimized on that day. When USPH decides to wait one month before showing up. This will hugely impact the food variety and quality in every US or Canadian port. Until the ship has passed the inspection. Things will go back to routine and the majority of the crew involved will be less stressed. Delayed arrival of USPH will tire the crew slowly. If unlucky USPH shows after 2 or 3 months.

2 - Repositioning cruises with lots of seadays (crossing the Pacific) will show of ultimately in the menu offerings. Some of the lettuce, fresh vegetables, fruits etc. Have only a shelve life of several days. Towards the last seadays the menu will consists of mostly canned and frozen vegetables root vegetables, romaine lettuce and all the hard fruits. Forget about strawberries, blueberries, fresh fish, lollo rosso, iceberg, fresh spinach etc. Until you reach Hawaii or if you are heading the other direction Fiji or whatever Pacific Island you’re calling.

3 - The bigger the ship. The lesser the family feeling is among the crew in general. Which I believe you can feel as a passenger till a certain extend.

4 - There is a zero tolerance towards drug and exceeding the alcohol limit set by the company. Although the truth on the other hand is that the alcohol consumption is not discouraged either. Sometimes it’s almost if you don’t drink hard you’re almost a pussy. But this strongly depends on which crew your currently sailing with. But in my experience the general culture is work hard and drink hard.

5 - Every company has it’s own codeword when there’s an medical emergency onboard. Many times a guest suffered a cardiac arrest. Amongst the crew when we heard the codeword in the galley through the P.A. we used to joke to each other. Too much makan (eating)

6 - I can say that a high percentage of crew working on a cruise liner is working there for a reason. And than money is not the only reason I’m talking about. I’m not saying they are on the run. But what is a better place to start all over again. Nobody knows you. Away from home. Over the years I’ve heard some crazy stories. From the average broken relationships or having a criminal record in their homecountry till one guy being homeless just recently before he joint because of some heavy sh*t he had experienced. Also alcoholics I met a lot. But I guess alcoholics are everywhere if you know how to spot them. If you are gay or lesbian and from a country where it is less accepted. Cruising is a good hide out for them also.

7 - Working on ships is tough. Especially for first timers it’s hard. A few years ago I joined for a contract. And I heard a week before I came onboard a new joiner jumped overboard after one week onboard. In the middle of the Pacific. They found out the next day by watching the security camera’s. For some reason the cruise companies are managing to keep these stories out of the news.

8 - Besides crew jumping overboard. Some guests also jump. And as the number of ships is growing each year. The amount of guests cruising world wide also increases. And one habit of people is that they occasionally kill each other. This is also news I hardly see or read about. Although there are some websites that lists the accident and crimes on ships

9 - Work related deaths happen quite often.

• Collapsing gangway
• Engine Fire
• Fails during lowering Lifeboat
• Accidents during Tendering Service
• Elevator Technician

At the end it’s a moving ship which can be 17 stories high. So accidents happen sometimes. Although my company is putting a lot of effort trying to reduce this trend.

10 - Many companies have now included a different tipping policy. All the companies that are part of the Carnaval Corporation adopted this policy. (102 ships at the moment) It’s called gratuities. I just googled it and Royal Caribbean, Disney and NCL also work with gratuities. It works like this. $14.5 will be added to your account each day for each guest (This may differ a bit depending on which company but they all charge about 14 to 15 a day). The good thing for the passengers about this that they don’t have to tip individually anymore. The bad thing for the crew is that most of our salaries are payed by gratuities. I am lucky in my position I have a guaranteed month salary. When the gratuities are not sufficient to pay my salary my company will add the remaining to pay me my guaranteed salary. Many of the staff from (mostly SEA) have a guaranteed salary which is very low. They depend for a big part on the gratuities. And now comes the clue. As a guest at the end of the cruise decides they don’t want to pay gratuities. It will be taken of the bill. Whether this is right or wrong. That’s up to others to decide. But in the end a majority of the crew will get less salary at the end of the month. There were rumors a few years ago that they wanted to make t manditory for everybody. But I think the big CEO’s are still scared to loose customers over this. It’s definately a cruise hack. But remember who you take the money from. The big Presidents are not going to consider to buy a smaller limo when you take back the gratuity. But it’s the crew that feels it.

11 - The guest is King, Queen and Emperor and at the same time. The more expensive your stateroom. The more people are willing to go on there knees for you. Because after all if you’re not happy and decide to go cruising with another another company for the next 10 years. The company could loose hundreds of thousands of dollars on a family or penthouse guest. The worst thing about this is nowadays a lot of guests know about this and they drive it to the max. I’ve seen people complaining about everything because they know the management will sometimes offer complimentary bottle of wine, free lunch/dinner of spa treatment etc. I’ve had guest ordering in my restaurant porterhouse steak and at the moment it was served they changed their minds to salmon filet. Try this at your local steakhouse and they will charge you for both. But not on cruiseships. Sites with cruise hacks are not helping us to have more polite guests. Guests are becoming more demanding more rude and some are trying to drive it to the max. Nothing wrong with giving each other tips but constantly trying to get something for free is another way to enjoy your holiday.

12 - As all you seasoned cruisers already know. Internet is crazy expensive for guests. Even for crew it’s already expensive. Guests are charged more than triple for this service. Try to avoid it at all time and go ashore for this. Many Cruise terminals nowadays have free internet. If you do want to use internet try and buy a unlimited package. In the end it will be cheaper than individual packages.

13 - Shore excursions are even more ridiculous expensive. I’ve seen 3 day tours in Peru of $6000 per guest. If your still mobile try to avoid these tours also. If you can manage your own tour it will be more fun and most of the time a lot cheaper.

14 - On the average size ships. The one with the biggest salary is often the onboard senior doctor and not the Captain. The captain can increase his salary with fuel, passing USPH, environmental bonuses. Which are quite large. The exact amount I forgot but for sure you can buy a nice car for that. Also when a captain retires they will received a couple of hundreds of thousands of dollars. But think about 30 years of service at minimum.

14 - Officers in general are not that nice towards the rest of the crew. I was through my position also an officer but never noticeable because of my chef’s uniform. For some reason is it when you give people an uniform. They suddenly think they are very important. I’ve seen 3rd engineers repairing elevators or plumbing toilets. And in the evening when they can change their boiler suite for their officers uniform. Acting like they are a captain. Of course there are luckily exceptions. But I saw this a lot.

14 - Racisme is there. Maybe not at all cruise-lines. But the company I work for yes. For example. Functions can be paid different depending on your passport. For a long time we had difference in working hours. My contract said I had to work 10 hours a day maximum. While somebody from Philippines had the same function and had to work 11 hours according his contract. Last year they changed this by giving everybody 11 hour contracts. I had a female friend from Indonesia which immigrated to Holland and was planning to come back as soon as she received her Dutch passport in the same position but better paid. At the moment she’s pregnant so I guess her plans changed.

15 - Being an officer brings lots of extra perks.

• Single Cabin
• Cabin steward takes care of your cabin and laundry
• Free meal in the specialty restaurant onboard.
• Access to all the crew bars O.B. officer’s bar, P.O. Petty officers bar, Crew bar (I hate all those separate bars) Some companies work with only one common bar where no uniforms are allowed. How it should be everywhere.
• Access to all guest areas as long as in uniform

Honestly I rarely used my officer status except for my cabin steward

16 - Hotel department is the hardest working crew onboard. Dishwashers, Galley cooks, waiters, bar staff and housekeeping in that order. Despite the stories of people who worked in the casino, photo shop, shops, spa, entertainment, fitness instructor, dance teacher, golf teacher, musician etc. With all respect but we call those jobs holiday jobs. For them it might feel like they have to work hard because it’s more than they were used to at home. But most of them are off in port. But no envy here. It’s a choice everybody makes individually. If you are a nail artist for example you know you are not are going to become rich on a cruiseship. You do it because you want to travel the world and meet people and see places.

17 - When crossing the Atlantic or Pacific and suddenly in the middle you need specialized medical treatment or an operation. You’re most likely not going to make it. There will be no submarine, helicopter or F-14 to pick you up and bring you to shoreside in time.

18 - Alcoholic beverages are quite expensive onboard. If you’re really on a tight budget. You might buy some hard liquor on shore side and pour it in a water bottle and join the ship during rush hour at the gangway. Security guards will have no time to check your bottle as they are busy checking in hundreds of guests.

19 - When going for a meal during one of the seatings. Remember the first meals are the best. Despite what we are trying to guarantee. The last guest should get the same quality as the first guest. But in reality during the service items might run out and replaced with other items. Problems arise when the kitchen is running out of for example primerib or ossobuco. Items which need roasting and braising for hours. Shortcuts will be made because telling no to a guests is not possible. So you end up with an ossobuco from the deep fryer and finished in the microwave. And a slice of primerib grilled instead of roasted. Reason why this sometimes happens I will explain in the next topic.

20 - The food budgets are extremely tight. Alaska or Caribbean season it’s $11 or $12 dollar a day per guest. That means breakfast, lunch, dinner, teatime, roomservice, late night snack, hamburger hot dog, pizza, icecream station, theme buffets, lobster night and all the things I forget. Try to buy three 3 course meals back home for 11 dollar. Even in Asia that’s not possible. So the most important thing for the exec. Chef is to control his food cost by reducing his waist and making sure the crew is not eating all. This might sound easier than it actually is. On the medium sizes ships you have easily 120 cooks, 30 to 40 dishwashers and hundreds of wait and bar staff. If half of them decides during steak or lobster night to hide some of it. This will take a big bite in your foodcost especially if it’s only $11 dollar a day. So in reality we are running all day behind the scenes. For eggs, butter, steaks, fish etc. The trick is to run as less as possible. To have the operation streamlined and go with the numbers from previous cruises. But if the chef decides to give you 4 cases of eggs and you need 6 cases. You eventually have to run or let somebody run for you. Or if suddenly most of the guests like to eat the seafood pasta instead of the Beef Wellington. We have to take action accordingly. The specialty restaurants have things better under control because they serve less guests and offering the same menu everyday.

21 - Yes Guest satisfaction survey’s and online surveys. Bottom line ratings are really important nowadays. Bad ratings can affect appraisals from all crew. The targets are really high. People who rate for example a 9 on a scale of 1 to 10. Is actually seen as a fail. Imagine when somebody rates us a 1. How many 10 have to compensate that 1 to go come close to that 10 average again.

22 - Yes USPH is crazy strickt. Here‘s a few examples. An individual yoghurt in your fridge out of temperature. Let’s say 43 Fahrenheit. Points deducted. Soup cooled down in your fridge but the log says it exceeded 5 min of the allowed timeframe to cool it down. Points deducted. Apples and oranges together in the same container. Even though washed. Not allowed. Ready to eat and non ready to eat food can never be stored together. Points deducted. And the rules getting stricter every year. Any major point deduction in your section you‘re probably gonna be sacked soon.

23 - Discount cruises towards the end of the season attracts the budget guests. But in general the cheaper the cruise the harder the guests complain.

24 - For some reason cruise ships attracts all the gluten free, lactose intolerant, nut allergic, vegan, vegetarian, seafood allergic, msg allergic, organic, non GMO, non dairy, non night shades, kosher, people. I actually learned a lot about all different kinds of diets. Anybody heard of Jain religion? I did!!

25 - Want to use your mobile on open sea. Out of reach of the shoreside signal. You can connect to the ships signal. Which is of course expensive with all the roaming costs. Try to avoid it.

26 - Having weird requests like having breakfast during dinner time. Some companies instruct their staff to never say no to a guest. Try not to abuse it. Some staff will do everything to please their guests. So if you’re asking for pancakes during dinner rush hour and you see the cook sacrificing his line and running to get your pancakes. Think twice please.

27 - Some crew if asked how many hours they work. They like to exaggerate or telling every guest about it. It’s true we work a crazy lot of hours. Sometimes 14 or 15 hours during special events. But I still don’t like when crew bothers the guests with that kind of information during their holiday. We all are working out of free will. Nobody forced us to work in the cruise industry.

28 - Utterly rude guests can be banned from a cruiseline. I had a guest a couple of years ago which was so rude to staff and fellow passengers. That the restaurant manager recommenden to our head office to ban her for future cruises.

29 - Law suits if there’s one thing cruiselines are afraid of it’s law suits. Law suits from guests but also from crew. So you will find advisories everywhere. Instructions and endless trainings for crew. Sexual harassment training. Not how to harass but how to prevent :). How to handle children. How to discard waist. Etc. Etc.

30 - Norovirus onboard. When there’s a certain percentage of guests or crew onboard has fallen ill. Then we go into code orange and eventually code red. There’s strict protocol we follow. Galley department got the blame first. The guests probably got sick from our food. Which doesn’t have to be the case at all. A guest or crew member could have spread it after not washing his hands properly. Or guest or crew could have been infected during a port visit. But all the crew and passengers have a strict protocol to follow in case of a norovirus outbreak. All condiment removed from the table. No more self service in the buffet restaurants. Mandatory hand sanitizer during restaurant visit. Etc etc.

31 - Ok one last one. During a kitchen tour. The galley looks impeccable clean. I sometimes wonder why we don’t show how it really works. For example a just used grill will be covered. Or the bakers table is shiny clean. While in reality a bakers table is always full of flour and dough. The galley we show you during a tour is the real galley but not how it looks when we are in full service. It’s actually a bit of a pain in the ass such tours. Everybody has to delay what he was really doing. And can pick up their work after the tour again. It’s all a circus act.