Rating of the day: 10/10
Official programs planned for today:
- Marseille cruise port arrivals
- Registration
- Welcome ceremony + 30 second pitches
- Newbie meeting
- Tribe dinner
- Speed friending
My day started with an alarm clock. My accommodation manager had left me a message the night before, which I read quite late, so I expected he wouldn’t be home. But a little later he came out of his room. So my day started with a really good conversation. Then I made a decision, so after I showered and packed my two backpacks, I set off on foot to the ship.
Goodbye Marseille
I decided to walk because it gave me the opportunity to see the city from another perspective. I had a 9+ kilometer walk ahead of me, but it wasn’t really a challenge for me, even with the two backpacks. My camping gear is usually heavier than my current cruise pack.
It was worth seeing the city from a different route. In the past two days, I got to know the true face of another big city. Today, this image became even stronger in my mind. First of all, I smelled grass a lot. And I’m not talking about the plant that you sometimes like to walk barefoot on, or sometimes curse because it needs to be cut regularly. It was an interesting experience that I could smell it even when I was in my room. One of my neighbors was probably relaxing. I’ve been to many places where I was surrounded by a suffocating stench, and the reason for this was the many crowded places. I really felt this a lot, everywhere on the streets. Let’s say I didn’t see a public toilet, according to my recollection. Due to the Mediterranean nature of the city and the time of year, everything is quite dry on the streets and there is a lot of dust.
Google drove along roads without sidewalks quite a few times, which I couldn’t really be happy about at a certain point. In addition to walking, my plan was to have breakfast at the first place that was open. After a few kilometers, the first place that appeared in front of me was available on the other side of a four-lane road with a cordon in the middle, so I skipped it. At the second place, the young man serving didn’t speak a word of English, it was strange that he didn’t even know the word “drink”. Although, with the experience that the French person opposite me didn’t understand a word of it, despite his fluent English, I had already been lucky enough to meet him in Paris.
In the end, I only came across a pizzeria, but it wasn’t attractive. I longed for a typical place – a place with small tables and chairs on the street – but there was no sign of one. Then the point came when the inhabited part of the city ended and there was nothing next to me but the highway. However, based on the chatter, I already knew that there was plenty of food waiting on the ship.
It was hot all day, so I sweated a lot under my two backpacks. I met many people during my walk, but I hardly remember anyone who smiled. Based on this, Marseille will definitely not be my new home.
Not far from the port, a taxi driver called me, seeing the backpacks on me. He wanted to take me to the port, for a fare of 10 EUR. I refused, but I could see that he looked stupid. He tried to convince me by saying that there was still 2 kilometers to go. He didn’t speak English well enough for him to understand when I explained to him that I was already eight behind, and that I would do the rest on foot, thank you.
Boarding
There were a lot of people waiting to board. Luckily, a girl and a guy I met yesterday were already in line, so I joined them. We stood in line for almost an hour before our large luggage was finally swallowed by the conveyor belt. At the registration desk, we received our plastic cards, which are an important part of life on a ship, because they won’t even give you water in the restaurant if you can’t identify yourself with this card.
There’s an entry on this card that refers to the participant’s group. According to this entry, I officially became a digital nomad.
A photo was taken of us as soon as we received the card. An official photographer was waiting for us and took the first official photo of us. Then we went through security. Like at the airport a few days ago, the welcome here wasn’t very nice, but at least we were done quickly. After we got our cards, we reached the security check within 50 meters in a one-way corridor, but they already asked for our cards there. Then we had to wait in another line, this time at the bottom of the ship. Here they checked everyone’s papers one by one. It was incomprehensible, since they had already done this when dropping off our luggage. It seems like they are doubling up everywhere. Because in addition to the double checks, they also took a security photo of us, of each of us, strictly one by one.
After that, we were finally on the ship. From then on, everyone was nice to us.
On the ship
The ship is a fucking labyrinth. It will definitely take some time for me to learn how to navigate it safely. Our first trip with the two guys led to the restaurant. Since I hadn’t had time to eat today, and the 10 km hike had also made me hungry, by the time I got here – it was two in the afternoon – I was almost starving. To compensate for the wait, the food available in the buffet was extremely delicious.
There was no time for coffee, because we had to go to the registration. I have never had such a warm welcome as what awaited me here. One of the members of Nomad Cruise almost jumped on my neck. I will tell him – although he probably knows – that he was a great guy.
From that point on, we were carried away by the many programs. The opening ceremony was quite difficult to find, but we finally got there. It was a very boring presentation about what the ship can do, what events are on it. I didn’t even remember a fraction of it. There was also a rescue drill that was recommended to take part in, in case the ship decided to sink. I skipped that, and had a drink instead. I decided that if the ship did start sinking, I would prepare myself for survival by drinking cocktails.
After the ship’s opening, the Nomad Cruise opening awaited us. This was much more interesting. I didn’t get much new information about the week ahead, but the presentation was very good.
We went to dinner, the original order of the programs changed a little. Here and now we found out what the tribal dinner was. We all received a little gift from the Nomad Cruise team during registration. A Tote bag with a notepad, a pen and the official program, an official T-shirt and a badge with our name on it. This badge had a small picture of an animal. I was in the hedgehog tribe. At dinner, I sat at a table marked with a hedgehog. This game reinforced what we had been doing for the past two days: talking to new, unknown, interesting people.
It turned out that this was exactly what fast friendship would be. What we did ourselves.
After the long and delicious dinner, the 30-second introductions came. Seeing how many people wanted to do this voluntarily, I didn’t join the line, even though I had my introduction text ready. We heard interesting and less interesting solutions. Perhaps the most interesting introductions were the ones that were the most common.
Actually, the getting to know each other continued until dawn. I talked a lot with interesting and smart people. I heard and told a lot of interesting stories. We went to a disco, danced together for a long time, and finally, tired from all the drinks, I went to bed around 2 am.
My host from Marseille wrote this review about me: Istvan was a great guest, very respectful and chill. It was a pleasure to host him. Thank you!