A Cruise to the Land of Bipolar Bear

Part 2 or 3: These Vikings Love Then Some Tex-Mex

Having docked at a tiny (3200 inhabitants) town called Hollingsvag, we traipse along its main street, noting boutiques, a hairdresser, and a supermarket, which is obviously the town’s biggest employer. Its Mexican food selection is even more extensive than that of Måløy’s Kiwi’s. We take several photos for my burgeoning statue molestation portfolio, and Mrs. Mendelsohn buys fridge magnets and a T-shirt, which, this being Scandinavia, costs only slightly less than my entire wardrobe.

Mrs. Mendelsohn in Hollingsvag.

Our destination is a 45-minute bus ride away. We enjoy the wry pre-recorded narration of our digital tour guide, which Mrs. Mendelsohn believes to be AI-generated, and marvel at the frigid bleakness. Mrs. Mendelsohn excitedly photographs the local reindeer, and we learn how, not that long ago, the dominant white Norwegians treated the Samis, the indigenous inhabitants of the region, approximately as the Australians treated the Aborigines and Americans treated the Cherokees and Lakotas. No one hates anyone more than him or her from whom he has stolen.

On our return we dine at the ship’s we-never-close Irish pub, O’Sheehan’s, which some of the Filipino servers pronounce Oceans, so we do too. We are serenaded by a trio of violinists playing Beatles melodies in unison, and then by a busker type who seems not to have learned a new song since 1970. I had hoped never to hear “A Horse With No Name”, “Wild World”, or whatever that touching Harry Chapin hit was called (“Cat in the Cradle”?) again, but it turns out to have been an impossible dream. I propose to ask if he knows any Ed Sheeran numbers, and then to offer him money not to play them, but Mrs. Mendelsohn vetoes the idea, hilarious though it is.

On the day of the Vile Excrescence’s birthday parade in DC, I begin the day with a bowl of sensationally delicious muesli and a bagel. I have been filling out comment cards at the end of every meal, in hopes that Norwegian will insist I accept a free cruise. I (accurately!) describe the bagel as tasting like a hand towel.

We attend a demonstration of fruit and vegetable carving. One of the ship’s army of chefs, none of whom knows how to toast a bagel, fashions a succession of fanciful creatures out of a lemon, an orange, carrots, and black olives. At demonstration’s end, we passengers are invited to photograph his creations. Mrs. Mendelsohn eagerly seizes the opportunity.

I watch another NBA Finals game, and marvel at NBA basketball having become entertainingly brutal since I last watched it a decade ago. (It isn’t shown in the United Kingdom.) Players are forever colliding at speed while in midair, and crashing loudly to the floor. Sometimes the Thunder have two white American players playing simultaneously, but the Pacers have cooler names, like Pascal Siakum and Opi Toppin. I understand the Phoenix Suns are intent on choosing point guard Oxy Contin in the upcoming NBA draft.

We enjoy five exotic mojitos between us at the mojito bar on Deck 13, and then dine at the third of our three alotted speciality restaurants, the French one, where the servers wear long aprons and walk with their left hands behind their backs, apparently a gesture of deference. Sometimes they form processions. The escargot are delicious, but how anything swimming in garlic butter not be? My main course is mediocrity itself. Mrs. Mendelsohn believes the chocolate dessert we’ve both ordered as resembling the penis of one of African lineage. It is difficult to disagree.

We karaoke up a storm. I, with my small voice, narrow range, and love of attention, offer two melodramatic interpretations of the venerable Big Voice numbers “Ebb Tide” and “Unchained Melody”, and Conway Twitty’s glorious Elvis impersonation, “Only Make Believe”. The more I perform, the less delighted the audience, which was a little deafening at the end of “Ebb Tide”. Ain’t no law in these pars but that of diminishing returns.