Day six: Oranjestad
Day six. A 7 am announcement from Jerry the Cruise Director that Santa was on the ship and in the Atrium. Note to self: do not scowl and mutter FFS when people wish you a merry Christmas.
Big day for me. I've wanted to visit Aruba for years. I'd not planned any excursions and was just looking forward to getting lost with my camera. Walking along the pier, I noticed all the car number plates saying ‘One Happy Island’. Magnificent black frigatebirds were circling overhead. Good omens for my day in Oranjestad.
I won't waste your time building up to a big reveal. It's a shithole. Like Gibraltar but with Yanks instead of Brits and excessive humidity. For the first twenty minutes, I thought I was in a Vegas reconstruction of a Caribbean town. Jewellery shops and Neapolitan ice cream buildings everywhere. Eventually, I found an information booth and asked which way to go to get away from the touristy bullshit. The man looked like the gnarly lovechild of David Carradine and Crocodile Dundee. “It's all touristy. Hire a car and drive around the island.” I'm wondering now if he was perhaps *not* a trained tourist advisor and I'd just interrupted a robbery. Either way, I ignored his stress-inducing and expensive suggestion and headed inland on foot, hoping Aruba would not be muggy in more ways than one.
The whole place was pretty much deserted except for the odd person carrying food in a plastic container from one house to another, a confused-looking lad on a bike, a tall mangy dog, panting hot. There was blood on the pavement outside a karaoke joint, some execrable music blasting from the window above the ‘cashier’ sign. I wandered along further until all I could hear were songbirds and barking dogs. Oh and a mad banging party outside a local bar opposite the church. People were hammered, dancing in the street and slurring, slamming beer bottles to cheers each other. The churchgoers coming out of morning mass did a top job ignoring the hullabaloo.
I walked on, past the abandoned Avanza car wash, the padlocked Hard Grooves jazz club, a shoeless human taking a piss by a dumpster, Oldenbarnelveltstraat, the university, a mockingbird singing from a lamppost, someone passed out drunk by the roots of a mimosa tree, Marmelito’s Sports Bar, a square-jawed silver fox in a white shirt and tie, wearing mirror aviators, sitting on a wall near the Kapel di Santonian. There was a statue of a pope, a squashed KFC cup, a plastic comb, a mural of Los Milagros de Jesus (dated 2025 by the artist), brown ground doves, prickly pears, a lizard climbing over a seed pod, roosters, old colonial houses, cacti growing through a metal fence, Mrs Minute’s Shoe, Leather and Luggage Repair Shop, a billboard for Frida Kahlo Eau de Parfum, the John Eman Bank building, Dutch gables, a Father Christmas heebyjeeby, Rose Alley, aloe plants, a Crocs superstore.
I took some pictures, got very sweaty, listened to a bit more terrible karaoke and decided to cut my losses and head back to the serenity of my balcony. ‘Let it Snow’ was playing loudly in the corridor. My neighbour (on the right, not the silent feet people) blew a snot rocket over the side of the ship after an argument with someone on the phone.
I decided day drinking might be the best option at this point and sought out a handcrafted Piña Colada. It was so thick and creamy that I feared that sucking it up through the cardboard straw may cause an aneurysm. A succession of some of the most fucking tedious people on the ship sat next to me and tried to strike up a conversation. A guy who ordered a Malibu and ginger and made snoring noises while he spoke. A climate change denier. An Austrian who has lived in the deep South for forty years and wanted to discuss his bad knees at length. Someone who has a sister in California but didn’t want to spend Christmas with her. A lady whose ex-husband was an absolute stickler for good customer service. Someone who was appalled to have to wait a whole minute for the barman to serve them.
I was slightly cheered by a dapper man with a plaited beard wearing a tailored suit of red cloth patterned with cats in Santa hats. The festive pyjama people were out in force too and many gathered in the Atrium for a carol-singing event. I thought it best that I don't mention to anyone that Jingle Bells was written by a racist and originally had nothing to do with Christmas and that Mistletoe literally means ‘shit twig’. And I did actually mouth a few words of Feliz Navidad before reassembling my Default Grimace Face (DGF).
The Maitre d’ gave me a lovely window seat in the Grand Pacific dining room so I could enjoy the sailaway and bid farewell to the twinkling lights of the Oranjestad casino and Louis Vuitton store. A beautiful ballerina-sized grande dame was shown to the next table where the servers warmly greeted her by name. A crimson velvet dress hugged her bones, old money jewellery on delicately sculpted hands and wrists. Diamante kitten heel sandals. A glass of Sauvignon Blanc and very small portions of food.
We both happily kept ourselves to ourselves until our splendid isolation was ruined by a friendly gay couple wearing matching red silk shirts. They bonded with my impossibly elegant neighbour over a common disappointment that most people don't bother to dress up for dinner on this ship. I tried to hide under the tablecloth and camouflage my Marks & Spencer black T-shirt and sandy espadrilles in the long damask curtains.
Somehow Martha and I went from not talking at all to crying and hugging over the intrusive memories of our dead husbands. She was only recently widowed, after 55 years of marriage and was also trying to cope with the suicide of a young relative. She kept apologising for being a Debbie Downer on Christmas Day but it was oddly calming to be reminded that pretty much everyone is carrying around some awfully heavy sacks of sorrow. The gays discreetly spoke to each other in hushed tones until announcing, “We’ve had a bereavement too!” Their 14-year dog had died on Christmas Day two years ago which was causing quite a bit of sadness. We all commiserated and raised a glass to love, wishing each other a happy holiday from here on in.
Up in the Spinnaker Lounge, I enjoyed a bit of Rock Night with the Sea Shakers. The lead singer had greased down her short hair to match the shine of her leather mini skirt and big boots. She belted out some classics, singing most of the time directly to a lad on the dance floor with Down syndrome who was doing air guitar windmills. What a world.