Ship Jumpers

Kell and I spent the night sitting Indian style on the bed, swapping pitiful stories of our rooms and that whole shindig of a place. We both giggled like sisters at a slumber party.
We laughed at about how could we be bamboozled. We thought it was nice. That hotel wasn’t our choice. The same monies we paid to the university to stay in Le Spice Garden we would have graciously spent $40 bucks more and stayed in a better hotel.
We made jokes about everything.
By the second night the room was littered with Kell’s damp, hanging under garments. Soggy socks lay on the table, panties in the closet and bras were laid out to dry on the straw sofa.
My packed bags were piled against the wall. Used water bottles were all over the night-stand. Potato chip bags were placed on the broken TV. Ragged bath towels hung in the bathroom.
The room looked and smelled a mess. Every so often we took to spraying perfume around the place as airfreshner.
We still didn’t go on that one side of the bed.
Later in my story, I mustered up enough courage to go back into my old room and swap blankets.
Kell still didn’t have her luggage, and she’d only packed a few pairs of fresh underwear in her lone carry-on. I didn’t think her luggage would ever come, considering it took us a two-day journey to make it there. We found out that her bags never left Atlanta.
Yet, the plot thickened.
That morning we went to breakfast. We met, Canadian, Welsh, Norway, two ladies from Cypress, lady Pakistan, Japan, Taiwan, Ethiopia and Nigeria. They were all staying in our hotel to attend the conference too. All of us were put in Le Garden by the conference “organizers”. But all the “organizers” stayed in the 5-star hotel.
We all sat at one big table then did the worldwide introductions.
Now, I sat in silence, looking in delight because I’d never been around so many different nationalities at one time before. Let alone breaking bread at the breakfast table together.
Besides my amazement, I really wanted to see if the people were thinking like us, or if our complaints were just an American thing.
We did a few minutes of cultural chatter.
Then Canadian finally broke the ice.
“Did anyone have hot water in their showers?” he asked.
I stopped chewing my bread and hushed. Kell dropped her spoon to her jam.
“I had hot water one day for a few minutes and I really enjoyed my bath,” Lady Cypress said with delight.
I hated her for that because I wanted hot water and she made it sound so good.
Canadian said he never had hot water. Neither did I.
Everyone at the table started talking at once.
Welsh looked up from his plate and said he woke up at 5 and got lukewarm water.
Even more stories came out.
Norway told his story of how he asked for a remote to the TV and the bellboy/waiter/janitor/tech support guy brought him a remote but it didn’t fit the TV.
“Well you asked for a remote and the bellboy did just that, he brought you a remote,” Lady Cypress joked.
We all laughed.
At least seven of us were surprised that Norway’s TV worked in the first place.
Welsh told his story of how his safe didn’t work and the same bellboy came and just took the safe.
In her thick Greek accent, Lady Cypress reminded us that safes are supposed to be mounted in the wall.
“I’m happy I didn’t store anything in the box,” Welsh quipped.
We all laughed some more.
“If you did store anything in the safe, we could just take the safe,” Lady Cypress picked.
Kell and I laughed until we cried.
At one point I almost chocked on my bread because I wondered what they did for face towels. Kell and I had some disposable face towels that we used for bathing. She picked up a pack of 48 towels from out of the old people’s section in the store. She said they use them in nursing homes. I figured that since we didn’t have hand towels, I thought it would be curious to ask the others what they used just to hear the funny responses.
Everything about the place became so funny. We were all thrown in it against the powers that may be.
We all had a lot more in common. Laughter. We grew close.
I started to have fun again. I met a lively bunch.
It felt even better to know that others were in my same position.
Come to find out, Lady Pakistan switched rooms in the hotel five times.
Kell and I found that hilarious too. As if she thought one room would be better than the other. They all were smelly and drab, if you asked me.
Everyone at the table had traveled all over the world so I was just delighted to hear their stories. And most everyone spoke no less than three languages. English was the language everyone knew.
We all had good laughs over croissants, jelly, powdered eggs, water and watered down juice that morning. Little did we know, that same food would be our same daily rations.
I thought my observations would seem spoil, selfish or just an American thing. It became a human thing.
As my country fought Pakistan and other countries probably fought each other. No one at that table bickered. For once, we formed a real United Nations.
All of the countries united against the enemies, poor service and the germ.
I loved those guys! And yet, I secretly plotted against them. Kell & I were going to be the first to run to the registration table and demand a new hotel. We needed to beat new friends from our hotel before vacancy signs went up. So what, we could still be friends from a different and nicer hotel. All is fair in love and war.
In the mist of laughter, I didn’t get too comfortable because I needed to make sure to not let slip that Kell & I planned to move out of Le Garden by tonight.


……they were probably thinking the same thing.