SHAPE UP OR YOU CAN'T SHIP OFF

WHY I WON'T BE WORKING ON A CRUISE SHIPEarlier this year I landed my third job with a cruise line. Yep, my third job. This time was going to be different though. This time I was going to finally make it on board and enjoy the amazing experience of sailing the world while working a job that I loved.  I seemed to be really really good at getting jobs and not so great at ever actually gracing them with my presence. The first time I was offered a position I had to turn it down due to a conflict of contracts and the second time I couldn’t go or I may have ended up in jail. (I’ll explain below) Third times a charm, right? WRONG. Apparently cruise ships just aren’t the workplace for me.

Anyone who’s tried, applied or worked on a ship knows what a painfully long process this can be. After sending off a number of applications directly and indirectly to an array of cruise ship companies sometime early this year I received a reply. One should be excited, right? Not really.. generally speaking this meant I was only one foot in on the nine mile path to actually stepping on board. The application over the next few weeks went a little something like this:
Make an online account, confirm email, log in, complete questions & scenarios, wait to have answers approved, add a profile online, wait to have said profile approved & accepted, add previous experience and desired job, wait to have experience cross checked, approved and accepted, submit a resume, wait for resume approval, add contact details, wait while contact details are confirmed, continue checking online for an invitation to complete a phone interview, pick one of the time slots available, wait for chosen time slot to be approved and locked in, complete the phone interview, regularly check back online to see if I passed the interview..  PASSED & APPROVED. -Please wait to be contacted by a cruise rep to arrange a second phone interview.
YEAH! I’d made it this far. Keep in mind none of this information has yet to reach an actual cruise ship – these are the steps to being pre-approved and put on the ‘potential list’ of a cruise ship staff recruiter who would then liaise with the cruise line. Many ships won’t actually accept direct applications & which recruiter you apply to depends on where you live and where you’re from.
This was the reason I never made it to my second cruise ship job – To complicate my second go at shipping off was the fact that I was indeed an Australian living in Europe at the time of application. This meant I couldn’t apply to a European recruiter without an EU Passport & for obvious reasons the AU recruiters were unable to process me as I was living abroad. Keeping to theme though this issue was never mentioned until I sent off my passport to my UK recruiter to finalize the position I’d been offered. Instead of receiving my ticket and departure information I received a short and sweet email “Hi Ashlea, I see your passport was issued in Australia? I’m really sorry to have to tell you this, but we only recruit EU passport holding staff due to our visa regulations. We’d really like you on board one of our ships though, do you have an EU Passport?” – I’m sorry lady, but did you not read the section clearly stating my nationality was Australian? Or that I ticked only Australian in the ‘valid passport’ section? Grrr. STRIKE TWO.

Fast forward back to this most recent application. With my profile now complete, approved and with the recruiters I was told to sit tight and await the notification of vacant positions. One morning I woke up to an email stating Disney was looking for staff & they’d love to consider me. AH! A sigh of frustrated relief. ‘Consider me’ - like the nine pages of information I’d already provided the recruiters wasn’t enough to know whether or not they’d want to hire me, merely enough to  CONSIDER the possibility of letting me join the maybe list of potential candidates who would then possibly be given a shot at impressing them. Sheesh. A second phone interview was scheduled with a rep from Disney & I was told more or less I’d been accepted and that it was going to be a further 2-3 months of pages, paperwork and preparation before I would be posted to my ship. It’s happening! I will have to wait.. but it is happening!

Cruise lines typically have a 3-6 month intake and if their staff turnover is high (how many members of current staff renew their contract) they’ll be looking for less newbies. This particular intake happened to have the highest staff turnover Disney had ever seen – so there were very few places on offer. Over the next few weeks I bounced back emails with my rep and started putting things in place when one peachy morning I woke up to my contract. HORAH! All that was left to do was sign it & send it off and this was a done deal. Reading through the contract, one section caught my eye. THE DISNEY LOOK BOOK. A real gem of a section. This wonderful 11page information booklet is the Disney bible of do’s and don’ts. How to look, what to wear, how to act and written evidence of why everything Disney looks so perfectly polished and shimmy-clean. With everything from cartoon drawings of how one may trim facial hair to at what exact height your socks should sit- this book covered it all. (& then some) So came the page on piercings & appearance and everything came crashing down. NO VISIBLE TATTOOS OR PIERCINGS.  BUM BUM BUM…
Back when I was freshly 18 I had taken myself on down to the tattoo parlour and got inked. I believe now it was somewhat more of an I’m-18-I-can-do-what-I-want and less of ‘I really want this design’ kind of situation. Don’t get me wrong, I am an avid fan of tattoos and don’t by any means hate mine, however had I really taken the time to consider my piece I would have had the design tweaked & the placement elsewhere.
My heart sank a little as I continued to read through the book, tattoos may be covered with makeup IF and ONLY job position does not involve direct contact with children. My career and heart thus far lay with the smiling faces of teenytots & after conversing with my rep, sending pictures off to Disney and awaiting a reply it was decided that the 1cm worth of tattoo still visible when wearing the uniform shoes, was going to be unacceptable for the position I was offered. STRIKE THREE.

What would have been awesome is if on the first page of the recruitment site there was a big warning sign reading ‘If you have any visible tattoos, piercings you don’t fancy removing or any other weird of wonderful things we won’t be okay with – save yourself and TURN AROUND NOW’.
I feel I should mention not all cruise lines are this tough. I know I could have applied / worked with another company without any problems it just so happened to be Disney who were looking for my expertise at the time & they have the most rigid grooming guidelines (& rightfully so, they do have a reputation to uphold.. this is Disney we're talking about).  

This unfortunate reality meant I was not going to be shipping off anytime soon. For the THIRD time this dream had once again defeated me and slipped between my fingers.
Or in actuality was stopped by the tattoo on my ankle. The little 4x2cm tattoo that happened to be none other than a dream catcher had caught my dream & was preventing it from happening. Ironic, right? Are dream catchers not supposed to filter out the bad dreams? Not hold on to the good ones? Perhaps I was going to fall over board or something terrible would have happened, who knows? Apparently I never will.
The lesson here? If you’re looking for a cruise job-Be sure you can shape up before applying to ship off.

PHOTOS SNAPPED ON BOARD THE SAPPHIRE PRINCESS WHILE CRUISING THE INSIDE PASSAGE OF ALASKA
A FEW YEARS BACK. LOOK OUT FOR MY UPCOMING POST ON THIS SCENIC ADVENTURE!