When you get a food craving in a foreign country, you're pretty much {for lack of a better term} screwed. You can search and search to find an authentic restaurant, but more often than not, you will find the food and it will taste like a washed-out cloned copy of your original heart's desire. Even our staple fast food restaurants from the states will have an international flare in foreign countries. Ironically enough, I will not touch a McDonald's in America, but give me a McDonald's in Prague and I will run to it like the Prodigal Son.
When you get a food craving on a cruise ship in a foreign country, you are even more {for lack of a better term} screwed. Your craving is heightened by the sheer isolation of eating only what is on the ship; plus, Jordan and I are doing a river cruise, so our meals are very regimented. At this point, we have been on the ship a week, which is nearly an eternity in our life without consuming a single slice of pizza. While enjoying a rather fancy dinner on the boat while docked in Wurzberg, Germany the other night, Jordan comes up the most brilliant plan of his entire life {aside from marrying me, of course}: we will order a pizza to the ship. Yes, brilliant. Jordan pulls out his iPhone, Googles pizza, and within seconds me have a variety of choices. Jordan dials the closest location, and after being passed off to a gentleman who could understand the smallest amount of English, my husband asks for "the largest pizza on the menu." The gentleman responds with "46." What?! A 46-inch pizza?! I mean, yes, but how in the world do they even transport a pizza that size? Will it be done in time {we were set to depart within the next 30 minutes}? No, we can't order a pizza that size. Jordan orders the next size down, gives the gentleman his cell phone number, and hangs up the phone.
At this point, everyone starts taking verbal bets on whether or not the pizza will actually arrive before the ship departs {captains don't wait on anything, even pizzas}, and we sit. Finally, a beacon of light comes towards us: two gentlemen with a pizza box approach the side deck where we are waiting. There is only one
small problem: the ship is prepared for departure and the docks have been raised. There is one dock sticking out from the boardwalk, but it juts into an unknown room. The hotel manager generously gives Jordan the number, and the two run down to the room like schoolboys. Knock. Knock. Who's there? A couple from our home city that we had just met upon boarding the ship! The wife {thankfully} allows the two to enter, and the pizza man runs down to the dock to make the exchange. Jordan slides open the glass window. The pizza man gets to the end of the dock. And, holy {expletive}, the ship is setting sail. Slowly by surely, we are getting farther from the boardwalk. Jordan climbs
out of the room, stands on a small metal plank on the side of the ship, and reaches as far as he can for this little box {later we found out that the hotel manager was humbly grabbing the butt of his pants to keep him from falling into the water} while exchanging an overgenerous amount of Euro for the pizza man's efforts. Success! Pizza victory. Craving satiated.
This has now become the joke of the ship {as if anything less was expected} since our program director relived the entire moment in front of the whole ship's audience the following evening post-dinner {of course, Jordan and the hotel manager re-enacted the full scene of events}. The only sad part was our moment of stupidity in thinking that we would get a 4-foot-tall pizza. Europeans use the metric system. Our pizza was only 32 centimeters {12-inches!} of goodness. Bummer.
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| A view of the original Wurzberg Castle from our ship |
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| A very blurry view of the pizza-money exchange |
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| Our 12" pie of pepperoni goodness {being shared with a fellow on-looker} |
