The few people waiting to get on the ship all waited patiently in line and took their turns to board the ship in a calm and orderly manner.
“Why can’t Chinese people do this?” Liam asked me.
I wanted to explain that it is a different culture with a different set of rules and values, but after all the pushing and shoving of the day, I was having a hard time convincing myself.
Back in our cabin, we both wanted to take a shower.
“I need to scrape all this China off me,” Liam said.
He had pretty much reached his limit of tolerance for the Chinese way of doing things.
“We should take a shower together,” he suggested.
“Sure,” I said. “Can you fit on the shelf?”
The shower was barely big enough for one person. There was no possible way we could both fit in there at the same time.
“You go first,” Liam said. “I’m going to tear into some peanut butter cups.”
I was already naked and in the bathroom by the time he offered to let me go first.
“Don’t eat them all,” I called out from the bathroom.
When I came out of the shower, there were candy wrappers all over the bed, but Liam was not in the room. It took me about a second to notice that he was sitting on the balcony, completely naked.
“What are you doing?” I asked while opening the balcony doors.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I didn’t eat it all.”
It took me a while to realize that he was talking about the candy even though my question was more about him sitting naked on the balcony.
“The ship is docked,” I told him. “Someone might be able to see you.”
“Good,” he replied. “Let them. They’ll see what a real man looks like instead of the tiny Chinese version.”
He held up his thumb and finger about an inch apart.
I ignored his stereotype and never bothered to point out that he does not have the biggest tool in the shed either.
“It’s against the rules,” I told him.
“What rules?” he asked. “This is China. There are no rules.”
“The ship’s rules,” I said. “We’re docked. That means you can’t be naked where people can see you.”
“What are they going to do about it?” he asked.
“Kick you off the ship for starters,” I answered. “Do you want to get evicted in Xiamen?”
Just the idea of being forced to stay an extra minute in Xiamen got Liam off the balcony and into the bathroom. By the time I was dressed, he was finished with his shower.
“I’m just going to stay naked,” he announced.
“Then I don’t know where you’re going to go besides this room,” I said.
“I can’t go anywhere naked?” he asked. “What’s the point of being on a nudist cruise if you can’t get naked?”
There were parts of the ship where you could get naked when it was docked, but neither of us knew exactly where the borders were. We knew you could not be naked on the top deck or the outer decks where people on the pier could see you. We did not know about the interior decks and all of the areas inside the ship.
“You should just put clothes on,” I suggested. “Unless you see someone else naked. Better yet, put on your swimming trunks.”
“Are we going swimming?” he asked.
“Why not?” I answered. “We’re on a ship with ten different pools and we haven’t even gone swimming yet.”
I changed into my bikini and wrapped a sarong around my waist while Liam slapped on a t-shirt and we were off.
We went upstairs to the main pool deck and did not see any naked people along the way. In fact, we saw very few people at all. Most of the passengers were still in Xiamen.
Finding a place to put our stuff was easy. There were maybe two other people on the pool deck.
“You should go in one of the hot tubs,” I told Liam as I put my sarong down on our deck chair. “You need to relax.”
Liam was not about to argue with me, especially since he agreed completely.
“You should join me,” he said. “I know a great way to relieve stress.”
“That’s not going to happen,” I told him.
The pool deck was practically empty, but I was not about to get kicked off the ship for relieving Liam’s stress.
I jumped into the main swimming pool and all the pushing and shoving of Xiamen just washed away. For a minute I even forgot that we were in China. Swimming in that pool on that giant ship, I could have been anywhere in the world.
After a few laps, I got out of the pool. Liam was looking at me and my wet body as I rose from the water.
“You are so hot,” he said to me. He was either drooling or there was hot tub water on his face. “You’re turning me on.”
“You should keep it in your pants,” I said. “Really.”
I got in the hot tub, but sat on the opposite end as Liam.
“You can get closer,” he offered.
“I’m warning you,” I said. “If you get hard, I’m leaving.”
“Too late,” he replied.
I knew he was not joking. He does not even have to see me naked to get excited. Seeing me in a bikini is good enough. A strong wind is good enough.
“I’m not doing anything to spoil this trip,” I told him. “I’m not kidding.”
Liam knew I was serious, but I think at that point he wanted nothing more than to get rowdy in the hot tub. But even if it were naked time, he also knew that I was never going to do something like that in such a public place.
The last time we took a vacation together we were busy, very busy, but we also had a very private villa with a very private swimming pool. We could walk around naked all day without worrying about anyone seeing us. The pool deck on the cruise ship was pretty much empty, but it was not at all private. People who worked on the ship walked by occasionally and anyone could come up on the deck at any time.
After a while, I got out of the hot tub and walked around the pool deck. I was wearing a bikini, but this was the most naked I had been on the nudist cruise. I did not even bring a towel. I just let the warm summer air dry me off. I knew that if other people were there I would have a towel wrapped around me, or at least my sarong. Since the place was deserted, it was just my bikini and me.
While walking around, I discovered that there was more to the pool deck than I originally thought. I knew about the pool, hot tubs and restaurant, but I quickly discovered the fitness center, men’s and women’s saunas and game room. Everything was empty except for the people who worked there.
“This would be the best time to get naked,” I thought to myself. “Ironically.”
Chapter 13: Dinner with Earl & Edna
Liam and I had dinner at the Italian restaurant that night. The boat was still docked, so everyone was still clothed, so I did not insist on eating in the no-nudity main restaurant.
It was a nice little Italian restaurant, but what I will always remember most about that night was having dinner with Earl and Edna. They were a friendly couple in their early forties from Mason City, Iowa – just down Interstate 35 about two hours from Minneapolis – who like to go to Gooseberry Falls up north. They were sitting at the next table and Liam quickly noticed that they were looking at us.
“Excuse us,” Earl said. “We don’t mean to be busy bodies.”
“But aren’t you the girl who got up on stage last night?” Edna finished.
“Yes,” I told them. “I sang one song.”
“It was beautiful,” Edna told me.
“You have a lovely voice,” Earl said.
“Thank you,” I replied. “And this is who I sang it with,” I said, introducing Liam.
They did not recognize him, even though he was one of the main performers during the show. I was merely an impromptu walk on.
We talked about how Liam was working on the ship and I was along for the ride.
“So you’re not ABC members?” Earl asked us.
“No,” I answered. “We’d never even heard of it before we came on the ship.”
“I take it you’re not naturists?” Earl asked.
“No,” I answered. “I’m the textile on board.”
They were impressed that I knew their terminology, and we talked a little about nudism. They were full time nudists who tried to do as much as they could naked. Their house and backyard was a nude zone ever since their adult son moved out, and they went to nudist resorts and social activities with other nudists. This was their first nudist cruise.
“We’ve been looking forward to this trip for years,” Edna told us.
“Every other nude cruise we’ve seen was just part of the ship,” Earl said.
“This is the first cruise of this size we’ve seen where we have the full ship,” Edna added.
They explained that it took about two years for their nudist organization to get enough reservations to charter the entire ship. Usually they get much smaller ships or only book part of something the same size.
“How does that work if only some of you are nudists and everyone else isn’t?” Liam asked them. “How do you do that?”
“Very carefully,” Earl laughed.
“So you’re just here for the nudist part?” I asked. “Or did you want to see China, too?”
“Hong Kong has always been our dream destination,” Earl answered.
“We can’t believe we’ll be there tomorrow,” Edna said, looking at Earl.
I think it is funny whenever I run into people who think of Hong Kong as some distant exotic city. Since I live there, it is not so exotic to me. I have to remind myself that before I came to Hong Kong, I saw it through American eyes just like they do.
Earl and Edna booked a tour of Hong Kong with the cruise line. They told us about all the places they were planning on seeing in Hong Kong the way children describe what they are going to do for Christmas.
“You don’t want to do that,” Liam said when they told us about taking the Star Ferry across Victoria Harbour. “Tomorrow’s Dragon Boat Day and the whole harbor is going to be packed with traffic.”
“You’ll see it all from this ship anyway,” I told them. “I’m sure the view’s even better here.”
That is when we told them that I live in Hong Kong and that Liam used to live there. We pointed out that a lot of the things they were paying a lot of money to see could easily be seen for less. Their itinerary was also unnecessarily complicated with far too many distant locations crammed into a short amount of time.
They asked us what we would recommend and I told them some things they could easily see and do in a day without having to rush through every stop.
“Yours sounds much better,” Earl told me.
“You’re not really going to see much on the tour,” Liam pointed out. “You’ll have to leave every place as soon as you get there.”
“The schedule they gave us says there’s a little bit of time,” Edna said.
“Does it include all the time you’ll spend in traffic?” Liam asked.
“If you’re taking a tour bus, you’ll be spending a lot of time waiting on it,” I told them. “The MTR can get you to all of those places in half the time.”
“Or less,” Liam added.
“We’d never be able to figure all that out,” Earl said.
“We’ve heard Hong Kong’s subway system is very complicated,” Edna explained. “And we don’t speak any Chinese.”
“That’s one of the reasons we booked the tour,” Earl said.
Hong Kong’s MTR is actually pretty simple, and all the signs are in English and Chinese, but if you only have a few hours in the city, it might be complicated for first timers. It probably is much easier for people who don’t know Hong Kong to simply take a scheduled tour, but from what Earl and Edna were telling us, it does not sound like a good way to see much of anything.
“It’s already paid for,” Earl said. “But from what you’re saying, we’d be better off without it.”
“I’d be happy to show you around if you don’t want to take the tour,” I offered.
“We couldn’t impose,” Edna said.
“It’s not a problem,” I said. “What are neighbors for?”
Liam had to work anyway and my original plan was to stay on the ship while it was in Hong Kong. Then after we went to the American grocery store in Xiamen, I decided to bring all our food to my apartment. That still left me with plenty of time to play tour guide.
Earl and Edna had a list of things they wanted to see the most in Hong Kong and I said that I could take them to almost all of it. The only things they would definitely not be able to see happened only at night after the cruise ship was scheduled to leave. Some of their wish list was on the tour, but most of the tour was not anything they really cared about. They only booked it because they did not want to get lost and confused in their dream city. I was the perfect solution. I could take them to all the things they dreamed about seeing and they would not have to worry about language issues or upsetting local customs.
At the end of dinner, they invited us to the bridge tournament they were planning on attending.
“You don’t have to go nude,” Earl said.
“We promise,” Edna added.
We politely declined, saying that we already had a long day and just wanted to rest in our cabin. We did not have any plans that night since Liam was not working, but I knew that he would not want to spend the rest of the cruise with our new friends. It’s not that he is not friendly, but he pictured us spending a lot of time alone or at least with young naked supermodels. Playing cards with a middle aged nudist couple was never on Liam’s itinerary.
We really were pretty tired by that point, so we went back to the cabin. We had never turned on the TV before and Liam was curious what kind of channels we had on board.
“It’s probably just a bunch of Chinese crap,” Liam decided.
Liam’s TV in China is almost all Chinese channels, so he was ready to watch something else. The ship had HBO, AXN, Disney, a lot of Chinese channels and a bunch of ship related programming, like a hotel’s special hotel channel. One channel told us where the ship was at all times, just like the navigational displays they have on planes. We also had CNN, but that is the only English channel Liam gets in China, so he was not at all impressed.
Liam was very disappointed that HBO was censored. Most of the violence and some of the language was edited and there was absolutely no nudity, which was kind of ironic on a nudist cruise. I already knew that HBO throughout Asia was censored, so I was not surprised. They have the TV show Girls in Hong Kong, but they cut out all the sex and nudity, which kind of makes the whole thing rather pointless.
We went out on the balcony as the ship sailed away from the pier. It was not the big romantic sunset of sailing away from Shanghai, but at least this time I had my boyfriend with me. Liam stood behind me and wrapped his arms around me as we sailed through Xiamen Harbor and watched the sun hide behind all the smog.
“Good riddance,” Liam said to Xiamen.
I could feel something pressing against my butt.
“Are you getting happy because of me?” I asked Liam. “Or because we’re leaving Xiamen?”
Liam kissed my neck and whispered in my ear, “Maybe a little of both.”
I knew what Liam wanted to do next, but we were on the balcony and we were still in the city. I wanted to watch the city disappear and that would be hard to do on the bed. I assumed his excitement would subside by the time we were in international waters. The ship always moved slowest when it was near a port, so we were drifting away from Xiamen at low speed. I underestimated how horny Liam was.
The smaller Xiamen got in the distance, the more Liam tried to take my clothes off, or at least the bottom half. When we reached the point where it would take the Hubble telescope to see us, I sat down on one of the deck chairs and made Liam happy the fastest way I know how. We were not in public, but Liam enjoyed it just the sa
me. We were outdoors and sometimes that is good enough.
“So can we get naked now or what?” Liam asked.
“You can,” I answered. “I think I’m going to take a quick nap.”
“Do they ever make naked announcements?” he asked as he started to take off his clothes.
“I don’t know,” I answered as I made my way to the surprisingly comfortable bed. “I’ve never heard one.”
“How do people know when it’s ok to get naked?” he asked.
Not that it mattered. He was completely naked and sitting on one of the deck chairs on the balcony.
“I guess they just know,” I answered, clothed and on the bed.
“What, they have some kind of nude radar?” he joked.
“Maybe,” I laughed. “Or maybe they just get naked whenever they feel like it.” I looked at him sitting on the balcony naked. “Like some people.”
My nap did not last very long. I was tired, but I was on a cruise ship. I did not want to sleep the evening away. There was a ship full of things to do.
“How about a nice romantic walk on the promenade deck?” I suggested.
“What do I need romance for?” Liam joked. “I already got what I want.”
“Get dressed,” I said. “We’re going out.”
“Do I need to get dressed?” he asked.
“I honestly have no idea,” I answered.
Liam got dressed anyway because we could not tell if it was naked time yet. We left the cabin and went to the elevator when we saw a naked couple.
“That’s good enough for me,” Liam said, and we went back to the cabin so he could take off his clothes.
It seemed unusual to me that while we were walking down the hallway I was dressed and Liam was completely naked, except for sandals. We went downstairs to the promenade deck and walked hand in hand. It could have been a romantic postcard moment if not for all of Liam swinging in the breeze. There were other couples out for a stroll on the deck. They were all as naked as Liam. It seemed that I was the odd one here.
“You should just get naked,” Liam suggested.
“Nope,” I replied.
Nudist Cruise Page 12
