Our First Cruise

Our first cruise didn't turn out quite like we had planned.  When we first started planning our travels, we found this cruise that had ports of call in Greece, Turkey, and Egypt.  We decided a cruise would be a good way to fit Egypt into our itinerary.  The first few days of the cruise were very fun, then while we were in Athens last Saturday Seth said his stomach was hurting.  He's a pretty tough kid and really doesn't complain much.  We thought he might have a flu bug or something.  When we returned to the ship he went to bed and later he did throw up a couple of times.  By the next morning he seemed a lot better, but just weak.  We left him on the ship to sleep while the rest of us went ashore in Turkey.  We returned expecting to find him much better and bored.  Instead he was still in bed saying his stomach hurt.

A few hours later he was in even more pain so we took him to the medical center on the ship.  They gave him an IV because he was dehydrated and thought it was a flu.  He spent the night in the medical center, and then all of Monday lying in his bed.  By 4 on Monday afternoon we had him back in the medical center.  He had 2 more bags of fluid put in through his IV.  Now we were thinking our cruise was not all we had hoped it would be.

We went back to our cabin on Monday night, changed our tour of the Pyramids from Tue to Wed to give Seth another day to recover.  On Tue morning he was still in pain and so we were back in the medical center yet again.  Dr, Joe (a great doctor who helped us a lot) said it was time to send him ashore to get some tests run that couldn't be run on the ship.  Through the port agent, they found a private hospital and Rich and Seth left to get the tests.

The rest of us decided to tour Alexandria while they were getting the tests.   We hired a taxi driver (we bargained, but still got ripped off).  Wow.  I totally get my dad's Philippine driving stories now!  It was absolutely crazy.  We were gone about 4 hours and when we returned to the ship we went right to the medical center to see if Rich and Seth were back yet.  The nurse said she had just received word about 15 minutes previously that Seth was scheduled for surgery to have his appendix removed.  Earlier the doctors had ruled that out because he didn't have the normal symptoms.  But then we all know that Seth is not your normal kid.  It's a good thing he was sent to the hospital.  Had we waited much longer it would  have been a much different story.

Later that evening (Tue),  Dr. Joe and I went to the hospital (a 30 minute wild ride), and were able to see Seth shortly after his surgery.  He was groggy and tired but seemed relieved to have it over.  The recovery would take about 48 hours.  Rich and I had to make some quick decisions about what to do.  We decided to have Rich stay in Egypt with Seth and I would continue on the ship with the others.  Rich returned to the ship with me on Tue night so we could pack his and Seth's stuff, and take care of the mountain of paperwork and arrangements.  That was hard leaving Seth alone in a hospital in a place he doesn't understand the language or the culture, but we really didn't know what else to do.

Rich returned early the next morning to the hospital with his backpack of stuff they would need for the next few days.  I took the other kids on our tour of Cairo to see the Pyramids and the museum. It was fun but my heart really wasn't into sight seeing.  If you remember, Egypt was the county that Seth had picked for us to see.  So it just didn't seem quite right to be seeing it without him.  We returned to the ship and went right to the medical center to find they had received no word all day.

Communication was so hard during all of this.  Rich found no Internet at the hospital, our phones didn't work and we had no means of communication.  I tried calling the hospital but could not find an English speaking person to help.  Have you ever tried to navigate a phone tree in Arabic?  Our ship had left and it was so hard knowing Rich and Seth were somewhere in Alexandria and I didn't even know if Seth was OK or not.

Joe and Sam were a great support to me.  Joe in his persistent way went to guest services and bugged them until they were able to get through to the hospital and get an update.  Meanwhile, Sam in his calm way helped me send out some "help us" e-mails to the contacts we had found through Facebook.  All I could do is hope that someone would be able to get a hold of Rich to help him.   The hardest part was just the lack of communication.  We are used to living in a world with instant communication, so when it's gone it is hard.

A while later we got a quick call from Rich and he said Seth was doing great and could possibly be released on Thursday.  I also received  e-mails from a few people who were able to contact Rich.  I am so thankful that there are good people throughout the world who are willing to help out.

We had 2 days on the ship getting back to Italy.  We did enjoy our time, but it wasn't quite the same without Seth and Rich with us.  I met many wonderful people who showed me and my family so much kindness.  It certainly wasn't the cruise experience we had hoped for, but it's certainly one we won't soon forget.  One day we will look back on it all and call it a good travel story.