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Can D.C. trust Obama and the Democrats?

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I want to answer the question, can we trust President Obama and the Democrats, with a loud “yes,” but after the last minute budget deal made on Friday night that avoided a government shut down, I am not so sure. It pains me to say that.

I grew up a Democrat in New York supporting and working for Democratic candidates since I was 12. I have always believed in the principles of the party. My parents were immigrants who came here to escape Hitler. My mother’s parents came too but my father’s died in Auschwitz. I was brought up to respect all people and to believe that government is fair and can provide a safety net for the least among us and for anyone in times of crisis and need.

I became a civil rights activist, community activist and anti-war activist. It was, after all, the 1960s and 70s — an exciting time and a time of struggle. I became a teacher in Harlem and joined the union, fought City Hall and supported the PTA when they padlocked the school and demanded the city build a new one. We taught our students in the local RKO movie theater until the city acquiesced. I then joined Rep. Bella Abzug’s (D-N.Y.) staff and fought for women’s rights and finally became true to myself after moving to D.C., came out and have been fighting for LGBT rights ever since.

Last week many people in D.C. and around the nation held their breath while negotiations went on to avoid the first government shutdown in 15 years. Friends were going to be without paychecks both in the federal and D.C. government. Along with others I was appalled that the current Republican leadership in Congress wouldn’t even do what Newt Gingrich had done 15 years earlier passing a bill allowing the D.C. government to stay open and spend its own money. Money that the taxpaying residents of the District pay to secure services from our Department of Sanitation, Department of Transportation, Office of Motor Vehicles and other basic services.

Then on Friday night I rejoiced with others when President Obama came on the air around 11:15 p.m. and announced that the crisis had been averted and a deal had been struck to keep the government open. He proudly said he had kept the social riders such as cutting the Planned Parenthood budget out of the deal.

Then we began to hear more about the deal and it soon became apparent that the president had lied. The president and the Democratic leadership in Congress sold the 600,000 residents of the District of Columbia down the river.

The deal cut had in it riders on the District’s budget that prevented poor women from accessing an abortion if they needed one with the District’s own funds and foisted education vouchers on the District. It may also include a prohibition on using our own money for needle exchange to prevent the continued rise of HIV/AIDS in the District.

President Obama and the Democratic leadership have allowed this to be done to the people of the District. People who have supported them for years and people who work in their offices and are their neighbors.

My first thought on hearing about the D.C. riders was: Where do the Democrats of today draw the line in the sand? What are the principles of today’s Democratic Party? I can’t join the Republican Party that wants to lower the corporate taxes for companies like GE that already pay no taxes while trying to take Medicaid coverage away from the poor. A party whose presidential candidates all want to demonize the LGBT community and are more concerned with pandering to the religious extremists and the Tea Party than they are with solving the nation’s problems. But then my party, the Democratic Party, is leaving me cold. They are losing their direction and now it appears their principles.

Why aren’t we demanding that we tax hedge fund managers, many of whom are making more than a billion dollars a year more than 15 percent on their income? Why aren’t we putting forth some budget solutions that will cut the budget but maintain our safety net for the poor and support education for all? Why are we treating the residents of the District of Columbia as if we are invisible?

I watched in awe as the women of the Senate stood together and said they will not allow a deal that will hurt the women of the nation. But it appears those same women stood by while the poor women of the District were hurt. Again, it is as if we are invisible to them.

I am pragmatic and understand functioning in the realm of the possible but won’t accept being lied to and treated as if I don’t exist. Democrats cannot act as if the issues facing the 600,000 residents of the District aren’t even worth mentioning.

My party must stand up for the people of the District. What will happen if the Republicans try to roll back marriage equality in the District? Will the president turn his back on us? Will the leadership in the Senate cave again?

We need the president to call for the immediate introduction of a bill to make home rule a reality. He needs to make a speech about the need for 600,000 people to have legislative and budget autonomy. The bill should be introduced not by our intrepid Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton but by Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and they should make floor speeches and work to have every Democrat co-sponsor those bills.

The next letter or e-mail any resident of the District gets from the DNC, DCCC, DSCC or President Obama’s campaign should not be asking for money but telling us that this legislation has been introduced and they are asking everyone across the nation to support it. This is not a plea for statehood or even a vote for the D.C. delegate, even though those things are important. It is a simple statement to the nation that the people of the District of Columbia who pay more than $5 billion in local taxes and nearly $3.5 billion in federal taxes need at a minimum to have self determination over how they spend their local taxes. That can’t be too much to ask of my party.

The time is now for the Democratic Party to stand up and be counted. Win or lose, the party must stand for decency and for the 600,000 people of the District of Columbia who for too long have suffered because not even the Democratic Party will fight for its own principles.

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Blade Blog

Cruising into Pride

Celebrity holds firm as a proud corporate supporter of LGBTQ community

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Celebrity APEX (Photo by Peter Rosenstein)

As you know if you have read my columns and blog posts, I love cruising. The kind where you are on a river or the ocean. Today in both the United States and around the world the LGBTQ community is facing difficult times. Attacks are coming fast and furious. There are few places where members of our community can feel totally safe these days. 

One of those places is on a cruise ship that values the community. That is what I have found whenever I travel on a Celebrity ship. Today, they are going even further in letting the world know about their respect for the community. They happily advertise Pride at Sea. Of course, they are doing it to attract LGBTQ passengers and their dollars, but that’s great in this day and age, when a company is willing to step up proudly, wants our business, and will do everything they can to make us feel both wanted and safe. That is what Celebrity Cruise Lines is doing. 

I want Pride to be celebrated not just in June, but every month. But I am excited about the June celebrations whether hosted in D.C. by Capital Pride, or on the high seas. While many of us will be at the D.C. Wharf, on June 10 to help the Washington Blade celebrate Pride on the Pier with spectacular fireworks, those who miss that and are on a Celebrity ship will be part of a Pride celebration as well. Their ships will all celebrate the month in various ways including flying a LGBTQ Pride flag. 

Celebrity has invited my friend, entertainer extraordinaire, Andrew Derbyshire, to lead the celebration on the Edge on June 13, in Ibiza. He recently quoted Celebrity, “In honor of Pride month and our continuing commitment toward fostering positive and authentic partnerships within the LGBTQIA+ community, Celebrity Cruises is raising the Pride flag to celebrate acceptance, unity, and support for the community. Each June, Celebrity Cruises hosts our annual Pride Party at Sea. Every ship takes part in the celebration that brings our crew and guests together to honor and celebrate Pride.” Andrew added, “I am happy to announce I will be flying to Ibiza on the 13th of June for a few nights, to host Pride on the Celebrity Edge, with my friend and captain, Captain Tasos, and the amazing team on board.” Andrew, like many of the entertainers I have seen and met on Celebrity ships, is encouraged to be who he is, ‘out’ and proud. 

The Edge will kick off Celebrity’s fifth annual Pride Party at Sea during its June 10, 2023, sailing. “The party will take place in tandem across the award-winning Celebrity fleet, with each ship ‘handing off the party baton’ to the next, to keep the festivities running across hemispheres and time zones. A variety of multi-generational LGBTQ+ focused programming will take place throughout the month of June. Together, officers, staff and crew around the world will participate in Celebrity’s signature Pride programming.”

You should know one of the things straight couples could always do on a Celebrity cruise is have the captain marry them. Now, since same-sex marriage became legal in Malta, where most Celebrity ships are registered, their captains can legally marry same-sex couples. After this happened the first legal same-sex marriage at sea, on a major cruise line, occurred on board Celebrity Equinox in January 2018 when the captain married Francisco Vargas and Benjamin Gray.  

Celebrity is a Florida-based company, and along with Disney, they are standing up for the LGBTQ community. They have been a Presenting Sponsor of Miami Beach Gay Pride for four years in a row. They continue to advertise their collaborations with gay cruise companies like VACAYA, which has charted the Celebrity Apex for a cruise of the Caribbean in 2024. The ship will be sailing with a lot of happy LGBTQ cruisers on Feb 17-24, 2024 for seven nights from Fort Lauderdale to Puerto Rico, St. Croix, and Antigua. For anyone who hasn’t been on the Apex, it is an amazing ship. While not during an official Pride month I will show my Pride along with many other LGBTQ travelers on Celebrity Beyond this October out of Rome, and on Celebrity Ascent in October 2024 out of Barcelona. The Ascent hasn’t even set sail yet. 

Let’s hope other companies will follow Celebrity’s lead and value the LGBTQ community. We are entitled to live our lives safely and to the fullest, as who we were born to be. 

Peter Rosenstein is a longtime LGBTQ rights and Democratic Party activist. He writes regularly for the Blade.

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Blade Blog

Shawna Hachey of Celebrity APEX on what makes a good cruise director

A love of people is a must

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Shawna Hachey (Photo courtesy Hachey)

The position of cruise director on any ship is one of the most important, especially on a transatlantic voyage, like the recent one I took on the Celebrity APEX. So much of what people remember is the entertainment. Shawna Hachey is a great Cruise Director and I had the opportunity to sit and chat with her during the cruise. The job keeps her jumping and she is one of the busiest people on the ship. Shawna has a great bubbly personality. She likes people, which is a requirement for that position. 

Shawna shared she is from New Brunswick, Canada, and has come a long way from there. She has now been with Celebrity for nearly thirteen years. I kidded her that meant she must have begun when she was ten. She is actually a very young looking thirty-five. She graduated from the University of New Brunswick with a degree in fashion design, a passion of hers. Shawna told me when she graduated, she had the options of a job in the fashion industry, or working on a cruise ship.  Her dad was the one who suggested she go see the world and she ended up falling in love with cruise ships.

It is not an easy job. Her schedule is four months on and four off. The recent pandemic had her off the ship for a year and a half, during which time she worked in a government job back in Canada until Celebrity called her back. Her first contract after the pandemic, because of staff shortages, was eight months on and two off. But she loves the job. 

Shawna did the usual for someone in her position and worked her way up the ranks from activity host, to activity manager, to cruise director.  At one point she did something different and had a stint as a school teacher in London for a year, teaching kindergarten, but came back to cruising. I can just see her with those kids and am sure she was great. 

As Cruise Director she is responsible for organizing all the entertainment on the ship. That includes lectures, Zumba, game shows, silent disco’s, evening parties, resort deck parties and other games, as well as the back of house and theater tours. She works to ensure every traveler has something to keep them busy and having fun. As Shawna told me, that is always a little harder on a transatlantic cruise with so many sea days. But judging by the comments on the ship by so many of the people I met, she was doing a great job. 

The Cruise Director doesn’t get to choose all the talent, as Celebrity does the booking, but Shawna can and did request some approved acts. She loves working with those like the incredibly talented, Andrew Derbyshire. Many of us were excited he was going to be on our cruise. I first met Andrew, and wrote about him, last year when I was on APEX. He is an amazing entertainer. Shawna explained to me with the big shows like Crystalize and Tree of Life, Celebrity now produces those themselves and interviews talent for them around the world. One of the cast members in those shows, Nate Promkul, I predict will end up a star on Broadway. With the individual artists, their agents submit them to Celebrity, who then hires them for all their different ships. 

Before working on APEX Shawna has worked on a number of other Celebrity ships including Solstice, Reflection, Equinox and Silhouette. Shawna shared a story with me about Celebrity. They have always had a lot of crew from the Ukraine. Apparently, after the war began any crew members from Ukraine still working, were able to bring their families who could get out of Ukraine on board to live with them. This is a wonderful humanitarian thing to do. 

I enjoyed talking to Shawna and urge any cruiser on the APEX to say hello when you are onboard. She will always have a big smile for you. 

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Blade Blog

Meet Captain Nikolaos Christodoulakis of the Celebrity APEX

Reflecting on life aboard a ship during COVID

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Peter Rosenstein and Captain Nikolaos Christodoulakis (Photo courtesy of Rosenstein)

It really was a pleasure to chat with Celebrity APEX Captain Nikolaos Christodoulakis who invited me to the bridge for a conversation. I learned he is quite an amazing man.  

Captain Christodoulakis told me Celebrity is the only cruise company he has ever been with and joined them twenty-eight years ago in 1994. While still a young man of 47 he has already been a captain for 12 years. In one of the many interesting lectures during the cruise, we were given a talk on how one can become a captain. How one moves up the ranks at Celebrity. We were told about all the education and testing required. The speaker, who was not yet a captain, kidded he would reach that goal by 2080. He then told us jokingly about the exception for those of Greek extraction. He said they received their captain’s certificate along with their birth certificate. When I mentioned this to the captain during our conversation he laughed and assured me he did have all the needed education and tests.  

Captain Christodoulakis told me proudly he is from the Island of Crete, and still lives there with his wife and eight-year-old daughter. A captain with Celebrity is on a schedule of three months on, and three months off. He said he loves those three months off when he can be with his wife and daughter, and the rest of his family, back on Crete. I told him I had been to Crete many years ago and thought it was beautiful and asked him if he had ever walked down the famous Samariá Gorge and he said he hadn’t.

Over his years with Celebrity, he worked on many ships, including Horizon and Century among others. His most recent ship was the Reflection, which he captained during the COVID pandemic. That was not an easy time for the cruise line. He was with Reflection for three years and during the pandemic spent part of the time with the ship sitting in the Bahamas, with a crew of less than 100. Just enough to keep the ship ready to sail again when he could welcome passengers back. I told him I was on the APEX last year on a transatlantic cruise out of Barcelona with only had 1250 passengers and a crew of about 1,000. He told me on this cruise there were 2340 passengers and a crew of close to 1200. The APEX can accommodate up to 3,400 passengers with a crew of 1,250. The captain agreed staffing back up has been difficult and complimented the Celebrity HR department who he said has been working overtime recruiting crew. 

I asked him about protections for the crew during the pandemic and continuing today. He said Celebrity has been really good about that and all crew on the APEX have been vaccinated and boosted against Covid and during this transatlantic cruise they were all getting flu shots. On this trip the crew was required to wear masks for their safety. During the sea days they were allowed to take them off when outdoors, so we could see their smiles.

I then asked him what he wants to do next after he stops being a Captain. He told me he loves being a Captain and really can’t see another career. He did tell me once he retires, years from now, maybe when his daughter is in college, he wants to get an RV, and drive across Europe with his wife, seeing all the sites at a slow and leisurely pace. Then would like to do the same going across the United States stopping at all the national parks. Sounds like a great retirement.  I asked if he often leaves the ship in the ports where it stops. He says he does if his wife and daughter are on board visiting, and anticipates them joining him for the upcoming holidays. When they aren’t with him, he gets off if he can get to a beach, or a place to swim and dive, which he loves.

I then mentioned there was a party that afternoon my friends and travel agents, Scott and Dustin, with My Lux Cruise, were hosting in the Iconic suite. He said he would enjoy coming to that. I thanked him for taking the time to chat, said I hope to see him at the party, and left the bridge.

I didn’t say anything to Scott or Dustin about inviting him. Not only did he come but brought the Hotel Director, Christophe, with him. They were incredibly open and gracious, taking selfies. Christophe told us he would be on the BEYOND when we do our next transatlantic cruise in October 2023. 

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