Surprises from Liberia

25 April 2010 Posted by Martin

[Monrovia, Liberia]

After a long journey, I am finally in Liberia.

It's hot - very hot. And humid - very humid. Yet, the rainy season has hardly begun. After few surprises, we finally landed in a missionnary family working with Serving In Missions (SIM). We will stay there for our first week:

Ben and his family are fantastic hosts. They gave us a very good introduction to the country.

Here is my team (Pauline, Norma and Lenhert), ready for our first local adventure: shopping

On our way, we saw a petrol station:

But Liberia has more than one surprise in stock... in the supermarket, I found Roquefort (made by my Dad in South of France) et the coraya surimi (which I packet in my first summer job in Normandy)

I leav you with this nice scenery where I can spend time with God. I make the most of it because next week, we will move to downtown and it won't be that peacefull.

Journey of Life

20 April 2010 Posted by Martin

[Hamilton,Bermuda]

A whole section of the visitor deck has recently been renovated. This area, called the Journey of Life, aims at connecting with people and sharing a message of hope. In the previous ports, it has been used in many creative ways: a cultural exhibition about Christmas around the world in Denmark, a Photography and Art exhibition in Europe, and a triptych about Beauty – Brokenness – Blessing in the Caribbean.

The settings we now have will be the permanent display. This wordless story portrays in a very visual way a modern version of the parable of the prodigal son. As the visitors walk through the panorama, they follow the story of rebellion and forgiveness between a son and his Father. I am amazed to see how the artists who build the display managed to make alive this story without using word, so that people from every nations can understand this message of forgiveness.

 The Construction of the Journey of Life

Cultural Adaptation

14 April 2010 Posted by Martin

[Hamilton, Bermuda]
My team will soon depart for Liberia, to prepare the visit of the Logos Hope, in August. With Lenhert, Norma and Pauline, we have decided to take a team picture in African clothes. It was quite fun to look for the colorful clothes in the back stage of the theater. Finally, I got a nice one! But when I arrived upstairs, a friend from South Africa gave me a weird look:

Louria – Why are you wearing that?
Martin – What? Isn’t it a traditional costume?
Louria – Yes, except that it’s for girl!
Martin – How can I tell?? They are all colorful?

That's better!

 

A Normal Day

05 April 2010 Posted by Martin

[Saint Affrique, France]
A Normal Day?? not really, I have moved my blog to a new address: http://martin-boulanger-en.blogspot.com
To celebrate that, I have put online the short movie I made last year for the Logoscars 2009 (a little competition organised on the Logos Hope)

Discover how an Indian, a Chinese, a French and a Mexican live a Normal Day...

PreShip training - Montego Bay

04 February 2010 Posted by Martin

[Montego Bay, Jamaica] Finally! They are here! The new promotion that will follow their pre-ship training in the port of Montego Bay arrived yesterday. This new group marks a significant change for me. After two years aboard, the promotion from Kiel, with whom I joined, has completed its service and most of my friends went back home this week to continue their studies, look for a job or serve with another mission.

I am part of the few survivors who chose to extend for one year. With the promotion Montego Bay and those who were transferred from the Doulos, almost to 140 new crew members have arrived ... it will take me time to learn the names!

video

Help Packs

22 January 2010 Posted by Martin

[Montego Bay, Jamaica]
Bringing Knowledge, Help and Hope, that’s vision of the Logos Hope. You can watch below some of the testimonies of our visit in Guyana, where several teams of the ship were sent ashore with Help Packs, filled with soap, toothpaste, notebook and pencil ... This video will show you in what context the Logos Hope seeks to provide practical help to the communities that we meet.

video

Where is the Christmas tree?

26 December 2009 Posted by Martin

[Caracas Baai, Curaçao]
This is a unique Christmas for me. The first one aboard Logos Hope. For the first time I swam on Christmas day and we had a BBQ for dinner! I have tried to find a Christmas tree to decorate, but it hard to find here. After all, do we celebrate Christmas for the tree? If Christmas is for the folklore and the French Bûche, there would be many reasons to be disappointed.

Yet even if the weather is far from being Christmassy, the joy of the good news that  God reaches out to the world through her son remains a reality that I want to have in my life. And I wish you can have that joy to. This joy is eternal, not my family and friends. This is also why it was special to celebrate Christmas on board, as many of my friends are leaving the Logos Hope next month.

A week ashore

19 December 2009 Posted by Martin

[Georgetown, Guyana]The Logos Hope moves from port to port every two or three weeks. It's a pretty intense pace. But during a visit to Georgetown, I went with a team to work with a local church for a week. It was a real privilege to be away from the ship’s business and live among locals. As all team members are part of the drama club on board, we've taught some dramas to the youth group of church for a Christmas concert where we performed as well. We also visited schools and an orphanage.

Above: one of the school visit

A drama we performed at the Christmas concert, which shares the message of the Gospel.
Despite the heat and the mosquitoes, it was a refreshing experience to live one week in a house ...

In my team (from left to right)
Marsha (Netherlands), Lilian (Chile), Liz (Trinidad and Tobago), Jérémie (France), Brad (South Africa), Alison (Northern Ireland) and me.

Logoscars 2009

23 November 2009 Posted by Martin

[Vieux Fort, Saint Lucia]
We just finished a Sabbath week in St. Lucia. During five days, the Logos Hope was not open to the public, but we had teaching on the theme of the Tabernacle in the morning and time to rest in the afternoon. One of the highlight of the week was the Logoscars: a little short movie contest organized by the crew. For this evening, the engine guys had left their overalls in the cupboard, and everyone was in their best cloth
With a friend, I made a film about cultural diversity - "A Normal Day" - I hope to present it soon! The film has been welcomed very well, and we received five awards! (Best Editing, Best Photography, Best Actress, Best Actor and Best Film)

This is a small family photo with the masters of ceremony and another director.

From left to right:
Simon Zemek, Master of Ceremony (USA), Ruben Munoz, Actor (Mexico), Christine Wu, actress and co-screenwriter (Taiwan), Martin Baker, actor and director (France) BK Madu, actor (India), Samy Schubert director of a cartoon about ship’s life which won the Audience choice (Germany) and Janice McShane, Mistress of Ceremonies (Australia)

TV Ad

19 October 2009 Posted by Martin

[Castries, Saint Lucia]
In two weeks, the Logos Hope will visit Barbados. Ruben has just finished a TV advertisement which is broadcast in the island. I share it with you, and I hope that its local flavour will warm up the cold autumn.

video

Life on Board : The Book Fair

26 September 2009 Posted by Martin

[Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago] In the Caribbean, the Logos Hope is know has the book sip. And well, the Book Fair can be a very busy place! Here in Trinidad, we received 5300 visitors one of the public holidays. And you can imagine that after such a busy day, there is no much time to rest... the place has to be cleaned and the shelves restocked for the following day.

Below a presentation video of this department.


video

PST Scarborough

12 September 2009 Posted by Martin

[Scarborough, Tobago]

PST Scarborough - here they come! As each semester the crew changeover is a unique and festive event. And this year they were 96 to join the Pre Ship Training (PST) from Scarborough on the island of Tobago.

Among them, two French ... the community grows a little. All these volunteers are joining the Logos Hope for two years. They will first go through a training to prepare them for the ministry of the ship and safety at sea, then they will join their work department.

As for the IT team, this means a lot of laptop to check!!

First port in the Caribbean

13 August 2009 Posted by Martin

[St Vincent and the Grenadines]
After two weeks in St Vincent it's time to share somes pictures...
It's a really beautifull country, with jungle...

and black sand beaches, due to it's volcano (La Soufrière). The Grenadines have whit sand du to the Corals, but I haven't been there. 

Last weekend, I went on a trip to this volcano with 2 friends, Ruben and Markus.

After one hour and a half, shaken in a crowded bus full of reggae music, we finally arrived in Gergetown. But the weather was pretty bad, so we drop the hike for a walk on the beach... with nices waves!

This is how I enjoy my days off, but the rest of the time (which is 6 days a week) are pretty busy as well. The Logos Hope has experienced har biggest crowds. Compared to Europe, it's amazing! 43506 visitors came on board, and they bought more books than in the 4 ports of Edinburgh, Belfast, Cardiff and London together! We have much more educational books than before, and they have a great success. As for me, I had the opportunity to take part of a church service in a prison and to meet with locals who are learning french.  

Premieres on the ocean

21 July 2009 Posted by Martin

[Atlantic Ocean]
During the Atlantic crossing, the work continues, but the atmosphere is more relax, and it's also a time full of discoveries:
Animals

• For the first time, I see dolphins, wales (let's say their water spray), flying fishes and plankton !!!!

Sport

• Playing Basket ball ! (and losing the ball during the game...)

Food

• Drinking desalinated water
• BBQ in the middle of the ocean.

Rest

• Changing time zone every 2 days.
• sleeping under the stars, and being rocked by the waves. (and we see thousands of stars here!)

Transatlanitc to the Caribbean

15 July 2009 Posted by Martin

[Cork, Ireland]
Joyeux 14 juillet!
Ce soir, le Logos Hope quitte l’Europe, et prend le cap pour les Caraïbes. On a célébré ‘ca avec Ruben, Betsy, Jérémie et Alice, les 4 autres Français à bord.

Alors que l’ on quitte Cork, nous goutons déjà à lui pluie (tropicale ;o) mais il ne manque que la température!

C’est partie pour 14 jours de mer à travers l’Atlantique. La météo nous prévoit du gros temps pour le début, mais j’ai hâte de vivre ça !

Cake Hunt

10 July 2009 Posted by Martin

[Cork, Ireland]

What a long day! To celebrate my quarter of century, several friends of the ship organized a cake hunt.

The quest was full of twists and turns: encrypted messages, hint discovery with a GPS and anonymous phone calls. After exploring the library for information and interviewing for 20 minutes the shop keeper of the shipshop  (a small shop on board), I was still empty-handed: NO CAKE.

Actually, with the cake from my work colleagues and the one from the "one year and a half on board" celebration (we celebrated it the same day with the group that joined in Kiel) my stomach was not empty. 

Finally, today I managed to get the cake, poor cake, he was in hostage in one of the freezers.

And as a gift, you know what I had? A trip to the Caribbean! Nice, isn't it? Yesterday in fact we passed  the last security audit was was required to continue to sail. We now have all the papers in our pocket, lift up the Andhor!
The departure is scheduled for July 14.

Au revoir Europe (under, the bell tower of Cork, Ireland)

Bonjour to the Caribbean islands.

Bringing Knowledge, Help and Hope

03 July 2009 Posted by Martin

[Cork, Ireland]
What is the Logos Hope about? We want to bring Knowledge, Help and Hope to the nations. Learn more about the Logos Hope in this video.

video

Download the video

London

26 June 2009 Posted by Martin

[London, United Kingdom] The Logos Hope is docked for 2 weeks in London. That's a great opportunity to visit!

But most of my schedule is shared between the IT office and the visitor deck. Indeed, if the week is fairly quiet, weekends are busy with up to 4,500 visitors a day, a good preparation for the Caribbean next month. So I went to lend a hand to the welcome desk or to give tours. And it’s very refreshing for me!

Lights and music!

13 June 2009 Posted by Martin

[London, UK] Every morning, the ship's company gather for a time of devotion. But this morning had a very special flavour: for the first time we gathered in the Hope Theater. This is the biggest conference room on board.
When I join the Logos Hope a year and a half ago, the welcoming party took place there, and at that time, it looked like that:

Today, after many hours of work, we had the first evening and 400 young people came:

In a few days, we will welcome school visites, youth groups, churches, and various conferences. It's exciting to have this new tool, but this opening is also another step in the renovation project which is clearly coming to an end. We are grateful for all the work that has been achieved by hundreds of people who gave their time and talents to build this place. Through them, we have seen God's provision for us.

On the diet

31 May 2009 Posted by Martin

[Cardiff, Wales] After Belfast and Dublin, we are now in Cardiff, the captial city of Wales.
The arrival was impressive as we had to go through several locks before coming alongside, at the heart of Cardiff bay.
And some places were tight:

really tight!

About one meter on each side of the ship.

But we all arrive safely! Congratulation to the Captain and the deckies!

In the Jaw of the Whale

28 April 2009 Posted by Martin

[Torshavn, Feroe Islands]Short visit in the sheep island -The Faeroe Islands - where twice as many sheep as people live. The hospitality of the inhabitants warm up the fresh weather (I have seen snow!). Before being a floating library, the Logos Hope was a car ferry - the Norröna - linking the Faroe Islands to the mainland. We felt feeling of ownership of the population for this ship which marked their history of the past 30 years. Overthe 10 days of visit, 14 800 visitors came on board, which represents 25% of the population! Here are some pictures of this fascinating country.

Hiking in a wonderful landscape.

Some cliffs are more that twice the heigh of the Eiffeil tower!

 The piece of wood on what I am lying down is in fact a whale jaw.
If we can't find giant whale in our plates anymore, the pilot whale hunt is still a big aspect of the culture here.
Notice also the grass on the roof!