Eliana and Henry

At Arte Consciente, they had percussion after a while. It was very loud, and it wasn’t terribly impressive, but it was good enough and I guess it was good to dance to. Everyone but a select few (myself included) started to dance. I remember Eliana was one of the ones getting most into it. Every time they changed the cadence she screamed a bit. One time they changed the cadence and she just unleashed a scream for I swear at least fifteen straight seconds, high and at the top of her lungs.

In all honesty, I think she sings opera in her normal life back at home. This wasn’t operatic, but it was seriously powerfully loud.

I remember one of the people who didn’t join in the dancing was Henry, the ship’s professional videographer. I wondered if he wished he could join in. He was sweating pretty intensely as it was, but he seems like a fairly lively guy in general, and I think he probably would have been interested. I felt a little bad for him. I talked to him later about whether or not he ever felt like his job made it impossible to be in the moment, and he said yeah, totally, all the time, living through the lens really isn’t living. But it’s his job, he said.

I went to a restaurant that night for Jenn’s birthday, only because she asked me to go. I ended up going somewhere else with Aleeza and Gabe and some other people, like Phi and Courtney, who we found there. When we were done we tried to walk back to find Jenn, but a guy on the street corner started gesturing at us, and some guys crossed the street towards us. We decided to call it a night and took a cab ride home. The fare was higher than we hoped.