Day 12 – May 30 (Wednesday) – At Sea

Not much to report for today.  We went to the final lecture by General Zinni on leadership.  It was a wonderful talk about what makes great leaders and essentially how in today’s world pretty much approval ratings from all leaders from political to religious to military are below 50%, and in the US it is below 20%.  He believes that the problem is that the world has basically gotten so much more complicated these days that finding someone who can do the strategic thinking and have the right decision making skills is very difficult.  Apparently General Zinni has written a book on the subject, which we think that we will check out.  It was a very good talk.

Next was team trivia.  We got 13 out of 15, but there were two winning teams with 14, so we lost again.  Oh well.

Lunch next (the Mediterranean café lunch) and then we went to the talk by Thomas Lippman on “The Next Middle East War”.  What he really talked about was the huge problem facing the Middle East which is lack of water.  It really is a huge problem for them and something that is likely going to shape what happens in the Middle East in the not too distant future.

The Mozart tea was this afternoon, and as always, spectacular.  With the waiters all dressed up, the amazing table of various edible goodies and the beautiful stringed music. 

There was time for a bit of relaxing and before getting ready for the captain’s farewell party (formal attire) and dinner in the dining room.  After dinner, we went to the production show “Curtain Call.”

All in all, a wonderful, relaxing sea day.