6 Degrees of Michelle

Michelle Merritt, the author and annoying jack of all trades

While slaving away as a deckhand onboard the National Geographic Sea Bird, Sven Lindblad voiced an observation that, although simplistically obvious, escapes the realization of most. In his delightfully genial way, he said something to the effect of: We are all related if we just go back far enough.

Ask yourself: How are we all connected?

In 2010, I was invited on a trip to Turkey as a civilian representative (for lack of a better word) from the United States. Of course, I jumped at the chance and immediately packed my bags.

In the midst of the whirl-wind tours, I took a break on the deck of a ship in the middle of Straits of Bosphorus.

And there they were: Hagia Sofia and the Blue Mosque. I’d seen them before in the crates of Dad’s photos. It wasn’t until returning home that I realized he’d snapped those same pictures more than 50 years before my arrival in Istanbul.

That’s when the idea to travel the world by ship struck me. Not as your run of the mill tourist, but as a crew member. And so this leg of my journey began...