This week we present two stories from people who experienced challenges in their travels.

Part 1: Transporting virginal fruit flies from Houston to Honolulu proves to be no easy task for Patricia Savant.

Dr. Patricia Shaw Savant has a Ph.D. In Counseling Psychology and Behavioral Medicine from North Texas State University (1986) and a Masters of Arts in psychophysiology from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas. She currently has a private practice in psychotherapy in Clayton, MO. She practices under the name Patricia Shaw, Ph.D. With Phoenix Psychological Group, Inc. Dr. Shaw also provides counseling and support at music festivals as part of Harm reduction and Medical services. At the time of her story she was an undergraduate at the University of Houston in biology and chemistry.

Part 2: When a storm rocks the cruise ship where he works, Mike Funergy worries about how the elderly passengers will handle it.

Mike Funergy first discovered his love for storytelling while wandering the markets of Morocco and watching old storytellers captivate the crowd. Upon returning to Canada he discovered the Toronto Storytelling Festival and found a new appreciation for folklore and mythology, and especially loves tales from the Jewish tradition. He now tells stories at the Vancouver Story Slam, and has made it to the finals for the past 2 years. Mike has studied Expressive Arts Therapy, and currently works for a non-profit organization helping adults with developmental disabilities discover what they want to do in their lives.

Episode Transcript

Part 1: Patricia Shaw Savant

On the morning in 1966, I woke up and I was so damn nervous. It was that kind of low-in-the‑belly fear that I couldn’t stop throwing up. And the reason that I couldn’t stop throwing up was because I was given the assignment to fly from Houston to Honolulu to Hickam Air Force Base to set up a recovery lab for the very first NASA Biosatellite. That was big for me, kind of like overwhelming.

Because when I was hired on to this lab, it was something of a fluke. It’s a genetics lab at Wright University. I was a tech, no big deal. And then I find out, no, I'm working for NASA and space flight, and this is really important.

I was so nervous because up to this point, I had been working with a team, I had been working in a lab, I had supervision, but all of a sudden, I was handed a box of virgin fruit flies and said, “Go to Honolulu. Go to Hickam Air Force Base. Set up a recovery lab and we’ll see you later.”

Man, I was freaked out. I had never done anything so important or anything that felt nearly as dangerous. I think the most dangerous thing I’d ever done was change a tire on a Houston freeway, which is kind of like changing a tire on a NASCAR raceway. So I was just really, really freaked out with the responsibility of it and the fact that it was NASA and space flight.

Patricia Shaw Savant shares her story with the Story Collider audience at the Ready Room in St. Louis, MO in October 2018. Photo by David Kovaluk.

I've always loved space. The idea of traveling to other worlds outside of Earth, the idea as in Star Trek, my favorite TV program, to go where no man had ever gone before. So it felt really, really big. And I didn’t know if I was up to it but, obviously, I was going to go anyway.

But there was another reason that I was kind of like really freaked out about this because we had already been part of a project, a NASA project pre-launched, but it had many, many mistakes. Unexpected mistakes, like GE was hired by NASA to design a module. Now, this module was about the size of a volleyball. You might think of Wilson, you know, in Cast Away.

And so here was this volleyball-sized thing and inside of it were these little cubby holes where people, our researchers, would put in live specimens. There were like 13 different research teams across the United States and they had specimens like frog eggs and plants and fruit flies. These things had all been chosen because they easily showed genetic mutation from outside forces.

And the idea was to send these live specimens into space, come back and, in our case, breed them to see what kind of genetic changes there might be as a result of radiation, weightlessness or who knows what out in space.

So my job was to take these little virgin fruit flies. They were virgin because our fruit flies were going, the males were going off into space to be hit with all these space things and come back to my lab. We would breed them with these virgins, see the offsprings and we could tell if there were mutations and what mutations and so on and so forth.

But there were a lot of mistakes along the way that I had never expected. For instance, GE was supposed to design the module, which it did, but their first design was one-third less than what it was supposed to be. I mean, I’ve gotten an F in Science before because a decimal was wrong. This is one‑third. I mean, I couldn’t believe it. It took them two more tries so that meant we had to go to Philly three times to do this.

But that wasn’t the only thing. We had worked on the project for two years. We had security clearance for one year. So our little team goes for the pre-launch mock-up to see how everything runs. We get to the gate at Cape Canaveral and they had never heard of us. They never heard the project, they never heard of us and so we had to sit in this little trailer for like an hour or so while they called all around and finally decided we were legit and they let us in.

Patricia Shaw Savant shares her story with the Story Collider audience at the Ready Room in St. Louis, MO in October 2018. Photo by David Kovaluk.

But there were a lot of other mistakes along the way that made me extra fearful today going on my trip, like what could go wrong. And if it did go wrong, it was totally my responsibility to handle it, to fix it, to figure it out, so I was very freaked out.

But, more than freaked out, I was excited and the thrill of this adventure, it overcame my fear and I wasn’t going to not go, so I took the fruit flies in one hand, I took a wad of paper towels in the other hand and I literally threw up all the way down the tarmac.

So I got into the plane and the stewardess came by. You know, they asked you coffee, tea, juice, what do you want? I said, “Alka-Seltzer.”

Now, in those days, you could ask for Alka-Seltzer on a plane and get it. You could also smoke in the plane. There were ashtrays in the armrest.

So I’d gotten the Alka-Seltzer, I started settling down. The Alka-Seltzer really helped. I could relax. I had accomplished the first phase of my mission. I had the little virgins with me. Well, I think that lasted maybe—I don’t know how long it takes to fly, but about an hour before we get to Hawaii, the stewardess announces, “Now we are going to commence fumigating the hold, fumigating the cabin because we don’t want any foreign insects coming into Hawaii.”

You know, our team was never given any kind of protocol on how to get fruit flies from Houston to Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii, so I was totally freaked out. I mean, really like, “Oh, my God!” Kind of like that.

Because if our fruit flies died, our project died with them because there would be no fruit flies to mate with the ones coming back and no offspring and no nothing. I was like freaking out. I told the stewardess my potential catastrophe.

And I wanted to tell you guys too that in those days, not only did you have ashtrays in the armrest and that they fumigated the cabins with insecticides, but when I was a kid, they also fumigated the streets. And as a kid, I would play in the fog of the DDT from the trucks. So that was a different time.

Anyway, I was in a panic. I didn’t know what to do. I was trying to think what to do. I only had a few minutes to figure it out. I think, I don’t know who it was, I think it was someone sitting close to me. It’s a blur. But they understood my problem and they took out this plastic bag that kind of goes over your shirts from the laundry. We put the flies in the middle of the plastic bag and we blew it up, tied off the ends just before they started fumigating the hold. So my virgins were safe.

And I relaxed. I'm sitting there. I have a nice little balloon in my lap. Everything is cool, until we land.

Now, in those days, they didn’t have these fancy dancy airports in tropical places like we have now. No. They were open air. That means I'm getting off the plane with my little virgins in their balloon and it’s hot. The sun is hot. Rays are coming down and I was like, “Oh, my God, they’re going to die again.”

Because in this box is this food that they eat and it was liquefying in the heat. It was this ugly, messy porridge of cornmeal and yeast. If it melted, those stupid little flies would drown. I couldn’t think what to do. No airconditioning. So I took it out and was fanning. I'm fanning through customs, I'm fanning through luggage, I'm fanning while I'm trying to rent the car, until, finally, I get airconditioning.

We’re safe. I'm safe. The flies survived. I survived.

I get to the trailer at Hickam Air Force Base. It’s much easier to set up the lab than I thought. Everything was good. Kind of.

So I'm waiting for the satellite to come down and for my team to come to Hickam to finish our project. And there were a couple or three days of waiting and that was really fun for me. I went Hawaiian. I bought a muumuu. I had leis. I had never heard of this, but you can get a hotdog on rice. I swam in the Pacific for the very first time. It was all cool. I was very excited.

So the day comes that the lead researcher is coming to our lab. We’re going to finish the project. I meet her. I have on my muumuu. I have leis. I have leis for her. I put these leis on her head and she glares at me. She takes it off and throws it on to the ground and I was like, “Oh, shit, what did I do?” Something is really wrong here, but I didn’t know what it was.

Well, it was Murphy’s Law again. Remember? If something can go wrong, it will go wrong.

She informs me that the satellite is not returning. No. The satellite is up there somewhere circling around with our little fly specimens and the retrograde rockets did not fire. They’re not coming home to the Pacific Ocean. No. The orbit is slowly degrading and they’re slowly falling until they burn up in this fiery fall and crash in the Australian desert. There wasn’t anything we could do about it.

But that was the end of the project. What do we do? She wasn’t mad at me, but me being so Hawaiian‑happy in the light of the satellite burning up coming down, it didn’t go very well, you know? So the only thing really we could do was just pack up our stuff and go home.

We were all disappointed. I was really shocked because, to me, NASA had made all these mistakes and I just didn’t think a big space program could do that, but it happened.

So NASA sent out two more Biosatellites successfully. I was no longer working the project. I had gone back to school full-time. I followed NASA, their progress and the dreams. I’m still enthralled with space. Star Trek was still my favorite, but I was no longer involved.

But what I did learn from all that experience was courage. I learned that mistakes are not stop signs. They’re not something that says you quit because you screwed up. No. You keep going and you figure out a way to get it done.

That courage, for me just getting on the plane, helped me throughout my life. It actually helped me get into grad school, because when I went to apply for my Psych PhD, the professor said, “No, I don’t think you’re going to get in. There's a hundred applicants and there’s only eight positions.” I felt like someone had really socked me in the stomach. I almost broke into tears.

I remember I was at a conference when he told me this. I went behind a post and I was just about ready to sob, and then that same courage that got me on the plane kicked in and I said, “Damn it, I’ve got to do something.” I went and applicated for myself and then a week later, I got my acceptance in the mail.

Part 2: Mike Funergy

So I was in the middle of the Caribbean Sea when a storm hit. The ship went bobbing up and down with the waves and swells, tossed side to side, and this was no small, wooden boat. This was a massive luxury cruise ship, the MS Prinsendam, ten decks high.

Now, the ups and downs of the water perform the same motion in the stomachs of our passengers, and most of them went back to their cabins to lay down to calm the nausea. And whenever they did that, for me, well, I was working on board. I was an activities host. I was hosting trivia games, sports tournaments, game shows on stage. So when they went to bed, my work was done. I could go down to the crew bar and have a drink with my friends.

Because storms and swells, when you work on the high seas, they’re calming enough. And after four years, my stomach was rock-hard.

By the way, you want dumb questions? Try four years on a cruise ship. “Do these stairs go up?” Think about that one.

So I essentially welcomed the storms. The storms meant time off and me and my friends would laugh about how our elderly passengers couldn’t handle it. It’s a storm. It’ll just pass. And sure enough, that one did.

Storms don’t bother me. I'm too rock solid for that. At least, that’s what I did think until the grand voyage, the MS Prinsendam’s grand voyage. That was the term the marketing department came up with for it.

Now, this was the cruise for the seasoned cruisers, the ones who had traveled everywhere. Every itinerary, been everywhere, seen everything. We were leaving from Florida, going through the Caribbean into the Panama Canal, down the coast of Peru and Chile all the way to the tip of South America, across to Antarctica then back up via Brazil into the Amazon back to Florida. In total, over two months, a 66-day cruise.

Mike Funergy shares his story with the Story Collider audience at the Vancouver Aquarium in Vancouver, BC in September 2019. Photo by Rob Shaer.

Now, I invite you to consider the demographic that would take a 66-day cruise. The average age was 82. The average hair color was gray. The average hometown was Palm Springs, and the average names were Bill and Barb.

Now, for them, this was the cruise of a lifetime, a chance to check off the last destination on their lives’ bucket list, Antarctica. They were excited and in great spirits about it, but as crew, I was a little concerned when I saw the condition of our elderly passengers. I admit, among the crew, we had a few jokes going wondering if they would survive the entire cruise.

But you know what, they were great. The Bills and Barbs were great. They came out and participated in everything. Like I was hosting a volleyball tournament up on the top deck and we kind of only put that in the program because we thought we were supposed to, not expecting anyone to show. But they came. And it might not have been the most competitive game of volleyball I've ever seen, but they came and participated in everything and were in high spirits, having a blast.

And the weather was beautiful all through the Panama Canal down the coast of South America, sun shining all the way to the tip, all the way until we hit the Drake. The Drake Passage, the narrow waterway that separates Tierra del Fuego from the Antarctic Peninsula, where the Southern Atlantic and Pacific Oceans meet and one of the strongest currents in the world, channels water into the narrow passageway known for the roughest seas in the world.

Waves came crashing over the deck’s dining room, dishes went sliding off the tables. Anything that wasn’t secured down came tumbling over. Every time the ship went over a wave and into the valley below, I felt it in my stomach, sort of like a rollercoaster drop followed by a smash that would jerk me forward. And for the first time, a storm scared me. I sort of knew I wouldn’t be going down to the crew bar this time.

And it was chaotic on the ship as all of the crew, we were all scrambling trying to secure everything down. And as soon as we would secure one thing, something else would come toppling.

But the Bills and Barbs, they seem to be doing just fine. Sure, they were stumbling and a few of them were a little bit seasick, but they were laughing about it. They were having a blast. It was like as if they had discovered a new game called Try and Walk. Yeah, stumbling their way down the hallways, having a blast.

Even as the storm intensified, they still had great spirits. And I’ll never forget one moment. In the center of the ship there was a large atrium with a staircase, a spiral staircase that went down with glass panels. And an elderly gentleman in a wheelchair was flung down the staircase, shattered through a pane of glass, landed upright in his wheelchair somehow.

And he brushes the shards of glass off of him, throws his hands up in the air and he shouts, “Is that all ya got?”

We would have made it. We would have been fine. We would have survived the Drake if it wasn’t for the rogue wave. A freak wave. Essentially two waves combined together, so large that they were once considered maritime myth.

They occur so unpredictably and infrequently that it’s only a couple of decades ago that scientists acknowledged their existence. They still don’t fully agree on how and why they form.

It’s generally agreed, or a leading theory anyway, leading cause, that there are two different swell systems. Swell systems all have different sizes, speeds and directions. Occasionally, they’ll sync up for a short period of time, usually only for a minute or two.

And the wave that hit us measured 20 meters, 65 feet high, essentially a 6-story building of water coming at you. I was up in the restaurant on the top deck when the wave hit. I remember looking out and seeing this giant wall of water coming towards us from the side. Even more alarming, though, was that as that wall was going up, we were going down, down into the trough below.

I remember feeling like it almost became a freefall but on a slant. And it felt like it wasn’t possible to be still floating on water and falling like this. But I didn’t have too much time to think about it as furniture started going tumbling. And I grabbed on to a door frame to stop myself from falling into the windows which are now below me. I watched as a giant chair came tumbling and smashed into my fingers. At that time was when the wave crashed over us and I heard shouts and screams from all directions.

We were forced to switch direction to change heading to go with the waves while the medical team set up a triage station to help bandage everybody up. Once I had bandaged up my fingers, I ran around trying to grab whatever the doctors and nurses needed to help out.

The ship was now going in the wrong direction, towards the direction of Africa, but we had no choice but to take care of everybody who had been injured. Meanwhile, the Prinsendam had also sustained damage and had even taken on some water down in the lower decks, so we had no choice but to turn the ship around and go back to Argentina.

We got some people to the clinics and started doing some repairs on the ship. And while we were docked there in Argentina for a few days, the captain had a big decision to make. Given what had just transpired, given the injuries that some of our elderly passengers had sustained, though amazingly, none of them were major injuries. Even though people were bandaged and bruised, there were no broken bones and also, no broken spirits. They were still in pretty good spirits.

But nonetheless, the captain had this decision to make and he made the appropriate decision. “I'm sorry ladies and gentlemen. We have to skip Antarctica.”

Of course, I was disappointed. I really wanted to see Antarctica. But the Bills and Barbs, they stood up hobbling and limping, bandaged and bruised and they said, “No way! We are going to Antarctica come hell or high water.”

This didn’t just take the captain by surprise. It took us all by surprise. The captain didn’t know what to do facing this potential senior citizen mutiny so he decided to put it to a vote. And of the 792 passengers on the Prinsendam, every single one of them voted to go back through the storm.

The Bills and Barbs had spoken. So we secured everything down, sealed all the hatches, closed all the water-tight doors, everybody was to go to their cabins and lay down in their bed for safety measure while we went back through the Drake, crew included.

And I lay there in my bed down in the decks below thinking, “Was it a wise idea to leave this decision in the hands of the Bills and the Barbs? The ones who only have one more item on their to-do list for life? I’ve still got a few more.”

And I lay there in my bed as the hull of the ship smashed over and over and over against the Drake all through the day and into that night. And somewhere in the middle of the night, finally, I fell asleep.

I woke up in the morning and everything was calm and still. I jumped up and pulled open the little curtain to the portal, and as I did, immediately, the sun blinded me. As my eyes adjusted, I realized that it wasn’t the sun directly hitting my eyes but rather, the reflection of the sun bouncing off the tallest mountains of ice I could’ve ever possibly imagined.

The Bills and Barbs didn’t care about the storm. They weren’t afraid to turn back. And it was pretty amazing, their attitude the whole way through. They just wanted to see Antarctica, just wanted to cross off that final item on their lives’ to-do list. And they did it.

For me, in my life, I often find I'm facing challenges, moments of indecision, moments when I don’t know whether to go forward or to go backwards and I often get scared. Moments when those challenges seem so giant and colossal. Moments like that when those challenges look to me like they’re a 20-meter wave about to crash down on me. And in moments like that, I think a good question to ask myself is, “What would Bill and Barb do?” Thank you.