Cruise ship worker explains why you might be approached if you wear a black ring on board

Cruises are an increasingly popular way to enjoy a trip away from home to visit multiple destinations during one holiday. You only have to unpack once and get to enjoy all the onboard amenities, activities and fine dining right on your cabin doorstep every day.

You could be an experienced cruise traveller or be considering the option for your next vacation but it seems there's a whole lot more that goes on behind the scenes than you might expect.

When it comes to choosing what accessories you take with you, it may, or may not - depending on your preference - pay to be wary of packing a certain type of jewellery.

According to one cruise worker who sailed the seas for 10 years, if you wear a black ring or jewellery with a pineapple theme, you could be approached by people with a preference for a particular type of lifestyle.

Lucy Southerton, 28, from Birmingham has plenty of knowledge about what goes on in the darker corners of the huge ships and has shared her experiences on her YouTube channel Cruising as Crew.

In one video from 2023, she claims that "swinging is a popular pastime" onboard the floating hotels - and suggests it could be because cruises offer an "enclosed population of people".

Couples who enjoy swapping sexual partners, use certain techniques to identify other potential companions onboard, according to the former cruise worker.

One of them is by displaying the upside down pineapple symbol in some way. "Some people put the upside down pineapple on their cabin door," Lucy says. "Some people wear an upside down pineapple like a hat or brooch."

But there's also a more "inconspicuous" way to alert others to your desires than dangling a spiky fruit from your person - and that's by wearing a black ring on your right hand, apparently.

Although as Lucy points out, this more subtle sign can have its issues. "Imagine if you went up to someone and you're like [in a suggestive voice], 'Hey, I can see that black ring on your right hand,' and they're like, 'Yeah it's just a black ring on my right hand'. You can never really be sure whether that's just something they like to wear, or if it's a signal," she warns.

According to Lucy, the third signpost that someone is a swinger open to offers is a male and female sign with "a third gender sign in there". She also shares an "embarrassing story" about how she came to realise the significance of the pineapple. Revealing that a long time ago she used to work in a ship's spa, she said a couple came in for a couple's massage.

When she went back to the treatment room after they had got dressed to tell them about aftercare such as drinking plenty of water, she noticed they were both wearing silver upside down pineapple necklaces. "They weren't like this bright yellow upside down. They've very subtle, very, very nice," she recalls. "And I was like, 'Oh I love your necklaces. I think it's so cute that you're both wearing matching necklaces. That's really sweet, but why the pineapple? Like what does that represent to you in your relationship?'."

The couple who she had built up a rapport with after treating them a few times, burst out laughing. "They were like, 'Look, we're swingers and this is how people can identify us as swingers,'." Intrigued, she went on to have a conversation about it with them where they told her the terminology used within the community.

Apparently, a unicorn is a woman who wants to swing on her own and swing with another couple. "They're basically like mythical creatures," she says the couple informed her. "They don't exist and if you find one then you've hit the jackpot."

A rhino is a single man willing to swing, while a mermaid is a married woman who wants to swing with a couple on her own. The word 'play' means sex, so you may say you don't play on the first date. Rainbow means they don't discriminate on gender and will swing with "everyone and anyone". While 'DDF' is drug and disease free.

Comments on Lucy's video, which has had over a million views, were suitably amusing. "Thanks for the info on the up side down pineapple. I will be placing a sticker of one on my brother and sister in laws cabin door on our upcoming cruise. Boy will they be surprised:)," joked one.

Another shared: "I'll never forget the amount of attention I got in the buffet on my first ever cruise - I bought shorts that had loads of little pineapples in all different directions - I innocently thought they were just 'nice and summery' - how wrong I was... Ha!"

A third wrote: "Jee whizz, I will have to make sure my pineapple earrings are pointing up," while a fourth revealed: "My partner bought me a nice black ring for Valentine's Day. Damn...I'll have to have a chat with her."