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The line is the reason you don’t lose a day now. When you circumnavigate the world westward, the earth has rotated one less time for you than for everyone else, so it appears you have lost a day. By artificially switching the day at the date line you avoid this kind of slippage.

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On a ship, you also keep the same time zone as local time for the area you are steaming through. Going consistently westward to get somewhere is a bonus, because every other day you get to sleep in an extra hour.

Oddly enough, on the Queen Mary 2, sailing eastward from NYC to Southampton, they change the time just after lunch. No extra sleep-ins!

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