Ship stories and other stuff
Instead of calling the fitter a lazy bastard the Chief Engineer said of him to me..(while we were doing nothing in particular).
“He like to work the same as donkey like to run, and he always start every job with a break……”
Diplomatic sort, the Chief.
One of the crew was pronounced deaf by 2 of the officers, they had apparently deduced this fact because they claimed he did not respond to them when they spoke to him directly. The fact of the matter was that he was not deaf at all, he just hadn’t a clue what was being said to him, so he got nervous and froze. Unfortunately he froze for the same 2 guys at different instances. He also asked them to repeat what they had said, so they did but he still didn’t understand and he had a facial expression to match totally spaced out looking with a wrinkled brow and eyes darting about like goldfish in a small bowl. They of course added this to the list of evidence of deafness. But he just didn’t understand their dialect, so he would ask others to explain too scared to ask again because he thought they would shout if he asked too much, of course they would shout, they thought he was deaf!
He was a bit nervous at the best of times anyway, he got a bit of spray splashed onto his face when climbing the foremast and he thought the ship was sinking! The sun was shining and the weather was beautiful he just got a few drops of spray on his cheek, but it was enough for him to get a panic attack and he wrapped himself arms and legs around the mast and called for help on the radio, but he had the receiver volume turned down so he didn’t hear the bridge calling him back and asking what he needed help with, this time the old man witnessed the event and heard the previous damning evidence. So the mate had to go up and get him down from the mast, when he got there he started shouting at the small figure clinging to the mast (because he believed him to be deaf) the sailor of course figured he was getting a bollocking so he said nothing of course! He was hauled down like a sack of spuds, then he started bawling crying out of the shame of being manhandled in front of the whole ships compliment.
When I tried to prove that his hearing was ok, it was already too late, his detractors had already made his supposed deafness a reality. Maybe he should put in a claim for a hearing aid? What?
The English language section of my shore pass from my “run up the road” in St. Petersburg yesterday. If you think that airport security is tough or has gotten tougher in the last few years, think again, the security in St. Petersburg was almost intolerably hard. To get out of the port installation there were two checkpoints, the first one had 5 guards they checked the ID papers, which had to match up with the paper which they had received from immigration. OK. Then there was a second control checkpoint with about 15 guards some armed, this was an immigration control who checked ID again and you then got the above shore pass. There was about 3 kilometers between each checkpoint, enough time for you to forge a new ID and escape unnoticed? nah, forget about it, unless you are an expert in Russian which is all anybody speaks. Russian is not only a foreign tongue, they have a completely different alphabet called “Cyrillic”, some letters may resemble the Latin alphabet but they mean something completely different here “B” means “V” and “C” means “S”, and then they have there own shapes too upside down v’s and back to front k’s and a few more thrown in for good measure.
All very straightforward? Enter Tim the sailor from Erin’s green shores, with my dark green Irish seaman’s discharge book, which may sound like something strange but it’s just a record or log book if you will of my time on various ships. On the front cover is a golden harp, and when you open it up it plays “When Irish eyes are smiling” ……OK it doesn’t play any music, but it’s fairly obviously Irish.
Checkpoint 1. Enter building 10:05 CET. Book taken by guard 1, everything seems to be in order but no, wait, hould on a feckin’ minute Patrick, one letter on my book does not correspond with the immigration papers. Guard 2 takes book, looks at me, looks at book, looks at photo in book (me from 1990, the book goes out of date when its full, a few pages left in mine) photo vaguely corresponds, and is in monochrome, stamp from immigration corresponds, same name, correct ship name only one flaw the serial number is one letter from perfection. I do believe I have entered the twilight zone. Are they being serious or is this some kind of humour I don’t get? Guard 2 hands book to Guard 3 who I don’t see, he is making a phonecall to Moscow or to somewhere important. Time now 10:40. It’s looking like Tim will have to go back to the ship, but salvation in the form of the young surveyor who speaks English appears, he takes the book and paper and drives to the immigration people who happen to be on a ship nearby. At 11:05 book and paper arrive back, and Guard 1 checks the details again, the thought crosses my mind is he taking the piss or does he have a very short attention span, anyway 10 minutes later I get passed the first checkpoint.
Phew! Checkpoint 2 is easy enough, I don’t know if any communication has taken place between checkpoints 1 & 2 but all goes well and I receive my shore pass, part of which is seen above. The pass is from the old days of the CCCP and has been through many greasy fingers over the years, many sailors have had it in their possession for a short period of time and it has remained in use. There was a serial number on the pass so there is probably a record of all the sailors that have used this pass somewhere. Penalty for loss of pass 1 rouble, which doesn’t amount to much these days about $ 0.04 so I was very tempted to lose it just to see what would happen, but I did not fall for my fleeting temptation, as it was not known what the Russian bit said, and they probably would not appreciate my sense of humour. I got back through the checkpoints without hassle, although the formality was at the same level, nearly no recognition, although I got a grin from Guard 1 and he mentioned Irlandia as he checked me back through.
Further notes on my shore leave to come, keep tuned to this page!
They say that knowledge is power, whoever they are. To be in possession of a piece of information that others may not know you have can be interesting, but may put you in a dilemma also. What to do with the knowledge. I’ll try to give an example of what I’m on about.
The shipping business is multinational and with that comes a load of different languages, the assumption is that everyone speaks English and this is fairly true but not entirely, on normal weekdays during normal office hours you get good service in English, after that in France, Germany, Russia (the list goes on but we can start it there) your chances of getting good English go down from about 85% to 10% depending on how late it is and how close to closing time on Saturday night. Thats just the way it is.
Now if I was in France for example and your man on the jetty is giving plenty of shoulder shrugs and Quoi? and Je ne c’est pas do you break out the school French ? NO, bad idea, don’t do it, if he thinks you understand French then he is never going to speak a word of his less than perfect English to you again, be prepared for a barrage of French and you will be mystified at the end.
On one occasion in France when I was a first trip third mate I overheard and made out from the surveyor and the agent in their conversation that they were casting doubts on the marital relations of the old mans parents on the date of his birth, this was interesting, how far do I let them go before I ask them something in French with a glint in my eye. I chucked out a trés drole and gave a laugh, the blood left their faces, until I told them il ne comprend la francais ( he doesn’t understand French) , they chuckled nervously, not knowing what to say or think, the old man who was a half Yorkshire, half Danish person was a complete bastard (but that’s another story. )
The old man who at this stage had noticed there was something going on said in a loud voice “wot are them French bastads sayin´ bout me?”
My turn to go pale. He might have looked stupid but I was the one feeling like an eejit. Should have kept my trap closed.
Be my guest and leave a comment if you like!
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