12 October 2020
Welcome to a new edition of FRIENDS. Today we have contributions from David, Mandy, Eric and Jenny.
Welcome to a new edition of FRIENDS. Today we have contributions from David, Mandy, Eric and Jenny.
..............................................................
David’s Anecdotes No.5.
More About My A30.
Having bought a 7 year old Austin A30, with an alleged 49,000 miles on the clock, from a second hand car dealer I knew it would need a bit of tlc. Bright and early on a Saturday morning I decided to drain the gear box oil, run flushing oil through it and refill with new oil.
Undid the drain plug and emptied the oil. The work was going like a dream. Inside the car removed the rubber plug in the carpet to reveal the filler plug for the gear box. Rummaged in my limited tools for suitable spanner and eventually found one that should do the job. Oh oh spanner not quite right so tried again. Finally got what seemed like a good grip on the filler plug which did not want to move. Hmm how frustrating was that? No oil in the gear box and unable to get the filler plug undone. After spending the best part of the morning I finally succeeded in getting the offending nut undone. By this time I decided that perhaps it might be more sensible to give the flushing oil a miss and just refill the gear box. Job done.
Some time later I thought to change the engine oil and fit a newly purchased oil filter. I had learnt my lesson with the gear box so set about first changing the oil filter which just screwed into the engine block. Needless to say I could not get the old filter to budge. In the end I had to take the car to garage, from whom I had bought the oil filter, for them to do the job. After that I have to admit I rather lost interest in trying to do my own motor maintenance.
A few months later with car seeming to use more oil than petrol I went the whole hog and had the car fitted with a reconditioned engine, gear box and clutch. It was after this that I had my little adventure to Brighton mentioned in Anecdote No.3. But after that I now had a trouble free car.
Or did I? More next time.
.....................................................................................................................................................................................
More About My A30.
Having bought a 7 year old Austin A30, with an alleged 49,000 miles on the clock, from a second hand car dealer I knew it would need a bit of tlc. Bright and early on a Saturday morning I decided to drain the gear box oil, run flushing oil through it and refill with new oil.
Undid the drain plug and emptied the oil. The work was going like a dream. Inside the car removed the rubber plug in the carpet to reveal the filler plug for the gear box. Rummaged in my limited tools for suitable spanner and eventually found one that should do the job. Oh oh spanner not quite right so tried again. Finally got what seemed like a good grip on the filler plug which did not want to move. Hmm how frustrating was that? No oil in the gear box and unable to get the filler plug undone. After spending the best part of the morning I finally succeeded in getting the offending nut undone. By this time I decided that perhaps it might be more sensible to give the flushing oil a miss and just refill the gear box. Job done.
Some time later I thought to change the engine oil and fit a newly purchased oil filter. I had learnt my lesson with the gear box so set about first changing the oil filter which just screwed into the engine block. Needless to say I could not get the old filter to budge. In the end I had to take the car to garage, from whom I had bought the oil filter, for them to do the job. After that I have to admit I rather lost interest in trying to do my own motor maintenance.
A few months later with car seeming to use more oil than petrol I went the whole hog and had the car fitted with a reconditioned engine, gear box and clutch. It was after this that I had my little adventure to Brighton mentioned in Anecdote No.3. But after that I now had a trouble free car.
Or did I? More next time.
.....................................................................................................................................................................................
Mandy Borelli
Another example of her art from Mandy plus some wisdom and fun.
Contact details are,
mandygata@hotmail.com
Another example of her art from Mandy plus some wisdom and fun.
Contact details are,
mandygata@hotmail.com
........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
Eric Fuller
Here’s a true story.
Back in the mid seventies I was in a band signed to Polydor Records. Our singer was one Felicity Buirski (pic below).
We were in Polydors studio cutting tracks for an upcoming album. One evening the president of the company came in the studio and invited us to go up to his office. We were elated and he offered champagne to us. He said “this year Polydor is putting its whole backing behind just one act. “ I remember thinking “wow, this is it, we are going to be huge”.
The president went over to the turntable. And placed the needle on the disc. By this time we are all grinning with anticipation.
And he said Pat Travers. Boom boom out went our lights.
Here’s a true story.
Back in the mid seventies I was in a band signed to Polydor Records. Our singer was one Felicity Buirski (pic below).
We were in Polydors studio cutting tracks for an upcoming album. One evening the president of the company came in the studio and invited us to go up to his office. We were elated and he offered champagne to us. He said “this year Polydor is putting its whole backing behind just one act. “ I remember thinking “wow, this is it, we are going to be huge”.
The president went over to the turntable. And placed the needle on the disc. By this time we are all grinning with anticipation.
And he said Pat Travers. Boom boom out went our lights.
.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
JENNY MORRISON
A work in progress and art displayed by Jenny.
For Pop Up shop - info@fineartamerica.com
JENNY ANNE MORRISON - ARTIST
Visit my website to see paintings
http://www.jennyannemorrison.com
For enquiries and to arrange a private view at the Gallery call:- LANDLINE : 96 558 7711. MOBILE :- 694 412 409
A work in progress and art displayed by Jenny.
For Pop Up shop - info@fineartamerica.com
JENNY ANNE MORRISON - ARTIST
Visit my website to see paintings
http://www.jennyannemorrison.com
For enquiries and to arrange a private view at the Gallery call:- LANDLINE : 96 558 7711. MOBILE :- 694 412 409
........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
9 September 2020
Welcome to our FRIENDS page with contributions from Lucinda, David, Mandy and Tim.
Welcome to our FRIENDS page with contributions from Lucinda, David, Mandy and Tim.
News From Lucinda
Firstly I have reduced the price of the 5th Amie book Amie: Savage Safari and it is on special for $/£0.99.
Amie, the world’s most reluctant spy is back.
Amie is assured that her next assignment will be easy and very safe.
How could a safari camp in the African bush along with the President and international representatives from several countries possibly be dangerous?
She has no choice but to do as they say.
Simon, her partner, has flown back to England for a brief meeting and then disappears. Amie has no idea where he is.
But not everyone is pleased about the rare and precious minerals discovered in the north and they are prepared to do whatever it takes to disrupt the safari and stop the auction even if it causes an international incident and people are killed.
Amie now has two lives to save and faces a bleak future on her own.
Fans of Wilbur Smith, Peter Rimmer and Tony Park will love this series by award winning author Lucinda E Clarke set in the modern day in the African bush.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07NCDKF8P
I'm also launching the 3rd in my series of psychological thrillers continuing the sage of the Brand family. "A Year in the Life of Deidre Flynn" will be out on Saturday.
Deidre is determined to protect her adopted niece Leah, but despite fleeing the country, the menacing threats continue. They believe their enemies can't reach them now, so who is behind the life-threatening attacks? The incidents escalate, each more horrifying than the last. How can they fight back when they don't know who the enemy is and they have no idea what they want?
A fast-moving, page-turning, psychological thriller that will leave you breathless, as once again, Leah is the victim of a cruel conspiracy that lurks in the shadows. A gripping thriller for fans of Louise Jensen, Avery Bishop and Claire McGowan.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08GZNCVWL
https://lucindaeclarkeauthor.com
....................................................................................................................................................................................
Firstly I have reduced the price of the 5th Amie book Amie: Savage Safari and it is on special for $/£0.99.
Amie, the world’s most reluctant spy is back.
Amie is assured that her next assignment will be easy and very safe.
How could a safari camp in the African bush along with the President and international representatives from several countries possibly be dangerous?
She has no choice but to do as they say.
Simon, her partner, has flown back to England for a brief meeting and then disappears. Amie has no idea where he is.
But not everyone is pleased about the rare and precious minerals discovered in the north and they are prepared to do whatever it takes to disrupt the safari and stop the auction even if it causes an international incident and people are killed.
Amie now has two lives to save and faces a bleak future on her own.
Fans of Wilbur Smith, Peter Rimmer and Tony Park will love this series by award winning author Lucinda E Clarke set in the modern day in the African bush.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07NCDKF8P
I'm also launching the 3rd in my series of psychological thrillers continuing the sage of the Brand family. "A Year in the Life of Deidre Flynn" will be out on Saturday.
Deidre is determined to protect her adopted niece Leah, but despite fleeing the country, the menacing threats continue. They believe their enemies can't reach them now, so who is behind the life-threatening attacks? The incidents escalate, each more horrifying than the last. How can they fight back when they don't know who the enemy is and they have no idea what they want?
A fast-moving, page-turning, psychological thriller that will leave you breathless, as once again, Leah is the victim of a cruel conspiracy that lurks in the shadows. A gripping thriller for fans of Louise Jensen, Avery Bishop and Claire McGowan.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08GZNCVWL
https://lucindaeclarkeauthor.com
....................................................................................................................................................................................
David’s Anecdotes No.4.
´I May Be A Dreamer But I´m Not The Only One`
I don’t know about you but I dream a lot, which is not bad going for someone who is an insomniac. Not to get a full night’s unbroken sleep is to say the least not nice. What makes matters worse is that on various occasions I have been dreaming that I am awake.
Sometimes whole dreams get repeated over a period of time. As a small child I had the recurring dream of being bombarded by giant mud balls against which my only defence was to try and pop them with a needle. I would wake up feeling absolutely terrified. I once dreamt that I was laying in bed on my back when a spear fell directly from the ceiling above me into my stomach. It was a long time before I ever went to sleep laying on my back.
I have lost count of the number of dreams in which I am under considerable stress and pressure. These dreams very often involve packing luggage, trying to get to or from a particular flight and of course doing everything in slow motion. I have dreamt numerous times about flying and piloting an aircraft or having flying lessons. I once dreamt I was driving an out of control double decker bus from the upper deck. Driving a car with a dead body in the boot was also a rather unnerving dream especially as I didn’t know whether I was a murderer.
Aged about 8 or 9 I dreamt that I was at the local swimming baths. If I had the dream today I suppose I would be at the local swimming pool but I digress. There I am laying on my stomach on the edge of the pool when I slide myself forward like a crocodile and swim off. In real time a couple of weeks later I was at the baths. My friends, who could all swim, suggested that we have been there long enough and should leave. As I was about to get out of the pool I made one last attempt at trying to swim and promptly swam the width of the pool. Needless to say we all stayed for quite some time.
I applied for a job in the dock office of a small coastal shipping company. My interview was held at their offices in Leadenhall Street in the City of London. A week later, having got the job, I started work in the London Dock. I walked into the office for the first time and had an instant deja vu experience. Every thing about the office was familiar to me and I could not shake off the feeling that I had been there before. With in seconds I decided that this job was not for me and left after two weeks.
I am writing this late at night and feeling rather drowsy so I wonder am I really writing or is it a dream?
....................................................................................................................................................................................
´I May Be A Dreamer But I´m Not The Only One`
I don’t know about you but I dream a lot, which is not bad going for someone who is an insomniac. Not to get a full night’s unbroken sleep is to say the least not nice. What makes matters worse is that on various occasions I have been dreaming that I am awake.
Sometimes whole dreams get repeated over a period of time. As a small child I had the recurring dream of being bombarded by giant mud balls against which my only defence was to try and pop them with a needle. I would wake up feeling absolutely terrified. I once dreamt that I was laying in bed on my back when a spear fell directly from the ceiling above me into my stomach. It was a long time before I ever went to sleep laying on my back.
I have lost count of the number of dreams in which I am under considerable stress and pressure. These dreams very often involve packing luggage, trying to get to or from a particular flight and of course doing everything in slow motion. I have dreamt numerous times about flying and piloting an aircraft or having flying lessons. I once dreamt I was driving an out of control double decker bus from the upper deck. Driving a car with a dead body in the boot was also a rather unnerving dream especially as I didn’t know whether I was a murderer.
Aged about 8 or 9 I dreamt that I was at the local swimming baths. If I had the dream today I suppose I would be at the local swimming pool but I digress. There I am laying on my stomach on the edge of the pool when I slide myself forward like a crocodile and swim off. In real time a couple of weeks later I was at the baths. My friends, who could all swim, suggested that we have been there long enough and should leave. As I was about to get out of the pool I made one last attempt at trying to swim and promptly swam the width of the pool. Needless to say we all stayed for quite some time.
I applied for a job in the dock office of a small coastal shipping company. My interview was held at their offices in Leadenhall Street in the City of London. A week later, having got the job, I started work in the London Dock. I walked into the office for the first time and had an instant deja vu experience. Every thing about the office was familiar to me and I could not shake off the feeling that I had been there before. With in seconds I decided that this job was not for me and left after two weeks.
I am writing this late at night and feeling rather drowsy so I wonder am I really writing or is it a dream?
....................................................................................................................................................................................
Mandy Borelli
More beautiful art by our friend Mandy. She has come along way over the past few years and I believe that her art is destined to be appreciated by a wide audience across the world. These are her contact details, passed them on to your friends.
Contact details are,
mandygata@hotmail.com
Also from Mandy are three pearls of wisdom. Enjoy.
More beautiful art by our friend Mandy. She has come along way over the past few years and I believe that her art is destined to be appreciated by a wide audience across the world. These are her contact details, passed them on to your friends.
Contact details are,
mandygata@hotmail.com
Also from Mandy are three pearls of wisdom. Enjoy.
.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
Captain Tim Reports
Cuba Missile Crisis
Novel Ship Design
In October 1962, the ship I served on, the “Clan Macnab”, unwittingly became involved in the Cuba Missile Crisis. Clan Line were pioneers in building some of the first British ships to have four hatches forward and one hatch aft of the bridge, accommodation block and engine room. The main benefit was that the distance from the engine to the propeller was shortened, so the prop shaft was much shorter. Also, in the old-fashioned ships with a centre castle bridge, engine room and accommodation block, with three hatches forward and two hatches aft of the engine room, the tail shaft tunnel passed through both No. 4 and No. 5 hatches, which meant loss of cargo carrying space. Also, loss of a flat bottom lower hold due to the prop shaft tunnel meant it was more difficult to stow general cargo in No 4. hold. The new design with four hatches forward and one hatch aft was much easier for loading and had more cargo space, hence greater revenue potential.
It also meant that there was more weight of the ship further aft, so this was compensated with “deep tanks” at the bottom of No. 1 hold, where the bow of the ship came to a point and where the lower hold at the turn of the bow to the keel was very narrow. This was another part of the ship that was difficult to load with general cargo so the four hatches forward and deep tank at No 1 killed two cargo loading problems with one design! The deep tanks had a fore and aft central partition giving a port tank and a starboard tank. This helped to minimise the “free surface effect” that affects ship stability. The tanks were useful for carrying consignments of liquid cargo, or for stowing “wet hides and skins” often carried to Italy from South Africa for the shoe-making trade. The skins were pickled and stank!
If there was no cargo to load in the deep tanks, or if the ship was “in ballast”, the deep tank lid could be secured with a thick rubber gasket to make it water-tight and then filled to the top “pressed up” with fresh water. This extra weight at the bow would help to bring the ship trimmed onto a more level keel if there was no cargo on board, which gave better fuel consumption efficiency.
I had already sailed for one voyage on the “Clan Macnab” to India and this was my second voyage, but with a different captain. After three weeks leave, I re-joined the ship in Liverpool on Monday 12th November 1962. When I arrived back on board I was thrilled to find two friends and colleagues from the Warsash School of Navigation, University of Southampton, pre-sea training were also appointed as cadets for the voyage; Barry Gates, who had been the Junior Leading Cadet in charge of the cabin I was in during my Junior term, and Alan Stewart. The fourth cadet, Bill Boreham was new to me, but turned out to be an exceptionally good artist and cartoonist with a wicked sense of humour.
The other reason I was thrilled was because the ship had been chartered to an American company. We were off to the U.S. of A, which was extremely exciting, especially for a seventeen-year-old with three shipmates of roughly the same age in the early 1960’s. We joined the ship two days before we were due to sail for New York, so we had two nights to enjoy the night-life entertainment of Liverpool. Barry had seen a show on TV in October about a venue called “The Cavern Club” with a group called “The Beatles”. He thought they were great, so we decided to go there. Unfortunately, “The Beatles” were not playing that night, but during “whisky time” for the live band, they played some Beatle’s music recorded at the club, and a recently released record of the group called “Love me Do”!
“What do you think?” asked Barry as we walked back to the ship. The opinion was that the live band were good, but the group called the Beatles sounded great. We determined to follow their fortunes when we got back to the UK.
New York
Two days later we were crossing the North Atlantic in early winter, bound for New York. With only ballast water in No. 1 deep tank, the ship was very “light” and being tossed about like a cork. Luckily for me I don’t get seasick, but the constant rolling and pitching of a big ship in a heavy sea makes me get short-tempered! It took ten days to get to New York, by which time I was not good company. People kept out of my way.
My mood was not improved by the Chief Officer arranging for the deep tanks to be pumped out and giving the cadets the job of opening up the bolted deep tank lid, removing the lid and cleaning out and drying the tanks. After completing that task, and just when I thought things could not get any worse, the Chief Officer decided that as the ship was now completely light and the bow was much further out of the water than usual, it was a great opportunity to chip and paint with red lead the area round the bow, cut in the red “boot topping” of the wind and water plates, and paint the draught marks on the bow. To be fair to him, he had probably never been to New York in late October before, but he should have realised that it was BLOODY COLD and except for the marks we could reach from the work-boat, for the higher (deeper) marks we could not reach, we were dangling on bosun’s chairs and being “bowsed in” by a bowsing line rigged around the bow from one side of the foredeck to the other.
Although we were wrapped up like “Michelin” men, it was fr-ee-ee-ee-ee-zing. To add further insult to injury, when it came time to take “smoko” or break for lunch, the only way off the job was to slacken away on the bowsing line, so that you were hanging directly under the flair of the bow, like a circus trapeze artist; but without a safety net! All there was below was the icy waters of the dock where we were berthed. Then, with frozen fingers and hands, we had to lower ourselves on the bosun’s chair down to the workboat or climb a pilot ladder that was rigged from the deck above. Either direction was fraught with danger as the ropes were as frozen and solid as we were. Once you made it to the workboat you then had to manoeuvre the boat to the ladder up the side of the wharf and climb up the frozen metal ladder. Ugh!!
Clan Line did not normally trade with the USA or visit American ports. We weren’t going to let freezing day-work stop us from enjoying the only USA visit we would get on a Clan Line ship. We convinced the Immigration officials that we, and our immediate family members, were not card-carrying Communists, so were allowed ashore. We managed to get soft drinks at the Waldorf Astoria (as we were all under 21 years old, alcohol was not allowed) and go to the top of the Empire State Building.
Cargo Loading in New York
If valuable cargo was being loaded, we sometimes had to act as “watchmen” in the holds. As Barry and Alan were senior to me, they had the more important jobs like tallying in bullion or cases of liquor. I just had to sit on the cases in the hold and make sure that there was no funny business going on. It was cold work as there was basically nothing worth stealing or interfering with in hatch no. 2. Barry was in No 3. Hatch, Alan in No. 4 and Bill in No. 5. About 11 o’clock A man appeared framed in the hatch opening above us and shouted, “Company Christmas drink coming down!” and a few bottles were lowered down into the hold where the longshoremen were working. The men opened the bottles and helped themselves to a generous swig, then said “Happy Christmas!”, to each other and the world in general. “What’s going on”, I asked. “Well, at this time every year the company supply some bottles of Whiskey for the men to wish them “Merry Christmas”, and to warm them up, since it is very cold”.
“Wow, that’s really good of them!”, I said.
He took a swig, wiped the top of the bottle, wished me “Merry Christmas” and proffered the bottle to me. I had never drunk Whiskey, or even Whisky, before so I accepted this kind gesture took a healthy swig, which nearly started me coughing and my eyes watering, gave him back the bottle and wished him “Merry Christmas”. I felt a lot warmer and sat happily watching what was going on thinking about approaching lunchtime, the stevedoring company’s generosity, and man’s humanity towards his fellow man. Mahatma Ghandi counselled “You should not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops become dirty, the ocean does not become dirty”.
Always the optimist, especially at Christmas time, I sat pondering the wonderful kindly world in which we live. My hunger got the better of me. It was time to stop work for the lunch hour, cover the hatch and see if the bandari in the crew’s galley will make a chapati for me. When I got there, Barry was already waiting for his chapati, the smell of which, mixed with the spices of the galley and the ghee, made me even hungrier. “How’s it been?”, asked Barry. “Oh, alright, bit boring. What about you?”. “OK, I was tallying Bourbon into the locker and they landed a case that broke one of the bottles. When I was taking notes for the Damaged Cargo book, the other eleven bottles somehow disappeared. I don’t know where they went.” Oh, dear, Tim, how naïve you are. It was only my 5th voyage, and I’d never been to the USA before, but I had gained another reminder of the realities of life.
Once or twice we went ashore with the Chief Engineer. He was Irish and about six foot four, built like the side of a barn; nickname “Tiny” (of course). He was a gentle giant and had a very distinctive walk, slightly stooped and leaning to one side. We noted that when we went ashore with him in Brooklyn, where the ship was berthed, we got brilliant service from everybody and deference from waiters and waitresses, taxi drivers and even people in the street.
The ship was bareboat chartered to an American Company (A. H. Bull, the Bull Lines of New York) carrying mainly oil rig equipment and huge American built limousines from Texas to the Arabian Gulf. The ship’s agent and his colleagues that came aboard all looked like gangsters to us, and we could hardly understand a thing they said.
We completed loading in New York and were preparing to sail to the next loading port, Philadelphia, when someone happened to mention to the agent how friendly everybody was when we all went ashore together. “I’m not surprised,” he said, “Your Chief Engineer is a carbon copy of the local Mafia boss. He even walks like him!!” No wonder we received a warm welcome everywhere.
In Philadelphia we went to look at the “Liberty Bell” and wrote something banal in the Visitor’s Book, and then the ship proceeded on its way to Miami and New Orleans.
Cuba Missile Crisis
I found Miami a bit disappointing, but looked forward to our next port, New Orleans. As we navigated round the State of Florida and the Florida Keys one sunny afternoon on the 12 to 4 watch and set course for the mouth of the great Mississippi River, suddenly all hell broke loose around the ship. A large US navy ship on the horizon started signalling with a daylight signalling lamp the single letter “dot dot dash” (U) which means “you are standing into danger” and then “dot dot dot dot, dot dash dash dot” (HP) which meant “submarines are exercising in your area”. We had to rush for the International Code of Signals book to find out what “HP” meant, but we needn’t have bothered as a few minutes later a submarine surfaced on our port side only about half a nautical mile away, on a parallel course in the same direction. A destroyer appeared almost out of nowhere heading for us at full speed and a jet fighter flew low screaming overhead.
The 2nd Officer, with whom I was on duty at the time, was in shock and decided that a fighter aeroplane’s low level “buzzing” action meant it was going to ditch in the sea. He was about to call all hands to emergency stations when the Captain arrived on the bridge and calmly took control.
Clan Macnab Russian Cuban Missile Ship
“Cadet take the biggest red ensign we’ve got and hoist it at the stern; the problem is the Yanks think we’re Russian”.
The new generation of Russian cargo ships had four hatches forward and one aft, like us. The Russians had a black hull with red boot topping, so did we. The Russians had a big heavy lift derrick at the main mast, so did we. The Russian’s funnel had a red band with a yellow hammer and sickle, our funnel had two red bands around it, remarkably similar. Even the ensign that I hoisted at our stern was similar. Theirs was the same red, with a golden coloured hammer and sickle at the top to the mast and ours was the Red Ensign, with the Union flag in the top corner to the mast.
Russian ships carrying missiles on deck had been sailing into the Gulf of Mexico on the same course as we were now taking since mid-1962. They came from the same direction as us. The US Air Force and 6th Fleet operated throughout the area monitoring what was going on. There were frigates and destroyers heading straight for us, planes buzzing us at low altitude and a submarine surfacing close to our ship. After a while, a slower reconnaissance plane buzzed us from right ahead flashing its landing lights and waggling its wings to indicate that it recognised our ship as friendly.
Having been through the 2nd World War the Captain knew that this was a recognition signal. The 2nd Mate relaxed and regained his composure.
On October 22nd, 1962, President John F. Kennedy had ordered a naval “quarantine” of Cuba. By using the word “quarantine” it legally distinguished the action from a blockade, which would have assumed a state of war existed between the USA and the USSR. The situation between the two superpowers was tense until October 28th, when Nikita Khrushchev issued a public statement that Soviet missiles would be dismantled and removed from Cuba.
The crisis was over, but the naval quarantine continued until the Russians agreed to remove their bombers and missiles from Cuba. Towards the end of November 1962, the United States ended its quarantine. The “Clan Macnab” had just sailed into the tail-end of a historical event. Little did I know then that the fate to be in the wrong place at the wrong time (or the right place at the right time, whichever way you look at it) would stay with me throughout the rest of my seagoing career.
....................................................................................................................................................................................
Cuba Missile Crisis
Novel Ship Design
In October 1962, the ship I served on, the “Clan Macnab”, unwittingly became involved in the Cuba Missile Crisis. Clan Line were pioneers in building some of the first British ships to have four hatches forward and one hatch aft of the bridge, accommodation block and engine room. The main benefit was that the distance from the engine to the propeller was shortened, so the prop shaft was much shorter. Also, in the old-fashioned ships with a centre castle bridge, engine room and accommodation block, with three hatches forward and two hatches aft of the engine room, the tail shaft tunnel passed through both No. 4 and No. 5 hatches, which meant loss of cargo carrying space. Also, loss of a flat bottom lower hold due to the prop shaft tunnel meant it was more difficult to stow general cargo in No 4. hold. The new design with four hatches forward and one hatch aft was much easier for loading and had more cargo space, hence greater revenue potential.
It also meant that there was more weight of the ship further aft, so this was compensated with “deep tanks” at the bottom of No. 1 hold, where the bow of the ship came to a point and where the lower hold at the turn of the bow to the keel was very narrow. This was another part of the ship that was difficult to load with general cargo so the four hatches forward and deep tank at No 1 killed two cargo loading problems with one design! The deep tanks had a fore and aft central partition giving a port tank and a starboard tank. This helped to minimise the “free surface effect” that affects ship stability. The tanks were useful for carrying consignments of liquid cargo, or for stowing “wet hides and skins” often carried to Italy from South Africa for the shoe-making trade. The skins were pickled and stank!
If there was no cargo to load in the deep tanks, or if the ship was “in ballast”, the deep tank lid could be secured with a thick rubber gasket to make it water-tight and then filled to the top “pressed up” with fresh water. This extra weight at the bow would help to bring the ship trimmed onto a more level keel if there was no cargo on board, which gave better fuel consumption efficiency.
I had already sailed for one voyage on the “Clan Macnab” to India and this was my second voyage, but with a different captain. After three weeks leave, I re-joined the ship in Liverpool on Monday 12th November 1962. When I arrived back on board I was thrilled to find two friends and colleagues from the Warsash School of Navigation, University of Southampton, pre-sea training were also appointed as cadets for the voyage; Barry Gates, who had been the Junior Leading Cadet in charge of the cabin I was in during my Junior term, and Alan Stewart. The fourth cadet, Bill Boreham was new to me, but turned out to be an exceptionally good artist and cartoonist with a wicked sense of humour.
The other reason I was thrilled was because the ship had been chartered to an American company. We were off to the U.S. of A, which was extremely exciting, especially for a seventeen-year-old with three shipmates of roughly the same age in the early 1960’s. We joined the ship two days before we were due to sail for New York, so we had two nights to enjoy the night-life entertainment of Liverpool. Barry had seen a show on TV in October about a venue called “The Cavern Club” with a group called “The Beatles”. He thought they were great, so we decided to go there. Unfortunately, “The Beatles” were not playing that night, but during “whisky time” for the live band, they played some Beatle’s music recorded at the club, and a recently released record of the group called “Love me Do”!
“What do you think?” asked Barry as we walked back to the ship. The opinion was that the live band were good, but the group called the Beatles sounded great. We determined to follow their fortunes when we got back to the UK.
New York
Two days later we were crossing the North Atlantic in early winter, bound for New York. With only ballast water in No. 1 deep tank, the ship was very “light” and being tossed about like a cork. Luckily for me I don’t get seasick, but the constant rolling and pitching of a big ship in a heavy sea makes me get short-tempered! It took ten days to get to New York, by which time I was not good company. People kept out of my way.
My mood was not improved by the Chief Officer arranging for the deep tanks to be pumped out and giving the cadets the job of opening up the bolted deep tank lid, removing the lid and cleaning out and drying the tanks. After completing that task, and just when I thought things could not get any worse, the Chief Officer decided that as the ship was now completely light and the bow was much further out of the water than usual, it was a great opportunity to chip and paint with red lead the area round the bow, cut in the red “boot topping” of the wind and water plates, and paint the draught marks on the bow. To be fair to him, he had probably never been to New York in late October before, but he should have realised that it was BLOODY COLD and except for the marks we could reach from the work-boat, for the higher (deeper) marks we could not reach, we were dangling on bosun’s chairs and being “bowsed in” by a bowsing line rigged around the bow from one side of the foredeck to the other.
Although we were wrapped up like “Michelin” men, it was fr-ee-ee-ee-ee-zing. To add further insult to injury, when it came time to take “smoko” or break for lunch, the only way off the job was to slacken away on the bowsing line, so that you were hanging directly under the flair of the bow, like a circus trapeze artist; but without a safety net! All there was below was the icy waters of the dock where we were berthed. Then, with frozen fingers and hands, we had to lower ourselves on the bosun’s chair down to the workboat or climb a pilot ladder that was rigged from the deck above. Either direction was fraught with danger as the ropes were as frozen and solid as we were. Once you made it to the workboat you then had to manoeuvre the boat to the ladder up the side of the wharf and climb up the frozen metal ladder. Ugh!!
Clan Line did not normally trade with the USA or visit American ports. We weren’t going to let freezing day-work stop us from enjoying the only USA visit we would get on a Clan Line ship. We convinced the Immigration officials that we, and our immediate family members, were not card-carrying Communists, so were allowed ashore. We managed to get soft drinks at the Waldorf Astoria (as we were all under 21 years old, alcohol was not allowed) and go to the top of the Empire State Building.
Cargo Loading in New York
If valuable cargo was being loaded, we sometimes had to act as “watchmen” in the holds. As Barry and Alan were senior to me, they had the more important jobs like tallying in bullion or cases of liquor. I just had to sit on the cases in the hold and make sure that there was no funny business going on. It was cold work as there was basically nothing worth stealing or interfering with in hatch no. 2. Barry was in No 3. Hatch, Alan in No. 4 and Bill in No. 5. About 11 o’clock A man appeared framed in the hatch opening above us and shouted, “Company Christmas drink coming down!” and a few bottles were lowered down into the hold where the longshoremen were working. The men opened the bottles and helped themselves to a generous swig, then said “Happy Christmas!”, to each other and the world in general. “What’s going on”, I asked. “Well, at this time every year the company supply some bottles of Whiskey for the men to wish them “Merry Christmas”, and to warm them up, since it is very cold”.
“Wow, that’s really good of them!”, I said.
He took a swig, wiped the top of the bottle, wished me “Merry Christmas” and proffered the bottle to me. I had never drunk Whiskey, or even Whisky, before so I accepted this kind gesture took a healthy swig, which nearly started me coughing and my eyes watering, gave him back the bottle and wished him “Merry Christmas”. I felt a lot warmer and sat happily watching what was going on thinking about approaching lunchtime, the stevedoring company’s generosity, and man’s humanity towards his fellow man. Mahatma Ghandi counselled “You should not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops become dirty, the ocean does not become dirty”.
Always the optimist, especially at Christmas time, I sat pondering the wonderful kindly world in which we live. My hunger got the better of me. It was time to stop work for the lunch hour, cover the hatch and see if the bandari in the crew’s galley will make a chapati for me. When I got there, Barry was already waiting for his chapati, the smell of which, mixed with the spices of the galley and the ghee, made me even hungrier. “How’s it been?”, asked Barry. “Oh, alright, bit boring. What about you?”. “OK, I was tallying Bourbon into the locker and they landed a case that broke one of the bottles. When I was taking notes for the Damaged Cargo book, the other eleven bottles somehow disappeared. I don’t know where they went.” Oh, dear, Tim, how naïve you are. It was only my 5th voyage, and I’d never been to the USA before, but I had gained another reminder of the realities of life.
Once or twice we went ashore with the Chief Engineer. He was Irish and about six foot four, built like the side of a barn; nickname “Tiny” (of course). He was a gentle giant and had a very distinctive walk, slightly stooped and leaning to one side. We noted that when we went ashore with him in Brooklyn, where the ship was berthed, we got brilliant service from everybody and deference from waiters and waitresses, taxi drivers and even people in the street.
The ship was bareboat chartered to an American Company (A. H. Bull, the Bull Lines of New York) carrying mainly oil rig equipment and huge American built limousines from Texas to the Arabian Gulf. The ship’s agent and his colleagues that came aboard all looked like gangsters to us, and we could hardly understand a thing they said.
We completed loading in New York and were preparing to sail to the next loading port, Philadelphia, when someone happened to mention to the agent how friendly everybody was when we all went ashore together. “I’m not surprised,” he said, “Your Chief Engineer is a carbon copy of the local Mafia boss. He even walks like him!!” No wonder we received a warm welcome everywhere.
In Philadelphia we went to look at the “Liberty Bell” and wrote something banal in the Visitor’s Book, and then the ship proceeded on its way to Miami and New Orleans.
Cuba Missile Crisis
I found Miami a bit disappointing, but looked forward to our next port, New Orleans. As we navigated round the State of Florida and the Florida Keys one sunny afternoon on the 12 to 4 watch and set course for the mouth of the great Mississippi River, suddenly all hell broke loose around the ship. A large US navy ship on the horizon started signalling with a daylight signalling lamp the single letter “dot dot dash” (U) which means “you are standing into danger” and then “dot dot dot dot, dot dash dash dot” (HP) which meant “submarines are exercising in your area”. We had to rush for the International Code of Signals book to find out what “HP” meant, but we needn’t have bothered as a few minutes later a submarine surfaced on our port side only about half a nautical mile away, on a parallel course in the same direction. A destroyer appeared almost out of nowhere heading for us at full speed and a jet fighter flew low screaming overhead.
The 2nd Officer, with whom I was on duty at the time, was in shock and decided that a fighter aeroplane’s low level “buzzing” action meant it was going to ditch in the sea. He was about to call all hands to emergency stations when the Captain arrived on the bridge and calmly took control.
Clan Macnab Russian Cuban Missile Ship
“Cadet take the biggest red ensign we’ve got and hoist it at the stern; the problem is the Yanks think we’re Russian”.
The new generation of Russian cargo ships had four hatches forward and one aft, like us. The Russians had a black hull with red boot topping, so did we. The Russians had a big heavy lift derrick at the main mast, so did we. The Russian’s funnel had a red band with a yellow hammer and sickle, our funnel had two red bands around it, remarkably similar. Even the ensign that I hoisted at our stern was similar. Theirs was the same red, with a golden coloured hammer and sickle at the top to the mast and ours was the Red Ensign, with the Union flag in the top corner to the mast.
Russian ships carrying missiles on deck had been sailing into the Gulf of Mexico on the same course as we were now taking since mid-1962. They came from the same direction as us. The US Air Force and 6th Fleet operated throughout the area monitoring what was going on. There were frigates and destroyers heading straight for us, planes buzzing us at low altitude and a submarine surfacing close to our ship. After a while, a slower reconnaissance plane buzzed us from right ahead flashing its landing lights and waggling its wings to indicate that it recognised our ship as friendly.
Having been through the 2nd World War the Captain knew that this was a recognition signal. The 2nd Mate relaxed and regained his composure.
On October 22nd, 1962, President John F. Kennedy had ordered a naval “quarantine” of Cuba. By using the word “quarantine” it legally distinguished the action from a blockade, which would have assumed a state of war existed between the USA and the USSR. The situation between the two superpowers was tense until October 28th, when Nikita Khrushchev issued a public statement that Soviet missiles would be dismantled and removed from Cuba.
The crisis was over, but the naval quarantine continued until the Russians agreed to remove their bombers and missiles from Cuba. Towards the end of November 1962, the United States ended its quarantine. The “Clan Macnab” had just sailed into the tail-end of a historical event. Little did I know then that the fate to be in the wrong place at the wrong time (or the right place at the right time, whichever way you look at it) would stay with me throughout the rest of my seagoing career.
....................................................................................................................................................................................
15 August 2020.
Welcome to the FRIENDS page with contributions from David, Mandy and Tim.
Welcome to the FRIENDS page with contributions from David, Mandy and Tim.
David’s Anecdotes No.3.
Afternoon Ride.
Mr & Mrs C reminded me of a typical seaside picture postcard couple. He was quite short and diminutive while she was quite large. They were both very good hearted, treated me well and I was going out with their daughter Ann.
Ann’s parents didn’t own a car, even though her father was an underwriter on Lloyds specialising in motor insurance. I thought it might be a nice idea if we all had a trip in my 1955 Austin A30 to Brighton. They liked the idea so early one Saturday afternoon off we went.
On arriving in Brighton we parked on Marine Drive, this was before all the redevelopment and the marina and backed the car so we would be facing the sea.
As I reversed there was an horrible scrunching sound and I realised that the underneath of the boot had scraped across the kerb stone. To a further scrunching sound I gently drove the car forward to get clear of the said offending kerb.
We got out of the car to see what damage had been caused. It all looked good, no obvious signs of any damage so sighs of relief. Just to make sure I had a look underneath. To my horror I saw that petrol was dripping out from a rather bent drain plug on the bottom of the petrol tank. I seem to remember talking to an AA patrol man who said he couldn’t do anything as his shift was ending and I needed to go to a garage. But of course he didn’t have any ideas.
On the out skirts of Brighton we came across a little service station. I pulled in to be told by the owner that he was on the point of closing for the day but in view of the problem he would have a look. He slid under the car saw the damage and said he might be able to help. I had to go the a nearby sweetshop and buy a couple of packets of chewing gum. After several minutes of frantic chewing he took the gum and pressed it in and around the drain plug. Then laying on his back under the car he put a mole wrench round the drain plug straightened his arms. I’m sure he lifted the car off the ground. The weight of the car bent the plug back into hole and the gum sealed it.
In the circumstances we thought to heck with Brighton there has been more than enough excitement for one day so drove back home. It was several weeks before my local garage were able to weld properly a new drain plug. It cost me considerably more than the man in Brighton and through out the whole of that time there were no leaks at all.
Afternoon Ride.
Mr & Mrs C reminded me of a typical seaside picture postcard couple. He was quite short and diminutive while she was quite large. They were both very good hearted, treated me well and I was going out with their daughter Ann.
Ann’s parents didn’t own a car, even though her father was an underwriter on Lloyds specialising in motor insurance. I thought it might be a nice idea if we all had a trip in my 1955 Austin A30 to Brighton. They liked the idea so early one Saturday afternoon off we went.
On arriving in Brighton we parked on Marine Drive, this was before all the redevelopment and the marina and backed the car so we would be facing the sea.
As I reversed there was an horrible scrunching sound and I realised that the underneath of the boot had scraped across the kerb stone. To a further scrunching sound I gently drove the car forward to get clear of the said offending kerb.
We got out of the car to see what damage had been caused. It all looked good, no obvious signs of any damage so sighs of relief. Just to make sure I had a look underneath. To my horror I saw that petrol was dripping out from a rather bent drain plug on the bottom of the petrol tank. I seem to remember talking to an AA patrol man who said he couldn’t do anything as his shift was ending and I needed to go to a garage. But of course he didn’t have any ideas.
On the out skirts of Brighton we came across a little service station. I pulled in to be told by the owner that he was on the point of closing for the day but in view of the problem he would have a look. He slid under the car saw the damage and said he might be able to help. I had to go the a nearby sweetshop and buy a couple of packets of chewing gum. After several minutes of frantic chewing he took the gum and pressed it in and around the drain plug. Then laying on his back under the car he put a mole wrench round the drain plug straightened his arms. I’m sure he lifted the car off the ground. The weight of the car bent the plug back into hole and the gum sealed it.
In the circumstances we thought to heck with Brighton there has been more than enough excitement for one day so drove back home. It was several weeks before my local garage were able to weld properly a new drain plug. It cost me considerably more than the man in Brighton and through out the whole of that time there were no leaks at all.
This is another example of the beautiful art by our friend Mandy Borelli.
Her contact details are,
mandygata@hotmail.com
Her contact details are,
mandygata@hotmail.com
Captain Tim Reports
A Sailor’s life
Isn’t life amazing!
You’re sailing along on relatively calm seas when suddenly there is a storm warning.
COVID 19 ahead.
As Captain what do you do!
There are those who say, “I have one of the most modern, sophisticated, economically powerful world-beating vessels, so we will just keep going and slow steam for a bit to ride out the waves”.
There are others: “Hard a’ starboard! We’ve no sophistication: we’re economically weak, and the vessel is antiquated. We’ll shelter in the lee of common sense and avoid contact with this disastrous tsunami at all costs”.
Luckily my Captain, Manasseh Sogavare, summoned his senior officers and told them to set a course for common sense. “We will anchor there and see what to do”.
“Do not allow anybody to come aboard”
“Order the whole crew to be COVID 19 aware and take precautions”.
“Prepare the HAZMAT suits”
“Stay in your cabin whenever possible”
“COVID 19 OUTBREAK DRILL every three weeks”
What does it say in the Convention on Preventing Collisions? “Any action taken should be positive, in ample time and with due regard for the observance of good seamanship”.
Good for you, Captain Sogavare! Your action was positive, (total national shut down) in ample time (March 2020), regarding good seamanship (prudent protection).
“But Captain, we will run out of food, fuel and money. Our economy and voyage to development will be halted.”
“There are ships from the People’s Republic of China and Australia on the horizon. Send out “MAYDAY” and ask for assistance.
I find myself confined to my cabin.
I don’t have to be, as the good ship “Solomon Islands” has anchored safely in the lee of common sense and the COVID 19 Pandemic has so far passed us by.
But from my last ship, the “Espana”, the news is grim. The ship has been overrun with the dreaded sickness. They say the companionways are packed with sick crew and many have died.
COVID 19 hit all the ships that just kept going at slow steaming, but not us sheltering in the lee of common sense.
It is not all plain (plane) sailing. My First Mate, who accompanies me, has found it more difficult to keep spirits up in self-imposed isolation.
Isolation apart from our weekly visit to the Purser’s stores for provisions; to the Chief Engineer at Solomon Power for a “Cash Power” payment; the Carpenter, “Chippy”, for a 10 litre bottle of water; and “Sparks” in the Telekom radio room for a mobile “Top-up”. Now we are all set for another week.
I wonder why do I seem to cope with this situation quite well? Then I realise that I started on my voyage long before the First Mate, before the days of electronic communication (apart from the ship’s radio, which was only for “official” use). We would be on a voyage for four, sometimes six, months with only a glimpse of land on the horizon as we rounded the Cape of Good Hope. No communication for months at a time; then letters at the next port that were already three weeks old. No fire brigade, no police force; if you get sick its just the Second Officer with the Ship Master’s Medical Guide in hand desperately trying to work out what is wrong with you. If his diagnosis is correct, another half hour thumbing through the pages of the Guide, wondering what to do about it.
Mind you, when we got to port, we could be there for two weeks discharging and loading cargo. None of this containerised turn-around in eight hours nonsense. When we got to port we let our hair down. And how.
Kilindini Road in Mombasa with its “Day and Night” clubs and exotic girls as eager to make money as the sailors were to enjoy their company. But always with good hearts and a sense of humour. Fun was just as important as business.
The “Hong Kong” restaurant run by a delightful Chinese family, where we put bottles of cheap Champagne in store for the next trip paid for out of our ill-gotten gains of tipping the ship’s husbandry bill. When I returned to Kenya in 1974 (at least ten years later) on my way from Nairobi to Lake Victoria I found a “Hong Kong” restaurant in Nairobi. To my amazement it was run by the same family. To my even greater amazement they insisted that I still had credit of a bottle of Champagne from 1964 and so we opened it. It was a far better vintage than the ones we had in Kilindini Road, and to this day I still do not know if I really did have credit or if the family were just pleased to see an old Mombasa customer back in Nairobi and drank with me for “old time’s sake”.
But I digress.
Being at anchor, locked down and reminiscing, I have had the opportunity to have a good look at myself.
What happened to that bright-eyed, bushy tailed young English middle-class but poor teenager who went for training and a career at sea, for adventure, in 1960.
I have tried to be honest with myself.
I had a great education at a wonderful charitable boarding school where I learned the difference between home life with my family and boarding life with a load of strangers (initially); between right and wrong; and where I was imbued with the protestant work ethic. Unfortunately, it did not rub off on me while I was at school and my record was an annual drop into a lower grade each year.
I managed to scramble together enough “O” levels to enrol in pre-sea training, and it was there, and when I went to sea, that the work ethic kicked in. I found a purpose for all that boring maths, physics, chemistry, English language, English literature, French, History and Geography. Maths for navigation; physics for cargo handling (safe working loads and pulley systems for the derricks); chemistry for dangerous goods in the cargo; English to enable good communication; and literature to enable good reading habits.
Even my school-boy French became useful. On my first sea trip the ship went to Tulear and Morombe in Madagascar. Nobody ashore spoke English, and I was the only person on the ship who had any knowledge of French; History because I was sailing in the same seas and rounding the same Capes as the great seafarers who explored and charted the world; and Geography because, in my school days, Britain still had many Colonies and Protectorates from the British Empire. I had learned a bit about trade with the places we visited, and their colonial past. Our Geography teacher had lived and taught in Africa and his love and enthusiasm for that beautiful and mysterious continent excited me.
On the other side of the coin I was a white Anglo-Saxon protestant (with fair hair and blue eyes to boot), who had spent his early teenage years at a boys only boarding school (I’m very pleased to say that they now have as many girls at the school as boys) with very few physically challenged boys and no children of colour as far as I remember.
If I am truly honest with myself, I must have been an elitist (although the school was basically a charity school), woman fearing (without being misogynistic: they were just a complete mystery to me) religious bigot, unintentionally racist, anti-communist, teenager.
My mother, bless her, who I loved dearly, was a single parent woman as the result of the 2nd World War, who trained as a teacher, retrained as a secretary and draughts-woman, became Office Manager of the company she worked for throughout her working life and ended up as a Director of the company. She never owned or had access to a car and cycled to work and back every day a distance of at least 10 miles or 7 miles, depending on where we lived. Without my realising it, she was a hard act to follow when assessing the women in my life, for the rest of my life.
I was also naïve. Very naïve. Especially where politics were concerned. Example: on my first trip the ship had cargo for Cape Town, so I decided to go up Table Mountain on the Cable car. To get to the Table Mountain Aerial Cableway I had to take a series of buses. The ship’s agent told me where to get the buses from and to, so I left on my adventure.
The first bus to catch was just outside the dock gates. I got on and turned to two spare seats towards the back of the bus and sat down in one of them, as you do. This seemed to cause much comment and amusement amongst my fellow passengers. Initially I did not understand. Then it dawned on me from their gesticulations that I should not be there as the seats were reserved for “Niet blankes”. In my naivety I knew nothing about apartheid or that the whites and the non-whites were separated. Where I was sitting, I was surrounded by smiling African faces. I was obviously not the first young sailor to make this mistake as my fellow passengers noticed where I got on and found the situation amusing. I was conscious that there was no animosity towards me sitting in their section. I wonder what would have happened if it had been the other way round?
I think it was Joseph Conrad who said, “Give me the company of sailors” and of course we know the old adage “Travel broadens the mind”. I now know what Conrad meant and have benefitted from the travel in my life opening my eyes to life’s realities.
My first experience of Russian seafarers was when I was a Cadet. Our ship was berthed in Dar es Salaam and astern was a Russian deep-sea salvage tug. It was the middle of October and the Russian tug was dressed overall celebrating the October Revolution. Our Captain received an invitation from the Russian ship’s Captain to join them for a drink. Being the Cold War our captain did not want to go, but not rudely refuse the invitation, so he ordered me to get spruced up in my cleanest, smartest white uniform, put on my cap and take a message to the Captain of the Russian ship.
I nervously approached the Russian gangway and the watchman showed me to the Captain’s cabin. In the cabin were about six Russian Officers all in their best white tropical uniforms. It turned out that the Chief Officer was a woman. She looked at me and said in a strong rough accent “Come here English. I luuurve English”, patting the couch next to where she was sitting. If she had looked like Sharapova I might have been more at ease, but she didn’t. She was more like one of those Russian Shot Putt champions, built like the proverbial “brick shit-house”, that won Olympic Gold medals in the 1950’s and 60’s. I swear that each of the huge legs that stuck out of her uniform shorts was thicker than my waist.
What to do? I did not want to be rude on behalf of my Captain, on the other hand I just wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible. The other Russian officers, much to their amusement, could see the discomfort in my dilemma, but I plucked up courage and went and sat next to her. She put her hand on my knee and squeezed it a little saying drunkenly “Drink to the glorious Revolution”. Followed by “I reaeaealy luuurve English!”. A shot of what I realised later was vodka was put into my hand and they all said what sounded like “nostrovia” and sank the contents of their glasses in one swig. I did the same, thanked them for their hospitality and made my way back to the gangway, slightly the worse for wear. Behind me I could hear guffaws of raucous laughter. Sailors!!
My second brush with the so-called Communists was on a ship in Mombasa Harbour in 1965 when a Russian ship was berthed alongside our ship on the offshore side. All the other berths were taken, and the Russian ship only needed to take on bunker fuel through a pipe that was led from the wharf across our ship to the Russian ship.
Please remember, that this was Cold War nuclear threat days when we were concerned about the 4 minute warning and had been taught that Russians eat babies for breakfast (well not quite, but you know what I mean!).
After a while, as sailors do, the Russians started chatting to us in their broken English across the bulwark. Somebody from our ship invited some officers to come over and we all congregated in the Officer’s Smoke Room. Drinks were offered and to our amusement they mostly asked for Coca-Cola. “We can’t get it in our country” one of them said with a knowing smile. In those days there was nothing “American” available throughout the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR).
Inevitably we got to chatting about a sailors’ life and somebody started a game of darts. It was decided to have a match of Britain vs Russia and a good time was had by all. I can’t remember who won the darts and soon it was time for them to leave the ship as their bunkering had finished. We all had a pleasant time. But what they did not know was that one of our officers came from a “White Russian” family that came to the UK in 1917 to escape the Russian Revolution, and who spoke fluent Russian. After they left, we started talking about the occasion as we were fascinated. These people who ate babies for breakfast and were going to drop the bomb on us at any minute didn’t seem much different to us.
Maybe they were just putting it on for our benefit we thought.
“No”, said White Russian, “they were talking about the things that we talk about”. He had the least reason to be favourable; “Worried about the children’s education”. “The wife wants the spare bedroom painting when I get home next leave”. “Not a bad looking ship, is it?”, etc., etc.
I began to learn that individuals, and especially seafarers, seem to have similar worries and concerns to me, whatever nationality they are. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs suddenly had a universality that bridged East and West. It starts you thinking about values and attitudes! Jingoism: sorted
Then I met a girl in Liverpool who was of a different religious background to me, but the sweetest, nicest person you could know. Admittedly she no longer followed her religious programming, but I realised that it was not her as a person that I had problems with, but the controlling indoctrination that went on in her early spiritual life.
“Do you know what your greatest asset is?” my tutor asked me many years later when I was studying for my degree. “No”, I really had no idea what he was talking about. “You have no sense of guilt, do you?” I’d never thought about it before, but he was right. “Don’t ever lose that” he said, “it is a huge power to have”. It made me realise that it was not the religious dogma that I disliked so much as the use of guilt as a controlling weapon that irked me. Religious intolerance: sorted.
What about women? Until I was about 18, I did not have a serious girlfriend and then I met Xara. I learned more from her about women, both good and bad, than I have learned from any other relationship with a woman, except perhaps for the good I learned from my mother! Most importantly I learned that a woman has the right to her opinions and must be given the freedom to be herself, however much it might hurt. That real love must be unconditional; “warts and all”, but most importantly a good male/female relationship has to be based on mutual respect. Relationships with women: only partially sorted as the deepest mysteries remain!
I am writing at a time when the racism situation in the USA is boiling over. It makes me examine my own conscience when it comes to racism. It was never a problem when I was a child. Across the road from where I lived was Mr Ebers. His wife was a Sussex girl and they had two boys about the same age as me. We played together and it never crossed my mind until many years later that they were “children of colour”. Boarding school was not a problem, but in common with my peer group I never thought about it very much. Then I went to pre-sea training and joined in the banter that went around, including so called “jokes” that on reflection were blatantly racist. I really didn’t think much about it. I guess I was like very many of my peer group in as much that I was on the “giving” end of racism, not the “receiving” end.
Then at 17 I had the incident on the bus in Cape Town and I was stirred into thinking about apartheid. I was confronted with active, in your face, real racism and I knew something was wrong, but I didn’t do anything about it.
I continued on my life journey trying to ignore it. At about the same time as I became 3rd Officer on the ships, the shipping company introduced a policy of employing East Africans as cadets training them for sea careers and to become the next generation of ships’ pilots and harbour masters in East Africa. Young men from Kenya, Tanzania and even Uganda. This was a bit uncomfortable for me as they were different from me. Then I thought to myself, well so are many of the people I have already sailed with who are Scottish, Irish, Indian, Pakistani or Sinhalese. How did I get on with them? I had learned to find something about my shipmates that I liked and concentrate on that. One from Scotland liked playing darts; one from India read Sci-fi books; one from Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) was proud of his heritage and wanted to share it with me.
John Ikoluot from Uganda was interested in African animals, Charles Njuguna from Nairobi wanted me to read the books about Britain’s colonial activities in his country that exposed the corruption of the colonial men of power. Another shipmate introduced me to the writing of Chinua Achebe, Ngugi wa Thiongo’o, Taban lo Liyong and Grace Ogot. These authors made me start thinking about the impact that years of colonial rule had on them. Not least of which was that their education and writing had been conducted mainly in English. Was that a good or bad thing? In my discussions with my African colleagues over the years, opinion has been divided; some say good, some say bad, some say good and bad.
The most influential from a personal point of view was Dave Kioko. He and I sailed together for two years. I was 2nd Officer; he was 3rd Officer. Our friendship started with a mutual like of avocados and grew into a rich “brotherly love”. We had many adventures that in themselves would fill another “Letter from the Pacific”. One day when he was handing over the watch to me, I asked him “How do you say that in (Ki)Swahili?” He said “Habari gani za kazi”. From then on he taught me Kiswahili and I taught him as much as I could about being a good ship’s officer and navigator.
Sadly a few years after we parted company to join other ships, he got into a fight in a Liverpool Night Club and his head hit a wall heavily. Although he appeared to be OK, the next day he complained of a headache that was getting increasingly more unbearable, so he went to hospital where he died that evening of a brain haemorrhage. The fight was not racially motivated; typically of Dave, it was over a woman!
In 1974 I went back to East Africa as Captain of Ships on Lake Victoria and left there in 1976. In 1977 I went to Papua New Guinea and from then until now I have continually worked for or with national officers in the host country. The only white bosses I have had since then in the past 43 years were from Finland and Australia; the first for three months in Timor Leste; the other for two years in Papua New Guinea.
Have I ever experienced any form of discrimination as a white man working in a black man’s country? No. Not only have I never experienced it in their country, but I have always felt welcomed and as well integrated on human qualities as I could be without necessarily understanding, but always respecting, the finer points of their culture. It is so much easier that way round, because the white people always had the upper hand, and racism looked down on the black people.
Despite the terrible things that white colonialists have done over the years, I’ve never consciously experienced hatred or even negativity from black people. The only time I experienced “indifference” was from a black ticket Inspector on my way from Gatwick to London on return from one of my foreign adventures. I greeted him with a cheery grin and something along the lines of “How are you today?”. His response was to look at me as if I was something that the cat had left on the rug, and I had to remind myself that I was back in England.
I have not gone “bush” either. I abhor corruption; not purely from a moralistic perspective, but because it robs the poorer human of his opportunities to be able to further himself. I maintain the work ethic because it is something that I was born with. When I look back on my life I know that part of what I have been doing is my own way of trying to make some small reparation for the wrongs that were perpetrated by my forefathers, that have given me the privileged life that I have been able to lead.
My greatest career achievement has been in Tanzania starting in 1985. I took on a consultancy to examine the feasibility of developing a maritime training college in Dar es Salaam; the Dar es Salaam Maritime Institute (DMI). It was achieved through my work and the dedication of the Norwegian and Tanzanian governments with a Tanzanian champion, my late good friend Abraham Massawe, who tragically died of the HIV virus in 1991.
Our legacy is now the centre of Excellence for Maritime Training in sub-Saharan Africa; it boasts six professors with MSc’s and 5 with PhD’s. All the ports in East Africa now have only African pilots and harbour masters, and there are over 5,000 graduates from DMI working as ship’s officers and marine engineers in the world merchant fleet.
In 2010 I celebrated 50 years in shipping whilst working in Papua New Guinea and received a letter from Thomas Mwayagilo, the Principal of DMI. He reported that the United Nations Programme for Least Developed and Island Developing Nations calculated the remittance of DMI graduates was over US$ 150M annually. I am immensely proud of this contribution to help redress the balance of exploitation by Britain through its colonial control of East Africa, fully acknowledging the benefits that they left behind in transport infrastructure, education and social administration. As Abraham Massawe used to say, “Thank God we were not colonised by the Belgians or the Portuguese!”
When I left Tanzania in 1993, the African Principal of DMI, in his speech at my farewell said, “Captain Tim Harris has the heart of the black man in the body of a white man.” I’m not sure that this is a good epithet either. I look forward to the day when all people have the hearts of common humanity in the bodies of all humans.
Racism: Sorted
....................................................................................................................................................................................
A Sailor’s life
Isn’t life amazing!
You’re sailing along on relatively calm seas when suddenly there is a storm warning.
COVID 19 ahead.
As Captain what do you do!
There are those who say, “I have one of the most modern, sophisticated, economically powerful world-beating vessels, so we will just keep going and slow steam for a bit to ride out the waves”.
There are others: “Hard a’ starboard! We’ve no sophistication: we’re economically weak, and the vessel is antiquated. We’ll shelter in the lee of common sense and avoid contact with this disastrous tsunami at all costs”.
Luckily my Captain, Manasseh Sogavare, summoned his senior officers and told them to set a course for common sense. “We will anchor there and see what to do”.
“Do not allow anybody to come aboard”
“Order the whole crew to be COVID 19 aware and take precautions”.
“Prepare the HAZMAT suits”
“Stay in your cabin whenever possible”
“COVID 19 OUTBREAK DRILL every three weeks”
What does it say in the Convention on Preventing Collisions? “Any action taken should be positive, in ample time and with due regard for the observance of good seamanship”.
Good for you, Captain Sogavare! Your action was positive, (total national shut down) in ample time (March 2020), regarding good seamanship (prudent protection).
“But Captain, we will run out of food, fuel and money. Our economy and voyage to development will be halted.”
“There are ships from the People’s Republic of China and Australia on the horizon. Send out “MAYDAY” and ask for assistance.
I find myself confined to my cabin.
I don’t have to be, as the good ship “Solomon Islands” has anchored safely in the lee of common sense and the COVID 19 Pandemic has so far passed us by.
But from my last ship, the “Espana”, the news is grim. The ship has been overrun with the dreaded sickness. They say the companionways are packed with sick crew and many have died.
COVID 19 hit all the ships that just kept going at slow steaming, but not us sheltering in the lee of common sense.
It is not all plain (plane) sailing. My First Mate, who accompanies me, has found it more difficult to keep spirits up in self-imposed isolation.
Isolation apart from our weekly visit to the Purser’s stores for provisions; to the Chief Engineer at Solomon Power for a “Cash Power” payment; the Carpenter, “Chippy”, for a 10 litre bottle of water; and “Sparks” in the Telekom radio room for a mobile “Top-up”. Now we are all set for another week.
I wonder why do I seem to cope with this situation quite well? Then I realise that I started on my voyage long before the First Mate, before the days of electronic communication (apart from the ship’s radio, which was only for “official” use). We would be on a voyage for four, sometimes six, months with only a glimpse of land on the horizon as we rounded the Cape of Good Hope. No communication for months at a time; then letters at the next port that were already three weeks old. No fire brigade, no police force; if you get sick its just the Second Officer with the Ship Master’s Medical Guide in hand desperately trying to work out what is wrong with you. If his diagnosis is correct, another half hour thumbing through the pages of the Guide, wondering what to do about it.
Mind you, when we got to port, we could be there for two weeks discharging and loading cargo. None of this containerised turn-around in eight hours nonsense. When we got to port we let our hair down. And how.
Kilindini Road in Mombasa with its “Day and Night” clubs and exotic girls as eager to make money as the sailors were to enjoy their company. But always with good hearts and a sense of humour. Fun was just as important as business.
The “Hong Kong” restaurant run by a delightful Chinese family, where we put bottles of cheap Champagne in store for the next trip paid for out of our ill-gotten gains of tipping the ship’s husbandry bill. When I returned to Kenya in 1974 (at least ten years later) on my way from Nairobi to Lake Victoria I found a “Hong Kong” restaurant in Nairobi. To my amazement it was run by the same family. To my even greater amazement they insisted that I still had credit of a bottle of Champagne from 1964 and so we opened it. It was a far better vintage than the ones we had in Kilindini Road, and to this day I still do not know if I really did have credit or if the family were just pleased to see an old Mombasa customer back in Nairobi and drank with me for “old time’s sake”.
But I digress.
Being at anchor, locked down and reminiscing, I have had the opportunity to have a good look at myself.
What happened to that bright-eyed, bushy tailed young English middle-class but poor teenager who went for training and a career at sea, for adventure, in 1960.
I have tried to be honest with myself.
I had a great education at a wonderful charitable boarding school where I learned the difference between home life with my family and boarding life with a load of strangers (initially); between right and wrong; and where I was imbued with the protestant work ethic. Unfortunately, it did not rub off on me while I was at school and my record was an annual drop into a lower grade each year.
I managed to scramble together enough “O” levels to enrol in pre-sea training, and it was there, and when I went to sea, that the work ethic kicked in. I found a purpose for all that boring maths, physics, chemistry, English language, English literature, French, History and Geography. Maths for navigation; physics for cargo handling (safe working loads and pulley systems for the derricks); chemistry for dangerous goods in the cargo; English to enable good communication; and literature to enable good reading habits.
Even my school-boy French became useful. On my first sea trip the ship went to Tulear and Morombe in Madagascar. Nobody ashore spoke English, and I was the only person on the ship who had any knowledge of French; History because I was sailing in the same seas and rounding the same Capes as the great seafarers who explored and charted the world; and Geography because, in my school days, Britain still had many Colonies and Protectorates from the British Empire. I had learned a bit about trade with the places we visited, and their colonial past. Our Geography teacher had lived and taught in Africa and his love and enthusiasm for that beautiful and mysterious continent excited me.
On the other side of the coin I was a white Anglo-Saxon protestant (with fair hair and blue eyes to boot), who had spent his early teenage years at a boys only boarding school (I’m very pleased to say that they now have as many girls at the school as boys) with very few physically challenged boys and no children of colour as far as I remember.
If I am truly honest with myself, I must have been an elitist (although the school was basically a charity school), woman fearing (without being misogynistic: they were just a complete mystery to me) religious bigot, unintentionally racist, anti-communist, teenager.
My mother, bless her, who I loved dearly, was a single parent woman as the result of the 2nd World War, who trained as a teacher, retrained as a secretary and draughts-woman, became Office Manager of the company she worked for throughout her working life and ended up as a Director of the company. She never owned or had access to a car and cycled to work and back every day a distance of at least 10 miles or 7 miles, depending on where we lived. Without my realising it, she was a hard act to follow when assessing the women in my life, for the rest of my life.
I was also naïve. Very naïve. Especially where politics were concerned. Example: on my first trip the ship had cargo for Cape Town, so I decided to go up Table Mountain on the Cable car. To get to the Table Mountain Aerial Cableway I had to take a series of buses. The ship’s agent told me where to get the buses from and to, so I left on my adventure.
The first bus to catch was just outside the dock gates. I got on and turned to two spare seats towards the back of the bus and sat down in one of them, as you do. This seemed to cause much comment and amusement amongst my fellow passengers. Initially I did not understand. Then it dawned on me from their gesticulations that I should not be there as the seats were reserved for “Niet blankes”. In my naivety I knew nothing about apartheid or that the whites and the non-whites were separated. Where I was sitting, I was surrounded by smiling African faces. I was obviously not the first young sailor to make this mistake as my fellow passengers noticed where I got on and found the situation amusing. I was conscious that there was no animosity towards me sitting in their section. I wonder what would have happened if it had been the other way round?
I think it was Joseph Conrad who said, “Give me the company of sailors” and of course we know the old adage “Travel broadens the mind”. I now know what Conrad meant and have benefitted from the travel in my life opening my eyes to life’s realities.
My first experience of Russian seafarers was when I was a Cadet. Our ship was berthed in Dar es Salaam and astern was a Russian deep-sea salvage tug. It was the middle of October and the Russian tug was dressed overall celebrating the October Revolution. Our Captain received an invitation from the Russian ship’s Captain to join them for a drink. Being the Cold War our captain did not want to go, but not rudely refuse the invitation, so he ordered me to get spruced up in my cleanest, smartest white uniform, put on my cap and take a message to the Captain of the Russian ship.
I nervously approached the Russian gangway and the watchman showed me to the Captain’s cabin. In the cabin were about six Russian Officers all in their best white tropical uniforms. It turned out that the Chief Officer was a woman. She looked at me and said in a strong rough accent “Come here English. I luuurve English”, patting the couch next to where she was sitting. If she had looked like Sharapova I might have been more at ease, but she didn’t. She was more like one of those Russian Shot Putt champions, built like the proverbial “brick shit-house”, that won Olympic Gold medals in the 1950’s and 60’s. I swear that each of the huge legs that stuck out of her uniform shorts was thicker than my waist.
What to do? I did not want to be rude on behalf of my Captain, on the other hand I just wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible. The other Russian officers, much to their amusement, could see the discomfort in my dilemma, but I plucked up courage and went and sat next to her. She put her hand on my knee and squeezed it a little saying drunkenly “Drink to the glorious Revolution”. Followed by “I reaeaealy luuurve English!”. A shot of what I realised later was vodka was put into my hand and they all said what sounded like “nostrovia” and sank the contents of their glasses in one swig. I did the same, thanked them for their hospitality and made my way back to the gangway, slightly the worse for wear. Behind me I could hear guffaws of raucous laughter. Sailors!!
My second brush with the so-called Communists was on a ship in Mombasa Harbour in 1965 when a Russian ship was berthed alongside our ship on the offshore side. All the other berths were taken, and the Russian ship only needed to take on bunker fuel through a pipe that was led from the wharf across our ship to the Russian ship.
Please remember, that this was Cold War nuclear threat days when we were concerned about the 4 minute warning and had been taught that Russians eat babies for breakfast (well not quite, but you know what I mean!).
After a while, as sailors do, the Russians started chatting to us in their broken English across the bulwark. Somebody from our ship invited some officers to come over and we all congregated in the Officer’s Smoke Room. Drinks were offered and to our amusement they mostly asked for Coca-Cola. “We can’t get it in our country” one of them said with a knowing smile. In those days there was nothing “American” available throughout the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR).
Inevitably we got to chatting about a sailors’ life and somebody started a game of darts. It was decided to have a match of Britain vs Russia and a good time was had by all. I can’t remember who won the darts and soon it was time for them to leave the ship as their bunkering had finished. We all had a pleasant time. But what they did not know was that one of our officers came from a “White Russian” family that came to the UK in 1917 to escape the Russian Revolution, and who spoke fluent Russian. After they left, we started talking about the occasion as we were fascinated. These people who ate babies for breakfast and were going to drop the bomb on us at any minute didn’t seem much different to us.
Maybe they were just putting it on for our benefit we thought.
“No”, said White Russian, “they were talking about the things that we talk about”. He had the least reason to be favourable; “Worried about the children’s education”. “The wife wants the spare bedroom painting when I get home next leave”. “Not a bad looking ship, is it?”, etc., etc.
I began to learn that individuals, and especially seafarers, seem to have similar worries and concerns to me, whatever nationality they are. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs suddenly had a universality that bridged East and West. It starts you thinking about values and attitudes! Jingoism: sorted
Then I met a girl in Liverpool who was of a different religious background to me, but the sweetest, nicest person you could know. Admittedly she no longer followed her religious programming, but I realised that it was not her as a person that I had problems with, but the controlling indoctrination that went on in her early spiritual life.
“Do you know what your greatest asset is?” my tutor asked me many years later when I was studying for my degree. “No”, I really had no idea what he was talking about. “You have no sense of guilt, do you?” I’d never thought about it before, but he was right. “Don’t ever lose that” he said, “it is a huge power to have”. It made me realise that it was not the religious dogma that I disliked so much as the use of guilt as a controlling weapon that irked me. Religious intolerance: sorted.
What about women? Until I was about 18, I did not have a serious girlfriend and then I met Xara. I learned more from her about women, both good and bad, than I have learned from any other relationship with a woman, except perhaps for the good I learned from my mother! Most importantly I learned that a woman has the right to her opinions and must be given the freedom to be herself, however much it might hurt. That real love must be unconditional; “warts and all”, but most importantly a good male/female relationship has to be based on mutual respect. Relationships with women: only partially sorted as the deepest mysteries remain!
I am writing at a time when the racism situation in the USA is boiling over. It makes me examine my own conscience when it comes to racism. It was never a problem when I was a child. Across the road from where I lived was Mr Ebers. His wife was a Sussex girl and they had two boys about the same age as me. We played together and it never crossed my mind until many years later that they were “children of colour”. Boarding school was not a problem, but in common with my peer group I never thought about it very much. Then I went to pre-sea training and joined in the banter that went around, including so called “jokes” that on reflection were blatantly racist. I really didn’t think much about it. I guess I was like very many of my peer group in as much that I was on the “giving” end of racism, not the “receiving” end.
Then at 17 I had the incident on the bus in Cape Town and I was stirred into thinking about apartheid. I was confronted with active, in your face, real racism and I knew something was wrong, but I didn’t do anything about it.
I continued on my life journey trying to ignore it. At about the same time as I became 3rd Officer on the ships, the shipping company introduced a policy of employing East Africans as cadets training them for sea careers and to become the next generation of ships’ pilots and harbour masters in East Africa. Young men from Kenya, Tanzania and even Uganda. This was a bit uncomfortable for me as they were different from me. Then I thought to myself, well so are many of the people I have already sailed with who are Scottish, Irish, Indian, Pakistani or Sinhalese. How did I get on with them? I had learned to find something about my shipmates that I liked and concentrate on that. One from Scotland liked playing darts; one from India read Sci-fi books; one from Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) was proud of his heritage and wanted to share it with me.
John Ikoluot from Uganda was interested in African animals, Charles Njuguna from Nairobi wanted me to read the books about Britain’s colonial activities in his country that exposed the corruption of the colonial men of power. Another shipmate introduced me to the writing of Chinua Achebe, Ngugi wa Thiongo’o, Taban lo Liyong and Grace Ogot. These authors made me start thinking about the impact that years of colonial rule had on them. Not least of which was that their education and writing had been conducted mainly in English. Was that a good or bad thing? In my discussions with my African colleagues over the years, opinion has been divided; some say good, some say bad, some say good and bad.
The most influential from a personal point of view was Dave Kioko. He and I sailed together for two years. I was 2nd Officer; he was 3rd Officer. Our friendship started with a mutual like of avocados and grew into a rich “brotherly love”. We had many adventures that in themselves would fill another “Letter from the Pacific”. One day when he was handing over the watch to me, I asked him “How do you say that in (Ki)Swahili?” He said “Habari gani za kazi”. From then on he taught me Kiswahili and I taught him as much as I could about being a good ship’s officer and navigator.
Sadly a few years after we parted company to join other ships, he got into a fight in a Liverpool Night Club and his head hit a wall heavily. Although he appeared to be OK, the next day he complained of a headache that was getting increasingly more unbearable, so he went to hospital where he died that evening of a brain haemorrhage. The fight was not racially motivated; typically of Dave, it was over a woman!
In 1974 I went back to East Africa as Captain of Ships on Lake Victoria and left there in 1976. In 1977 I went to Papua New Guinea and from then until now I have continually worked for or with national officers in the host country. The only white bosses I have had since then in the past 43 years were from Finland and Australia; the first for three months in Timor Leste; the other for two years in Papua New Guinea.
Have I ever experienced any form of discrimination as a white man working in a black man’s country? No. Not only have I never experienced it in their country, but I have always felt welcomed and as well integrated on human qualities as I could be without necessarily understanding, but always respecting, the finer points of their culture. It is so much easier that way round, because the white people always had the upper hand, and racism looked down on the black people.
Despite the terrible things that white colonialists have done over the years, I’ve never consciously experienced hatred or even negativity from black people. The only time I experienced “indifference” was from a black ticket Inspector on my way from Gatwick to London on return from one of my foreign adventures. I greeted him with a cheery grin and something along the lines of “How are you today?”. His response was to look at me as if I was something that the cat had left on the rug, and I had to remind myself that I was back in England.
I have not gone “bush” either. I abhor corruption; not purely from a moralistic perspective, but because it robs the poorer human of his opportunities to be able to further himself. I maintain the work ethic because it is something that I was born with. When I look back on my life I know that part of what I have been doing is my own way of trying to make some small reparation for the wrongs that were perpetrated by my forefathers, that have given me the privileged life that I have been able to lead.
My greatest career achievement has been in Tanzania starting in 1985. I took on a consultancy to examine the feasibility of developing a maritime training college in Dar es Salaam; the Dar es Salaam Maritime Institute (DMI). It was achieved through my work and the dedication of the Norwegian and Tanzanian governments with a Tanzanian champion, my late good friend Abraham Massawe, who tragically died of the HIV virus in 1991.
Our legacy is now the centre of Excellence for Maritime Training in sub-Saharan Africa; it boasts six professors with MSc’s and 5 with PhD’s. All the ports in East Africa now have only African pilots and harbour masters, and there are over 5,000 graduates from DMI working as ship’s officers and marine engineers in the world merchant fleet.
In 2010 I celebrated 50 years in shipping whilst working in Papua New Guinea and received a letter from Thomas Mwayagilo, the Principal of DMI. He reported that the United Nations Programme for Least Developed and Island Developing Nations calculated the remittance of DMI graduates was over US$ 150M annually. I am immensely proud of this contribution to help redress the balance of exploitation by Britain through its colonial control of East Africa, fully acknowledging the benefits that they left behind in transport infrastructure, education and social administration. As Abraham Massawe used to say, “Thank God we were not colonised by the Belgians or the Portuguese!”
When I left Tanzania in 1993, the African Principal of DMI, in his speech at my farewell said, “Captain Tim Harris has the heart of the black man in the body of a white man.” I’m not sure that this is a good epithet either. I look forward to the day when all people have the hearts of common humanity in the bodies of all humans.
Racism: Sorted
....................................................................................................................................................................................
26 July 2020.
Today I present contributions from Mandy, David, Jenny, Lucinda and Tim.
.....................................................................................................................
Today I present contributions from Mandy, David, Jenny, Lucinda and Tim.
.....................................................................................................................
MANDY BORELLI
This is one of Mandy´s latest pieces of art. Superb.
Her contact details are,
mandygata@hotmail.com
This is one of Mandy´s latest pieces of art. Superb.
Her contact details are,
mandygata@hotmail.com
DAVID´S ANECDOTES NO. 2
ENGAGED
My colleague Ted and myself had both been separately visiting various of our business contacts. We agreed to meet up in Scunthorpe, not the most exciting town in Lincolnshire, so that the following day we could together visit a nearby port and storage facility. Accordingly we booked two single rooms with en suite bathrooms in one of the town’s hotels.
I arrived to find that Ted had already checked in. Reception told me that there was a problem with my room and that whilst it had an en suite the toilet was in fact broken. Needless to say Ted’s room was fully functional.There was however a separate toilet next to my room just a couple of yards down the corridor. As we were only staying the one night I accepted it.
The following morning after breakfast I made my final visit to use the adjacent toilet before checking out. Having finished in the toilet I tried to unbolt the door but the bolt sheared off in my hand. I rattled the door to see if I could get any movement but the bolt was well and truly stuck. I banged on the door and shouted out but to no avail. I was well and truly locked in.
There was a small window which looked out onto the surrounding walls of the hotel and down one floor into a sort of court yard at ground level. There was a narrow ledge some two or three inches wide about three feet down and I remembered that I had left my bedroom window open. I had seen this sort of thing done in count less films so I decided it was worth a try. I climbed out of the window, pressed myself against the wall and inched my way along the ledge. I successfully gained entry to my room, gathered my stuff together and went down to check out.
Feeling a bit like James Bond I explained at reception what had happened. I told them that the toilet on the first floor was showing engaged but was in fact vacant as the bolt on the inside of the door had sheared off and that I had crept along the ledge to regain my freedom. The receptionist just said ‘’Oh.” I don’t think she really took on board what I had told her and I sometimes wonder whether that toilet is still engaged.
Perhaps the next time you see an engaged sign you might care to knock and enquire if all is well.
.....................................................................................................................................................................................
ENGAGED
My colleague Ted and myself had both been separately visiting various of our business contacts. We agreed to meet up in Scunthorpe, not the most exciting town in Lincolnshire, so that the following day we could together visit a nearby port and storage facility. Accordingly we booked two single rooms with en suite bathrooms in one of the town’s hotels.
I arrived to find that Ted had already checked in. Reception told me that there was a problem with my room and that whilst it had an en suite the toilet was in fact broken. Needless to say Ted’s room was fully functional.There was however a separate toilet next to my room just a couple of yards down the corridor. As we were only staying the one night I accepted it.
The following morning after breakfast I made my final visit to use the adjacent toilet before checking out. Having finished in the toilet I tried to unbolt the door but the bolt sheared off in my hand. I rattled the door to see if I could get any movement but the bolt was well and truly stuck. I banged on the door and shouted out but to no avail. I was well and truly locked in.
There was a small window which looked out onto the surrounding walls of the hotel and down one floor into a sort of court yard at ground level. There was a narrow ledge some two or three inches wide about three feet down and I remembered that I had left my bedroom window open. I had seen this sort of thing done in count less films so I decided it was worth a try. I climbed out of the window, pressed myself against the wall and inched my way along the ledge. I successfully gained entry to my room, gathered my stuff together and went down to check out.
Feeling a bit like James Bond I explained at reception what had happened. I told them that the toilet on the first floor was showing engaged but was in fact vacant as the bolt on the inside of the door had sheared off and that I had crept along the ledge to regain my freedom. The receptionist just said ‘’Oh.” I don’t think she really took on board what I had told her and I sometimes wonder whether that toilet is still engaged.
Perhaps the next time you see an engaged sign you might care to knock and enquire if all is well.
.....................................................................................................................................................................................
JENNY MORRISON
Two examples of amazing art by Jenny Morrison.
For Pop Up shop - info@fineartamerica.com
JENNY ANNE MORRISON - ARTIST
Visit my website to see paintings
http://www.jennyannemorrison.com
For enquiries and to arrange a private view at the Gallery call:- LANDLINE : 96 558 7711. MOBILE :- 694 412 409
Two examples of amazing art by Jenny Morrison.
For Pop Up shop - info@fineartamerica.com
JENNY ANNE MORRISON - ARTIST
Visit my website to see paintings
http://www.jennyannemorrison.com
For enquiries and to arrange a private view at the Gallery call:- LANDLINE : 96 558 7711. MOBILE :- 694 412 409
LUCINDA E CLARKE
News from Lucinda
The third book in my psychological series "A Year in the Life of ..." is with the editor. I am running a competition in my newsletter and on my readers' page Lucinda E Clarke's Readers on Facebook to win a signed paperback copy of the new book - this is the sign up link for the newsletter http://eepurl.com/cz-Mpv
https://lucindaeclarkeauthor.com
News from Lucinda
The third book in my psychological series "A Year in the Life of ..." is with the editor. I am running a competition in my newsletter and on my readers' page Lucinda E Clarke's Readers on Facebook to win a signed paperback copy of the new book - this is the sign up link for the newsletter http://eepurl.com/cz-Mpv
https://lucindaeclarkeauthor.com
CAPTAIN TIM REPORTS
The White Carpet
“I’m John Hull, everybody calls me Noddy”.
“Hi Noddy, I’m Tim”. We shook hands.
It was time to handover at the crew change.
The other cadets introduced themselves to the cadets they were going to relieve.
“What’s the Old Man like?”
“OK, but a bit of a Bible thumper”.
“What about the Mate”.
“He’s a right pain in the arse. Makes you repeat a collision regulation before he lets you go ashore. If you get it wrong, he makes you go back and learn it by heart. If you’re successful, then he lets you go”.
I often found that other cadet opinions did not tally with mine by the end of a voyage, so I tried to keep an open mind.
“Only real problem is he’s deaf in the left ear, but doesn’t like to let on, so be careful to make sure he hears what you say, but don’t make it obvious that you have to raise your voice a bit”.
Good advice from John.
I was Senior Cadet, so after John had let me know about the idiosyncrasies of the ship, and the work load they’d had, he indicated something special he wanted to tell me. Out of earshot of the other two new cadets.
We went out on deck, despite the cold and blustery weather.
“You see that Contactor Room over there”. He pointed. I nodded, “Well, inside is a beautiful white lambswool carpet all rolled up and tied securely. We found it when we had to clean out the hatch and smuggled it up to the Contactor Room one night. It must have been part of the cargo that got left down in the hold as it was hidden by piles of dunnage. We would have sold it ourselves, but we didn’t get the chance, so you and the new cadets might as well benefit from it.”
Wow! Great, it must be worth quite a bit and it would be silly to throw it away. I thought to myself, maybe we can sell it to the “bumboat men” while we’re going through the Canal.
The ship was empty and clean, waiting to start loading. Before loading we always tested the bilge suction from the lower holds. This was quite a performance as it was before the days of mobile phones, or walkie-talkies, so with three cadets it meant there would be one down in the hold, one on deck, usually with the duty officer or the Mate, and one at the engine room entrance.
The proceedings started with a bucket of water being lowered to the bottom of the hold and purposefully tipped into the bilge, near the suction rose. The hold cadet then shouted up to the cadet on deck “No. 1 port”, the cadet on deck then shouted to the cadet at the engine room “tell the engineer to pump out No. 1 port”. The duty engineer then opened the valve for No. 1 port to extract the water by suction. We anticipated hearing a loud slurping sound that meant the suction pump was working and the bilge line was clear. Then a quick look over the ship’s side, where the discharge came out, to make sure that there wasn’t oil in the discharged water. If there was it meant a leak in the fuel tank, where the bilge pipe passed through, and it was going into the bilge line.
The Duty Deck Officer, or the Mate if he had decided to take responsibility, climbed up and down the hold ladder to make sure he could hear the suction. If there was only one cadet on board, he’d climb up and down too, to work with the Mate. He’d also have to go down into the engine room to communicate with the duty engineer. Quite a performance and could be very tiring.
On this ship we had three cadets. One was a first tripper. He would get the worst jobs, so he had to go down to the bottom of the hold. It was him and the duty Mate who had to climb up and down the ladder; the other cadet had to go down the engine room to find the duty Engineer; I had the cushy job; all I had to do was lift the bucket of water out of the dock and lower it down to the new lad at the bottom of the lower hold. Then I relayed the instructions from the Mate.
After testing the port side of the hold, “tell them to suck on No. 2 starboard”. I’d wait at the engine room door for the other cadet to reappear and be told that suction was on, then run back to the top of the hatch and shout down to the Mate “engineer’s sucking on No. 2 starboard now”. Hopefully, the Mate or the cadet would shout back “OK, I can hear suction on No. 2 starboard” and we moved on to the next hatch.
You might imagine that it sometimes got a bit confusing and the relaying of messages got out of sync in a time delay. By the time we had got to No. 5 hatch we were always a bit spaced out, so it was not surprising that as I came back and told the Mate “the engineer is sucking on 5 port”, the Mate emerged on deck from the hold hatchway, sweating profusely, and said “I can’t hear on the port side!”
I remembered what John Hull told me. That he was deaf in the left ear. For some reason I thought “what a very nautical way to tell me that he was a bit hard of hearing on the left side” and forgetting that the Mate was also a bit sensitive about it, I cupped my hand and shouted in his right ear “they’re sucking on 5 port”. He looked at me with utter amazement, anger and disdain. “I’m NOT deaf. I can’t hear bilge suction on 5 port”. Oh dear, we hadn’t even started loading for the voyage and I already had a bad mark. That’s torn it.
It turned out later that the engineer had got the valves mixed up, and that 5 port was working OK. Maybe the Mate never forgave me for my blunder about his deafness that embarrassed him. For the rest of the voyage he always asked me to repeat the more longest and most obscure collision rules before allowing a trip ashore. It was a nuisance, but I have to admit that I learned the “Rule of the Road” for collision avoidance extremely well, which put me in good standing when I went for my Class 3 Certificate of Competency oral examination a few years later.
Cargo loading was finally completed, and we set sail for Port Said. Once we dropped the pilot off at Beachy Head we headed for the Isle of Ushant and the Bay of Biscay. It was time to brief the other two cadets about our good fortune; a beautiful thick white lambswool carpet to sell to the “bumboats” while we were going through the Canal. “How much do you think we should ask for it?” “Whatever we ask it should be divisible by 3 so that we can all get our share”. “Persian lambswool carpets don’t come cheap. What about £60?” We agreed that was about right. The bottom fall-back position was £48 as between us we had £2, so we could give change for £50, however it was paid, and divvy it up when we got home.
Plans were made. It was decided that as Senior Cadet I should find a buyer, carry out negotiations and make the deal. I would be on the 12 to 4 watch and when we found a buyer and finalised negotiation, the carpet exchange would happen during my watch. Best opportunity? In those days the Southbound Convoy anchored in the Lake to let the Northbound Convoy go through. The Great Bitter Lake at anchor was chosen. Excitement and tension mounted as we got nearer to Port Said and individual dreams were formed on what we would do with our windfall.
We got into the next Southbound Convoy and arrived at the Great Bitter Lake.
Once we were anchored, sure enough the “bumboats” arrived like moths around a lantern. “Hey, Johnny, you wanna buy Days of the week knickers for your girl?”, “Doll for your little daughter?”, “Binoculars?”, “Camera?”, “Radio?”, “Record player?”, “Watch”, “Souvenirs?”. Tropical white cotton uniforms and khaki shirts and shorts were the best buy. You name it, they had it, and if not, they knew where to get it.
Some bumboat hawkers always came on board. Presumably they had to pay the ship’s agent for the privilege. “Hey, Johnny, you want feelthy pictures?” This was always a good way to get a few of us off-watch together, sitting in a cabin passing round dog-eared photos of naked bodies doing quite incredible things with each other or even, occasionally, with assorted animals. Sometimes superimposed on the bodies were the heads of senior members of the British Royal family. I guess they must have had the equivalent for royalty and aristocracy of other flag states that passed through the Canal.
After we had ogled them, they were handed back with a polite “No thanks” and the dirty books were brought out. The books always amused me, not because of the content, but because of poor production print and quality. “You want Lady Chatterly’s Lover?” The books were full of spelling mistakes that made me laugh. I can’t remember them all, but one sticks in my mind. It erotically stated “He funked her on the soda”. Sounds like a good advert for Coca-Cola!
I approached a few of the bumboat men until I found one who seemed interested in our carpet and whose English was quite good. I explained what we had for sale and intended to do and asked for his opening offer.
“£10”.
“Forget it, I want £60”
“How big you say?”
“9 foot by 6 foot”
“I give you £30”
“It’s worth at least £1 per square foot; £54”
“OK, I give you £40”
“No way, I’m not going below £48”
“OK, Johnny, done”
We shook.
It was as easy as that!
He didn’t want to wait until the middle of the night and suggested we made the exchange at about 10.00 p.m. With luck the Gilli Gilli man would have attracted a crowd by then that would be a distraction. It was arranged that the Gilli Gilli man would do his tricks and fun entertainment on the aft deck at No. 4 hatch. The bumboat man and I would smuggle the carpet out of the Contactor Room that was between No. 2 and No. 3 hatch, forward of the accommodation block.
He would moor his boat on the side opposite to the Accommodation Ladder, where it was dark. Although the ship was at anchor the fore deck was only dimly lit. The other cadets would somehow distract the officer of the watch on the bridge so that the exchange could proceed smoothly.
The plan was set.
The Gilli Gilli men in the Suez Canal are famous throughout the world fleet. Magicians who work with coins and fluffy yellow baby chicks. The chicks never made a sound but would magically appear from behind an ear, from under a hat or from your clothing. The magicians had nick names like “George Robey”, “Jock Macgregor”, “Thor Waldersen”. I wondered whether they were all the same guy who just changed his name depending on the nationality of the crew. Maybe, because George and Jock were also barbers
Most of the ships that I sailed on through the canal were Clan Line, Scottish Shire Line, or the Union Castle Line. Jock Macgregor’s Scottish accent was very good, but if I was on a Union Castle ship with British crew, George Robey would speak Cockney or Scouse.
Every sailor who transited the Suez Canal has his Gilli Gilli man story to tell. Whether they are true or not I don’t know, but it would not surprise me. Whether they were entertainers or thieves depended on the individual’s experience.
“They were word perfect on every accent out of the UK and pitched their voice to every ship going through the canal. They seemed to know where the crew mainly came from. I have never heard the Scouse accent copied better by anyone, including actors.”
“The Gilli Gilli man was the highlight of the Suez Canal. He could have taught Paul Daniels a trick or two. Who remembers Jock McGregor the Barber? He could be a Geordie, Scouser, Glaswegian, Cockney, Taffy, Paddy. Perfect accents but could not cut hair to save his life. A number of times I nearly ended up like Van Gogh, but his patter was good fun.”
“A Junior Engineer had his haircut by the barber in his cabin. The barber asked him to close his eyes while he cut his fringe, when he opened them again the barber had disappeared and so had his stereo and the wallet off his desk!”
“On a Kuwaiti registered ship the Third Mate had his stereo stolen from his cabin, and a cadet bought a stereo. At dinner the next evening they discovered it was the same machine. No love was shown between them, the Third Mate wanted his stereo back, the cadet wanted his money. Sort that one out!”
In the sixties there was a barber who spoke Norwegian quite well, and I let him do my hair. He cut off a few strands and asked me: "Now, about Anker - is he inside or is he out?" Anker Rogstad was a well-known safe cracker in Norway, who always swore he would turn straight, but was forever getting caught after a big bank job on some tiny detail and was something of a hero to many among the working class. He was hardly a name known outside of Oslo, let alone Norway. The barber’s demonstration of kinship, of empathy with a lonely sailor who was far from home, was heart-warming.
It was also a good marketing tool!
“I bought perfume for my girl and will never forget its name, “Aroma of the Wadi”. When she opened it there was no fragrance, just canal water I assume. Of course, the one he let us test in Port Said had a beautiful aroma. It must have been from another Wadi!
Oh! those Gilli Gilli, men. They were all fakirs.” I think he means “funkers”.
But Gilli Gilli men were a great distraction. As 10.00 p.m. approached the cadets persuaded the Third Officer to stroll down to the aft end of the boat deck, away from the Bridge, and have a quick shufti at what was going on. The crew were mostly from Liverpool, so the Gilli Gilli man was doing his performance in a broad scouse accent. You would have sworn that he came from the Wavertree Road.
Time to do the deal. We met and got the roll of carpet out of the Contactor Room and started carrying it across the deck to the bulwark.
“Hey, Johnny, wait” He pulled a wicked looking knife and started cutting the binding. “What are you doing”, I whispered, “Get it on your boat as quickly as possible”.
“I look before money.”
“OK,” I said, “but get a move on.”
With a practiced twist of his knife he cut the binding and the carpet slowly began to unroll. I was helping him from one end until, with horror, I saw a series of the blackest, oiliest, dirtiest engine room boot prints possible that went right across the beautiful white carpet from one end to the other.
There was a nanosecond’s silence and then Bumboat let out a sort of guttural roar and started towards me brandishing his knife. I turned and ran for the working alleyway as fast as I could, aware that Bumboat was coming fast behind. My cabin was on the next deck up, so I ran round the after end of the accommodation block to the darker side of the ship and climbed, outboard, to the next deck.
The noise of the commotion had disturbed the group watching the Gilli Gilli man. Bumboat ran into the middle of the sailors, looking for me, not realising that I had gone back along the working alleyway on the starboard side. He was momentarily delayed, and I had time to get into the accommodation and find my cabin door. It was locked of course, and although I had my key out of my pocket in a flash, I was shaking so much that I couldn’t get it into the lock. In the distance I could hear Bumboat shouting angrily. Finally, it seemed like a lifetime, my cabin door opened. I was inside. I locked the door behind me. I lay on the floor with the light off. Heart pounding
“John, you bastard” I thought to myself, “you must have known that those boot prints were on the carpet. You might have told me. I could have been killed or at least badly maimed!”
“Tim, you idiot” I said to myself, “why didn’t you check the carpet before you tried to sell it? I know you should not look a gift horse in the mouth, but this became life-threatening”
The next morning as we left the Canal and headed down the Gulf of Suez for the Red Sea, one of the cadets reported to me that Bumboat had stayed on the ship for a while, looking for me. The sailor on night watchman duty reported to the Third Mate that there was a white carpet with dirty oily footprints on the foredeck. The Third Mate called the Bosun, explained the situation, and told him to get the crew to search the ship. They found Bumboat wandering about on the Boat Deck, decided that he was trying to steal the carpet from the cargo and forced him off the ship, back to his boat.
At breakfast the Old Man said to the Mate (to his good right ear) “Are we carrying any carpets out this trip? Some shore fella tried to steal one last night”.
“No,” said the Mate, “that was in the homeward cargo last trip and our outturn was short delivered one carpet. I’ll send a message to head office that we have found it, but that it is severely damaged”.
“Harris, tell the Third Mate to make an entry in the Damaged Cargo Book; the Company should be able to make a claim on the P&I Club.”
“Yes, Sir”
.....................................................................................................................................................................................
The White Carpet
“I’m John Hull, everybody calls me Noddy”.
“Hi Noddy, I’m Tim”. We shook hands.
It was time to handover at the crew change.
The other cadets introduced themselves to the cadets they were going to relieve.
“What’s the Old Man like?”
“OK, but a bit of a Bible thumper”.
“What about the Mate”.
“He’s a right pain in the arse. Makes you repeat a collision regulation before he lets you go ashore. If you get it wrong, he makes you go back and learn it by heart. If you’re successful, then he lets you go”.
I often found that other cadet opinions did not tally with mine by the end of a voyage, so I tried to keep an open mind.
“Only real problem is he’s deaf in the left ear, but doesn’t like to let on, so be careful to make sure he hears what you say, but don’t make it obvious that you have to raise your voice a bit”.
Good advice from John.
I was Senior Cadet, so after John had let me know about the idiosyncrasies of the ship, and the work load they’d had, he indicated something special he wanted to tell me. Out of earshot of the other two new cadets.
We went out on deck, despite the cold and blustery weather.
“You see that Contactor Room over there”. He pointed. I nodded, “Well, inside is a beautiful white lambswool carpet all rolled up and tied securely. We found it when we had to clean out the hatch and smuggled it up to the Contactor Room one night. It must have been part of the cargo that got left down in the hold as it was hidden by piles of dunnage. We would have sold it ourselves, but we didn’t get the chance, so you and the new cadets might as well benefit from it.”
Wow! Great, it must be worth quite a bit and it would be silly to throw it away. I thought to myself, maybe we can sell it to the “bumboat men” while we’re going through the Canal.
The ship was empty and clean, waiting to start loading. Before loading we always tested the bilge suction from the lower holds. This was quite a performance as it was before the days of mobile phones, or walkie-talkies, so with three cadets it meant there would be one down in the hold, one on deck, usually with the duty officer or the Mate, and one at the engine room entrance.
The proceedings started with a bucket of water being lowered to the bottom of the hold and purposefully tipped into the bilge, near the suction rose. The hold cadet then shouted up to the cadet on deck “No. 1 port”, the cadet on deck then shouted to the cadet at the engine room “tell the engineer to pump out No. 1 port”. The duty engineer then opened the valve for No. 1 port to extract the water by suction. We anticipated hearing a loud slurping sound that meant the suction pump was working and the bilge line was clear. Then a quick look over the ship’s side, where the discharge came out, to make sure that there wasn’t oil in the discharged water. If there was it meant a leak in the fuel tank, where the bilge pipe passed through, and it was going into the bilge line.
The Duty Deck Officer, or the Mate if he had decided to take responsibility, climbed up and down the hold ladder to make sure he could hear the suction. If there was only one cadet on board, he’d climb up and down too, to work with the Mate. He’d also have to go down into the engine room to communicate with the duty engineer. Quite a performance and could be very tiring.
On this ship we had three cadets. One was a first tripper. He would get the worst jobs, so he had to go down to the bottom of the hold. It was him and the duty Mate who had to climb up and down the ladder; the other cadet had to go down the engine room to find the duty Engineer; I had the cushy job; all I had to do was lift the bucket of water out of the dock and lower it down to the new lad at the bottom of the lower hold. Then I relayed the instructions from the Mate.
After testing the port side of the hold, “tell them to suck on No. 2 starboard”. I’d wait at the engine room door for the other cadet to reappear and be told that suction was on, then run back to the top of the hatch and shout down to the Mate “engineer’s sucking on No. 2 starboard now”. Hopefully, the Mate or the cadet would shout back “OK, I can hear suction on No. 2 starboard” and we moved on to the next hatch.
You might imagine that it sometimes got a bit confusing and the relaying of messages got out of sync in a time delay. By the time we had got to No. 5 hatch we were always a bit spaced out, so it was not surprising that as I came back and told the Mate “the engineer is sucking on 5 port”, the Mate emerged on deck from the hold hatchway, sweating profusely, and said “I can’t hear on the port side!”
I remembered what John Hull told me. That he was deaf in the left ear. For some reason I thought “what a very nautical way to tell me that he was a bit hard of hearing on the left side” and forgetting that the Mate was also a bit sensitive about it, I cupped my hand and shouted in his right ear “they’re sucking on 5 port”. He looked at me with utter amazement, anger and disdain. “I’m NOT deaf. I can’t hear bilge suction on 5 port”. Oh dear, we hadn’t even started loading for the voyage and I already had a bad mark. That’s torn it.
It turned out later that the engineer had got the valves mixed up, and that 5 port was working OK. Maybe the Mate never forgave me for my blunder about his deafness that embarrassed him. For the rest of the voyage he always asked me to repeat the more longest and most obscure collision rules before allowing a trip ashore. It was a nuisance, but I have to admit that I learned the “Rule of the Road” for collision avoidance extremely well, which put me in good standing when I went for my Class 3 Certificate of Competency oral examination a few years later.
Cargo loading was finally completed, and we set sail for Port Said. Once we dropped the pilot off at Beachy Head we headed for the Isle of Ushant and the Bay of Biscay. It was time to brief the other two cadets about our good fortune; a beautiful thick white lambswool carpet to sell to the “bumboats” while we were going through the Canal. “How much do you think we should ask for it?” “Whatever we ask it should be divisible by 3 so that we can all get our share”. “Persian lambswool carpets don’t come cheap. What about £60?” We agreed that was about right. The bottom fall-back position was £48 as between us we had £2, so we could give change for £50, however it was paid, and divvy it up when we got home.
Plans were made. It was decided that as Senior Cadet I should find a buyer, carry out negotiations and make the deal. I would be on the 12 to 4 watch and when we found a buyer and finalised negotiation, the carpet exchange would happen during my watch. Best opportunity? In those days the Southbound Convoy anchored in the Lake to let the Northbound Convoy go through. The Great Bitter Lake at anchor was chosen. Excitement and tension mounted as we got nearer to Port Said and individual dreams were formed on what we would do with our windfall.
We got into the next Southbound Convoy and arrived at the Great Bitter Lake.
Once we were anchored, sure enough the “bumboats” arrived like moths around a lantern. “Hey, Johnny, you wanna buy Days of the week knickers for your girl?”, “Doll for your little daughter?”, “Binoculars?”, “Camera?”, “Radio?”, “Record player?”, “Watch”, “Souvenirs?”. Tropical white cotton uniforms and khaki shirts and shorts were the best buy. You name it, they had it, and if not, they knew where to get it.
Some bumboat hawkers always came on board. Presumably they had to pay the ship’s agent for the privilege. “Hey, Johnny, you want feelthy pictures?” This was always a good way to get a few of us off-watch together, sitting in a cabin passing round dog-eared photos of naked bodies doing quite incredible things with each other or even, occasionally, with assorted animals. Sometimes superimposed on the bodies were the heads of senior members of the British Royal family. I guess they must have had the equivalent for royalty and aristocracy of other flag states that passed through the Canal.
After we had ogled them, they were handed back with a polite “No thanks” and the dirty books were brought out. The books always amused me, not because of the content, but because of poor production print and quality. “You want Lady Chatterly’s Lover?” The books were full of spelling mistakes that made me laugh. I can’t remember them all, but one sticks in my mind. It erotically stated “He funked her on the soda”. Sounds like a good advert for Coca-Cola!
I approached a few of the bumboat men until I found one who seemed interested in our carpet and whose English was quite good. I explained what we had for sale and intended to do and asked for his opening offer.
“£10”.
“Forget it, I want £60”
“How big you say?”
“9 foot by 6 foot”
“I give you £30”
“It’s worth at least £1 per square foot; £54”
“OK, I give you £40”
“No way, I’m not going below £48”
“OK, Johnny, done”
We shook.
It was as easy as that!
He didn’t want to wait until the middle of the night and suggested we made the exchange at about 10.00 p.m. With luck the Gilli Gilli man would have attracted a crowd by then that would be a distraction. It was arranged that the Gilli Gilli man would do his tricks and fun entertainment on the aft deck at No. 4 hatch. The bumboat man and I would smuggle the carpet out of the Contactor Room that was between No. 2 and No. 3 hatch, forward of the accommodation block.
He would moor his boat on the side opposite to the Accommodation Ladder, where it was dark. Although the ship was at anchor the fore deck was only dimly lit. The other cadets would somehow distract the officer of the watch on the bridge so that the exchange could proceed smoothly.
The plan was set.
The Gilli Gilli men in the Suez Canal are famous throughout the world fleet. Magicians who work with coins and fluffy yellow baby chicks. The chicks never made a sound but would magically appear from behind an ear, from under a hat or from your clothing. The magicians had nick names like “George Robey”, “Jock Macgregor”, “Thor Waldersen”. I wondered whether they were all the same guy who just changed his name depending on the nationality of the crew. Maybe, because George and Jock were also barbers
Most of the ships that I sailed on through the canal were Clan Line, Scottish Shire Line, or the Union Castle Line. Jock Macgregor’s Scottish accent was very good, but if I was on a Union Castle ship with British crew, George Robey would speak Cockney or Scouse.
Every sailor who transited the Suez Canal has his Gilli Gilli man story to tell. Whether they are true or not I don’t know, but it would not surprise me. Whether they were entertainers or thieves depended on the individual’s experience.
“They were word perfect on every accent out of the UK and pitched their voice to every ship going through the canal. They seemed to know where the crew mainly came from. I have never heard the Scouse accent copied better by anyone, including actors.”
“The Gilli Gilli man was the highlight of the Suez Canal. He could have taught Paul Daniels a trick or two. Who remembers Jock McGregor the Barber? He could be a Geordie, Scouser, Glaswegian, Cockney, Taffy, Paddy. Perfect accents but could not cut hair to save his life. A number of times I nearly ended up like Van Gogh, but his patter was good fun.”
“A Junior Engineer had his haircut by the barber in his cabin. The barber asked him to close his eyes while he cut his fringe, when he opened them again the barber had disappeared and so had his stereo and the wallet off his desk!”
“On a Kuwaiti registered ship the Third Mate had his stereo stolen from his cabin, and a cadet bought a stereo. At dinner the next evening they discovered it was the same machine. No love was shown between them, the Third Mate wanted his stereo back, the cadet wanted his money. Sort that one out!”
In the sixties there was a barber who spoke Norwegian quite well, and I let him do my hair. He cut off a few strands and asked me: "Now, about Anker - is he inside or is he out?" Anker Rogstad was a well-known safe cracker in Norway, who always swore he would turn straight, but was forever getting caught after a big bank job on some tiny detail and was something of a hero to many among the working class. He was hardly a name known outside of Oslo, let alone Norway. The barber’s demonstration of kinship, of empathy with a lonely sailor who was far from home, was heart-warming.
It was also a good marketing tool!
“I bought perfume for my girl and will never forget its name, “Aroma of the Wadi”. When she opened it there was no fragrance, just canal water I assume. Of course, the one he let us test in Port Said had a beautiful aroma. It must have been from another Wadi!
Oh! those Gilli Gilli, men. They were all fakirs.” I think he means “funkers”.
But Gilli Gilli men were a great distraction. As 10.00 p.m. approached the cadets persuaded the Third Officer to stroll down to the aft end of the boat deck, away from the Bridge, and have a quick shufti at what was going on. The crew were mostly from Liverpool, so the Gilli Gilli man was doing his performance in a broad scouse accent. You would have sworn that he came from the Wavertree Road.
Time to do the deal. We met and got the roll of carpet out of the Contactor Room and started carrying it across the deck to the bulwark.
“Hey, Johnny, wait” He pulled a wicked looking knife and started cutting the binding. “What are you doing”, I whispered, “Get it on your boat as quickly as possible”.
“I look before money.”
“OK,” I said, “but get a move on.”
With a practiced twist of his knife he cut the binding and the carpet slowly began to unroll. I was helping him from one end until, with horror, I saw a series of the blackest, oiliest, dirtiest engine room boot prints possible that went right across the beautiful white carpet from one end to the other.
There was a nanosecond’s silence and then Bumboat let out a sort of guttural roar and started towards me brandishing his knife. I turned and ran for the working alleyway as fast as I could, aware that Bumboat was coming fast behind. My cabin was on the next deck up, so I ran round the after end of the accommodation block to the darker side of the ship and climbed, outboard, to the next deck.
The noise of the commotion had disturbed the group watching the Gilli Gilli man. Bumboat ran into the middle of the sailors, looking for me, not realising that I had gone back along the working alleyway on the starboard side. He was momentarily delayed, and I had time to get into the accommodation and find my cabin door. It was locked of course, and although I had my key out of my pocket in a flash, I was shaking so much that I couldn’t get it into the lock. In the distance I could hear Bumboat shouting angrily. Finally, it seemed like a lifetime, my cabin door opened. I was inside. I locked the door behind me. I lay on the floor with the light off. Heart pounding
“John, you bastard” I thought to myself, “you must have known that those boot prints were on the carpet. You might have told me. I could have been killed or at least badly maimed!”
“Tim, you idiot” I said to myself, “why didn’t you check the carpet before you tried to sell it? I know you should not look a gift horse in the mouth, but this became life-threatening”
The next morning as we left the Canal and headed down the Gulf of Suez for the Red Sea, one of the cadets reported to me that Bumboat had stayed on the ship for a while, looking for me. The sailor on night watchman duty reported to the Third Mate that there was a white carpet with dirty oily footprints on the foredeck. The Third Mate called the Bosun, explained the situation, and told him to get the crew to search the ship. They found Bumboat wandering about on the Boat Deck, decided that he was trying to steal the carpet from the cargo and forced him off the ship, back to his boat.
At breakfast the Old Man said to the Mate (to his good right ear) “Are we carrying any carpets out this trip? Some shore fella tried to steal one last night”.
“No,” said the Mate, “that was in the homeward cargo last trip and our outturn was short delivered one carpet. I’ll send a message to head office that we have found it, but that it is severely damaged”.
“Harris, tell the Third Mate to make an entry in the Damaged Cargo Book; the Company should be able to make a claim on the P&I Club.”
“Yes, Sir”
.....................................................................................................................................................................................
DAVID´S ANECDOTES No. 1
Having dropped out of sixth form at the first half term at 16 years old I would have to wait until I was 21 before I could apply to be a customs officer. In my third job I was still looking for suitable employment that might stand me in good stead.
My first job was in the city working for a shipping and forwarding company where I learnt about shipping goods overseas. On one occasion I had to instruct about 4 or 5 different factories to mark and crate up a number of crates of components for a large piece of equipment for I think a power station. The crates duly arrived in West Africa where to the power stations horror they had 4 or 5 boxes all numbered one and another 4 or 5 numbered 2 and so on. Instead of them being able to unpack and work with crates in number order like say 1 to 20 they had to unpack each crate to see where it fitted.
My second job of working in a dock office lasted just 2 weeks and I had already decided that job was not for me within minutes of going into the office. Dickensian would have made the office sound modern. Writing up ship’s manifests not the most exciting job. Luckily after a few days the London dockers went on strike so I had nothing to do for my remaining week.
My third job shipping goods by railway wagons to Switzerland. Each morning I would go to Bricklayers Arms goods depot in London’s Old Kent Road to see what goods had been delivered - it was known as a call over. On return to the office my immediate boss would decide how to best load up the wagons and I would type up various forms. Nothing in that to fire my imagination.
One morning having done the call over I again read the advert I had seen in the previous day’s Evening News. Smart, intelligent, reliable young man needed for busy shipping and transport department. Hm I thought you might be thought big headed to apply for that then again nothing to lose. So I decided to give the company a call before returning to my office.
Me: Good morning I am calling in respect of your advert in last night’s Evening News for a smart, intelligent, reliable young man.
Advertiser: Hello, hello.
Me: Good morning I am calling in respect of your advert in last night’s Evening News for a smart, intelligent, reliable young man.
Advertiser: Hello, hello.
Good morning I am calling in respect of your advert in last night’s Evening News for a smart, intelligent, reliable young man.
Advertiser: Hello, hello. Then in a rather pained way ‘’Caller if you are in a public ‘phone box press button A.’’
Me: In a very small voice said ‘’I am calling in respect of your advert in last night’s Evening News for a smart, intelligent, reliable young man.’’
I got an interview and to my even greater surprise got the job. Within a short time of starting, like 30 minutes, I was not sure that this was the job for me. I thought I ought to give it a week or two before handing in my notice.
In fact I stayed with that company for almost 43 years. Perhaps I once was smart, intelligent and a reliable young man and HM Customs and Excise lost out.
....................................................................................................................................................................................
CAPTAIN TIM REPORTS
On 14th October 1966 I passed the examinations for the 1st Mate Foreign Going Certificate of Competency that in modern times is known as a Class 2 Certificate. I was 22 years and a few months old. After a short coastal spell on the Scottish Shire Line’s steamer “Argyllshire” I joined the Clan Macnair in Liverpool on 14th December and sailed for East Africa, Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and Australia.
I often found myself being appointed to a ship just before the Christmas/New Year holiday. The Company must have had a list of names of officers that did not make a fuss about shipping out just before Christmas; in my case it was usually not that I didn’t like to be home at Christmas, it was more a case of financial necessity.
The voyage to Australia was an exciting adventure as I had not been there before, and we did the whole of the Aussie coast discharging between Fremantle then round Cape Leeuwin and West Cape Howe to Albany, across the Great Australian Bight to Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Townsville to Cairns. Loading at the same ports on the way back, leaving Fremantle for Colombo, the Suez Canal, through the Mediterranean, the Straits of Gibraltar, across the Bay of Biscay, along the English Channel and back to the London docks. It had been a good voyage, with mostly fair winds and calm seas, together with some pleasant adventures and whale watching episodes. The Officers all got on well together and I looked forward to another voyage on the same ship with the same captain after a few weeks leave.
The ship left the Thames on May 21st bound for East Africa with cargo for Mombasa, Dar es Salaam, Nacala, a beautiful natural unspoiled harbour in the north of the then Portuguese East Africa (now Mozambique) and Beira. On the passage across the Mediterranean I celebrated my 23rd birthday and we arrived in Port Said on Tuesday May 30th. Port Said was always a bit hectic, trying to get on the next available convoy so that we didn’t waste any voyage time. On this occasion there was an unusual atmosphere as we prepared for the transit and I noticed as we went through the Canal that the Egyptians were putting hoods, rather like a cardinal’s hat, but black, on all the channel marker buoys, such that the lights from the buoys could not be seen from above, but could still be seen from the bridge of the ship, shining out from under the wide brim. Bit odd, but I didn’t think any more of it. The transit passed off unremarkably and we passed through the Bitter Lakes, after anchoring to let the northbound convoy through, back into the Canal and on to Suez where the pilot disembarked on 3rd June.
The Captain was pleased to have got the Suez Canal transit under his belt and came on the bridge to sign the Night Order Book and pass the time of night with a cup of cocoa before he turned in after a tiring day. The passage down the Gulf of Suez was uneventful.
The average watch is quiet, gives you time to think and let your imagination soar freely, interspersed by plotting the ship’s position on the chart every fifteen minutes or so and checking that the helmsman (or auto-pilot) is following the correct course.
So when you saw the lights of a ship dead ahead on a collision course and you knew that you were going to pass quite close, it was not uncommon to grab the Aldis lamp that was always plugged in for emergency readiness, point it at the ship approaching and send out • , • , • ,• , (AA, AA) of the Morse Code; a two letter signal used for calling an unknown station or general call. If the other ship’s officer was equally bored, there was a response, and the standard exchange using the lamp “What ship? Where bound?”. Many ships ignored the call up, but ships of European country flags usually responded. If the ship was a British company ship you might have quite a conversation on the lamp, and if it was one of your own company’s ships you would then get on the VHF to exchange crew lists and generally chat about the ship’s company and your respective voyages. Sometimes you got an old shipmate and had a reminiscing chat.
So, I was a bit surprised when the vessel coming the other way, in response to my signal, sent “Scottish Star ……….. Suez ……… VHF Channel 16”. I knew that the Scottish Star was a British ship of the Blue Star shipping company, but thought it was odd for them to want to have a chat on the VHF. Once we had agreed a working VHF Channel the conversation went something like this:
“Scottish Star, Scottish Star this is Clan Macnair, how do you read me, over”.
“Clan Macnair, Clan Macnair, this is Scottish Star, reading you loud and clear, over”. Then the conversation continued “Clan Macnair, what was your transit of the Canal like? Over”
“No problem,” I said, “We arrived on Tuesday 30th, got a convoy on 31st. Anchored in the lakes on June 2nd and passed out of Suez, down the Gulf of Suez on 3rd June”.
“You didn’t experience any problems then?”
“No, everything was fine.”
“Thanks, Clan Macnair, this is Scottish Star signing off, over and out”
By this time the two ships had passed each other safely (port side to port side) and the Scottish Star was rapidly disappearing astern. I’d better put another position on the chart and start writing up the logbook. A quick scan of the horizon and nothing untoward so I go into the dimly lit chartroom. A few moments later the helmsman calls to me that there is a vessel two points on the port bow, so I leave the chartroom to have a look. To my surprise the oncoming ship starts calling on the Aldis. We are busy tonight, I think as I respond and read the usual message. “Clan Macnair ……. Aden, what ship?” I replied.
“Port Invercargill …… Suez …… Channel 16”. Not again. Another British company, Port Line, I thought, it’s getting near to the end of the watch and the 2nd Mate will be coming up to the bridge soon, but never mind.
The VHF crackled “Clan Macnair, Clan Macnair, this is Port Invercargill calling, how do you read please? Over.”
“Loud and Clear, Port Invercargill. Over”.
“Clan Macnair, how was your transit of the Canal? Over”. I retold the message that I had given the Scottish Star only an hour or so before, finishing off with “No problem. Over”.
“Thank you, Clan Macnair, the Old Man will be pleased when I tell him in the morning. Over and out!”.
Our ship continued on its way bound for Aden, past Jeddah to port and Port Sudan to starboard. Another day and I went for breakfast before relieving the Mate at 8 o’clock. The Captain was in full voice as I entered the dining saloon and I just heard “ ….Israelis are having another go at the Arabs, bombing the Canal and ships in the Canal. There are four British ships trapped in the Lakes, two Blue Funnel ships: the Agapenor and the Melampus, a Blue Star ship, the Scottish Star, and a Port Liner, the Port Invercargill”.
Well, how was I to know?!!
....................................................................................................................................................................................
On 14th October 1966 I passed the examinations for the 1st Mate Foreign Going Certificate of Competency that in modern times is known as a Class 2 Certificate. I was 22 years and a few months old. After a short coastal spell on the Scottish Shire Line’s steamer “Argyllshire” I joined the Clan Macnair in Liverpool on 14th December and sailed for East Africa, Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and Australia.
I often found myself being appointed to a ship just before the Christmas/New Year holiday. The Company must have had a list of names of officers that did not make a fuss about shipping out just before Christmas; in my case it was usually not that I didn’t like to be home at Christmas, it was more a case of financial necessity.
The voyage to Australia was an exciting adventure as I had not been there before, and we did the whole of the Aussie coast discharging between Fremantle then round Cape Leeuwin and West Cape Howe to Albany, across the Great Australian Bight to Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Townsville to Cairns. Loading at the same ports on the way back, leaving Fremantle for Colombo, the Suez Canal, through the Mediterranean, the Straits of Gibraltar, across the Bay of Biscay, along the English Channel and back to the London docks. It had been a good voyage, with mostly fair winds and calm seas, together with some pleasant adventures and whale watching episodes. The Officers all got on well together and I looked forward to another voyage on the same ship with the same captain after a few weeks leave.
The ship left the Thames on May 21st bound for East Africa with cargo for Mombasa, Dar es Salaam, Nacala, a beautiful natural unspoiled harbour in the north of the then Portuguese East Africa (now Mozambique) and Beira. On the passage across the Mediterranean I celebrated my 23rd birthday and we arrived in Port Said on Tuesday May 30th. Port Said was always a bit hectic, trying to get on the next available convoy so that we didn’t waste any voyage time. On this occasion there was an unusual atmosphere as we prepared for the transit and I noticed as we went through the Canal that the Egyptians were putting hoods, rather like a cardinal’s hat, but black, on all the channel marker buoys, such that the lights from the buoys could not be seen from above, but could still be seen from the bridge of the ship, shining out from under the wide brim. Bit odd, but I didn’t think any more of it. The transit passed off unremarkably and we passed through the Bitter Lakes, after anchoring to let the northbound convoy through, back into the Canal and on to Suez where the pilot disembarked on 3rd June.
The Captain was pleased to have got the Suez Canal transit under his belt and came on the bridge to sign the Night Order Book and pass the time of night with a cup of cocoa before he turned in after a tiring day. The passage down the Gulf of Suez was uneventful.
The average watch is quiet, gives you time to think and let your imagination soar freely, interspersed by plotting the ship’s position on the chart every fifteen minutes or so and checking that the helmsman (or auto-pilot) is following the correct course.
So when you saw the lights of a ship dead ahead on a collision course and you knew that you were going to pass quite close, it was not uncommon to grab the Aldis lamp that was always plugged in for emergency readiness, point it at the ship approaching and send out • , • , • ,• , (AA, AA) of the Morse Code; a two letter signal used for calling an unknown station or general call. If the other ship’s officer was equally bored, there was a response, and the standard exchange using the lamp “What ship? Where bound?”. Many ships ignored the call up, but ships of European country flags usually responded. If the ship was a British company ship you might have quite a conversation on the lamp, and if it was one of your own company’s ships you would then get on the VHF to exchange crew lists and generally chat about the ship’s company and your respective voyages. Sometimes you got an old shipmate and had a reminiscing chat.
So, I was a bit surprised when the vessel coming the other way, in response to my signal, sent “Scottish Star ……….. Suez ……… VHF Channel 16”. I knew that the Scottish Star was a British ship of the Blue Star shipping company, but thought it was odd for them to want to have a chat on the VHF. Once we had agreed a working VHF Channel the conversation went something like this:
“Scottish Star, Scottish Star this is Clan Macnair, how do you read me, over”.
“Clan Macnair, Clan Macnair, this is Scottish Star, reading you loud and clear, over”. Then the conversation continued “Clan Macnair, what was your transit of the Canal like? Over”
“No problem,” I said, “We arrived on Tuesday 30th, got a convoy on 31st. Anchored in the lakes on June 2nd and passed out of Suez, down the Gulf of Suez on 3rd June”.
“You didn’t experience any problems then?”
“No, everything was fine.”
“Thanks, Clan Macnair, this is Scottish Star signing off, over and out”
By this time the two ships had passed each other safely (port side to port side) and the Scottish Star was rapidly disappearing astern. I’d better put another position on the chart and start writing up the logbook. A quick scan of the horizon and nothing untoward so I go into the dimly lit chartroom. A few moments later the helmsman calls to me that there is a vessel two points on the port bow, so I leave the chartroom to have a look. To my surprise the oncoming ship starts calling on the Aldis. We are busy tonight, I think as I respond and read the usual message. “Clan Macnair ……. Aden, what ship?” I replied.
“Port Invercargill …… Suez …… Channel 16”. Not again. Another British company, Port Line, I thought, it’s getting near to the end of the watch and the 2nd Mate will be coming up to the bridge soon, but never mind.
The VHF crackled “Clan Macnair, Clan Macnair, this is Port Invercargill calling, how do you read please? Over.”
“Loud and Clear, Port Invercargill. Over”.
“Clan Macnair, how was your transit of the Canal? Over”. I retold the message that I had given the Scottish Star only an hour or so before, finishing off with “No problem. Over”.
“Thank you, Clan Macnair, the Old Man will be pleased when I tell him in the morning. Over and out!”.
Our ship continued on its way bound for Aden, past Jeddah to port and Port Sudan to starboard. Another day and I went for breakfast before relieving the Mate at 8 o’clock. The Captain was in full voice as I entered the dining saloon and I just heard “ ….Israelis are having another go at the Arabs, bombing the Canal and ships in the Canal. There are four British ships trapped in the Lakes, two Blue Funnel ships: the Agapenor and the Melampus, a Blue Star ship, the Scottish Star, and a Port Liner, the Port Invercargill”.
Well, how was I to know?!!
....................................................................................................................................................................................
Three beautiful painting by Mandy Borelli. Also, another of her thought provoking quotes.
Her contact details are,
mandygata@hotmail.com
Her contact details are,
mandygata@hotmail.com
This is from Eric Fuller, a friend from the old days in the UK. Eric now lives in the USA.
16 June 2020
For your enjoyment, today, are contributions from Captain Tim, Mandy Borelli, Lucinda E Clarke and Dawn Howlett.
Captain Tim Reports
For your enjoyment, today, are contributions from Captain Tim, Mandy Borelli, Lucinda E Clarke and Dawn Howlett.
Captain Tim Reports
THROUGH THE SUEZ CANAL.
When you traverse the Suez Canal it is eerie. Especially at night. The ship is going at slow speed, so the usual powerful vibrating throb of the huge diesel engine is reduced to the murmur of a mouse’s heartbeat. In certain sections of the Canal there is just desert sand on either side (well there was in the nineteen sixties and seventies, but it is over forty years since I went through there). Down in the engine room it is not much different than when you are on passage in the middle of the ocean, but the engine is just working more slowly, and the propeller shaft is turning lazily. The engineer is alert; monitoring the engine in case there is need to change the ship’s speed if the bridge telegraph rings.
Up on the bridge it is a different atmosphere. As usual at night the bridge wheelhouse is in complete darkness, with just a faint glow from the monitor lights on the various pieces of navigational, communication and steering equipment. The autopilot has been turned off and there is a helmsman at the wheel. Sometimes the Captain will be on the bridge with the ship’s officer of the watch (OOW). In my day there were sufficient cadets to have one on each watch, taking notes of what happens as the transit proceeds. And, of course, there is the Suez Canal pilot who is conning the ship and occasionally giving orders in the dead quiet that are repeated by the OOW and the helmsman to make sure the correct order has been given and received at the helm. It is spooky, especially when it is your first voyage.
The Universal Company of the Maritime Canal of Suez constructed the canal in the decade between 1859 and 1869 and operated it until the 1956 Suez Crisis. The company was formed by the famous Ferdinand de Lesseps in 1858, and it owned and operated the canal for many years. Initially, French private investors were the major shareholders, with Egypt having a significant stake.
When the Wali (a sort of Provincial Governor) of Egypt and Sudan changed in 1863, he refused to abide by some of the concessions to the canal company made by his predecessor. As compensation Napoleon III awarded £3,800,000 (equivalent to about £350 million in 2020) to the company for the losses incurred by the changes that the Wali demanded. During 1875, a financial crisis forced the Wali to sell to the UK for £3,977,000 (equivalent to about £380 million in 2020).
The UK owned company operated the canal until it was nationalised by Nasser in 1956, (which led to the Suez Crisis). In 1962, Egypt made the final payment for the canal to the Universal Suez Ship Canal Company and took complete control of the canal which is now owned and operated by the Suez Canal Authority.
So it was that in 1961, on my first voyage from London to East Africa, on a ship called the M.V. “Riebeeck Castle”, that the Suez Canal pilot who came aboard was German. At the time the Canal Company employed pilots from all over the world, but mainly European. By the end of the sixties, however, they had nearly all retired and been replaced by Egyptian pilots.
In order for the pilot to be able to keep the ship in the middle of the canal channel, a searchlight was rigged on a gimbal on the prow. On the older ships (the Riebeeck Castle was built in 1946) the searchlight was hung from a permanent stanchion post on the focsle deck, right at the point of the prow. An Egyptian electrician was employed who came aboard at Port Said and left in Suez (or vice-versa depending on which way you were going). He set the whole system up and at night focused a split beam giving two separate ribbons of light to shine on the two edges of the canal well ahead of the ship. When properly calibrated the lights shone equidistant on both canal banks when the ship is in the centre of the canal, in the deepest water. If the beam on the port side appears to be nearer to the ship than on the starboard side, it means the ship has drifted to the port side of the channel and a course correction is necessary. The pilot continually made sure that the ship was kept in the middle. The electrician stayed by the light from dusk until dawn. On the company’s newer ships, there was a “Suez Canal Lamp/ Searchlight” permanently in place in the bow, with its own special area and a door in the bow of the ship that was opened to enable the light beam to shine out.
So there I am, just turned 17 years old, full of excitement and romantic thoughts of adventure, pootling through the Suez Canal, at 2 o’clock in the morning, half asleep, with the faint glow of the equipment lights, eerily quiet, leaning on the bridge front trying to keep awake, watching the sandy banks of the canal slip slowly by when I feel a tap on my shoulder. I turn to see a disembodied, turbaned head and dark face with blood streaming down one side mysteriously lit by the glow from the ship’s telegraph. It was far more frightening than that moment in “Psycho” and gave me the nearest to a heart attack I have ever had. I let out a muffled scream and a softly spoken Egyptian voice said to me in broken English “help, please!”. It was the electrician from the Canal light. He had slipped on the deck and fallen, splitting a nasty gash in his temple that was bleeding badly and he needed First Aid. I will never forget that moment.
Sorry I must rush; I am guest judge for the “Guadalcanal Under 21 Girls Hula-Hula Dancing Contest”. It is a tough life in the Solomon Islands, but someone’s got to do it!!! (Only joking)
......................................................................................................................................
Donald,
Objectionable
Man,
It’s
Not
A
Terrorist
Entity.
?
Donald,
Objectionable
Character,
Turn
Off
Racism.
Strange
Trump
Rat
Actions
Never
Gain
Egalitarian
Law
Over
Violent
Enforcement
Donald,
Objectionable
Nut’,
Trump
Delivers
Republican
Objectionable
Policies
This
Highly
Explosive
BOMB
DOMINATE?
DOCTOR STRANGELOVE, DON’T DROP THE BOMB!
.......................................................................................................................................
Captain Tim.
....................................................................................................................................................................................
When you traverse the Suez Canal it is eerie. Especially at night. The ship is going at slow speed, so the usual powerful vibrating throb of the huge diesel engine is reduced to the murmur of a mouse’s heartbeat. In certain sections of the Canal there is just desert sand on either side (well there was in the nineteen sixties and seventies, but it is over forty years since I went through there). Down in the engine room it is not much different than when you are on passage in the middle of the ocean, but the engine is just working more slowly, and the propeller shaft is turning lazily. The engineer is alert; monitoring the engine in case there is need to change the ship’s speed if the bridge telegraph rings.
Up on the bridge it is a different atmosphere. As usual at night the bridge wheelhouse is in complete darkness, with just a faint glow from the monitor lights on the various pieces of navigational, communication and steering equipment. The autopilot has been turned off and there is a helmsman at the wheel. Sometimes the Captain will be on the bridge with the ship’s officer of the watch (OOW). In my day there were sufficient cadets to have one on each watch, taking notes of what happens as the transit proceeds. And, of course, there is the Suez Canal pilot who is conning the ship and occasionally giving orders in the dead quiet that are repeated by the OOW and the helmsman to make sure the correct order has been given and received at the helm. It is spooky, especially when it is your first voyage.
The Universal Company of the Maritime Canal of Suez constructed the canal in the decade between 1859 and 1869 and operated it until the 1956 Suez Crisis. The company was formed by the famous Ferdinand de Lesseps in 1858, and it owned and operated the canal for many years. Initially, French private investors were the major shareholders, with Egypt having a significant stake.
When the Wali (a sort of Provincial Governor) of Egypt and Sudan changed in 1863, he refused to abide by some of the concessions to the canal company made by his predecessor. As compensation Napoleon III awarded £3,800,000 (equivalent to about £350 million in 2020) to the company for the losses incurred by the changes that the Wali demanded. During 1875, a financial crisis forced the Wali to sell to the UK for £3,977,000 (equivalent to about £380 million in 2020).
The UK owned company operated the canal until it was nationalised by Nasser in 1956, (which led to the Suez Crisis). In 1962, Egypt made the final payment for the canal to the Universal Suez Ship Canal Company and took complete control of the canal which is now owned and operated by the Suez Canal Authority.
So it was that in 1961, on my first voyage from London to East Africa, on a ship called the M.V. “Riebeeck Castle”, that the Suez Canal pilot who came aboard was German. At the time the Canal Company employed pilots from all over the world, but mainly European. By the end of the sixties, however, they had nearly all retired and been replaced by Egyptian pilots.
In order for the pilot to be able to keep the ship in the middle of the canal channel, a searchlight was rigged on a gimbal on the prow. On the older ships (the Riebeeck Castle was built in 1946) the searchlight was hung from a permanent stanchion post on the focsle deck, right at the point of the prow. An Egyptian electrician was employed who came aboard at Port Said and left in Suez (or vice-versa depending on which way you were going). He set the whole system up and at night focused a split beam giving two separate ribbons of light to shine on the two edges of the canal well ahead of the ship. When properly calibrated the lights shone equidistant on both canal banks when the ship is in the centre of the canal, in the deepest water. If the beam on the port side appears to be nearer to the ship than on the starboard side, it means the ship has drifted to the port side of the channel and a course correction is necessary. The pilot continually made sure that the ship was kept in the middle. The electrician stayed by the light from dusk until dawn. On the company’s newer ships, there was a “Suez Canal Lamp/ Searchlight” permanently in place in the bow, with its own special area and a door in the bow of the ship that was opened to enable the light beam to shine out.
So there I am, just turned 17 years old, full of excitement and romantic thoughts of adventure, pootling through the Suez Canal, at 2 o’clock in the morning, half asleep, with the faint glow of the equipment lights, eerily quiet, leaning on the bridge front trying to keep awake, watching the sandy banks of the canal slip slowly by when I feel a tap on my shoulder. I turn to see a disembodied, turbaned head and dark face with blood streaming down one side mysteriously lit by the glow from the ship’s telegraph. It was far more frightening than that moment in “Psycho” and gave me the nearest to a heart attack I have ever had. I let out a muffled scream and a softly spoken Egyptian voice said to me in broken English “help, please!”. It was the electrician from the Canal light. He had slipped on the deck and fallen, splitting a nasty gash in his temple that was bleeding badly and he needed First Aid. I will never forget that moment.
Sorry I must rush; I am guest judge for the “Guadalcanal Under 21 Girls Hula-Hula Dancing Contest”. It is a tough life in the Solomon Islands, but someone’s got to do it!!! (Only joking)
......................................................................................................................................
Donald,
Objectionable
Man,
It’s
Not
A
Terrorist
Entity.
?
Donald,
Objectionable
Character,
Turn
Off
Racism.
Strange
Trump
Rat
Actions
Never
Gain
Egalitarian
Law
Over
Violent
Enforcement
Donald,
Objectionable
Nut’,
Trump
Delivers
Republican
Objectionable
Policies
This
Highly
Explosive
BOMB
DOMINATE?
DOCTOR STRANGELOVE, DON’T DROP THE BOMB!
.......................................................................................................................................
Captain Tim.
....................................................................................................................................................................................
This is another beautiful painting by Mandy Borelli. Also, below, is another of her thought provoking quotes.
Her contact details are,
mandygata@hotmail.com
Her contact details are,
mandygata@hotmail.com
This is a nice pic of Lucinda E Clarke at one of her many book signings. You can contact Lucinda at
lucinda@lucindaeclarke.com
I´ve added the three pics, below, courtesy of Lucinda´s website to raise a smile in these uncertain times.
lucinda@lucindaeclarke.com
I´ve added the three pics, below, courtesy of Lucinda´s website to raise a smile in these uncertain times.
We recently reconnected with Dawn Howlett. I first met Dawn at a book signing a few years ago and she mentioned that she worked in stained glass and tile. The pic on the left is a great example of her talent and the one below is a particular favourite of mine. A truly talented lady.
25 May 2020
Welcome to the second update of my FRIENDS page.
Welcome to the second update of my FRIENDS page.
Here is a picture of my POP UP SHOP selling greetings cards, posters and prints. I also welcome commissions and can produce canvas prints from any of my images on the web site - any size to suit wall space
For Pop Up shop - info@fineartamerica.com
JENNY ANNE MORRISON - ARTIST
Visit my website to see paintings
http://www.jennyannemorrison.com
For enquiries and to arrange a private view at the Gallery call:- LANDLINE : 96 558 7711. MOBILE :- 694 412 409
.....................................................................................................................................................................................
For Pop Up shop - info@fineartamerica.com
JENNY ANNE MORRISON - ARTIST
Visit my website to see paintings
http://www.jennyannemorrison.com
For enquiries and to arrange a private view at the Gallery call:- LANDLINE : 96 558 7711. MOBILE :- 694 412 409
.....................................................................................................................................................................................
Captain Tim Reports
No Starbucks! No cinemas! No theatres! No live entertainment! No McDonalds! No KFC! 80% unemployment!
You think I’m talking about the “lockdown”.
No, I’m talking about normal life in Honiara in the Solomon Islands. Josie and I came here in 2013 and I worked here until the end of last year. It is a beautiful sleepy Pacific Island nation with beautiful Pacific Island (Melanesian) people.
We had been to the Philippines for Christmas and the New Year in November and came back at the beginning of March to the capital city (one main road, three good hotels and about 50,000 people) Honiara, on Guadalcanal Province island, to pack up our personal effects and sell our cars. My work here had come to an end.
We accomplished all that and were booked to leave on 22nd March by Air Niugini to Manila via Port Moresby when at midnight on 21st March the Papua New Guinea Government closed their border (and the International airport) to all but PNG citizens and permanent residents. So, Air Niugini would not let us board the plane in Honiara on Sunday.
We had visas to go to Australia, but Australia had already closed its borders to non-Australian passport holders and residents, and soon afterwards the Philippines did the same. Then the Solomon Islands closed its airport to all international flights. Being a poor country, the health facilities here are basic with a capital ”B”. The Government knew that if the virus ever arrived here it would practically wipe out the population. When I first arrived here my immediate “boss” a senior Government Civil Servant advised me “Whatever you do, do not get yourself admitted to the “Referral Hospital” (the only one in the Solomon Islands) as you will probably never come out”. And that was years ago before anybody had heard of COVID 19.
So, the Solomon Islands Government (SIG), in its wisdom, closed entry to foreigners; returning residents were immediately placed in quarantine from the airport for fourteen days. The result: there has never been a case of the virus in the Solomon Islands. (Johnson Trump take note).
The SIG Cabinet took it very seriously because they knew they had to and because they listened to scientific advice. A State of Emergency was declared to give the Prime Minister and his Cabinet sweeping powers, many Government offices were reduced to a minimum staff. Everybody unemployed (the wantoks) and who was not “essential” in Honiara in Guadalcanal Province was given a free enforced ferry boat ride. Baack to their original town or village on one of the other eight main Provincial Islands. The net result is that we go about our normal routine lives, which you can see from my opening sentences, is very simple. A beautiful central market with friendly smiling ladies selling luscious tropical fruits and vegetables; the biggest sweetest, tastiest pineapples for less than 50p! Eat your heart out Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Masymas and Lidl!!
In the simplicity is the beauty. The Solomon Islands until Independence in 1978 was a British Protectorate and the people remember a “British” way of life from even before that time. The children play the games that I played as a child 70 years ago; they run around and laugh, squeal and sing the songs we used to sing at primary school. The grown-ups also like to laugh; not a giggle, but a belly laugh.
Solomon Islanders are spiritual; they live within their environment and are close to the sea and the earth. Prayers are said before meetings; but they are not pious, have a great sense of humour and enjoy fun. They believe strongly in the importance of family and “clan” groups; respecting their elders.
So, we could not wish to be “locked down” in a better place. We are safer here than we would be almost anywhere else in the world. See you all when we get back to Pedreguer!
..................................................................................................................................................................
Here is another one from my collection, I am running out of space now. My "style" changes but I try and go with the flow. What is is........
I love these quotes AND this one just gently reminds us that age is only a number.... Appreciate and ENJOY " THE NOW"
If you want to contact me my email is
mandygata@hotmail.com
(and not forgetting a very happy birthday to you from Ray and Margaret.)
........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
I love these quotes AND this one just gently reminds us that age is only a number.... Appreciate and ENJOY " THE NOW"
If you want to contact me my email is
mandygata@hotmail.com
(and not forgetting a very happy birthday to you from Ray and Margaret.)
........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
8 May 2020
Welcome to the FRIENDS page. As you will have read in the HOME page, this is a forum for YOU to use at zero cost. Three very talented friends have got the ball rolling for me so, see what you think.
Welcome to the FRIENDS page. As you will have read in the HOME page, this is a forum for YOU to use at zero cost. Three very talented friends have got the ball rolling for me so, see what you think.
This is a piece by our friend and local artist
Mandy Borelli
´I had always wanted to learn to paint, having never had any artistic ability at all, so once I retired 3 years ago, I took the bull by the horns and set to. I had various classes with a local artist, but my choice is abstract.
I love all the vibrant mixes of colours, using any tools to hand, balloons, ridged cardboard, bubbly wrap, cling film, anything really , a lot of ideas that have come from youtube.
If you want to contact me my email is mandygata@hotmail.com
Lastly I would like to share a favourite poem, "my bible"
Desiderata... It says it all... Keep safe.`
Mandy Borelli
´I had always wanted to learn to paint, having never had any artistic ability at all, so once I retired 3 years ago, I took the bull by the horns and set to. I had various classes with a local artist, but my choice is abstract.
I love all the vibrant mixes of colours, using any tools to hand, balloons, ridged cardboard, bubbly wrap, cling film, anything really , a lot of ideas that have come from youtube.
If you want to contact me my email is mandygata@hotmail.com
Lastly I would like to share a favourite poem, "my bible"
Desiderata... It says it all... Keep safe.`
........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
This is our friend and writer Lucinda E Clarke
I first met Lucinda when we shared a table at Javea Bowls Club in Spain.
We hope to be sharing another table, later this year, at a language college in Valencia. The students will learn from our writing experiences.
You can contact Lucinda at,
lucinda@lucindaeclarke.com
I first met Lucinda when we shared a table at Javea Bowls Club in Spain.
- Lucinda was promoting her latest book and I was doing my best at promoting my first book. She sold more books than me on the day!
We hope to be sharing another table, later this year, at a language college in Valencia. The students will learn from our writing experiences.
You can contact Lucinda at,
lucinda@lucindaeclarke.com
........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
This is a piece by our friend and local artist Jenny Anne Morrison.
Entitled THE KISS
OIL ON CANVAS
measures. 90 cms x 90 cms
A little information:-
´I painted this image a few years ago on a smaller canvas, and it was sold to a client in the Philippines.
The painting was so beautiful to create, I decided to produce a slightly different version on a much bigger canvas.
I am known as a romantic painter, and THE KISS really captivates the romance in me.`
Visit my website to see paintings
http://www.jennyannemorrison.com
For Pop Up shop - info@fineartamerica.com
For enquiries and to arrange a private view at the Gallery call:-
LANDLINE : 96 558 7711
MOBILE :- 694 412 409
jennwill306@yahoo.co.uk
....................................................................................................................................................................................