Just saw my "slop chest" at the crew mess and it was a whooping 48 U.S. dollars , (equivalent roughly around 2,000 PHP plus). Yeah It was definitely a huge deductions and that means I ordered a lot of stuff to use for my personal needs, on top of it I'm the largest of all the deductions for the whole crew. But there's nothing to be ashamed of and that my money is pretty much only for me and I'm responsible enough to spend that money at my own disposal, besides using the slop chest here is definitely unavoidable on the point of the safe drinkable "Water" issue, which is definitely not free. Anyway the funny thing is that my younger sister was right in the money management, saying that "the larger a persons income is, the larger the expenses are" . There is one thing I might add here , although I admit that I'd do have a large income now compared before (and the largest so far) , there are two things in this world that money cannot buy no matter how large it is - Happiness and Freedom, I'm going to be stuck here on this hell hole for 6 to 7 months, I'm wasting a huge part of my life here in the process.
Seriously people say that being a sailor in the Philippines gives an impression of "being rich". Yeah indeed that we do have received salaries that are in U.S. Dollars, but despite all the money the trade off is freedom and happiness. The Psychological stress effect of doing the same thing over and over again is tedious plus a sailor has to deal with co-workers who are basically cruel, greedy and barbarous. Being a sailor is more like being a prisoner in exchange for money and in the end of the said contract (time of bondage, as I prefer the term) you get to win your freedom back for a few months then head back again to working onboard a ship. Honestly I'm getting so sick and tired of this, and I've only been working for only three ships (including this one) , Being a Sailor is basically a love-her , Hate-her relationship for me. The only thing why I'm doing this is only for two things , practical money and the perks of going to other countries - nothing more. I could live my life without being a sailor at all and I had already proven it during my years as a telephone operator. Anyway writing my resentment won't do me any good here, For now I have to focus on my remaining 6 months of work.
Change topic…
So far I had been gaining strength and power , thanks to the gym and weight lifting equipment of this ship - plus also the body building instruction A.B. "Patrick" told me, Now I'm able to lift and carry some objects that I previously cannot carry before. I do thank a lot on "Patrick" on showing me how important going to the gym is here.
In other news
There is a rumor here that there might be a deck cadet boarding the vessel in new Orleans, and word is it's the son / daughter of the incoming chief engineer of this ship. According to what I heard from the crew mess their scheduled to board the vessel on this port in new Orleans.
In other matters, the work today had us washing the whole deck area .The forward part of the ship going to aft. We mixed the chemicals "Cold Wash" and "Oxy Acid" to clear the deck of grease and rust stains, we mopped the deck area riddled with it, just have to remember that when we should mix it with fresh water and not salt water as the effect of those chemicals will be different. Later on the afternoon we replaced the old broken pilot ladder and put the new one from the deck store in preparation for the arrival at the U.S. , If Captain Slabada is correct we should be arriving there at 11 in the evening , followed by a 12 hour channeling then berthing upon arrival. Aside from that based on what I heard from "Patrick" discharging operations will be at least 8 to 9 hours on the first type of cargo. Then afterwards its still not sure on what will happen next.
The next day, July 26, 2013 Friday…..
Morning wasn't very good on the fact that they checked my cleaning area and found out that the garbage's hasn't been taken out and segregated, but hell I care I'm not bothered by it and they can blabber all they want with it - they free to do it and I'm free to frown as much as I want , if they got a problem with it , then they're free to file a report.
I was given a job by BOSUN AMICAN to put the life rings in place as well as the scupper plugs, I accomplished the putting the life rings around the ship however for the scupper plugs I wasn't able to complete it until on the latter since I didn't saw at first were it was stowed. For the general information the scupper plugs here for the deck area are stored on the deck store portside (for the port side scupper plugs) and on the Oil Pollution locker on the starboard side (for the starboard side). The rest of the morning till afternoon me along with A.B. Mallorca, O.S. Hall and A.B. "Bryan" we busy hauling off mooring ropes from the BOSUN'S Store and Steering Gear Room. If my memory serves me correct 3 loose mooring ropes were brought out on the forward part of the ship while on the aft part 4 mooring loose ropes. The last task we did was to clean the deck store and the BOSUN Store with any "loose paints" that fell off, While we were busy cleaning I heard from O.S. Hall's conversation to A.B. "Bryan" that disembarking crew are only given 500 U.S. Dollars (for ratings) from the actual total salaries earned here and the rest of the money will be forwarded to career shipping, In other words a sailor here on this company never gets to handle his own hard earned cash onboard and you work here day and night without being paid at all since the rest of the money can only be claimed when they're in the Philippines.
What the hell ?!!! Then why the hell am I here working overseas if I can't buy stuff abroad ? It doesn't make any sense at all, another purpose why the hell I'm working overseas is that I could buy stuff abroad. Now how the fuck can I buy those stuff if I can't have my money here in the first place right ? Who gives them (Career Ship management and CSM) the right to handle my hard earned cash ?! I'm terribly dismayed to learn that kind of policy here on this company and that I should have known earlier that CSM and Career ship management was very stiff when it comes to money matters, I'm starting to think that coming here in CSM was a big mistake after all. Anyway but since they promoted me to O.S. and gave me a U.S. Visa maybe I'd get to stay here for another ship and no more , only two ships here for me and that's enough - no more.
The crew should handle their own money and the right to dispose their own cash as they please. Believe it of not the financial system on my former company Sea cap Shipping is much better - way superior compared to Career Ship Management.
Going back to work
In the afternoon , much to our surprise we were given another job order coming this time from Captain Slabada himself. The job was to make sure the starboard mast of the ship is securely fasten so it wont vibrate anymore. Me, O.S. Hall, BOSUN Amican and A.B. "Patrick" were immediately dispatch to the area and we carried along a few tools as well. As I saw at the bottom of the mast, that there was a crack with it which render the mast a bit unstable (which in turn resulted to it vibrating a lot). BOSUN AMICAN playing "Mr. Know-it-all" says that having a chain block strapped around it will make the broken mast situation even more worse and said that a simple strap should do the trick.
July 27 Saturday, early morning 1am
I was waken that early morning by orders from the Bridge to prepare the pilot ladder, Immediately I dressed on my coverall and went to the deck area. We had to remove to bar and drag the heavy pilot ladder. Based on what I heard on BOSUN's radio the ladder should be dropped 2 meter above the water , Soon after the pilot ladder was prepared the pilot boat arrived and a pilot boarded this vessel. After another 3 hour another pilot boat came and 2 pilot came by , probably I could surmise that these two pilots are coastal pilot and arrived to "assist" the earlier pilot that came by. The channeling was quite a bit long as it took 10 hours to channel thru the Mississippi river and arrived at an anchorage somewhere near St. Rose, New Orleans.
After 10 hours , this ship arrived at the anchorage site and was ordered to drop anchor nearby for the U.S. coast guard inspections. The two coast guards came in at around 2pm followed shortly by 2 customs and border protection officials, By the moment The customs came by they said that the gangway we prepared has some safety issues from the rope and wanted it removed. "Patrick" and I went immediately to modify the rope issue on the gangway. BOSUN AMICAN saw this and insist that we should stick to the original rope arrangement on the gangway , the block head never understood the part that it came directly from the Customs official and that its necessary that we change the said rope.
The Customs officials business was very short and we just simply came in to the CCR to have the passports check and see if we are actually the one's on the passport and that's it. The U.S. Coast Guard however was a bit lengthy and inspected everything and on the late afternoon had us going in for a fire drill. Fire Drill was no "Big Deal" as opposed to what Filipino's sailors say - I think it was their exaggerated story that make the coast guard inspection a big fuss. Just remember and do the specific (TAKE NOTE SPECIFIC) duties that is assigned to each sailor on those drill and everything will be fine. The only problem I saw at that time was the weather for now on the Mississippi area is quiet very hot , despite the occasional rainy and cloudy weather, the heat and humidity here was awfully terrible. My coveralls was always wet from the heat and most of the time just to keep myself cool I always went to the few fresh water outlets to shower my face and sometimes wet my coveralls with water and lets it dry while I wore it.
In the abandon ship drill, Mess man Ferdinand screwed up and forgot to bring the blankets, worse part was that he was in front of the two coast guard inspectors when it happened. The new chief mate was obviously furious over it and scolded the chief cook and mess man for the crew up.
At 6pm it was finally over and the coast guard left, BOSUN AMICAN as usually never bothered to tell me what is my specifically job schedule for the day and I ended up going straight on work for yesterday midnight till 6pm. Leaving me to figure out for myself, that old bastard doesn't do his job well and supposedly that is one of the main functions a BOSUN here onboard to tell when the time of the work schedule and when were off. I decided that it was already 6pm and took a time off, I needed the rest and was exhausted, at 9pm I was awaken again by BOSUN AMICAN and was headed off again on the anchor winches to heave off the anchor. This ship went on again for another 6 more hours in channeling before reaching the said destination, The mooring arrangement this time on what we have was 4:2:2 obviously 4 headlines , 2 breast lines and 2 spring lines.
Spring lines were drawn first then followed by the headlines then the breast line. During the said breast lines while we were circling and fastening it to the double bollard, BOSUN AMICAN said to A.B. "Bryan" that he should follow his orders and that he hates complainers, It was very rude of BOSUN AMICAN to tell it to "Bryan" but nevertheless I stayed out of trouble and let them kill each other off. A.B. "Bryan" was definitely furious about this and was grumbling even after the mooring operation. After the fire wire was set up we went next on putting the gangway ladder as a form of a "Real" pilot ladder. Had all the deck department push and pull the said ladder just for it to be properly setup. While the crew were having difficulty over setting up the ladder and needed a flashlight A.B. "Patrick" told me that I should use the flashlight that was attached to my helmet to help them out, I told "Patrick" that I won't use it. Not to these kind of people , and wont waste a mega amp of energy for people who's not even worth it beside's I should be very careful in using tools here as for people here are a bunch of jealous son of a bitches and ungrateful bastards. I'd be better not helping them off rather than helping them - believe me.
Immediately after the ship was fully moored, The on signer's came in for the new chief engineer, electrician, third mate, and a new joiner a deck cadet - (yes believe it or not a deck cadet). Couldn't believe that there was a deck cadet here on this ship, I think its only temporary for this ship to have a deck cadet at a time and probably only during summer time, from what I found out on the later this cadet will only be here for two short months. Anyway the discharge operation was very short on this port and only took 8 hours. After which we immediately prepared again all the equipment necessary for the mooring , since we found out later on that the next port was just an hour away.
The mooring operations on the next port was quiet difficult because of the weather and to make it worse the mooring crew on the other side had wrong mooring arrangements which eventually resulted in having a modified version of the 4:2:2 mooring arrangement. A.B. Patrick had to tag along this time on the mooring operations on the forward part and the Future Third mate of this ship, the south African national.
Another thing that I could mention was the BOSUN AMICAN and 3rd Mate German Tan Corales wasn't that helpful as they act like mooring operations is some sort of competition for them,3rd Mate Corales is a bastard when I comes to this as he always shouts at people, Incidentally I had 3 unreported accidents on this mooring operations. One is that when the cable wire being paid out it dragged my foot, Good thing though that it was a slip, Second was that the other wire had some loose spiky fibers which caught my coveralls and dragged me for a meter or two , I let myself be dragged in the sense that if I resisted the "dragging" the spike might caught my flesh in the leg and might tear it apart. Third accident was very obvious that the wire "whip lashed" on my chest, wasn't that serious but I felt the weight of the object hitting me. Felt like a human hand hit my chest during my college ROTC years, It was so sudden that I shouted at instinct the curse word "God damn it !!! Putang Ina !!! " (translated in English God damn it !! Mother fucker !!!). BOSUN AMICAN saw this and didn't mind at all the accident , he is cold hearted as usual and never bother to ask if I was alright or not. Bastard didn't even helped me out in dragging another wire to the lead and even scolded me for not tying up the rope tail properly. It was a good thing that A.B. "Patrick" was there and was constantly reminding me not to be in "Berserker Mode" from all the pressure, I thank a lot that I had a real friend here to help me out and said to me often "Phil, chill out" or "Phil, take it easy" .
Immediately after the mooring operations, we set out again in preparing the fire wire then the portable gangway , I wasn't exactly feeling well and was badly exhausted from the hot weather but I was still manage to finish the job. For BOSUN AMICAN , he left without even saying to his subordinates whether they're already off the hook on work or not - he just simply went to the accommodation ladder leaving everyone.
