RUDENESS AND LACK OF MANNERS OF PINOY SAILORS

Been some time since I last updated my journal, and I guess it's about time I write something. The days that went after this ships recent departure from kinder Morgan terminal in Galveston Texas have been relatively quiet. I had been busy doing mostly the usual routine maintenance work and some affairs related to the  bond store.

Apparently the latest news is that , the bond store inventory is not that accurate as it was supposedly and as I suspect 3rd mate keith caduas predecessor (3rd mate german corales) never even bothered to update it before he left and finished contract. As a result me and Keith have now been updating the inventory every so often and checking out why the numbers have been inaccurate. Anyway doesn’t surprise me that German was always such a dick and dumped all the unresolved inventory to keith after he left, I mean he was an asshole back then in Cape Tallin and It hasn't changed when I encountered him again here in Conti Agulhas.

For the moment I had been testing out the latest laptop computer (Lenovo) I bought to my sister during this ships stay in U.S.A. . The new computer I bought isn't really much to look at and from my perspective as a buyer, I only intend it as a gift and nothing more, This Lenovo computer I bought lacks the RAM power , I sufficiently need to run games. Its only has 4GB of RAM compared to my aging HP laptop that is 6GB Ram.  I'm sure that my sister will be delighted to see her new laptop and she needs a little reward after all in successfully taking care of mom when I'm not around.

Aside from the high end equipment that I will giving to my sister when I get back home, I'm also planning to buy a new car for myself. My sister has told me that there's a possibility that I could buy one this Christmas season and that the payment terms are easy , 60 thousand pesos for the down payment and the succeeding monthly payment will be just 10k

In other news

I recently ran into a heated discussion over someone who posted something on the internet (tinig ng marino facebook group page). Apparently the posting is basically harmless and does not have anything to do at all in regards to the maritime community but what happened was that someone butt in on my advice and sharing of wisdom in regards to matters of the relationship. From what I saw this "Navie trasga" guy is very rude and ill mannered, and not only does he even contradicted my posted opinions but that thunder cunt even has nerve in insulting my username like a dog that got loose from his yard and keeps humping and shitting his way through the neighbourhood. Of course I'm not just going to sit around and let that insult pass, the problem with Filipino sailors is that they love to insult people but are afraid to take an insult, So I respond on his message by hurling a lot of nasty words and beating the shit out of him (in cyberspace)

That's one of the many reason why people (and me in particular) don't like Filipino sailors , they always piss each other off. 

Here's the snap shot copy of what transpired. (its not translated) 

KINDER MORGAN

AUGUST 06 2015

Ship has arrived and is waiting a couple of days now, Ship has arrive at around august 03, 2015 midnight. Supposedly I was the one (or two of the O.S.'s) needed to drop the anchor but turns out that BOSUN serafin has a new policy regarding anchor dropping / heaving - he only needs one O.S. at a time. So in turn my presence there was no longer needed. O.S. Joash was the one who dropped the anchor at that time.

Weather on the past few days was cooler compared to what I experienced in Louisiana. A bit windy now in Galveston Texas probably because summer season in the U.S. about to end. On the days that this ship was at anchorage , we were basically busy in doing the same old maintenance task (chipping , polishing and painting rusted areas) plus washing the deck every now and then from bird droppings which littered the whole forward aft area.

On the 7th of august there were rumours that this ship might go to berth sooner than expected. At around 5 pm on the same day , as small supply boat came near on our ship to deliver some food provisions. It was expected that this small supply boat would also bring in the new on signers to replace the disembarking ones (2nd engineer, 2nd officer and electrician) but apparently it was revealed that they are only carrying a small amount of provisions and bonds store supplies (only becks beer, nothiing else)

After helping out in the provisions, it was expected that berthing schedule was cancelled within this day. So I went back to my cabin and resumed playing a pc game called "call of duty: modern warfare"  , it was a first person network game and I was playing against three people (fitter, wiper and oiler) . It was about roughly 8 pm when I received a call from my cabin phone that berthing schedule will commence and we have to heave up anchor and prepare for the pilot ladder.

After the pilot went on-board this ship , we were ordered to heave up the pilot ladder and secure it.

Usual charade when it comes to berthing , same old drill that I'm now accustomed and familiar after years being a sailor. Channelling to the terminal took six hours an  

OLA REPUBLICA DOMINCANA

Here's the events that happened during the Dominican republic stay.

Monday work routine was done as usual , I was put on the task of segregation of garbage along with the disposal of food waste and then on the latter helping out O.S. Joash and A.B. Ryan Osiang in washing the deck. The whole work took us until noon time and was expecting or assumed that berthing will be sometime on the latter afternoon. During lunch time all of a sudden , it was announced that arrival in dominican republic will be in an hour and its berthing upon arrival schedule. (meaning this ships gets to dock as soon as it arrives).

1pm exactly when I was called in the cabin to rig the pilot ladder , then it was followed by mooring operations. Temperature in domincan republic (and the rest of central America was humid and hot. I had to bring along three purified water bottles filled with cold water just in case to keep us rehydrated. Mooring arrangement from what I recall is 3:2:2 and the spring lines will be wire , the rest is soft ropes.

Mooring is tedious and complicated because of the weather and we have to drag one soft rope around all the way from the forecastle area to the spring line winches . After that we have to give the spring line to the dock . Since there was no apparent mooring boat on standby we had to manually give those ropes one by one via heaving line. It was taking us a lot of time and as a result Captain Romanuik was already shouting on the radio that were wasting too much time on that rope.

By the time we already finished heaving up the third rope , everybody was already exhausted from the temperature. Good thing for me I already took my anti-heat medications so at least I have some form of resistance from the hot weather.

SAILORS PERCEPTION ON THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC

Security in Dominican republic is a bit different compared to the usual countries in central America , although it's not as tight as in south America or even west African countries. There is still a discrimination on how we treat them - all because on the guise of "Security measures" . As expected there no supposedly allowed at all times to go inside without any permission and if permission is granted they don’t go around without any escorts. The kitchen is closed for them at all times and they cannot use any facilities inside.

Despite the ill treatment, The D.R. guys don’t seemed to mind being treated that way.

Anyway , One good thing about the local folks here in the security and gangway watchman is that they also sell all sorts of stuff , and believe it or not they also sell "black stone" (some sort of premature ejaculation tablet from what I heard on the locals) . Earlier I thought that this was only being sold in the panama area and not elsewhere, it was a surprise for me that they were selling it here as well. I suppose this tablet is available on the whole Caribbean area. Aside from selling that drug , some local folk here also sell the usual stuff , internet SIM card and from my understanding , it's about 15 U.S. Dollars per 750 MB , their mobile network here is either "Orange" or "claro" , unfortunately for me I didn't saw on how they registered the whole process - so for now I have no clear records on the internet here.

One thing I found out on the port here in Dominican republic is that there's a night club here called "Manila bar" , and as expected on any red light district in a foreign  country especially central and south America there's prostitutes and whore's inside it. During my late afternoon gangway watch shift , I heard on the radio that A.B. Ryan asked me that he will be coming in late on work and will go on shore leave and I had to fill him in for a while. I agreed of course. A few hours later (well about 9pm) , he returned back and showed something in the gangway . It was a panty and a high heels shoe, I don’t want to get into the details but its obviously he went there and had some fun.

DEEP IN THE CARRIBEAN

july 24 , 2015 friday

As part of the two part unloading cargo operations , this ship is now currently moored in Jamaica. Docking operations started as early as 6:30 pm and was told to immediately prepare the pilot embarkation ladder for the pilot. Soon after the pilot embarked on this ship, all crew was announced via P.A. to standby for mooring operations. Mooring operations proceeded very smoothly and without any problems , the mooring arrangement if I recall was 3:2:2 (3 headlines and 2 springs lines) The spring lines was of surprise, a soft rope was used along with the headlines. The breast line if I recall was a wire line. The whole mooring operation in the forward could have finished a lot sooner , if not for the Jamaican mooring boat crew which took its time in placing it on the dolphin platform.

As for the weather , it has very few changes and was still very hot. - not much to expect on a tropical country , as a matter of fact the Philippines despite being a tropical country is much cooler compared to tropical countries in central America. But if I could compare the temperature experienced in Louisiana and here , I could say that its much better.

The loading operations here in kingston Jamaica will only take a day based on what I heard and it's not a full discharge , ( the other half of it will be in the Dominican republic ).

So what can I say in Jamaica ? First off this is a small island located south of Cuba , mostly this country is a tourist destination and people here speak English, even their local television shows are in English language so there's basically no problem, which is good since a lot of Filipino sailors understand English (take note UNDERSTAND , I didn’t say their able to speak English). I'm not sure if Jamaican's here are nice people given that this ship is only moored on a platform. The internet from what recall here is bandwidth charge and expensive . 20 U.S. Dollars for 250 MB of internet. The good thing about internet here is its ready to use and no registration needed.

After a day of discharge , pilot boarded this ship at about 10:00 pm and immediately went into unmooring. Unmooring and securing of deck equipment was finished at about close to midnight.

Travel time from the Jamaica to the Dominican republic takes about a day.

Sunday was a good thing a rest day , and we haven't have a good rest day for ages now (which for some reason berthing and unmooring operations get timed always on weekends). 

INCOMING DISASTER

July 17, 2015 

When this ship leaves port, it will have four new crew members. The thing here that concerns me is the new crew , Rumours have been going on that these new crew members are somewhat trouble makers and definitely not the kind of people whom can't get along easily. I don't know them personally but there are rumours saying that two of these new crew have serious attitude problems. Specifically the O.S. and the BOSUN.

Anyway in just a matter of a few hours after they arrived , immediately two I had mentioned got into the wrong foot with some of the crew. And caused a bit of bad impression during then recent bunkering operations (Immediately after we unmoored). Apparently BOSUN Serafin left the whole six hour long transit outside lake charles to only me and O.S. Joash, each of us has to spend three hours each on the forward part being on "guard" , when supposedly he should be the one leading and staying on watch , but it turns out that he was the first to step inside the cabin and slept. O.S. Joash said he wasn't happy on what happened that were still out there  while him (referring to BOSUN Serafin) is inside, in other words he ditched us out. From what I interpret this new bosun is somewhat a problem from what I heard on previous crew. 

A few days later…

We are still doing the old maintenance work of chipping, polishing and painting rusted area on this ship. As expected this so called routine maintenance will never end , like exercise during prison time and 24 hours before we arrived oj the next port we did the usual chore (I mean work) of washing the whole deck area.

In other news during those few days' time

The new salary rate scale of NSB just arrived, as expected the new salary scale was a bit lower compared to our current salary. Most of the affected that got a huge decrease in salary was for the higher rankers, as for the A.B.'s and lower ranks they got at least 30 U.S. dollars down from their current salary. The rank that was hugely affected was "messman" ( ship version of a "maid" ) which had a decrease of as much as 200 U.S. Dollars. On my current status , the reduction of salary was not that severe (in fact benign)  with only 13 U.S.D. something. Despite my rank was less affected , I still have thoughts of maybe going to another company - not because of the money but because I wanted to started over again , start fresh and maybe (and hoping) that this new start will be better from the previous one.

Honestly I'm facing a dilemma as a sailor, this so called "profession" is now very impractical and costly in maintaining, and I have serious doubts I will ever proceed further in this job. Seriously this job will cost me another 100 thousand pesos more in upgrading in the years to come and this doesn’t include the objective of securing a license. All this expense for a job that is related to similarly to a construction / maintenance job ,

Frankly I have serious thoughts of retiring early and shifting career and going into medicine, in fact to be honest I shouldn't be here in the first place at all - If it weren't for the financial difficulties that I had suffered during my teen years, I would have been very much a medical doctor by now.