SEAMANLOLOKO AND SEAMAN GAGANTYO ???

Inspite the annoyance of some pinoy seafarers being branded "seaman-loloko and seaman gagantyo" . I ask myself the moral question , why us are being branded like that ? we never answered that question, why ? Why are we as a people worth saving? Because we knew better than them about the grim reality of it and refuse to accept the responsibility for anything that we’ve done. We still commit those sins  because of greed, spite, jealousy and cheat on our wives

we comforted ourselves in the knowledge that it really wasn’t our fault, not really. To be honest we cannot play God then wash our hands of the things that we’ve done . Sooner or later, the day comes when we can’t hide from the things that we’ve done anymore.

AS SOON AS THE WIND BLOWS

December 04, 2018 Tuesday

Jubail Dana , UAE

The new chief mate seems to be harmless enough , but yet I have to be on my guard - after all he has only been here for almost a week and chances are you don’t get to know a person very well until the 2nd month. For now I'm relieved that the previous chief mate of this ship will no longer be a problem since he disembarked a week ago in fujirah, UAE during the "provisioning" operations

The ship headed north for the loading port, apparently earlier information I thought that it should load cargo in Saudi arabia., but now it looks like that it will load its cargo here in UAE ., just in the far edge area of this country. It headed north within just a day of travel and this ship lowered its anchor and awaited for any further instructions from the charterer.

Laundry was opened on Sundays for The crew to wash those dirty clothes and coveralls. Honestly I can't really think any good reason on why the use of the laundry room here is still on schedule - the condenser is already fix during Fujairah and now there is no more excuse on why it should not be opened for everyday use.  I guess this is usually the problems if "Uwaks" are in charge of the ship., Can't really think of any other reasonable reasons why this is still happening.

It was already almost noon when I finished on my laundry due to having a very long queue in the washing machine., when suddenly I heard from O.S. "Romy" passing by that within a few hours., a pilot will be coming for the ship . Specifically at 2pm. Immediately on the first minute when I heard it, I was in disbelief and that it was really a bad timing for the notice., Both my clothes and working coveralls was still wet and just fresh out from the washing machine - I  have no dress to wear for work if the pilot immediately comes. I came to my senses that I still have two hours left and hurriedly jammed all my clothes in the dryer machine. It never mattered to me if this was a working coveralls or my regular clothes - I just needed it to be dried ASAP.

After 20 minutes my clothes was almost dry and had to take it out of the drier hurriedly.

Pilot came by at around 2pm as what they said, along with the mooring master for the SBM kind of mooring.

From all the mooring operation that came and went all this time, "SBM" kind of mooring is the most easiest kind. Basically the ship will be just tied up to a buoy sitting in the middle of the ocean and from that, the buoy there has some huge rubber hose attach to it (as in HUGE , larger than a human ) and from there they're going to connect that on the ship's cargo pipes to load cargo - voila "SBM" operation finished ! Plus there's less effort made because it doesn’t require a lot of folks on mooring.

The following day , the loading of cargo was immediately finished and this ship soon set sail bound back to go to kwinana, Australia  . Took us a whole day after that in securing all the equipment that was used for the cargo operation and mooring operations.

BREAK TEST

November 26, 2018 Monday

UAE , Fujirah area.

As anticipated weather did not improve until 2 days , when the ship got moving again. In any case I'm optimistic that weather will definitely improve from here till this ship gets to Saudi Arabia. I guess there won't be a problem from here from the temperature given that its already winter time in this area.

2 days ago , Third officer told me that he didn’t got to submit the "electronic tablet" I wrote on the "private" order stuff and of all the people who wrote on the private order list, only mine was left out. Recently thanks to mess man , he sorted  out and found that my request for a "quotation" for a Samsung 10 inch tablet did make the price list ( which upon looking cost at about 325 U.S. Dollars ). It was apparently written on the "quotation list" reply by the ships chandler. I spoke to third officer about this and told that he may include it on the order , as for the payment I told him that I was getting 300 U.S. dollars as cash advance for this December and as additional I had 100 U.S. dollars on my pocket money right now. 

I am told by third officer that this private order, is payable by cash on hand and NOT SALARY DEDUCTIBLE. I hope that my cash advance will arrive in time and that this ship will not go stingy again.

( "quotation" means getting the price details of a certain Item. Ship chandler in Seaman terms means Ship supplier , a land base person who supplies needed items on the ship - in particular  food, ship working supplies etc. )

Early in the morning during the tool box talk, I was told by chief officer "Jobert" to remain for a few minutes after the routine tool. I'm not exactly sure on what he meant if this is related to the appraisal report that I signed early on. As far as what I read on my appraisal report there is nothing negative about it, everything was basically average from my point of view.  In any case I remained the toolbox talk and chief officer told me that my appraisal report was basically average which has no problems and warned me that the new incoming chief officer will be qoute "Strict" unqoute. If he's worried that I will have a difficult time to adjust on the new chief mate then it won't be an issue - besides I have dealt with more crappier people on the past , so from the start this is not going to be the first time I had encounter "worthless garbage" people in the workplace. I'd greatly consider this as a warning coming from him even though I dislike "jobert".

Anyway  I heard a lot of bad stuff rumors about this incoming chief mate from the crew. Aside from rumors like he tends to "overwork" people till exhaustion, there's a rumor that he's also a stingy kind of person who refuses to give crew safety working equipment like coveralls no matter what the case was. I'm not sure if he has an manners or attitude problem but most rumors I heard to this incoming chief mate is generally negative. Anyway based on my working experience for both land base and sea based jobs , the word "Strict" is Generally polite terms for "asshole" folk in the work place. Not an offending word but obviously bad news for any worker.

And that concludes the early morning work meeting..

( "Tool Box Talk" , in nautical terms is actually a  few minutes meeting held before the work usually starts. It tells what manuals jobs are to be done during the day etc. every detail needed to know about the work to be done. This is done every day before work starts, usually in the ships office or any place that the chief officer wishes)

As for this work , we had to do a break test on the ships winches., this test is usually done annually to test if the " safety release" function of the ships mooring machines is still functioning. Everything was going smoothly on the break test on each winches. Basically I just needed to help out my co-workers in removing and reattaching the heavy triangular frames for each winch , and then assist A.B. Roderick on the hydraulic pump to add pressure in the winch and that's all there is to it.

On the last winch , there was a mishap when the frames and support suddenly collapse from all the pressure from the manual hydraulic pump. Thankfully it flew in the opposite direction away from me and AB Roderick or else the person who will get hit by those flying blocks will be very unfortunately on this day. The metal  block hit the support block metal of the winches and it was very obvious that the block had a huge nick from all that force that hit it and considering it was made of metal it was pretty obvious that the hitting force was very hard enough to make a metal break.

After the break test , the rest of the day was spent cleaning up and putting back the canvasses and returning the tools that was used during the break test work.

On the last few minutes before the work day ends , I saw a small bat on the deck area. Probably this animal was exhausted from all that flying made at sea and had to land here ., I didn’t pick up the animal as for fear that it might have rabies and would bit me . After all this animal is considered wild life and is obviously feral. I just left it alone and continued on my work.

I assume that this ship might be close to land somewhere since there a flying animal landing here , even though I don’t see visually any land nearby. (probably more than 16 mile difference) .,  

(Typically "safety release" is a measure that happens when the ships mooring line are too tight , instead of the ropes breaking and snapping when the tightening force is too extreme , it does as a safety measure to release the ropes instead thus preventing damage on the rope or any other unfortunate damage that might occur, instant death to a sailor if he gets caught or got snapped by the ships ropes by the way)

Glad that the work day has already ended , however this doesn’t mean that I'd be going to rest after that. Inside my cabin I continued to do my personal work maintenance in washing my clothes in the bath room and repairing and patching up the small hole on one of my coveralls.

It’s a surprise that up to now I still have to wash my clothes , because as of the moment , engine personnel haven't resolved the issue yet on fresh water production.  It's really lucky for me that I brought along on this trip a lot of extra clothes for work.

38 AND RISING

November 19,2018 Monday

Drifting somewhere near Sri Langka Area

There has been sudden updates on where this ship is going, earlier it was thought that this ship might go directly to saudi arabia then after that to Fujirah UAE for bunkering (refueling) . Now the updated news says that it will go first to UAE , then saudi arabia for loading cargo then go directly go back to Perth, Australia.

For the moment this ship will be drifting back to somewhere near sri langka. The tropical weather at the moment there is horribly hot especially in the morning till noon time., then slightly cools down late in the afternoon. It was so hot that I had to take anti dehydration packs that I brought along for this trip together with anti-oxidant tablets , and to ease the discomfort I had to do my usual tactics in cooling myself by wetting my coveralls with water.  I was painting some areas on the deck and I could really felt the "hot" weather, especially when I climbed on the pipes to paint those "2nd coat" patches., Heck the pipes itself was hot because of the direct sunlight and if it were not for my knee pads which I wore for work ., I would have ended up with some skin burn marks on my knees.

On top of that aside from the weather related problems , Water problems have not yet been solved by the engine room and the laundry room is still only usable for two days in a week. ( can't really figure out why there is restrictions on using water when this ship is at open sea , I surmise that this has nothing to do with the technical stuff and that our "Uwak" chief engineer is just simply being stingy on us using water).

For the short time., I had been washing my clothes inside the bathroom area. There is no other option for now than wash it there. The tactics I had been using is wash it there and then later hang it in the "Drying room" near the laundry room of this ship, for it to air dry. Sadly even drying of clothes seems to take a while here as well because the dryer machine is also switch off like the rest of the washing machines here.

Damn those "Uwak's" , they always make life difficult here - if I didn’t have plenty of practice on survival skills back in "Eagle Boston" ship back then, I would have surely have serious set of problems right now. Good thing the survivalist tactics I learned there was really helpful here.

On work related news …..

Currently we already rigged up razor wires all over the side of the ship in preparation when this ship will be entering HRA (high risk area), apparently the western part of the Indian ocean all the way up to the gulf of Aden has some pirate presence and to avoid this ship being hijack (and us sailor being held hostage) , Every ship has have to put up some sort of deterrent devices to ward off would be pirates. Some ships even hire armed guards for security whenever this ship will be transiting in that area.

Luckily on this principal, the rigging for razor wires (barbed wire) has an extra pay,  from what I heard , its about 200 U.S. Dollars per crew member who participated. Good for me because I might be needing it to buy something for Christmas.

In other news

Past couple of days was very uncomfortable - as in really roasting temperature. Based on the room thermometer I bought along for the trip, temperatures rise as high as 38 degrees Celsius in the shade - but maybe based on what I had been experiencing in direct sunlight and totally exposed condition , I could bet its about roughly as high as 40's something degrees Celsius

I was still painting the "final coat" on some spot left over from the spray painted work done on the past couple of days in the manifold area and I could really feel the heat stress from all that exposure ., I was soaking wet with my perspiration and had to douse my coveralls with water all the time just to cool myself.

Occasionally from all hot temperature, there would be a rain just to relieve the problem of hot temperature but only for a few hours and during the night time only, Once Morning arrives another cycle of hot weather arrives. Probably I could guess that this is the weather in the sri langka area, and until this ship gets to finish its drifting there , I will still continue to experience this kind of Ultra hot summer temperature in this area.

From what I heard this ship will continue to drift , until November 22nd. And weather will not improve unless this ship gets moving. 

In other news …

As of the moment , the Chinese deck cadet (seaman trainee) we have onboard  is currently isolated on his cabin due to being sick. Some say that he might have chicken pox, based on blisters appearing on his face - of course I haven't seen it (and haven't seen our deck cadet in a couple of days now) and can never know what is the exact cause ,and I'm no doctor to tell. For now he is quarantined in his cabin until he gets well.

Maybe some bad case of allergic dermatitis from all that exposure to paints and stuff.

PROBLEM WITH FILIPINO SENIOR OFFICERS

November 15,2018 Thursday

Enroute to Fujirah , UAE

Things have going rough lately, not by own undoing but by the temper tantrums of our bi polar Chief mate Jobert Semantar. He has a nasty habit of starting trouble early in the morning. His latest psychotic episode as of the moment was he lashed out in the CCR during tool box talk and his tantrum is not even related to work.

Worse was that I was the center of his bitching. That cunt wants that every time I pass by him or sees him around I should mandatory greet him - like some sort of lordship. Sorry to disappoint him , but I don’t greet wannabe "Nobles" like him. Problem with almost all Filipino Senior Ship Officers around (Chief Mate and Captain) is that they are too arrogantly cocky and have a feeling of being high and mighty like a king. They think they're too good to be even hanging out with typical Filipino folk.

Bastard Jobert even added on his insults in the CCR., "who are you ?" . As if like some lord ..

I kept silent but maintained my composure and sharp straight look , sending a body message that I'm furious.

The insult never stopped and added more , He said something that I should fix my "attitude" . I kept silent again but maintained a defiant look, I kept the impression that I maybe silent on the outside but not on the inside.

He keeps saying that I should work on my attitude,… Be as it may, but what makes him so sure that his manners aren't foul . From the way he is looking and acting at the moment , it makes a conclusion that his manners are offensive.

The CCR tool box was over …. Even if the subject that was discussed was not related work . Either way It was clear that having a Filipino and "Uwak" senior offices onboard are a pain in the ass

JUST ANOTHER DAY

November 13, 2018 Tuesday

Enroute now to Saudi Arabia

For now there is no other maintenance work a "rating" would do here but continue on the routine "Chipping, Brushing and Painting" scenario. Yeah an endless scenario of what a Filipino seafarer would say "tiktik Kalawang". despite what other wannabe High and elevated (filipino) ship officer would say that it’s a derogatory work, I don’t find it to be that kind of a lowly job. As a matter of fact , this is the most common and simplest of all maintenance jobs here onboard - it doesn’t take a lot of muscle work to do this.

"Chipping, Brushing, Painting" Scenario work , will be the usual routine for a while till this ship reaches UAE.

Funny that Filipino's have been the largest nationality bloc in this profession for roughly about 40 years now (since 1980's) and that they never realized on all that time that a seafarer is actually a manual laborer job similar to a construction job. Generations of social engineering at schools has left seafaring in the Philippines to be perceived as quasi militaristic, Personally speaking I never liked on what the maritime industry in the Philippines has become - Seafaring is a civilian job , not a United Nations Peace Keeping Force. Those idiotic high ranking Filipino's seafarers sitting at the company chair never realized that. They seriously need a reality check

WATER PROBLEM

And I thought when this ship left Perth bound for UAE middle east , The problems regarding water shortage and water discipline will be solved. Guess I was wrong on that part and it turns out that water problem here still continues. Laundry day as of the moment is still being on scheduled which meant I can't wash my clothes  immediately after use , same goes as well for my working coveralls.

According to this ships Uwak chief engineer., Ships water production has been very slow lately and that there are few spare parts left for the ships purifier to work on, thus there conserving them which in turn ships produces slowly on water.  I'm not exactly sure on how would I believe on this bullshit excuse , but for now I have laundry problems to deal with aside from the low laundry soap and bathing soap I have. For now, they said that we will be advise on when water will be available for everyday washing and laundry.

Seriously ??!!! Since when is that going to take huh ?

This "Uwaks" really know what the word pestilence means and When they are around and onboard , they tend to make things really difficult for Filipino's. Probably these fools are trying reason out this so called "Energy Efficiency Plan" to applease TCC company and  justify their actions on why they refuse to give laundry soap and restrict water and bathing soap issue.

(for the record , as of the moment NO laundry soap has been issued for two months now and we were only given two bathing soaps for the whole month, the previous month we were only given a bar of soap for the whole month).

I never had these kinds of problems when I was on European ships (Career Ship management) and even on Full crew Filipino ships ( Seacap Shipping) . Even if there were "water discipline" issues , it only lasts for days - certainly not weeks or months. Ever since I encountered "uwaks" during CF Sharp - Norstar time and up to now (OSM - TCC). There has been water issues that last for months , I'm starting really feel that "Uwak's" are not the people who should one work with and this is going to be a very long campaign before I finally get rid of OSM - TCC.

POSSIBLE "OTHER" COMPANIES TO SETTLE WITH

During the typical maintenance chore of "chipping, brushing and painting" ., I came to a small talk with the new O.S. "Erwin".  On our conversation he said  Teekay company has a work practices similar to "UPL - Shell", which this sounds really bad news for would be job seekers , and an unsuspecting crew - in other words it has the same hostile work practices .

On my point of view its really horrible to be putting on that kind of situation based on my experience with UPL - Shell.

Unsurprisingly it has similar problems in crewing like shell because people are having an crew exodus and avoiding teekay like the plague. (incidentally they are mass hiring people in order to replace their crew losses).

I think this is a total problem when "uwak's" are totally in control of a shipping company. They tend to enforce work practices that are too hostile for any other nationalities to thrive with - utterly they are monopolizing it and being such a racist to other nationals.

Anyway it pretty obvious that I'm not going to teekay nor any other shipping company that has a heavy infestation of "uwaks" ., The work practices would certainly be too hostile for me to thrive and advance , let alone settle on that kind of work environment. For now my aim goal if I were to establish to settle on a company it would be on an european environment and has no presence of "uwaks" or filipino senior ship officers of any kind.

The most appealing for me at the moment is going back to Career Ship Management or Senator Crewing - given that these two companies have the same principal called CSM and NSB. So it's possible that after I've done my business here with OSM., this is the place where I would likely go.

2 CONTRACTS

November 12, 2018 Monday

Enroute to UAE

"They are not open to new opinions, and that the only opinions that are welcomed are theirs alone (just like shell company) -everything else is blasphemy to their narrow mind"

After a very long wait (and discharging operation ) in Perth, This ship will be finally get moving again and its next destination will be somewhere in the middle east possibly UAE or Saudi Arabia.

During the stay in Perth , I was constantly being pestered by this ships annoying chief mate "Jobert" .  Trying to berate and ridicule me on almost any work. Fucker always complains out loud on almost any work I had done which includes the cleaning areas. I'd be very glad that I'd be getting rid of him when this ship comes to the middle east (since he's already finished contract). That asshole thinks he's high and mighty, just because he's chief mate - pathetic !

One thing why I (and most Filipino sailors) don’t like about Filipino chief mates or captains is that most of them turns out to be douche bags. Like "uwaks" , Filipino senior officers are mostly obnoxious people, and definitely work place bullies. They are exactly opposite of what they are portrayed in posters and TV commercials which they are pictured to be knightly gallant and gentlemen (like sir lancelot) - In reality they looked more like tony soprano and have thuggish manners and behavior, like some sort of mafia low life criminal.

Speaking of replacements , I had heard that the Filipino Chief mate that will be replacing "Jobert" is another douche bag. Anyway that is not surprising at all given that its Filipino captains and Chief mates are shitty people to start with and they are as bad people as "uwaks".

For me it doesn’t matter anymore and I'd be staying only in OSM-TCC for about two contracts before moving on. If OSM - TCC doesn’t give me what I want (which is getting a U.S. Visa) then it's no point staying here. The only point why I'm hanging out here in OSM - TCC in the first place anyway is just to get rid of my recent bad reputation of "ONE-CONTRACT ONLY" ., Certainly this isn't the place where I had to settle for career advancement or for long term stay.

As far as I'm concerned TCC, only offers a bit slightly higher salary compared to other companies , but everything else is shitty on my perception. Health card is basically non - existent (half-truth told by the recruiting which I found out that a crew has to have 3 finished contracts first before having one). their Ships have no internet for crews despite its already MLC regulations nowadays, and they mostly just operate in the far east. To mention as well this company is also a stingy one, and their allotments arrive only late date of the month, plus the so called Dollar account was basically half-truth as well, (OSM - TCC only forwards the salaries at the END OF CONTRACT only) . To add more difficulty on this is that there is an "uwak" presence here and tries (really hard) to impose draconic oppressive "Shell" policies in the work place. Having Filipino senior officers here as well does not help at all and add more complications than solutions. They also don't have the travel allowance perk compared to other companies which have one, (basic explanation - crew travels empty handed during ship joining).

The crew here are also a bunch of low life snitches and "company worshippers" (sipsip in tagalog)aside from that there is no true freedom for me to practice my arts and advancement in work ., as with the case were I was forbidden to use my personal headlight on my helmet. They are not open to new opinions, and that the only opinions that are welcomed are theirs (just like shell company) everything else is blasphemy according to them.

Here in OSM-TCC , they see that knowledge as a medal or precious stone. Something to be appreciated by its "rightful" owner alone. Knowledge is power and power is to be hoarded., An unfortunately attitude, indeed. Besides like I said I'm only here for two contracts., If I'm not permitted to share and practice what I have learned on work and to the public, there is little point in continuing my advancements and research here.         

ZERO DEFICIENCY

November 01, 2018 Thursday

Perth, Australia

So much for the so called aimed "zero deficiency" vetting results ., made by our uwak captain , and Snitch Filipino chief mate. Serves them right for being such ambitious perfectionist douches. That’s what happens when people onboard are being too "Perfectionist" on the smallest details  - they end up having their dreams crushed like a garbage compactor. I'm really glad personally that the Pakistani Vetting inspector found once deficiency.

To tell the truth I don’t see any motivation on why a crew should exert more effort when it comes to vetting inspections. Certainly a crew would get no benefit even if this ship reached a "zero deficiency" , absolutely no reward or benefit whatsoever. For me this is just plain booth licking schemes made by "Uwak" and Filipino ship officers to please the company. What's worse is that they pressure their crew for their own personal gain and take credit on other peoples hard work., Their only good in taking credit from others.

That’s why most Filipino's crews dislike and loathe having Senior Ship officer that are "Uwak's" and Filipino's. I myself don’t prefer it and find it repulsive like what I have right now having an "Uwak" captain and a Filipino Chief mate. Both of them act like "they know everything" , too cocky and arrogant to begin with.

Anyway "Uwak's" and Filipino's are infamously notorious on being snitches on Ships . This is one of the sad realities of being a seafarer, the bad side of human nature really shows up here especially on Filipinos, all the worst kind of Filipino people you can think of and see on the movies are actually here - living and breathing and in the flesh.

I'm really glad this ship didn’t get the zero deficiency that they're bragging at.

In other news …..

I'm satisfied that one by one the crew I find repulsive and snitches are leaving this ship (finished contract) and being replaced. Soon it will be easy for me to operate or move around without any further annoyances. 

CYBER SECURITY DECEPTION

October 30, 2018 Tuesday

Anchorage at Perth, Australia

Not a very lively situation right now as this imposed water discipline really takes its toll on the laundry. Yesterday it was announced that laundry will be open till 12pm tomorrow, really good timing considering that my personal clothes are already piled up and need washing, I hurriedly went to the long line in the laundry just have my clothes washed. Since there was a long line at the washing machine I decided to leave my clothes there for a while since and attend to other matters first, I can't be there always and cant waste my time just waiting for the long queue and guarding my clothes  - I'd be back in the morning as there is long line on that hour and besides they said its still up to 12noon that they will close the laundry.

In the morning , at 3am I was surprise to see that the washing machine switched off., and not only that I was expecting that the laundry room is still open till 12 noon. Guess I'd be proceeding to washing my clothes again by hand (which I'm not very used to ) . Good thing I had plenty of clothes on my luggage.

In any case I should have known better that an "uwak's" words cannot be trusted in the first place., and it's always deviates from what they say, if there is an "Uwak" onboard , expect a lot that they're nothing but trouble and they will make a person's life miserable as humanly possible. As far as I'm concerned , "Uwaks" are an obnoxious people and very repulsive . Europeans don’t like them, Australians don’t like them , Heck even Filipino's even don’t want them as well.

Back then when I was still in CSM, water discipline was never a serious problem  and Europeans have better understanding on a person's necessity on work and laundry is always open even at anchorage. But anyway that was then and this is now , no matter how much I think about the good old days - I still have to deal with this problem and situation on what the "uwak's" have caused.

In other news….

Looks like that Ship officers here are totally hyped by the incoming Vetting's inspections and to my puzzlement they kept insisting to the crew that we should take a CBT lecture about "Cyber Security" (which is another worthless piece of ocean garbage, wait ! Practically all CBT's are ocean garbage to begin with). I found out later that the real reason why keep pestering us to take that filth CBT was apparently pressure coming from the TCC about a certain  "Shell Vetting Inspector" conducting vetting on a sister ship "Valiant" .

Turns out that the Shell inspector checked the CBT's of crew and insisted that they take CBT lecture called "Cyber Security". Now the question is why is this shell vetting inspector (of all trash CBT's out there, they singled out "Cyber Security" ) keep insisting that this CBT taken.

My assumption is that since this is a "Shell" vetting inspector tries to market the lecture because Shell ulterior motive was to promote this "Uwak made garbage" CBT called "Cyber Security" .

In any case I did took the CBT as what folks here told me , just to comply with the requirements for the upcoming vetting inspection. I never liked the "Cyber Security" CBT from the start. I couldn't help but be amazed on the level of patheticness they discuss the topic,. Certainly very low level and plain stupidly of people behind this CBT - very obvious that the persons (most likely uwaks) behind it didn’t even considered the opinions of experts working in the Information technology sector specifically folks from the Telecommunications and Financial Sector, it does not even fully explain or justify why "Cyber Security" should be implemented at all in ships.

True that merchant (civilian) ships nowadays have advance tremendously from their counterparts versions way back in the 80's or 90's but ships haven't reached to the level of sophistication to think that a hacker would commander a ship using only a single computer (or destroy a ship entirely) . This idea that this "Cyber Security" is telling is pure crap and science fiction, and has no basis whatsoever., from what I'm thinking as a normal and typical active Filipino seafarer right now is that the "uwak" author or authority behind this CBT has watched too much science fiction on T.V. and his / her imagination is a byproduct of paranoid delusions combined with science fiction fantasy. "Uwak's" are really good at lips service, they can fool almost everyone in the maritime sector but not me ! Save it to a person who would buy out this filthy idea of theirs.

INDOOR HOBBY

For the moment my work involves painting some of the steam pipes with silicon black paint - a type of heat resistant tape. Took me a while to full paint those "heating pipes" given it has tons of nooks and crannies

It’s a good thing that this ship is almost practically new (barely 2 years old) practically new and maintenance is not much of a problem, and mostly I'm just left painting some area in the deck for two months now. Probably if I should compare my work on all my previous "Crude tankers" - working on this ship is probably the lightest of all maintenance work I have done.

I guess probably that work here on ship will mostly be that for the whole 8 month long stay here until my contract is finished somewhere in April.

Later on work , we had a pressure test on the cargo pipes of this ship. To my annoyance some of my co-worker are trying to con their way again to dodge the work they were paid for. This time they're trying to use me as a ruse for it. Making an excuse saying that It's about time I learn some of the work (… their own work) made during pressure test. I didn’t buy on what they were saying and knew from the start on their intentions, they wanted to escape on their work and dump all their task to me. ( in tagalog,  "magulang" sa trabaho)

I didn’t made a wrong guess when the work started. While I was busy turning one wheel to another on orders from the radio , I could just see them sitting their lazy fat asses doing nothing while I do all the work., and this wasn't the insulting part yet. The infuriating part was they have the guts to joke about on how slow my response was in radio, which isn't the case . It might be their impression , but in reality I was listening carefully first before I respond.  

I guess each company or ship has its own lazy pricks of crews, I would mind them being lazy but deceiving other people and letting them do their jobs is another story. 

In other matters…

There's a rumor a heard from fitter during lunch that this ship maybe bound for the dry docks by march ., Personally I don’t think this ship will go that early for the dry docks , after all this ship is just newly built - aside from that if this ship does indeed go to the dry dock shipyard for maintenance ,it will be probably be (and most likely) be beyond march and I'm already long gone , another reason why I think its impossible in march is that  TCC is quite of a stingy company from my perception, I don’t personally think that march will be the dry dock time for this ship and the company will maximize its profits first before they head out on their ship maintenance.

Last and foremost reason I could think of is that its possible that fitter is just joking around.

Later in the afternoon after finishing the daily maintenance , I tried to watch an anime as entertainment since I typically just stay just inside my cabin - I could have been hanging out in the smoking room watching regular TV and be more social , but how can I be social when every time I go to the smoking area to watch TV , people there just mock me , or if not ask questions about my personal life and interrupt my watching (which annoys me most) . I lost interest in going there and would just practically stay in my cabin and watch anime. Besides that , My personal space setup on my cabin is mostly for the purpose of being solitary and isolation. If it were not for the problems in prohibiting bring along shoes and coverall inside cabins, I would have been 100 percent isolated from them.

Lately watching anime has been my hobby (aside from updating this blog) , and   I recently finished "ladies X butler" title. My interest in anime is almost everything except the "shonen" type which is mostly for kids (such popular examples are "dragon ball z" , One Piece, Bleach, Naruto etc.). I go for romance, action, sci-fi and harem types or anime.  I watch anime because I had problems in reading novels and somehow every time I read it , I end up having a head ache or feeling sleepy plus I lack the "visual imagination" when it comes to novels, I really struggle to understood on what is written in the novel , So I much prefer seeing things rather than reading. I understand things there more.

If only anime's could adopt and animate the variety of stories written on western novels (like tom Clancy's , Sidney Shelton, Michael cricton, Stephen king  and others etc.) then , I could really say that I would be a diehard fanatic of anime.

MODIFICATIONS ON PPE

October 15, 2018 Tuesday

Enroute to Perth Australia

For some time now, I had been making thoughts on modifications in the equipment I had been using , to fit more in the TCC working environment. I had completed some of the modifications now, although some of the equipment that I had in mind will not use here due to "Work Politics" such as using my very own head light. Apparently here they don’t allow 3rd party equipment brought in by their crew., Funny that on this ship (and company) they don’t sufficiently supply their crew with head lights and yet when it comes to the crew providing their own equipment for work (which is far more superior than their standard issue) , they will forbid the use of it and will come up with a lame excuse that "other third party equipment is prohibited and use only company supplied equipment - even if its instrincally safe" (from this part , they sounded more like that Shell )

Pathetic Fools !

Anyway what can I expect from an industry environment that has been laid back for forty four years, it's only natural I guess to assume that people inside it is also thinking forty years late. Of course it's not my business if they think that way, my concern is on how I do work comfortably , using some modified equipment.

Despite some limitation, it does not stop me on my work and the use of my light equipment is just a minor setback. Most of the equipment I have can be used here , and they can't come up with any stupid excuses of why I shouldn't I use it. Thankfully even though there are some limitations and ban on certain equipment people and TCC is not that hard headed and single minded compared to Shell and that folks here still have some room for open mind when it comes to progress.

In any case my latest work involves me in modifying the helmet I use. Hopefully jealous folks here won't notice some the modifications I made.

Another changes I had to do is can my balaclava I use on daily work , the previous one I'm using was already too old and worn out and that I had been wearing that head equipment for almost three ships now , spanning back when I was still in career ship management. So I guess it's about time I retire that balaclava and make a new one.  

In other news….

After the loading of cargo in Papua New Guinea, this ship is back again heading east to Perth Australia to discharge cargo and has already started to adjust its clock to the same time zone in the Philippines. Probably I'd get an internet connection there thru the Optus internet sim card I bought there. Probably I may even get to publish or update my blog once this ship reaches Australia or maybe even download the RPG game I bought recently for the Nintendo switch called "Octopath Traveller"

In other news again …..

Finally got my hair trim , thanks to fitter who has some knowledge in being a barber. The long hair is already starting to bother me because its already starting to itch in my ear area, and sadly I do not know anyone here onboard who knows how to cut hair - that is before I found out fitter can.

So I guess now that my hair is already trimmed again, I won't have to deal with the long hair issue for a month or two and no itching for a while.

Having a long hair maybe good when I'm stationed in Europe, since hair acts as some sort of heat insulation (which traps body heat) for the protection in cold weather environments , but currently I'm now in the tropics and in south east asia and this area in the globe is one of the hottest places and basically heat insulation is practically useless., and having a long hair is a terrible idea as in might lead to heat  exhaustion or terrible discomfort.

On another news…

Lately some of my crew mates decided to play a LAN multiplayer FPS game called "Counter Strike" . Yeah the game is very old as in about roughly almost 20 years now and yet believe it or not we still play this game like it was yesterday. It was actually 3rd mate who came up with the idea , and I just went along on what they were thinking. There are six of us playing the game , so it's basically a 3 on 3 shoot-out game.

I'm hesitant at first probably because the computer I had with on this trip is not exactly built for gaming , rather the one I have right now is for office use and for internet only - if I wanted to play games all along I could have settled for a much larger more muscled computer to play games with. Aside from that , right now I'm in the transitioning from Playing PC games going to console gaming like what I had the Nintendo switch for.

The good thing playing counterstrike , is that this game is so old that almost all computers can play this game and no computer will have difficulty running this game.

EXPLOITS IN PAPUA

October 13, 2018 Tuesday

Enroute to Perth Australia

Yesterday marks my 60th day here, and without any stressful situations or incidents.

The Papua New Guinean exploits went in very quick, and although shore leave was totally impossible due to the ship mooring in a buoy (SBM , also known as  ship buoy mooring in nautical terms) at least the work load was very light compared to the traditional port facility. Basically most of my work there is just babysitting a buoy on which the ship is moored at and see if the ship is aligned, and that’s about it.

Despite the announcement made by this ships Indian captain that we will be expecting visitors specifically customs and immigration authorities, it turns out that it was just a deception and that this uwak captain is just paranoid. The only persons that came in is a mooring master, a ships agent and a loading master. Nothing more

So I guess there won't be cabins inspections and checking of hard drives which is good for me.

During work I manage to take the liberty in taking pictures while no one was around., of course I made sure that I'm alone in taking pictures and had to be careful since people here are not that trust worthy - Filipino's or any other nationality alike. 

I took pictures on how SBM looks like in the actual , this info and pictures will be invaluable as a reference and knowledge.  My actions on taking pictures may violate some "safety" standards on a tanker but people who would say that are stupidly ignorant and do not know the value of knowledge nor even thinking of what we can learn from it.  Dangerous or not ITS IS STILL KNOWLEDGE FOR ME , AND THEREFORE MUST BE STUDIED AND LEARNED FROM.