JOURNALS OF A FILIPINO SEAMAN

April 16, 2015 Thursday While waiting for any news regarding berthing schedule, This ship temporarily had  a tiny problem regarding vacuum type toilets. Problem started at around 10 pm late night when the toilets stopped flushing (or suctioning given that it’s a "Vacuum" type) and persisted until on the next day of 7pm, worst part is that the septic / toilet system here on this ship is centralize which meant that if one machine (or area) breaks down the whole entire ship is also affected. Not exactly sure on what is the specific details given that it's an engineering maintenance kind of job, but from what I overheard it has something to do with the machine that produces a suction. During the time the toilets were broken , some of my co-workers here are joking about us readying the buckets and throwing crap on the poop deck during night time where everyone else isn’t looking (I'm starting to figure out why the "Poop deck" is called that). For time the whol...

APRIL 13, 2015 Dropping anchor wasn't as bad as it was compared to CONTI Greenland , No thanks to my previous BOSUN Nilo Payopay who made me learn on how to drop anchor effectively. Now given with my experience and skill acquired , I dropped anchor without any problems in CONTI Agulhas and believe it or not the anchor brakes have a much better grip than Greenland. Anchoring procedure is slightly a bit different in Agulhas and this ship only requires one BOSUN and one O.S. to drop and anchor the vessel compare to other ships I had been before. Typically there should be two O.S. around and a BOSUN during anchoring operation but somehow they have reduced the staff to just two. Anyway like any other NSB Conti Ships, Anchoring is still via free fall / gravity type and not by winch.   In the meantime after dropping anchor this ship has finally arrived in Netherlands after a couple of days sailing, Its now exactly sure on the next destination of this ship after Netherlands it coul...

April 09, 2015 Thursday Life under a tyrant dictator can all be but challenging, On a ship ratings and officers are at the mercy of a depriving captain who fancies himself as god. Seriously these are one of the reasons why I encourage Filipino's not to take a job as a sailor or study a college course called B.S.M.T. (bachelor of science in marine transportation). Incoming college students and High school students are too damn good to deserve this rotten kind of life, and I feel sorry for them to condemn themselves on this life of hardship. A lot of people wonder on what kind of society sailors live on-board a ship, like I said I can only summarize it that it's an autocratic dictatorship and nothing more, some ships have a benign dictatorship but nevertheless ITS STILL AN AUTOCRATIC form of society with no room for any form democratic kind of system. A person taking this course is basically condemning himself / herself on a life of coveralls and closed spaced dwelling and str...

APRIL 07, 2015 Tuesday "WORK HAS STARTED, MAY IT END SOON" Just unfinished unpacking my stuff and putting some of it on my cabinet and my locker for work. I tend to reflect and look back on my life in the Philippines, on those nearly 3 months that have passed seems like just a dream, and that I had to woke up again and find myself here in European waters. Frankly I wish I had more time back home and there are still a lot of stuff that I wish to do in the Philippines that was cut short because of my work as a sailor., Seriously I'm not enjoying my life knowing that I'm imprisoned here and all locked up on some floating vehicle that strides over water - I mean I should be spending my life in making important memories than being trapped and doing work. Anyway being a sailor, One should be mentally, Physically and logistically stable enough to endure its rigors. Most sailors overlook this factor and just concentrate on their experience and knowledge on work and look on...

"I will start from scratch on this new ship, but I have done so successfully before. When I started out a few years ago I only relied on my strength and vigilance. Survivalism has never baffled me, as it has so many others. Such principles just makes sense in me. I will lead my family to great riches, and Career Ship management will profit once I had my share" APRIL 05, 2015 Sunday After being notified by Career Shipping company on such a short notice, and getting the plane ticket in just a few hours before the actual despatch (can you imagine me hurling my way on such long distance from my home) and successfully making it all the way to Taragona, Spain along with five others. Only the four of us proceeded directly out of the airport and into Conti Agulhas (what no hotel accommodations??) and one was left to the hotel to be followed in joining us on the latter. While writing this , I had been on CONTI AGULHAS for a couple of hours now, staying on the Suez cabin temporarily...