JOURNALS OF A FILIPINO SEAMAN

Piracy watch keeping is now officially over and I don’t have to be problematic about the lack of sleep over this. Although the piracy watch is just roughly a four hour shift every 12 hours, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s the only work I was doing on that time. With cruelty and brutality our Indian officer's had us doing day work - worst part is that this so called "O.T." doesn’t even get paid at all.   Anyway it’s a good thing that I'm now living on the 21st century, and social media is already invented. I can now chronicle my experiences as a sailor and let the public read it one day, it's for them to know the inequalities, and viciousness of this line of work and to show that being a sailor is not "living in the lap of luxury" as what it was always portrayed in the Philippine Public.      Going back, Since this ship will be now arriving very soon in Fujirah U.A.E. , we have now removed the anti-personnel razor wire throughout the whole ship...

Entry date : July 26 016 Tuesday Location : South of Yemen     For the moment, I had been thinking for several days now on using the public satellite email this ship has - actually it’s the email used by the captain to send messages to the company , turns out it can be used as well to send to messages to emails. The catch is that privacy of messages is zero and that there's a possibility that someone (or even the captain) can read to those email messages and read it. I'm not really comfortable sending an email that has no privacy - a lesson I learned way back on "CAPE TALLIN" a few years back.   Most likely if I'm going to send an email here, I had to set some rules. First is that the language in email will be the local dialect of Filipino's which is called "Tagalog" , since ship officers here do not understand that language fully and I don't know any other foreign language to code my messages. At least using that   language minimizes the po...

ENTRY JOURNAL DATED: July 20, 2016 Location : Somewhere Far east on the Somali coast     "Just for the record this is a bad idea , if I ended up being hostage by Somali pirates because of negligence of these blockhead Indian ship officers we have here, I swear to god , I'm going to play Judas and help out the pirates on how get to the citadel and open it myself"     - Unknown Filipino Sailor During G.O.A. Somali Piracy Transit, July 2016 -     As expected despite the anarchy reported and hostage taking, transiting Somalia area is generally peaceful and nothing to worry about, and what's more to add to the assurance is that we have an armed guard around to cover our asses.   But despite all the confidence and assurance. Our Indian ship officers here exploited this and wants us to do day work - WHAT THE FUCK !!!! Go outside and do our normal routine of day work ! Right in the middle of a Somali pirate infested area ?! You got to be shitting me ! Jus...

ENTRY LOG: July 18, 2016 Monday Location: Nairobi, Kenya     Although It was highly unlikely that our Myanmar 2nd engineer would quit on his job, He did pass his repatriation request - and what's written in his letter is disembark on next convenient port. Up to now it's not clear what is his reasons why he quit his work, but it's obvious that maybe he quit the job because this ship is not a comfortable working environment to begin with and almost all of the crew agree on that matter.   In any case, this adds to the list of the number of people who are supposedly going to disembark.   In other news   Other anti-piracy measures have been put up such as dummies' (though highly ineffective because of the material used to make it) which had toy guns and fire hoses (doubtful on the fact that most of these are broken) , anyway despite the ineffectiveness of these measure's , I'm relieved that there's an armed guard around so in cases of any pirate gets smart e...

ENTRY LOG : July 14, 2016 Thursday Location : East of South Africa     Working late as usual - worst part is that I'm not being paid for the extra hours Norstar is dishing out on their old pathetic ship. To keep for the record, they had me working up until 6pm on regular working hours. Geez what a total dick !   Recently we have been putting up some razor wire and barbed wire as anti-piracy measures , The stuff that was widely used during world war 1. Typical stuff now a days and still being used up to now. Razor wire isn't really a problem installing in this ship - No thanks to those thick leather gloves that was issued as hand protection, So basically punctures and razor cuts on the arms and skin are a thing of the past now (well as long as any company would issue those types of gloves) - but incase a company is cheap enough not to issue those , I would be grabbing fitter's welding gloves which is thick enough to repel those nasty spikes of a razor wire, It’s a goo...

Entry log is July 11, 2016 Monday   Location : Port Elizabeth, South Africa   A lot of people have been dissatisfied on recent developments on our working condition here and it's no surprise that there are grumbling a lot as well, I can't blame them , seeing that I myself is dissatisfied over the conditions here and it’s a far cry from the good treatment I had received when I was in Career Ship Management on NSB "Conti" Ships. Shame that I had to leave on my former company due to very long "Waiting time". Anyway now I know why CF sharp is not included on my list of possible suitable companies to begin with, Working Conditions here and Company policies are not suited for a seafarer and not built for long term employment. Frankly my employment here is a big setback rather than progress on my career.   Despite the battery of consecutive disappointments that plague working conditions here, life goes on and so does the never ending process of work. I'm n...

Entry log is June 28, 2016 , TUESDAY   Latest updates about this ship's "dry dock" repairs was rumored to be sooner and will be dubai instead of somewhere in china. Although this info has not been confirmed yet by our Myanmar captain, so for now if there's no final word from the management - I'd just consider this info to be moot.   If the rumors were indeed true however, I'd bet that next month's weather will be difficult for me and will be a "blow torch" for me in Dubai. The encyclopedia I looked about UAE's climate are very clear that temperatures in that area spike to as much as 49 degrees Celsius, and with me having a no effective means or counter tactics against high temperatures, I'm not exactly sure on how things will turn out for me there, for the moment THERE IS NO EFFECTIVE WORK TACTICS AGAINST HOT WEATHER, compared to cold weather environments.   In other news…   Official pay slips just came out regarding our pay and as e...

Entry log is July 10, 2016 , Sunday     Weather has been very beautiful and comfortable over the past week, now that this ship will be in south Africa in a few days - reminds me of summer time season in Europe.   Sadly despite being comfortable now , next week and so will be very uncomfortable as this ship approaches UAE area. As what I recall a few years back during my deck cadet years, the weather in this area is blistering hot and surely the last place I had in mind in visiting. I still very much prefer and like the weather in Europe than in Asia or in the middle east. If I had known earlier that this ship will be trading on the middle east and Asia , I would have simply avoided and turned down this contract from the start. Anyway I didn’t discovered it only until latter - and besides that CF Sharp lied to me POINT BLANK about this contract.        In other news on work   Finally have completed sewing all the pockets needed for the co...

Entry log is June 28, 2016 , TUESDAY   More and more are joining in on the "Unsatisfied" band wagon and wanted to leave this ship due to undesirable working conditions here. Recently I learned that two of the O.S. riding crew here on this ship has submitted his letter of repatriation and will be joining Fitter Amiel Lorzano and Oiler Allan Sta. Maria in disembarking in Singapore. To what reason why O.S. will be disembarking is still yet unknown as of this moment(thought Oiler Allan is still undecided as of the moment), but its not surprise to learn that the reason might be something to do with the working conditions here. After all that's the main reason why most of   people here are unsatisfied and disgruntled , including myself because not all (in fact none at all) that they promised was met here on this ship.   As a matter of fact, I myself was planning to disembark here but I screwed up after St. Eustatius when I didn’t submitted my letter of repatriation. So my ...

Entry log is June 26, 2016 , Sunday     (FOT / GOT - means fixed overtime / guaranteed overtime pay , meaning you still get the paid for the work done outside normal working hours. Common term used here as a sailor is "open" overtime and "fixed" overtime. )   It's now confirmed that FOT / GOT won't pay that much, for them it’s a surprise but for me it wasn't and was anticipated weeks before it came out. Basically the FOT / GOT pay was based per rank of person on this ship, so the higher the rank goes the higher the pay, but for me since I'm one of the lower rankers then its pretty obvious that this pathetic company named norstar will just give scraps. From what I heard the GOT / FOT for the O.S. given on this month was just a total of 17 hours, yeah 17 fucking hours !!! All that hard work that was put for a total of a month without rest days and excess working was just put as toilet paper. (total of only 53 U.S. Dollars all in all, WHAT THE FUCK...

Entry log is June 22, 2016 , Wednesday   There have been news that came in lately, not exactly bad news but definitely not good news.   First off, the overtime pay that almost everybody is awaiting here has been approved and from the looks of it , a few have been happy about the excess overtime working hours but of course not all. From the rumours Deck department had an excess 25 working hours, so that means the total of working hours will be something close to 105 to 110 working hours from the standard GOT / FOT on our contracts (guaranteed overtime / fixed overtime). This may sound sweet but doing the math may not be so,   Based on my contract I had a net pay for a month is just 1,000 U.S.D. which includes the GOT / FOT , If I add my excess working hours then multiply the excess working hours to my rate per working hour - it only adds to 78.25 U.S.D. ,   Hmpf !!! All that hard work for just 78.25 U.S.D. ??? I had already been working even on weekends on this p...

Log entry: June 15, 2016 Wednesday   Typing and sending Oiler's Allan Sta. Ana's message was troublesome but I had to send it anyway since I owe the guy in helping me out sending a message to my sister via putting TOP UP's on my phone. His personal message was very long and was absolutely littered with " blessing for us and pray for me - religious gibberish" which complicates my SMS sending given with the limited amount of time I had to squeeze those SMS before the menu refreshes.   His messages looked more like a standalone email than simple 150   character tweets for an international SMS standard and cramming a four page note on it was frustrating, Anyway I did manage to get it done because I owe him a favour. Oh by the way just to write for the record , the nearby mountain was blocking the cellphone signal and I had to smuggle on the workplace an instrically unsafe device because the only area that has a signal was on the forward part of the ship, everythi...

Journal log entry : June 13, 2016 Monday Area: St. Eustatius , (Somewhere in the Caribbean)   After much deliberation and thinking, I had finally made a verdict and I think it's best for me to sit tight and ride this whole contract out. Now the only problem I have for the moment would be notifying my sister, that I had changed my mind and will not go home by August.   Maybe surprising by now that a couple of weeks ago, I was blabbering about going home and all that shit. As a matter of fact I still do because I was deceived and coerced by CF Sharp in signing unfair contracts. However despite my reasons , I cannot set aside logic and reason that land base jobs are more easily constructed / deconstructed with minimal whiplash compared to overseas job. Basically having a land based job is more secure and the worker is more protect by law than the overseas one, As an OFW I have to consider that once I'm outside the Philippines, It's every man for himself - and that I'm...

Entry log : June 12, 2016 Sunday   Yesterday's talk with Oiler Allan Sta Maria had been fruitful on planning but it reveal some complications about our situation on getting out. Apparently my reason is valid, so there's little complication about my predicament, however regarding Oiler Allan's situation on "refusal to work" it’s a lot more complicated. From what I heard from him is that there's some sort of 4 months professional reason for any resignation, which rendered him to - if he submits his resignation to somewhere in August. So it means bottom line is that if I ever decided to proceed in quitting this job - I have to go thru it alone. If I submitted my "letter of repatriation" it's up to the company anyway, if they will approve it or not. For me the difficult part is going to it alone on this plan, But Oiler told me that it's not an issue with him if I went ahead first - If I manage to pull this off.   Aside from me and Oiler, another ...

Entry Log : June 10, 2016 Friday     Looks like the environment here gets uglier and worst each day that passed. Latest update is that the laundry room will be rarely opened from now on, as in one a week to wash clothes, so basically it means I have only that chance to clean all my numerous coveralls and clothes on that very single day which I know will have a very long line. I have no idea about this illogical water discipline but its sure that life here will get worst as the time goes by. Anyway according to what I heard, fresh water production of this ship is very slow. Really now ?! And am I supposedly to believe on this kind of shit ?! Ha ?! For all I know I had been taking all the shit Norstar Ship Management has been giving me since day 1 when I arrived here. I think they're just saying that to make my life here even more miserable.   Just to add more insult on injury on this matter, I had only received an issued box of tide powder soap for the laundry ( 595 g...