My First Trip

[Doc Vernon]

Biltong.... Thought they sold it in the pubs in small packets the same as crisps, and those hard crunchy things forget the name of them. JS

Not the Pork Scrathings !??

Was Gonna say! LOL! (For Jim)

Just beat me JS!

[Jim Brady]

First trip as a galley boy the cook was a big fat Polish man the only word he could speak in English was WORK .
Believe me when you are really hungery you will eat anything

Hi Lou were there many Polish ships sailing from Liverpool around that time I know my brother did his first trip on a Polish ship the Batory.
Regards.
Jim.B.

[happy daze john in oz]

Remembered Porkie Scratchings. JS #29.... See can remember. JS

So you sailed with Porkie as well! Yes I recall the scratchings, apparently he had a bad case of worms.

[j.sabourn]

Remember the Polish ship as well but it was named Anna when I knew her,came into the Tyne in thick fog one time for pit props. Lloyds hailing station called up what ship, answered 3 times Anna, Lloyds man got quite annoyed, finished up shouting back I nah e nah, but I wanna nah anah. JS

[vic mcclymont]

Hi Marion, I have seen it (Biltong) in ASDA and other supermarkets. Is actually quite nice.

[Doc Vernon]

Its blerry lekker Vic! LOL (bleedin nice)
Cheers

There is also what they call the Droe Wors (Dried Sausage) very tasty too!
Ouma Rusks are great for Dunking in your Morning Coffee! Yummy!

http://www.mopanitrading.co.uk/Meat-...g/prod_96.html

[Captain Kong]

This is the BATORY,


The M/S Batory was a large (14,287 BRT) ocean liner of the Polish merchant fleet, named after Stefan Batory, the famous sixteenth-Century king of Poland.

She was built at the Cantieri Riuniti dell'Adriatico Monfalcone Shipyard in Trieste, Italy, under an arrangement where part of her payment was made in shipments of coal from Poland. She was among the most notable tourist attractions of the Polish seaside and among the best-known Polish ships of the time. She was launched on 3 July 1935. The ship was powered by 2 sets of Burmeister and Wain diesel engines driving 2 screws giving a speed of 18 knots. She began regular service in May 1936 on the Gdynia—New York run, and by 1939 she had carried over 30,000 passengers.

Mobilized at the outbreak of World War II, she served as a troop transport and a hospital ship by the Allied Navy for the rest of the war. In 1940 she, along with M/S Chrobry, transported allied troops to Norway. She was also responsible for secretly shipping many valuable Polish treasures to Canada for safekeeping. She participated in the evacuation of Dunkirk late May early June, taking aboard 2,500 persons. Later she carried as many as 6,000 people in one evacuation. In June to July, she secretly transported much of Britain's gold reserves (₤40 million) from Greenock, Scotland to Montreal, Canada for safekeeping. On 4 August 1940 she left Liverpool with convoy WS 2 (Winston's Specials) transporting 480 children to Sydney Australia, under the Children's Overseas Reception Board for safekeeping until the war was over. She sailed via Cape Town, India, Singapore (where she disembarked 300 troops) and Sydney. The journey had been a happy one, with so much music and laughter that the Batory was dubbed the "Singing Ship" and was the subject of a book [1] by the same name.

She was involved in the invasion of Oran in Algeria in 1942, transported troops to India and the invasions of Sicily and southern France, where she was the flagship of General Jean de Lattre de Tassigny, Commander-in-Chief of the French Army. She came under attack several times from the ground and the air, but managed to escape serious damage.

Dubbed the Lucky Ship for her military career during World War II, she was a sister ship to the less fortunate MS Piłsudski which was sunk in November 1939.


Returned to Poland in 1946, she continued her civilian service, transporting such eminents as Ryszard Kapuściński. From May 1949 through January 1951, she was the subject of several political incidents in which dockers and shipyard workers in the United States refused to unload cargo from her, or to service the ship by drydocking and painting.


After these incidents, she was withdrawn from the North Atlantic route, refurbished at Hepburn for tropic service, and sailed in August 1951 from Gdynia and Southampton to Bombay and Karachi, via Gibraltar, Malta, Aden, and Suez. In 1957, she returned to the North Atlantic route. She continued in service until 1971, when she was scrapped in Hong Kong.

She was replaced by TSS Stefan Batory, which began service in April 1969.

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Regarding `BILTONG`, it is also used as a greeting in South Adfrica,
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When I went back to East London in 2001, to find my mates grave who drowned there in 1953,
My South African friends had a Welcome card and a bag of BILTONG in the room at the Hotel when we checked in.
They said it was a custom to make you feel welcome.
The following day the bag was half empty, we had not opened it, and the day after the bag was empty.
We complained to the Front Desk and asked who was eating it,
The room maid had taken a liking to it and had scoffed the lot. The manager replaced the Biltong and probably replaced the maid as that one was OK.
cheers
Brian

[Jim Brady]

Thanks for that Brian,the Stefan Batory berthed across from the Empress boats in Montreal 50's/60's the Empress boats football teams used to play against the Stefan Batory's team.
Regards.
Jim.B.

[John Arton]

I visited the Stefan Batory when I was in Montyplonk on the Beaverfir. Got chatting with the stewardess's and had a nice tour of the ship, crew accommodation pretty ropey and was stinking hot.
Later on she used to cruise/sail from the Tilbury landing stage until one of C.P.'s container ships tried to demolish it.
C.P. had to fork out a considerable sum in compo to them as they had to go into Tilury docks to load the passengers.
rgds
JA

[happy daze john in oz]

Its blerry lekker Vic! LOL (bleedin nice)
Cheers

There is also what they call the Droe Wors (Dried Sausage) very tasty too!
Ouma Rusks are great for Dunking in your Morning Coffee! Yummy!

http://www.mopanitrading.co.uk/Meat-...g/prod_96.html

When I worked in the Uni one of the reps used to get Biltong for me from a shop the other side of the city. It was not the shredded type but a solid piece. I would cut a piece off when the fancy took me. One day one of my staff saw me and not knowing what it was asked why I was eatinga piece of wood?