I don’t see what this has to do with shipping!
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I don’t see what this has to do with shipping!
#71, well as the site has been running since 2008 and if still restricted to shipping then we would have run out of things to say years ago, as our shipping has all but disappeared. Very few of us stayed at sea until retirement, although some of us stayed closely related to it in our follow on careers. Others followed different paths and it is nice to hear of their endeavors in their chosen fields, not matter what they chose. Alas politics affect us all whether we like it or not, so we tend to stray off course, even when discussing sea related subjects, this happened in the messroom and the saloon when at sea, so is nothing new. Yes, the site is/was primarily for seafarers to share their experiences, but at one time the MN had 195000 personnel sailing under our well loved Red Duster, so experiences were numerous and varied and many of us had shared experiences at the same time but in different ports and different femme fatal. Many of us sailed in the 50's and 60's in a near post war era and sailed with shipmates who had endured the war years and knew how to let off steam when ashore and they included us newbies in their world, even the average 8 -12000 ton tramper had crews of 50/60 so characters in our service abounded and had tales to tell and experience and guidance to pass on. We had long sea passages, long times in port with plenty of time to discover the delights and pitfalls of those ports.
Now we have around 16000 registered UK seafarers, most serving under disfigured Red Dusters or FOC's, on very large ships, with very small crews, short sea passages and very short times in port with the berths miles from any nightlife as we knew it and no time to enjoy it, even if they wanted to, as most will be be on twitter, whatsapp or something similar. I was reading an article by a Ship Master the other day and he said that when a crew joins the first thing they ask is 'what is the ship's wi-fi password' no interest in where the lifeboats or LSA equipment is, even though those items would save their lives.
We had the best days, probably the best experiences, but the shipping world has changed and world will never see our likes again, as alas we are in reality and literally a dying breed and Fiddlers Green has a crooked finger beckoning us to his and Davy Jones Locker.
So you will have to forgive us if we stray off course, but we are not all on auto pilot, and we put our thoughts on paper as they come back to us, because by tomorrow we will have forgotten all about them.:confused:
Used to be also Ivan if want to be quoting rules of long ago to quote your dis A. Number as a form of proof of who you are . How many real seamen are there on site ? JS
Memories George, it's all about memories. Down here in Cooma in Aus, I can read stories from others that remind me of my own time at sea
it's all we have from those heady days of sailing around the world, and a world that was mysterious to us from small villages and towns of the UK, different people had different experiences, visited different countries and ports, but we live it with them as they write.
Des
We are what is left of our forerunners the merchant venturers of Britain who were the forerunners of the British Empire now the Commonwealth. India and the likes were opened to the world by merchant seamen , the likes of the East India Company might get the kudos , but the real people responsible are British merchant seamen , other parts of India the same applies to the French and Spanish. Now when you look at it , at the wastage of a past Empire builder bringing a lot of good to an undeveloped world , who do you blame .? Politicians ? And there is probably a lot of truth in that . JS.
Well Vernon and Des.
we went to Moama, NSW, at the weekend, Murray and Campaspe still very high and still some flooding.
But then read an article, back in 1950 NSW had the same conditions as now, major floods and very odd weather.
It was also at the end of a three year La Nina effect.
The in 1974 similar conditions after a two year La Nina effect.
This flooding of the region is only the third highest behind 1876, 1950 and 1974.
Voice of sanity!