sayonara

[cappy]

on ties every week i go for a beer with an old seaman .....he was on about japan in the 50s and 60s .......it was the place to be ........everything so cheap ......a bottle of suntory whuskey for next to nothing ....and the little japanese girls so beutiful and so gentle never drunk to much and really knew how to tret aguy .......i got a letter from michicoin oz ....dear geordiesan now you go from nipponmy heart like the cherrry bblossom in winter no beutiful flower .....i await your return and the blossom will be new in my heart .....please come soon sayonara michico .....i went tosee my cabin mate to show him the letter his girl was called kasuko........but was really peed of to see his letter from kasuko was the same as mine ....presumably the mamasan was just touting for business if we came back to japan japenese song on u tube sayonara means japanese good bye always reminds me now of great times

[j.sabourn]

Did you ever go for the wax treatment Cappy. JS

[Keith Tindell]

I had always wanted a trip to Japan, when it came very unexpected, we had fitted ahi fitted shifting boards in Rotterdam (what aan antiquated system by today's standards), for sugar from Cuba. 200 miles from Cuba the crisis developed very quickly, buzzed by Yankee planes etc, so we were told to steam South while they looked for a cargo. The cargo they found for us was grain from Durban to Japan, wonderful place when we got there,cheap, lovely run ashore with lovely girls etc, we went from there to Oz, back to Japan, and others I cannot remember. I remember the girls we'll, if you were seen with another girl they got areal strop on, and you were known as a butterfly !! . Got home 10 months later, and me thinking it was going to be a 6 week trip, KT

[john sutton]

john s
know that joke

[j.sabourn]

#4... What joke John, that was Cappys speciality, the Turko bath was always his first stopover on his runs ashore in Kobe. As Regards Keiths Butterfly, that was also Cappys Nickname the Geordie Butterfly, however on at least one occassion when he ran out of Yen, this was changed to the Geordie Moth. Think he found true comntentment however with emu in oz. Stand by now for the flak.Hadawayans####. No idea what he"s talking about there. Cheers

[Colin Wood]

Japan in late 50's was one fantastic run ashore!!!! But if you only drank soft drinks you were definitely out of 'Aces' as it was assumed you had a medical problem

[cappy]

Did you ever go for the wax treatment Cappy. JS

####why nee chance john am from shields me pipes were always clean .....regards cappy

- - - Updated - - -

I had always wanted a trip to Japan, when it came very unexpected, we had fitted ahi fitted shifting boards in Rotterdam (what aan antiquated system by today's standards), for sugar from Cuba. 200 miles from Cuba the crisis developed very quickly, buzzed by Yankee planes etc, so we were told to steam South while they looked for a cargo. The cargo they found for us was grain from Durban to Japan, wonderful place when we got there,cheap, lovely run ashore with lovely girls etc, we went from there to Oz, back to Japan, and others I cannot remember. I remember the girls we'll, if you were seen with another girl they got areal strop on, and you were known as a butterfly !! . Got home 10 months later, and me thinking it was going to be a 6 week trip, KT

proper ships keith proper seamen and no drugs just alcohol and lovely japanese love birds........regards cappy

[j.sabourn]

#4... Always having trouble with my ears John, always too much wax. Have to get syringed out about every 2 months. The old Japanese method although painful at times was much better. JS

[DeepSea]

Done about 10 ports in Japan in the 1980's very expensive. See link for you older guys who should remember Kyu Sakamoto's song Sukiyaki, made number one in the USA about 1963. He died in the JAL air crash in the 80's.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zpOc9n7dlI

Nosira Lin 82 Japan.jpg

[Richard Quartermaine]

Puccini's Opera Madam Butterfly is to me the most beautiful and I have been enraptured ever since I went to enjoy it at Covent Garden in London over sixty years ago. Never visiting Japan as you have shipmates I got the next best adventure. When I was courting my Margaret she studied opera at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music and she, a soprano along with her contralto friend in the group were asked to sing the One Fine Day aria from Madam Butterfly at a prominent private school auditorium. I was invited along and as her fiance was the proudest of proud. What you write takes me back to those days and the words of the aria are so poignant and the music so captivating I copy it here to share. I suppose I am 'The Sentimental Bloke' but I can't help that. Richard

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AR0SlCTj1Bo

ONE FINE DAY
Butterfly's aria from Act 2 of "Madame Butterfly"
Music by Giacomo Puccini / Libretto by Luigi Illica & Giuseppe Giacosa
As recorded by Deanna Durbin for the film "First Love" (1939)


Weeping? And why? And why?
Ah, 'tis faith you are lacking
Hear me
One fine day we'll notice
A thread of smoke arising on the sea
In the far horizon
And then the ship appearing
Then the trim white vessel
Glides into the harbour
Thunders forth her cannon
See you? Now he is coming
I do not go to meet him
Not I
I stay upon the brow of the hillock
And wait there
And wait for a long time
But never weary of the long waiting
From out the crowded city
There is coming a man
A little speck in the distance
Climbing the hillock
Can you guess who it is?
And when he's reached the summit
Can you guess what he'll say?
He will call, "Butterfly" from the distance
I, without answering
Hold myself quietly concealed
A bit to tease him and a bit
So as not to die at our first meeting
And then, a little troubled
He will call, he will call
"Dear baby wife of mine,
Dear little orange blossom"
The names he used to call me when he came here
This will all come to pass as I tell you
Banish your idle fears
For he will return

(Transcribed by Mel Priddle - December 2003)
The story is here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madama_Butterfly