Since we sailed out of the Suez Canal, we haven’t had much good news. There was delays in the canal that put us behind schedule, piracy watch all week as we sailed through the Indian Ocean, my first port of Tanjung Pelepas in Malaysia came and went before I could get the opportunity to go ashore and the ship encountered every engineers worst nightmare, the bridge lost the engine one night at some ungodly hour. I cannot complain however as I slept through without knowing we had encountered a problem, the 3rd Engineer had solved the problem in record time.
As we headed into China, we were told that shore leave wasn’t going to be possible and we would get a few hours off in a different port to make up for the lost time off. So, on Monday the 3rd of June I woke up as usual at 0730 and made my way down to the engine room. I greeted the 2nd Engineer who was on watch and then proceeded to do my usual round of checks and readings. This took around an hour and I walked round to clean up any oil stains I had left, we were due to have an inspection in the port and all week we had been cleaning and getting everything ready for the examiner. As I returned to the Engine Control Room (ECR) however I noticed that the place was empty. I walked several laps of the Engine Room to try find anyone who needed help, but the place was empty and with the engine turned off because we were in port it was quite creepy being alone down there. I am used to working with everything around me vibrating and the sound of our 4 massive generators and the main engine screaming through my ear defenders. After the two hours of my shift I decided to go to the ship’s office from the ECR. The 2nd Officer on duty told me none of the engineers would be working today and I was supposed to have heard this information the day before. What a waste I could have got another 2 hours in bed!
I went round the ECR making sure everything was on EMS (which is kind of like putting everything on autopilot so that if there was a problem the Chief Engineer and Officer on watch would be alerted) and then headed back along deck to A Deck where I met some of the crew who were waiting on our latest supply of provisions to be lifted onto deck. This was my first time to see where we were and what a sight it was. Roughly 40 meters below the main deck workers and trucks were bustling around, huge cranes were loading hundreds of containers from the trucks into our holds. It was like watching a time-lapse, everything went smoothly, and ship's holds were filling up at a steady rate. Just outside the port's perimeter we could see hills of green with the morning’s clouds rolling over them. From these hills came a tunnel which connected to a large suspension bridge which ran over the bay towards Hong Kong. For the first time in 2 weeks I saw rain, which is a very strange feeling for a Scotsman who is used to some rain just about every day.
We then spent an hour taking on pallet after pallet of food that would last us the next few weeks combined with further provisions which we will pick up later in Singapore. By the looks of it we are having chicken three times a day for next month, but there was relief to see a few other boxes making their way on board, the best of which was obviously ice cream. Call us childish but its amazing how much the crew of scary looking Ukrainian and Bulgarian men look forward to the Sunday meal that has ice cream on the menu, highlight of the week when you are at sea! The ice cream wasn’t even the best news of the day however, as the 3rd Officer passed us with one of the Inspectors he told us to wait in the ship’s office until he was finished. When he came back 10 minutes later, he was holding my new ship’s ID and 3 crew passes, finally we were getting shore leave!!
At 1150, myself and two other deck cadets from Glasgow that I have been friends with set off into Hong Kong. The journey took us two buses and a train before we reached the bay side stop of Tsim Sha Tsui. To be totally honest we just threw ourselves into the city hoping to find a café near the water where we could eat our first proper meal in weeks, hats off to the chef onboard but I miss my usual British food. We spent hours going in and out of different cafes shops and pubs just trying to do as much as possible before our deadline at 1600. We decided to have lunch in a large hotel right on the water, there was a large restaurant that looked out over the bay and we were too hungry to look elsewhere at that point. We had agreed that seeing as we were in China, we would embrace the city and try proper Chinese food. This decision lasted all of 10 minutes because the burgers and club sandwiches just sounded too good to pass up. Our lunch tab ended up being close to 1300 Chinese Dollars, but it was totally worth it for those 10 minutes of stunning food. We spent our remaining time going into shops and browsing. At first, I was nervous to go into the city, none of us had been there before and nobody spoke a word of the language but after a day walking around, I can now say I love Hong Kong. It’s a totally different world here. The people are lovely and willing to help you with anything, everything is efficient and done right on time and there’s just glass skyscraper after glass skyscraper. We only got to spend around 3 hours exploring and doing what we wanted but, in that time, we saw so much, and I would love to return to this city on my next trip on board and maybe even for a holiday.
Every minute I was in total shock, back home I have friends who have just finished exams and are now finishing school, all at different stages of life heading on different journeys and yet here was me, a young boy from a small town on the other side of the world, wandering the streets of Hong Kong and this was me working, not even as if I was on holiday.
For the next two weeks I am in and out of ports in China, Malaysia and Vietnam. Every day I wake up and walk down the port side passageway towards the ECR just staring out at the ocean and pinching myself to see if its real. I think I have one of the best jobs in the world and it is taking me places most people will never even go. Everybody else has come to grips with what they are doing but I still find it incredible to even think about, let alone be here doing the job myself. Words simply can’t describe some of the moments I have witnessed in my short two weeks on board.
Here’s to another amazing 14 weeks at sea!!