The ship was surprisingly quiet, only the wailing of seabirds in the distance could be heard, the crew tacitly interrupted entertainment activities such as dinner, table tennis, and tv, and Captain Hu Yuexiang frequently looked at the sea through the telescope, and the driver did not dare to relax in the slightest.
This is the 1996 North African Mediterranean sea - pirate sensitive area, captain Hu Yuexiang's ship to the North African port to unload, due to machine failure docked anchorage.
What shouldn't have come is still coming. Through the telescope, Hu Yuexiang saw two small boats coming straight at five or six nautical miles, and a dozen North Africans on the dinghy were armed with automatic rifles. Hu Yuexiang realized that "the pirates are coming."
It was just an adventure in his seafarer career. Ocean-going crews like him, floating on the endless sea all year round, no signal, no network, limited fresh water, monotonous life, long journeys are always full of loneliness and unknown.
Fatal moment
Too late to lift the anchor, the automatic rifle is daunting. Hu Yuexiang urgently summoned the first mate and asked him to inform the crew, "Don't resist, safety first, put some valuable things on the face, pirates take away and don't argue." Subsequently, Hu Yuexiang carried the fifty thousand dollars in the safe to chisel the ceiling in the corner of the conference room, hid it above the ceiling, and kept three thousand dollars to re-lock it into the safe, waiting for the arrival of the pirates.
The pirate leader led his men straight to the first room on the right hand side of the helm, the captain's room, located on the first floor under the helm. The muzzle of the gun was against Hu Yuexiang's temple, and fear dominated him to swallow unceasingly, and his shirt was close to his back and took off enough to wring out a small half basin of water.
The pirate told him in English that we were checking and opened the safe.
Hu Yuexiang tried his best to keep the length of the thumb cap from the muzzle of the gun, carefully walked to the front of the safe, used the key to rotate left and right a few times, and the lock of the safe bounced open with a "bang", and he took out the only three thousand dollars and handed it to the pirate leader.
The pirate straightened his wrist holding the gun and asked, "Only these cash?"
Hu Yuexiang explained that after the ship docked, it could only get fifty thousand DOLLARs from the agent, and now there was only so much. His voice was dry, and he could feel the smell of blood deep in his throat.
Dressed in tattered desert camouflage uniforms, the bearded pirate leader stared slyly at Hu Yuexiang's head. He didn't know what to do, vaguely aware that he could only be rescued if he broke the atmosphere that was about to drop to freezing, "You can take everything on board and take me away, but don't hurt my crew." Parents and children need them. ”
After saying this, Hu Yuexiang had a kind of relaxation where the dust had settled. Unexpectedly, the pirate leader reached out his hand to show friendship, and he hesitantly reached out his hand and was squeezed hard by the other party. "We only want money, not the lives of our crews." I love the captain's courage, see you next time."
After saying that, a group of people got off the boat with guns, and disappeared into the vast sea in a small boat, and Hu Yuexiang slumped in a chair.
Later, recalling this experience of being hijacked by pirates, he always overshadowed "bravery" with "hindrance".
In 1977, the first year after the resumption of the college entrance examination, Hu Yuexiang was admitted to the navigation department of Dalian Maritime College, majoring in driving. He grew up on the banks of the Huangpu River and spent his childhood at the Jiangnan Shipyard where his father worked, when he only worked with the machinery and equipment of the shipyard, and never boarded a large ship.
It wasn't until his neighbor, who was the first mate of the ocean-going ship, led him aboard the big ship that was loaded by the dock for supplies, that Hu Yuexiang stood on the steering platform for the first time. Looking out from the helm, the distant sea sparkling, the sails dotted, Hu Yuexiang vaguely felt the pride and passion of being the helmsman. Driving an ocean-going ship to sea became his first dream.
A photo of Hu Yuexiang when he was on the ocean. Courtesy of respondents
Ocean-going ships organize anti-piracy exercises every month, and anti-piracy nets worn by blades, water guns made of fire-fighting equipment, sending distress signals, and placing cash in a conspicuous place when there is nothing to do are all ways to deal with pirates. There are also "unclear" crew brothers who refuse to give the gold necklace around their necks to the pirates, and are punched and kicked by the other side, and after a few slaps, they no longer resist.
The reason why Xia He became a crew member of the second pipe ship is similar to Hu Yuexiang, his cousin served as the first mate on the ship, and every year he came home as a star in the family gathering, in the 2000s, the ordinary work salary on land was one or two thousand a month, and the cousin had earned thirty or forty thousand. In 2007, Xia He did not hesitate to follow in the footsteps of his cousin during the college entrance examination, filled in the Department of Navigation Engineering, and studied marine engineering.
At the beginning of 2014, the Panamanian-type vessel where the two-pipe ship Xia He was located was put on a boat test, the crew sat in the lifeboat wearing a life jacket, pulled down the remote control handle, fell from a height of nearly 15 meters weightlessness to contact the sea surface, because the mother ship's navigation may tow the lifeboat, so the lifeboat contacted the water surface When the crew of the boat needed to quickly release the hooks at both ends.
During that exercise, the three mates of Xia He's ship were accidentally thrown out of the boat by huge waves and fell into the cold and bone-chilling sea. His companions dragged him into a lifeboat against the strong wind and waves, the exercise had to be hastily concluded, and the mood of the three pairs after returning to the mother ship was difficult to calm down for a long time, and they did not board the ship for more than a year.
Since then, every time Xia He participated in the boat release test, he would be physically uncomfortable due to excessive tension, his face was stiff, his stomach was sore, his hands and feet were cold, and he couldn't help but recall the moment when the three pairs fell into the sea.
Unlike Xia He, who deals with the cabin machine, the second dundee is determined to become a ship driver when he is studying.
In 2011, Deng Di's coal cargo ship sailed from Bohai Bay to the Pearl River Delta, and was affected by typhoon Meihua No. 1109, and the captain ordered him to move north to avoid the typhoon, but received an order from the company to go south to Lianyungang to avoid the wind.
The captain refused the company's orders and chose to anchor in Yantai to avoid the wind, according to the meteorological fax map, the typhoon may pass through Lianyungang to leave. The captain, as the first responsible person of the ship, has the right to refuse the company's instructions that may cause danger, but sometimes it is inevitable that the judgment will be wrong.
The surge kept hitting the right wing of the ship, and the impact was so strong that the crew did not dare to come closer. The captain had to order an emergency anchorage late at night and sail into the back of the Yantai coast to avoid the wind and waves, only to avoid a marine accident.
During the ocean, a sudden illness can kill people.
For example, sailing through the Pacific Ocean, the fastest docking takes more than ten days, once the crew falls ill, the speedboat arrives at least a few days, and the cost of arranging a special plane is too expensive, the company negotiates and makes decisions, and it also takes time, financial resources and material resources to appoint a special plane.
The second Dundee had encountered such a life-and-death moment.
That day he was awakened by the sound of a phone call from the first mate, who was on the driver's desk for a 4:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. shift.
Dundee was informed to "hurry to the driver's platform." Deng Di thought that the ship docked in advance, and the first, second, and third mates of the driver had to perform their respective duties, and were responsible for command, positioning, and operation.
Hurriedly put on his coat and rushed to the steering platform, only to see an operator half-crouching and leaning against the chart table with the pilot, and the pilot's head had a hole the size of a thumb fingernail and grunting out of the blood. Dundee did not have time to hesitate, assisted the sailor, the first mate laid the pilot flat on the ground, and replaced the sailor to constantly press the pilot's chest to ensure that the CPR frequency reached 100 beats per minute.
The pilot's face changed from dark to pink, and after pressing for ten minutes, Dundee's two hands burst into flames, trembling uncontrollably. Just as he was about to let the sailor take over the pressure, the moment he let go, the pilot turned black and his breathing stopped.
The accident occurred on the west coast of the United States in the winter of 2014, and the pilot took a speedboat to the anchorage to guide the coal-pulling cargo ship to dock, and the forensic doctor said that the source of the disease was heart disease. After the pilot's breathing stopped for more than an hour, the Coast Guard rushed to the ship to take photos and collect evidence, and then the crew and six members of the guard carried the pilot weighing nearly 300 pounds to the deck to wait for the port.
For many nights, Dundee lay in bed and couldn't sleep, often wondering if the pilot would have been saved without stopping his heart compressions. Or will the pilot wake up again after receiving timely medical treatment? Thinking of this, he couldn't help but cry.
During the arrival of ocean-going ships, the crew disembarked and "stepped on the ground", and sometimes encountered unexpected disasters. A chief engineer who has been in the industry for 26 years recalls that in October 2006, he was loading sugar in Santos, Brazil, and he was about to go to the ground after taking a shower, when suddenly a local child called "not good is bad", and a trainee crew member in Weihai, Shandong Province, was killed in a bar street.
According to witnesses, the crew encountered robbery, struggled desperately, and finally ran out of the alley, running for a while and then falling to the ground and out of breath. In the same year, in Korro, Africa, the two crew members disembarked from the ship to shop until the ship started and did not return, and the captain sent local agents and security guards to look for them everywhere, which was defined as a missing person.
Deep in the ocean
"Loneliness" is the lingering background of ocean life. More than 15 nautical miles offshore, there is no signal on board, and he and his wife, children, and parents are separated for nearly a year at a time, drifting on the vast sea, like an island.
Hu Yuexiang stood on the steering platform and looked out, when the wind and waves were calm, there was no cloud, and if there was a cloud floating by at this time, it was a happy thing. He would watch the white clouds drift from far and near and farther away, as if a visiting friend had briefly accompanied him.
Before becoming the captain, he would hide in the cabin when the wind was strong, close his eyes and lie flat, forced himself not to think about the waves and dangers, and restrained the discomfort of turning the river and the sea in his stomach.
"In the depths of the ocean, there are not even seabirds." First Mate Shen Bo recalled.
On the days of ocean voyages, the crew's life is invulnerable. Crew members are required to be on duty in the cabin and deck 24 hours a day. The cabin department is responsible for the chief engineer, and there are large tube wheels, two tube wheels, three tube wheels, foremen, and mechanics below; the helm station and deck are responsible for the captain, and there are first mates, second mates, third mates, sailor chiefs, and sailors below. There are shifts every 4 hours, and the crew is on duty for 8 hours a day.
The ship is highly hierarchical, and the captain has absolute command during the voyage. In any situation encountered by the ship, the captain gives instructions based on professional knowledge, sailing practices and experience, and the crew must obey unconditionally.
Outside of the 8-hour duty time, the entertainment life of the crew is very monotonous. Usually only the captain and the captain (old track) had televisions in the rooms, and the crew watched TV, played chess, played table tennis, or two or three people got together to gossip in the recreation room.
"Talk about the port time, the unloaded goods, and whether you have been to this port before." Because the phone on the ship doesn't go to the Internet, there is nothing new to talk about, Dundee said with a bitter smile.
What happens when a ship docks at the port of Amsterdam in the Netherlands. Courtesy of respondents
Before each time Shen Bo got on the ship, he copied a large number of movies, enough for 1T hard disk. At home vacation, new movies, popular TV series, variety shows are all downloaded, and left to relieve boredom after getting on the ship.
But compared with the 8-10 months of ocean life, a few G memory movies are "not enough to plug the teeth", and over time, most crew members have developed the habit of reading, and novels and magazines have become sought-after goods.
When Xia He rested, he liked to put up his pillow and lean on the bed to read novels on a tablet. He usually likes to read suspense and fantasy novels, and the length is the reason why he loves it. "Otherwise, I will soon read a book and find a new one."
Liu Yong serves foreign ships, in order to facilitate the collection of goods, the ship runs around the world on average for 5 months, every time the crew celebrates birthdays, Thanksgiving, Christmas and other holidays, the Dutch captain who likes to be lively, the Romanian captain will let the senior crew buy red wine, beer, drinks to greet the crew on the deck for a small gathering, eat some potato chips, peanut rice, popcorn, chat time flash by.
According to international maritime regulations, "drunk driving" is prohibited for personnel working and on duty. In order to improve the long-term wandering monotonous and dreary life of the crew, some ships allow the legal drinking of empty crew members, but stipulate that they can only drink less than half a bottle of beer four hours before going to work. Hong Kong vessels require crew members to have zero alcohol.
Liu Yong graduated from high school in 2002 and applied for a job as a sailor at the Shanghai Shipping Company. One has no education, the other has no technology, originally thought that to be a sailor long to do the head. But his down-to-earth and enterprising was seen by an old captain, who talked about his experience of graduating from junior high school as an ordinary crew member until the age of 29, when he was admitted to the third vice mate through night school study, Liu Yong was encouraged to resign in 2008 and return to school.
After two years of part-time study at the vocational and technical college in his hometown of Shandong, Liu Yong finally obtained three certificates. The opportunity to be hired by a foreign shipping company and see the wider world is "like a dream, especially not easy".
The Filipino crew members Luca and Liu Yong have the best relationship, with 40% of the ocean-going ships the two have worked with European crews, 30% Filipino crews, and crews from Sri Lanka, China, India, Bangladesh, Russia and other countries, regardless of borders. Luca often worked in a group with Liu Yong, luca had four daughters and always wanted a son.
After a year or two after getting off the ship, Luca and Liu Yong still kept in touch, and on the phone he invited Liu Yong to the Philippines for a vacation, and Liu Yong joked, "The ticket is too expensive." Luca replied seriously, "If I have a son, I'll buy you a plane ticket." ”
Fishing is the crew's main recreational activity at the anchorage. Many crew members come from Bohai Bay, The Yellow Sea, Lianyungang and huangpu rivers, eat the sea by the sea, and have superb fishing skills, preferring to bring less change of clothes to carry a bulky set of fishing gear when embarking on the boat.
In 2011, Xia He was an intern on a boat running the Panama Canal, and at 11 p.m. local time, he and the rest of the crew were fishing on the stern deck, and Taiwan's chief engineer (old track) walked happily from the bow to the stern, shouting, "I caught a shark, hurry to the bow to help."
The crew ran to the bow of the ship, and that was the first time Xia He had seen a shark. At 1.6 meters tall and burly, the crew tossed for 2 hours to get the dying shark onto the ship, and after making sure it would not pose a threat to the crew, everyone took a picture of the dead shark and carried it to the back kitchen of the restaurant.
That was the first time Xia He was really excited after getting on an ocean-going ship, and he was not good at fishing when he grew up in Sichuan. Shark fishing uses a large steel hook, tied with a two-meter-long steel wire, wrapped in a nylon rope, hanging a large piece of fish meat on the hook, and going to the deck every 30 minutes to see if there are any fish hooked. When the shark bites the flesh of the fish, it will be cut through by the hook, the rod will tremble violently, and the blood and rusty iron hooks oozing from the shark's mouth can be seen across the sea.
At more than 4:00 a.m., the three-pipe wheel called out to the sleeping two-pipe wheel Xia He, "I have caught a lot of fish, come to the deck to see." It was 2015 at the Brazilian anchorage, and Xia He came to the deck confused with slippers, and flocks of Ming Dangling fish gathered around the side of the boat, scrambling to bite the fishing hook.
Xia He suddenly woke up, and asked for a fishing rod from the three-pipe wheel, and the kung fu fishing rod sank in less than two seconds and then lifted a fish with a fish to firmly bite the hook. The fish caught were more than 1 meter long, and they formed a silver hill on the deck, like a beam of light in the middle of the night.
Offshore "007"
On the afternoon of April 3, 2010, the Chinese ocean-going cargo ship Shenneng 1 crashed into a coral reef on the seabed 70 kilometers off the east coast of Australia, causing a stranding and a small amount of oil spills, resulting in pollution of the Great Barrier Reef. The reason is that at the time of the incident, "Shenneng No. 1" deviated from the established route by 20 or 30 kilometers. The duty driver worked 72 hours continuously before the accident and slept less than 10 hours, causing the accident in the case of extreme fatigue driving.
Coincidentally, the "XLYG" ship 2006 0065E voyage, from Xiamen to Busan, also because of the lack of sleep during the handling of loading and unloading business during the first mate dock, the morning shift from 4:00 to 8:00 drowsiness, a wake-up "XLYG" ship with a high speed of more than 22 knots rear-ended a 5,000-ton general cargo ship, resulting in the ship's port-side tail cabin immersion, in a very short period of time the ship sank, 10 people died of a major liability accident.
These two accidents caused by fatigue driving are familiar to the crew. It is common to work overtime after boarding the ship and not have a rest day. Deng Di said that the first deputy supervisor loading and unloading, doing some company system reports; the second deputy supervisor of the instruments and equipment on the ship, modifying the charts and library materials; the third deputy supervisor of life-saving and firefighting. "The handover shift encountered special circumstances, could not go immediately, by the dock loading and unloading, subject to inspection, machine failure requires the crew to work continuously, may not return to the room for two or three days."
From 2014 to 2019, Dundee had three birthdays in Singapore for five years. After arriving at the port, as the second vice-mate, he and the third vice-mate were each responsible for 12 hours of duty every day, working overtime to make the next voyage plan, assisting in customs clearance, coupled with the difference in geographical location, sometimes the birthday passed for several days before realizing that he had grown another year older.
In 2015, he docked in Brazil, and in the 30°C heat, the crew walked from the room to the deck and the kung fu clothes were close to the upper body. Quarantine officer, measuring officer, maritime bureau, ship agent respectively on board the ship to require cabin inspection, loading cabin up to 18-20 meters, the driver needs to climb a straight ladder or rotate the ladder with the cabin inspector to get out of the cabin, multi-day sleep can not be guaranteed, it is very easy to accidents.
Dundee climbed eight large cabins in one go, and took people down to the cabin one by one to inspect the goods and check whether the hygiene of the cabin was up to standard. Sending off the last batch of inspectors, Dundee felt a darkness in front of his eyes, and the anti-skid lane covered with anti-slip particles seemed to be getting narrower and narrower. He stood where he was for a long time, "I feel that if I take another step forward, I will fall." Suddenly, a crew member behind him tapped him on the shoulder to pull him back to reality.
"The modern loading and unloading of port machinery has led to shorter and shorter ship arrival times and fatigue driving of crews." Captain Hu Yuexiang explained, "At present, every container terminal in China is pursuing the highest container volume, so each port built has ordered the most advanced container bridge crane to shorten the port docking time. ”
When loading and unloading cargo at Yangshan Port, the berthing time of 8500 container ships is only 24 hours, up to 36 hours. A bridge crane starts from lifting one container, slowly to 2 containers, and has developed to hoist 4 TEUs at once.
Dundee had previously loaded iron ore in Narvik, Norway, a place close to the Arctic Circle, and the tenant asked for only 14 hours to load goods in port. Basically, every company will write "the ship leaves the port immediately after unloading the cargo", and if it fails to leave the port on time, the shipping company's transportation costs will be deducted.
Strictly demanding Taiwanese captains usually require the first mate to only return to the room in the office after calling in. The first mate was tired and lay on the couch in the office for a few minutes, and when the person came, he had to get up. "There is not enough time to adjust, it is very dangerous to sleep after setting sail, and the ship is in a unmanned state."
The work of ordinary crew members is more arduous, and "undignified, dirty and tired" is the sailor's description of the work. The washing of the cabin takes a lot of energy, usually one sailor is responsible for the straight ladder, one person is responsible for the hanging ladder, and the rest of the people will hang the bucket with garbage on it. If the grain tank is more demanding, the sailor must scrub every corner of the cabin with a sponge, and an ocean-going cargo ship usually has nearly 10 cargo compartments. The cabin inspector wears white gloves to wipe the bulkhead, and if there is a little stain, the cabin inspection will not be qualified and a fine will be issued.
The sailors spent a long time washing the cabins, and often fell asleep on the coal piles in the cabins. Dundee also learned from the ship's records that two sailors had died in the large cabin, "some people said that they fell to their deaths due to fatigue operations, and some said that they had a sudden cerebral hemorrhage."
Compared with the hard work of the crew, what worries them more is the tightening of senior crew positions such as captain, first officer and chief engineer. According to the pass rate of the 2019 2019 competence examination of seafarer training institutions published on the official website of the Maritime Safety Bureau, the pass rate of the three-pipe wheel preliminary examination of many training centers is 0.0%, and the pass rate of the three-board preliminary examination is also maintained at a single-digit percentage. Becoming an officer requires passing more than ten theoretical examinations and practical assessments, which is undoubtedly a difficult challenge for sailors and mechanics with low educational backgrounds.
The examination of the third pair, three pipe certificate, or the first mate, the big pipe certificate, does not mean that you can hold the corresponding formal position on the ship, usually requires an internship period of up to half a year to a year. After the internship period, if there is no vacancy for the third, second and first mates on the ship, you can only wait for the vacancy or hold a lower position.
Xia He once met a third intern, and the three certificates were about to expire for five years, "A masculine man ran to the captain's room and cried that he hoped to be promoted. Looking at it, his heart was particularly uncomfortable, and later the captain could not bear it, and when his three certificates were more than a month away, he was promoted to a post.
Many crew members feel the same way about this problem, Liu Yong took the third certificate in 2008, and after a four-year wait, he became the official third pair. "During that time, the financial crisis had just passed, the shipping market was not good, and some companies were in arrears in wages, but some crew members went to small companies in order to be promoted quickly, and they were not guaranteed."
Liu Yong hopes to stay in a large company, "it is difficult to jump from a large company to a small company for a moment, and then jump from a small company to a large company." In 2014, when he successfully interviewed three pairs for the first time in Hong Kong, the Indian interviewer said "I got you!" To his forgetting, he received the affirmation he had dreamed of.
Hu Yuexiang, the old captain, said that sometimes it is not that the captain is unwilling to recommend the crew to be promoted, like the shipping company of the central enterprise and the state-owned enterprise has a fixed number of promotions every year, and the private enterprise, including the captain, is also employed by the company. Usually there are vacancies in the position, and the company will choose the crew with work experience in the position, rather than the novice. The imperfect senior crew training system is the main reason for the difficulty of staff promotion.
On land
Before 2009, smartphones were not yet widespread, and crew members contacted their families through letters. At each port, the ship agent carries a bag of letters to the ship, and the crew's family sends the letter to the shipping company's mailroom, which is then uniformly packaged and sent to foreign ports.
Whenever the captain informed the time of receiving the letter, the crew picked the lamp to complete the family letter, and some crew members who could not write letters looked for the college students on the ship to ghostwrite, and the words of the meat and hemp did not fall word for word, and they deliberated on the envelope again and again and put it into the ship mailbox in the restaurant. Wait for the next port call, receive the letter, send the letter, and wait again.
As the communications industry grew, crew members bought mobile phones and the tradition of writing letters disappeared. However, due to the limitations of the sea signal, the crew can only find a stable signal within 15 nautical miles from the port, so they cherish every anchor and port call.
Hu Yuexiang commanded the ship to depart from the Bohai Sea to the direction of Singapore, and there is a small island of projectiles at the location where the motherland is about to bid farewell, Zhongjian Island, on which there is a relay station of Hainan Island Mobile Company, whether it is before the voyage or after the long voyage, the crew can say goodbye to their families here or say "I am back." ”
Because Zhongjian Island is so small, the mobile phone signal lasts only about 45 minutes, and the crew happily shuttles through all corners of the deck to make a final farewell to their families. The driver and sailors on duty were somewhat agitated, and Captain Hu Yuexiang said quietly, "There are no ships sailing ahead, I will perform the observation duty, and you will go outside the pilot's platform to make a call." The crew on duty opened the flank door of the helm station and slipped out quietly.
Hu Yuexiang in the Suez Canal. Courtesy of respondents
The time to spend with the family as a crew member is very limited, more than 10 months a year on the ship, and even less than 1 month at home.
When his wife gave birth to her first child, Xia He was on the route from Taiwan to Indonesia, he clearly remembered the day before he dropped anchor, and at night he dreamed that the child fell to the ground, just when his wife's due date was approaching, when he arrived at the anchorage, he immediately dialed the home phone, "Last night your wife gave birth", the end of the phone said.
Xia He was on an ocean-going ship savoring the joy of becoming a new father and wept with joy. The first time I saw the child, but after the child's full moon, I returned home at the end of the boat period, and the child snuggled in his wife's arms, looked at him strangely, and resisted his embrace in the first few days.
Shen Bo, the first mate who also missed the birth of his child, summed up the three major regrets of life, the birth of two sons, the death of his dearest grandmother in 2016, the fall of his father in 2018, and the crushing fracture of his foot bone, all of which were on the boat.
When Shen Bo left home to board the boat, the younger son was only 2 and a half years old, and the 8-year-old eldest son held his father's thigh and cried. Shen Bo told his son, "Soon I will be back, my father is at home every day to manage you, every day to beat you, what is good?" The eldest son said, "You can beat me at home every day, don't leave." Shen Bo also cried.
It was planned that after eight or nine months, I would be able to see my sons again. A temporary voyage order to Go to Madagascar Timber pulled Shen Bo and his sons farther and farther apart. Because the vessel they served was identified by the Malaysian side as suspected of smuggling redwood, Shen Bo and 15 other crew members have been detained in Madagascar prison for nearly two years.
He did not dare to tell his son his true situation, and he wrote a letter to the eldest son, "Our ship is broken, the ship cannot be opened, and now it is very far away, and the ship must be repaired before we can go back." When you're a little older, ask your mom to point you out on the map. ”
The son wrote on the paper, "Okay, Dad, you're over there to repair the boat, and we're waiting for you." Don't be afraid, we all miss you and the family is fine. Shen Bo had mixed feelings, "If I go home again this time, I will definitely think more about my wife's feelings and the feelings of my children."
When the child left home, the child pestered his father to prevent him from leaving, but when he returned home, the child hid behind his mother and did not allow his father to come closer. Hu Yuexiang recalled that many crew members returned home on vacation, and the children would call uncles strangely. Some of the crew members went home to sleep on the bed and were pushed out of bed by the children: "Uncle, this is my bed with my mother!" "In order to repair their feelings with their children and wives during the short vacation, the crew usually takes care of all the housework when they return home.
"Reporting good news but not worrying" is the norm for crew members to reply to family messages. The crew encountered big things and small things during the voyage, and they were reluctant to tell their families, for fear that they would be worried.
The saddest time on the boat is not because of loneliness or exhaustion, but because of the emergency of the family and the fact that I am not around. Liu Yong took a boat to Trinidad and Tobago in North America, near a port east of Verinella, the chef asked to disembark for a long time because of the health of his wife, and he did not get the consent of the company for a long time.
"Chef has been in the industry for more than ten years, usually does a good job, and is not an impulsive person." Liu Yong recalled, but when the family suddenly fell ill and the shipping schedule stipulated in the contract did not arrive, the crew's psychology had to undergo great pressure.
The longer you spend with the sea, the stranger your impression of land becomes. Dundee came home from vacation, walked past the zebra crossing, but forgot to walk sideways or vertically, in a trance, and the feeling of stepping on the road seemed less real. The streets and alleys were posted with stickers of "Pleasant Goat and Gray Wolf" and "You Are My Little Apple", and he just felt inexplicable.
I went down with friends about hot pot, kebabs, and a few beers, and never understood what bitcoin and Ethereum my friends were talking about. They are intimately familiar with each other, but they struggle to find a topic to talk about. The months of separation from society take up to a few weeks or even the entire vacation time to slowly adjust, from the duty schedule on the ship to the rhythm of life with the wife.
But often the crew has just adapted to the lights on land, and it is time to set sail separately.
(Except for Hu Yuexiang, the characters in the text are pseudonyms)