Today was a pretty good day.

Not many deckies working'; many people are seasick, and so extra deckies are taking on other's seawatches, and so on, so not many day-workers. Tomorrow there are only 3 of us!

Anyway. The Bosun asked me to wirebrush/clean/paint one of the compass stands on the bridge, which was a good job. Went well too. Hopefully the rain the rest of the day wont have messed it up too much....

Then in the afternoon we had fire attack-team training. Which basically envolved learning about how the breathing-apperatus worked (BA-sets). Then putting them on, and going about the ship, all of us getting shut inside a small compartment/fan-room togeather (to make sure we could cope with such spaces, and not get claustrophobic), crawling along mainstreet (the main corridoor of the ship) using only hands and feet (knees not being protected enough) and then we went up to the funnel, climbing down through inside of the funnel structure inside the engine room, (very very hot! while wearing heavy BA-sets too...) to give us an idea of how it is like inside a fire, then we had to go out along the propellor tunnel shaft (small, hot, and with the propellor axel/pole spinning half a meter away from you the whole time) and climb up the emergency escape shaft.

Then our instructor (one of the ship's firemen) went and lay down somewhere in the lower engine room, and we had to go in to find him, and carry him out as a casualty, the whole time wearing our BA-sets. The normal cylinders we are using here for air give about 45 minutes, so the whole thing didn't take THAT long, but it sure felt like it, as it was so hot, and carrying a human body about while wearing a set is quite hard. One of the people on the training mis-attached his BA tube to his mask, and so had to stop half way through, and go on the rest of the time just breathing normal air, with his BA-set detatched, and one of the others ran out of air 10 minutes before then end, as he is less fit or something, and so was using up air faster. But we got out in the end.

I enjoyed it a lot. For some reason many of the others didn't. Most of the others got burns on their hands while we were climbing down through the smokestack funnel, -- it was that hot. I didn't. Family asbestos fingers coming into play, I think. Anyway. They ended up walking around the rest of the day clutching plastic bags of icecubes. One of the others as well was feeling too sick to participate. But one of the other guys, from Germany, was really really good. Very competent, and good to work with. I'm sure he will be on the attack team soon, and good too.

So yeah..

We left India yesterday. Kind of sad. I will miss India a lot. A lot of people on board are glad to leave, as it has been very stressful for them, what with many of the visitors being so pushy and all. For me, I didn't get so stressed by it, even when on gangway watch, with many people coming and asking for tours, and for permission to walk about the ship and stuff like that.

I was thinking about it, and many of the cultural traits which ship people were finding hard to deal with, and much of the culture are pretty similar to Cypriot culture.... just imagine a Cypriot culture that had continued for 3000 years without being invaded every 100 years like Cyprus has.... then imagine their religion teaching that they were spiritually better than others, and that the others were trash, lower than dogs, because of bad stuff they had done in previous lives, not even to be pitied. But the aspects of everyone being out for himself, but caring about his family, or family image. Not wanting to look bad, trying to get the best for himself out of every situation, thinking he knows best, and so on. Very similar to Cypriot culture. Maybe that's why I didn't have such a problem.

Two days ago we got the new deck schedule for this month. no news about jobs or anything, BUT, I found I had an extra 2 days of 12-4 gangway watch this week, as some people are on re-entry training. That's not good news. So I did 12-4 today. I'm SO tired. I wasnt ready and so didnt get enough sleep or anything, and I still have tomorrow to do.

BUT the good news: one of the other blokes wandered into my cabin just now, we were chatting, and he said, "just 2 days of 12-4? That would totally wreck your whole sleeping pattern. 1 day is fine though. How about we swap tomorrow? I'll do your 12-4 tonight and tomorrow afternoon, and you can do my cleaning team." He just phoned to say he confirmed it with the bo'sun. COOL!!!!!

He said he quite likes gangway. So many people tell me that. I just dont get it.

Re-entry training is brief 2 day training about getting ready for going back home. We have about 8 or 9 deckies leaving in the next few months, so it may be quite unlikely that I leave deck any time soon. I hope I'll get the lifeboat job and that it works out as well as I hope.

I spoke with the bosun, and he knows that Im quite practical and good with my hands and stuff, and so he would quite like me in lifeboats, but the watermen want me to join them too (specifically asked for me). And he knows I'd quite like the lifeboat job. I told him that I am interested in moving from deck into creative ministies or AV or videographer job in the future, so if it is better for the deck to get someone who doesn't want to leave deck ever (which would be good if there was someone to do lifeboats for 1 and half years! very good for the department), then maybe is better I stay in normal deck work. He was happy I told him. unhappy that I may not stay a deckie, but he really appreciates openness.

Watermen job is (in my opinion) not fun. Others think it sounds great. Basically no hard physical work at all; they are in charge of the ship's drinking water, so when trucks come, they have to come and get it attached and coming to the right tanks, moving water from one tank to another so the ship doesn't get lopsided, checking the water making sure it's OK, testing the depths of each tank. There's also a bunch of other random jobs (like looking after the baggage locker, making the new keys for the ship, repairing shoes, etc) mostly it doesn't require too much work, but not exciting.

AND... many times they end up being "on call" all evening, and having to rush off to do water trucks at all hours, which would be really really is bad for me, as I'd almost never be able to totally confirm with a programme organiser, "yes I can be in a programme to do a drama" so they would not want me in dramas at all, as I might have to keep rushing off. So you can see how some people like the job. No hard physical work.

Sometimes they don't ask if you want a job, though, they just assign. It's the chief mate's decision in the end. Apparently what happens is that all the department heads meet up to discuss what people they want, and then negotiate it all out, and then after that each deparement head assigns jobs out within the department according to which people they have left, and so on.

According to the AV people I'm almost certainly on the list of people they will request, but because of me being quite strong and a guy, I will almost certainly stay in deck for the first year. The thing is, AV will be SO short staffed in the next few months. I know I could do the AV job, and many people could not, and so I dont want to commit to the deck department of getting the extra training and stuff of the lifeboat job, if I will then end up having to dump them in a few months if AV cannot find enough other people. Its not fair to the department. So it's all quite complicated. That's why I told the bosun.

At the moment, though, I'm just glad about not having 12 to 4 again tomorrow!

I missed lunch today as I had to give a tour for my "little brother"s family at 11:30. So I went and brought an icecream from the book-ex shop, then made a chocolate spread and jam sandwhich and put the icecream on top. Scrummy. Then I had some dinner too, but not much. I put the rest in the fridge for later. But i'f I'm not on watch I wont need it...

Gangway watch is so bad for eating too. You never feel hungry at normal times, and then need energy quickly at random times, and waking up at like 2 am, and so end up eating really bad stuff, chocolate spread sandwhiches, choclate bars, tea with loads of sugar,cereal with sugary squash juice stuff as the Doulos milk is not nice.

We were supposed to go on an extra trip on my off-day, all of our group, to do a special programme at an old peoples home. But the driver didn't turn up, and so we were waiting for ages. Then when he did turn up, we got taken off to the wrong place - the same place where we did some building. They wanted us to start building again, but none of us were in building clothes. All the girls were in punjabis and all . I remembered the house of a local guy we had met before, so we went there, and phoned to the real guy, and explained the problem ... and then it began to totally chuck it down with rain. So we hid under the veranda and played music and sang songs with the local slum kids, which was really cool. They sung us their Sunday school songs. Really nice.

Then somehow the guy turned up, found us a jeep, and drove us back to the ship. On the way we stopped at a really nice cheap Indian fast food/resurant place and had lovely lovely lovely Indian food. A whole huge meal. The whole meal, plus drinks and dessert, and auto ride home cost us 50 rupees each!!!! 50 rupees is about 50 CY cents [approx $1 US].

It was too late to go where we were supposed to go - everyone had gone home.

Today has been pretty good. Sunday service music practice at 7am. I went early, to warm up, then we practiced until 8:20, service started at 8:30, so about 5 minutes for breakfast. Then after the service cleaning duty, so went outside to start cleaning. Barely started when an absolute torrent of rain started. So we ran around lashing down all the canvasses, lowering the engine room hatch, etc. Got totally soaked. Totally!

Ship seems SO clean now. It's lovely. Everyone said "God is on cleaning duty today!"

Yesterday was i-night, at an outside quasi-amphitheatre venue, a 4000 seater. We packed it!!!!! We were praying for no rain on Saturday for the last 3 weeks or so. So it was really great getting soaked today, and thinking, "This rain might have come yesterday, and ruined all our equipment, and wrecked the whole night, but God made it rain today!" so we didn't mind getting wet at all.

Then after lunch I did the rubbish, had a 10 minute rehearsal for a drama, finished the rubbish, had a shower, went and performed the drama, played guitar for a few minutess, got some props from creative ministires, practised with 4 others for a drama tomorrow. Then I got ready for gangway relief, went and did relief for half an hour while the watchman (watchwoman) went for dinner. Then I put the lights on on the ship, lowered the flag, ate dinner myself, then came back to clean up my bunk a bit. It was covered in random stuff from i-night and all.

I was in two acts in the i-night. Scottish dance, and then TWO minutes later, the "parade of nations" as Cyprus, so very rushed to change. I wear the closest I can find to Cyprus costume: black trousers, white shirt, and a black "Spanish" waistcoat from the costume locker. Looks kind of silly to me, but (a) no one in the audience knows any better (b) if it really looked stupid, they wouldn't keep assigning me to parade of nations (c) most of the costumes look a bit "made up" or fake, so yeah.

Oh, and i've got jazz dance practice in 15 minutes.

I'm working on a puppets script at the moment, for tonight's practice. We brainstormed it last week. Someone else wrote the first draft, and I should have sent it back to them before. But now I have fixed many things, and re-written a few scenes, so I hope it is OK.

I will be BUSY tonight.

6.28: drama performance
6.30: Scottish dance practice (I'll be late though)
7.00: puppets practice
9.00: jazz dance practice
10.00: clarinet practice in foc's'cle
11.00: sleep

The drama will probably actually be nearer 6.40. I still don't know if I'm definitely in the official drama team! One of the other drama team people who is in this drama tonight (which I already knew, and so taught them) told me he thought I was. But who knows? I'm waiting for them to tell me.

Funny thing is, in deck work I am totally NOT busy. There is far too little work for us all to do at the moment. So we're doing silly things, and spending as much time as we can on them. Like cleaning the aft mooring station. Totally pointless, as in three days time it will be filthy again from the coal dust, and takes just as long to clean now as it will in three days, whether or not we clean it now.

We also spent about half an hour re-whipping a rope for the canvas cover for one of the bridge compasses, and then stood down two hours early.

But that's good for me, it means I can finish this script now!

Fare from the firefighting. Fair food for free! Fantastic...

I'm finished watch, but feeling kinda sick/queasy, possibly bad fruit. I did eat four apples just before watch in one go; the fruit had probably been sitting in the backstage of the theatre getting hot and stuff all day. Not serious.



Visak port is even dirtier than the last one but it's rained twice! Lovely. Huge massive torrents of it, with thunderstorms like in Colorado. Lightning hit one of the port floodlight towers, and so the port lost lighting for about 6 hours.

Then we got a page from the book exhibition, "Attention ship's company, we are in need of volunteers to come to the book-ex deck to help save the books."

So of course loads of us charged up there. Water was coming in all the sides, as it wasn't prepared for 45 degree torrents. All the cash desks got soaked too. So I was running around tying canvases down all over stuff. Because it was a sort of i-night last night, most of the ship's company were off-ship, so only about 40 people were on board. A lot of books got a bit wet, but not wrecked.

I spoke to the bosun about the lifeboatman job. He says he wants whoever does it to start working as soon as possible so they learn the job really well before September, when the current guy leaves. When I spoke to one of the firemen, he said that with the lifeboatman and fireman jobs, you can basically work what hours you want to, as long as you get jobs done. So it would be very cool.

Lifeboatman does maintenance of all lifeboats, emergency equipment and so on, also repair of all canvases on board, and nets, ladders etc. They can get as many deckies as they need when they want them. But if just checking rations and water supplies, no others are needed. If I did this, I'd be able to do more dramas and programmes easily, and sleep more at night! Also because I'd be working on my own frequently, I'd be happier socialising during off-time.

It sounds ideal, but then again, the grass is always greener and all that. Heading for almost 4 months on the ship, almost the whole of my preship is a bit fed up with their jobs and want to move/change etc, which is expected. In about 2 months' time, most will probably be happy again.

I don't know if I will do it; they must have this week's team leaders meeting first and see what happens. They will probably decide then, but who knows? Some things happen on board so fast and other things take forever! I still haven't been told definitely that I'm in the drama team...

Here is a poster they showed us in our fire-fighting "training". I'm quite glad we didn't have to actually put one of these on...

Last week has been kind of slow/busy/confused etc. One of the creative ministries people is on an away-team, we had an i-night, I went on an overnight, and am on watch this week (12 till 4), and so on. Also I learned a new mime/dance and performed it the next day. Tomorrow we sail to the next port.

The overnight went well, it was a very good experience. I'm so glad to have gone on an overnight in India. Some of it was not such fun, but very good to have experienced it. Hole-in-the-ground type toilets without toilet paper, for instance...

The book-ex has closed for this port. We were going to be open today, and pack down tomorrow, but today is election day so the local people (port authorities) told us it wasn't a good idea to be open. So we closed today and are doing major clean/pack down. A major, major clean. This is a coal port, so there is black dust caked onto EVERYthing. Horrible. Apparently the next port is even worse...

One of the team leaders asked me yesterday if I would consider the job of lifeboat man!! More flexible hours, I'd be pretty much my own boss, as long as I got the jobs done, no gangway watch or firerounds and so on! I'd have to look after the lifeboats, clean them, make sure all ropes/equipment are correct and good, learning more about how they work, and helping to direct during drills and when using them etc. It should mean I could have more flexible hours as I'd be working on my own most of the time and so I could work around performances/practices with drama and stuff. But I'd still be a deckie, which would also be good. And, I'd get a special letter/chitty/thingy from captain and mates, which would (apparently) pretty much get me a job on any ship anywhere!

"I'm on a church team tomorrow," said I.

"Cool. Who's your team leader?" said he.

"I am."

"My goodness? What is the teams co-ordinator smoking to make you team leader?"

... or so (approximately) went a conversation on Saturday.

Yeah. I was a team leader. So, what does that mean? well, basically, a church asked for a team of us to go do a short programme/presentation in their service today, and my job was to find out (a) what they actually wanted, (b) what we would do, and (c) how we would do it. Another question was also (d), who "we" are.

I was told that I was a team leader on Wednesday.

I thought it was Thursday, at the time. So I went to the board, and make a notice that my team should meet on Saturday evening, in the dining room. 6.20pm. Why this time? Well, the sheet of paper they had given me told me we would be collected from the port gate at 6.20am, the next morning. And I thought it kind of appropriate.

I phoned the pastor as well, and found out what he wanted (songs, drama, mime, a couple of testimonies, and a short presentation about the ship. nothing too challenging).

So...

SATURDAY :

18:20 - I was in the dining room. Waiting for 2 fairly experienced Douloids (both had been on the ship longer than I have), and 2 STEPpers.

18:30 - I phoned the info desk to ask if it was allowed for me to make a page for them to come. They told me no, only on the actual day itself could I page.

OK. No problem. I'll just wait then.

6:35 - one of them turned up! Whoo! One of the experienced Douloids. We chat for a bit about what kind of things we should do. I'd been given one good idea earlier by someone else. As the STEPpers probably don't know any dramas, and probably don't know how to give a good (ie, short) testimony, I could ask them to sing a song in their own languages. Most westerners are horrified at the thought of being asked to sing solo in front of a church, but many Indians don't seem to be. Also, although some don't sing so well, most seem to sing very well indeed.

7:00 - I ask info, and apparently one of the STEPpers is actually out today, with some other team, and hasn't returned yet!

7:30 - no one else decided to turn up. oh well. the both of us leave. I have some work to do, I need to stick some adhesive sandpaper-type tape to the steps to Hold 3, so they are safe to walk up without slipping over. The trouble is that the self adhesive isn't strong enough to hold it in place, and the contact glue I have to use should really be left overnight to dry, that's why I am doing it tonight.

8:00 - My K-group (fellowship/family group) "parents" are leaving, and it's now time to say goodbye, so pretty much the whole of the people who joined the ship at the same time as us are there. Quite sad.

9:00 - I get dressed in work clothes to go do that work. On my way, I pop by the book-exhibition up on deck, as one of the cabin mates of the other STEPper (not the one already away from the ship) told me that he should be working there. I found him! I told him we're meeting at the info desk at 6am, and he says he can sing. Jolly good.

9:45 - While working on the steps down to hold 3, Andy (from the previous pre-ship group to mine) brings the other STEPper down to see me! I ask her if she can sing, she says yes, and although she doesn't like the idea of a 6am start, thats OK.

10:00 - Finished. Bedtime.

SUNDAY:

6:10 - At info. We're all there! Wow. Pray, discuss briefly what we will do, and head for the port gate.

6:25 - We're in the bus heading for the church!

8:00 - Service finished already. Didn't really go as planned at all. Very short simple baptist style service, which I enjoyed. Old hymns and everything. Not 200 people, as my paper said, but more like 30 or 40. The CD played didn't work properly, which disrupted us a bit, as a mime/dance kind of relied on it. But! One of the STEPpers sang very well, and the other one... could be professional! Lovely voice. Amazing. So, yeah, it all kind of worked.

10:20 - The pastor took us out for an indian breakfast (lovely), and we're now in a taxi on the way back to the ship. Wow...

11:20 - I find my "little brother" port volunteer, and gave him a tour of the ship (I'd been on watch when he joined, and kept missing him, so he hadn't yet had a proper tour! Not so good of me. But he liked the tour.).

And that was it!

It all went well. Afterwards in the team "de-brief" in the mess, while filling out the form about how it went, one of the experienced Douloid team members took the form and in the extra comments she wrote how she liked my leading style, as I was so relaxed, and asked peoples
opinions rather than being a dictator, and how unusual I was. *blink* hm. Thanks!

But maybe that means I'll have to lead many teams in the future! Oh stress!

So, yeah.

Doulos life is still pretty hectic.

We've been having many inspections and stuff this port, so yesterday I was helping to clean up the lifeboatman's office, and in the back, we found an old guitar (without strings), which belonged to one of the lifeboatmen of ages past, and the current one didn't want the guitar, and so said I could have it! Wow! So I now have my own guitar! Today hopefully I can go and buy some strings. I'd just been talking with God a few days ago about not being able to practice guitar so much, so yeah! Doesn't often happen like this, but a nice present. It's even a classical guitar! Whoo!

A new picture! OK, so now all the bloglines people will actually visit my blog. that's cool.

So... meself in a kilt, after Scottish dancing in the international night programme last week.

I've been asked to consider if I want to join the drama team or not. One of the guys left, went home. He decided to leave about 3 weeks before he left, and had been discussing it with personnel for some time. Id still have to do deckie job full-time and then drama team a few evenings a week, during free time.

In deck department, apparently in a few months some of the carpenters are leaving, and if no professional carpenters join, they may be looking for normal deckies to start learning that job. The carpenter's job does have slightly better hours... basically normal deckie, but no firerounds or gangway watch! Yes, it would be hard, giving up firerounds. It's so fun getting my sleep pattern all messed up, feeling depressed and never knowing what time it is, waking up terrified that I've missed the watch, and wanting to go home, but I think I could handle the disappointment of not
experiencing it.

If I try really hard.

One of the other deckies told me he thought it would be my kind of thing, as I like doing stuff with my hands, and am quite perfectionistic, and so on. I'd love to learn more proper carpentry.

We've been doing fire-fighting training this week. Went to the Chennai technical college of maritime, for 3 full days of lectures, plus one practical day, and one other day when the time was kind of confused. We've been hearing loads on board about the training course the previous preship went to in Sri Lanka, I think, and how it was fantastic, real loads of training, having to crawl through cargo containers set on fire, put out loads of types of fires, and so on.

We didn't learn ANYTHING in the lectures, nothing we didn't have in preship. We didn't even touch a fire extinguisher, or see a match get struck. But we get a certificate, just the same as the other people!

About the malaria tablets... they seem to perhaps be causing restlessness and sleeplessness, in varying degrees and forms. But many many people on board are finding it hard to sleep at night, just lying awake wanting to walk around or get up and type, or work out, or whatever. Particularly on Sundays, when we have to take the weekly extra pills. But we're not really tired in the day. Everyone is so hot and sweating so much anyway. We take 2 tablets daily, and another 2 extra on Sundays. so many and we must all take salt tablets as well, as we sweat so much.

We're going out this evening to eat (our k-group) as the k-group parents are leaving this week, for good. They only joined the ship for 3 months. K-group is sort of family or fellowship group, all from our preship. There is one set of "parents", one of the married couples on the ship, so each kgroup has one married couple as parents. Ours are from our preship (which is the ideal), but many are not, but ours leave this week.

One of the older couples on the ship are on furlough right now, but come back in a week or so, and they will be the new parents for our group. They were also at the preship training. Each week we have a time together, for an hour or so, and generally it's in the parents' cabin, so they host it, generally provide drinks and buscuits, and so on. Also they make sure we're all ok, and not hating our jobs too much, or whatever.

Food here is very cheap. Like a whole meal for one person can be 4 dollars. For good meal, that is.
Fast food can be a dollar, or less. Mostly veggie. Many places have "veg", and "non-veg" on the back page.

I was so tired this week. My last off-day was right after watch, and we went out for the whole day,
so I'm just having a quiet day today. I read in the morning, had long lunch, chatting, and some music practice, perhaps clean up my cabin a bit, maybe start scripting a new film project or something this afternoon.

Just got back from the town. So many contrasts, so much poverty, so much deception, so much weird stuff. Several million people, bigger than London, and this is nothing like the capital. Huge numbers of beggers, homeless, etc. and the other people just shoving them out of the way, not caring, or worse. And so strange seeing thousands of idols everywhere.

Traffic is insane here, there are so many auto rickshaws. Imagine a 2 wheel hand cart, attached to a motorbike, and its slightly less posh than that. All metal.

Weather is pretty hot. Not too bad, for me. But if outside a long time in sun, for the Finnish, or whatever, it's bad.

We're in India! Whoo!! etc.

We arrived yesterday, on the 11th April.

I'm kind of tired, in a general way, but also kind of excited and awake too. Jumping to the firerounds schedule (11pm to 7am work time!) really messed up my body clock, and so I got very little sleep the first few days. And I know I need sleep soon. But I'm going to stay up til lunch, and then sleep from lunchtime until 8 this evening, as one of our k-group is going on a team away from the ship for 2 weeks, and we are going to have a goodbye lunch for her.

So I was filling up time until then.

I've been part of a group learning a jazz/modern dance since pre-ship, and had wanted to make a "training" dvd for the dance, with each section (verse, chorus, rap-section, finale, etc) able to be played, and explained on the dvd, so that if people miss learning sessions, they can catch up faster, but also so that we can review on our own parts, and also to allow the dance to be kept going if key people leave the ship.

So I went just now to the photography/graphics office, and looked through their video collection to see if they had any tapes which had the dance on, with the right kind of tape that I can play on my camera, so I could start working on making the dvd (or at least a demo of the dvd,
which I could then use to persuade the dance leader to schedule a few sessions to properly record it).

While I was talking to the photographer about this, she (first of all she wanted to talk about my toaster video -- apparently her machine didn't play it right, so she watched it about 4 times trying to get to the ending, but it didn't work, and she was getting angry because she wanted to see how it ended! rather cool!)

.. anyway, she told me maybe I should apply for job of videographer, which is a post they have been looking for someone for for quite a while. I knew they wanted someone for the job, but thought they wanted a professional videographer, someone like dad. But she said no, in fact she had never even seen Adobe Photoshop until 2 weeks before they came to the ship, and had basically to learn on the job!

It's kind of weird... Like, all during firerounds this morning I was thinking about my job as a deckie.

I love the job, doing all the physical work and all, all the painting, scrubbing, chipping rust, and so on, but a lot of the attitude of some of the other deckies really annoys me, and I find hard to work with.

For instance, on the fire-rounds, there are these little red strips on the walls in different sections. What you are supposed to do is go to each section, make sure there are no irons plugged in, or whatever, check the bilges, and so on. Then scan the strip, and go on. There are some strips which are outside a hold, or other room, and you are supposed to open the door, check inside the space, and then close it and go on.

When talking with one of the other watchmen, I mentioned that I really didn't like going into one of the holds, as it's so creepy down there... always sounds like someone is walking around, and hiding from you. And he couldn't understand why I would go down there anyway, as the strip is outside the door, and "no-one ever bothers" to actually check inside. I dunno. Like some people are trying to get away with doing the least possible, but it seems like such a bad attitude to have, since we are here to serve God, and it's not like the jobs are enormously strenuous anyway.

Yeah, I've been kind of feeling a bit fed up with deck department for a week or two now. I was expecting it, of course. Most people go through a "down" cycle after about 3 to 8 months of their first department. And I've done 4 months of deck work now (including my STEP). So I know that it's just part of Doulos life, and that in 6 months more, I'll probably feel a lot better about it.

But anyway, I was thinking for ages this morning during my watch, if I was to move department, where would I go? I am even feeling engine room might be better, and was so tired with the attitude that if IT asked me to join them, I might even do that. Not too happy. So quite a surprise to hear someone tell me about this position needing filling, like the same day I'm really thinking about this.

Right now, I'm thinking it would be so cool to do this job. I'm pretty tired, and going through a not too happy week with deck dept, so I'm probably seeing it brighter than it is (the grass is always greener, and so on). I dunno. That's what I'll be praying about for the next while, we'll see what happens.

I won "Pioneer" DoulOscar !

I thanked the toaster, said how great it was to work with, and how generous it was, etc, and then told everyone not to grow up. Stay as children. Its much more fun. We had 2 mintutes max for speeches, then they started playing snoring sound effects. Only one person got that though.

One of the creative people told me I got the pioneer award partly because I'm the only one doing short videos. Most people are trying to make whole long things.

our preship has a lot of techie/AV/media people, which is cool, and we're all (except I think 3) staying for 2 years, so hopefully we'll get the Doulos media quality going up and up. I was the only one in our preship to have made anything for the DoulOscars though!

I just got nominated for the DoulOscar "Most Creative" and also for "Best Actor". I have to prepare speeches in case I win... for the video I made about the Doulos toaster.* I was camera man, director, gaffer, editor, cutter, best boy, tea lady, actor, pyrotechnican, etc...

I want to make it again. Its kind of rushed in too many places but I learned a lot.


* note - to understand the significance, see the blog entry about the toaster

We've been doing India orientation training. It was good, though quite long, and nothing too new: mozzies, be careful of drivers, no physical contact between men and women in public, no tight jeans, etc, knee length shorts at minimum, etc, etc, and be careful about what water we drink.

We all started malaria pills yesterday: dailies and weeklies. Apparently less nasty ones than last time, as there are hardly any resistant strains or anything here. The dailies are proguanil, and weeklies (as well!!) are chloroquinine. It turns out all of the people who got malaria last time were not taking their pills.

I think the biggest worry is crowd control. Apparently we will probably be doing no deck work for most of India, just crowd control. They're expecting at least 12000 visitors a day, maybe more.

One thing makes me very happy in India orientation: In most of the world, they talk of normal food, and veggie food. In India, they talk of normal food, and non-veggie food.

Food on board is very good now. Much pasta these days, the new chef Glenn is v. talented, and he has a hatred of "one each" signs. Most meal times there is fruit now, and also some at other times. Many times now we have signs up "ask galley staff for veggie option..."

It gets very hot now here... apparently we will have no visits to schools, as all the schools are closed for the next month, as it is too hot!!! And then we will start hitting monsoon season, I think. for most of Malasia, islands, etc. But we have teams out every day, loads of a-teams (2/3 weeks away from ship), and so on. One deck team per day is probably going out on visits too. We have only 5 teams, so maybe much more extra days out! whoo! Also the on board programme/conference schedule is up, and it is totally full. Like every morning, afternoon and evening, almost.

They had a couples night a few days ago, for all the marrieds on board. They interviewed over the last few weeks lots of them, talking about their families, pets, dogs, etc. and then mixed / edited them up. So they asked questions about the husband/wife, and then put in the answer about the dog, or something. eg: "what was your first impression of him? " "well, he has a really big nose, like this... " Funny.

i'm on firerounds or something next week, so I dont know what times I will be awake.

We will sail (in just a few days time) for Chennai, India. It is quite a long voyage, about 10 days. Hopefully not many people will be seasick.

I'm getting to do more dance on board, which is something I've wanted to learn more of for some time. I'm in the Scottish dance group, am learning a jazz/ modern piece with a bunch of others who joined at the same time as I did, and may be learning joining a Dutch dance group in a few weeks as well (time permitting). I'm also in the puppets workshops/teams thing.

Yesterday we did the big "International Night", which I was involved in (3 items! I was changing costumes all evening!), and then from about 11.30pm when we got back, I was helping to unload the 3 book containers which arrived yesterday. We finished the unloading at about 4.30am this morning. I'm kind of tired, and also have a cold, have been coughing and all for the last 2 days. Poor ol' me, whinge whinge, moan moan, etc, etc. I actually love days like this, it's kind of unusual, but staying up crazy hours heaving heavy boxes of books about is really rather satisfying.

So, I'm still quite busy.

We're now in Oman. Last week was kind of down, I was really busy, and still tired after watch and all.

The voyage was very nice, I was kind of hoping to be on sea watch, but wasn't at all. During long voyages, they often arrange special tournaments, so we had a table tennis championship, which was enjoyed by all. It was per- k-group, so each k-group chose 2 people to represent them. It was all kind of rushed though, if they had told us a few weeks in advance, then I think it would have been better.

One of the other k-groups had someone who had been top in her country as a child, or something like that, but because her English was not so good, and she had not understood/replied to an email until too late, and so other people in her group played instead of her... which was kind of sad.

I didn't play, by the way. :-)

Anyway. This week looks as it if will be more fun. Tomorrow is I- night, the big programme off on shore somewhere. I'm in the Parade of Nations (bah), Scottish Dance (grand!), and a drama (whoo!), then on Friday, I'm doing a puppets sketch with one of the other Daniels in the service (yah!), so all in all, quite busy.

Today will be a bit hectic though... we have 3 containers of books arriving. Probably in various Indian languages. So our deck team is "stood-down" until they arrive, and we will be working with those. Possibly until quite late.

BUT... I have a drama practice tonight at 6, and scottish dance practice at 6:20! Also the Dutch dance have asked if I would be interested in joining, they need more guys, apparently. Next week... maybe. ;-)

About the drama thing. Although I'm not in the drama team (still don't know why), I think the creative ministries people still kind of like me (they know that that is where I would like to work, eventually), and want me in dramas, I just wont learn the more complicated long ones that the drama team prepare.

So yeah. And when we go visit schools and so on, I'll still be doing drama at most of them, I think.

I should probably go now... I have many things to do. I need to listen to the audio of the puppets sketch (we are just doing lip- synch), and one of the school teachers wants me to play my clarinet for her students (4 year olds, I think!), maybe I will do that today. But I need to prepare the puppets more importantly.

I'm sitting in the dining room, typing this, after a children's programme this morning. We went to visit the school at 11.30, and were told we had a 45 minute or an hour long cultural programme, they wanted. No problems. One of the other team members is a teacher from oz, and so she was voted to "MC" the time.

The kids enjoyed it a lot, as did the teachers, but one of the teachers _kept_ coming into the room, like, every 2 minutes, and calling for another kid to come because their parents were there. We should have really started the programme at about 11 o'clock, or 10 thirty. Eventually the whole thing dissolved at about 12 o clock when pretty much all the kids left as their parents were there to collect them. Oh well.

We taught them some (fairly) silly songs, performed a drama about friendship (they gave me the main character, which was fun), did a song about Doulos work (also quite silly, but impressive. Basically a short chorus about "if I was not upon the stage of the Doulos, I would be..." and then each "verse", one of the people stands forward and pretends to be some job; captain, carpenter, laundry, etc, with a short chant, and actions. and each time through the song another person stands forward.

So it starts off with one person standing forward, next verse two people, the verse after that 3 people, until all of us stand forward. and the actions to each persons chant include standing up, bending down, stretching arms up and down, etc, which are choreographed so that each person ducks out of the way of the next person just as they do something. IE, the carpenter stretches out a measurement, just as the painter ducks down to stir paint, and so on.

The last character to stand forward is... a ballerina. and they are supposed to be a really strong masculine macho deckie, and so guess who that was? yes! me! wearing my deckie clothes (really grubby looking and "work" ish) and also a ballet skirt thingy on top. it always makes the kids laugh, seeing someone so tough and manly pirouette and leap across the stage... yeah. pretty fun anyway. this evening we are going to help up at the bookshop, and give tours and chat to people. but until then is time off, which is quite nice.

Yesterday was my off-day, and I went out to see the town with some of the others. we visited the souk, I wanted to try and find a new watch (analogue, with alarm and backlight, but not big and heavy, and nice looking. I'll be using it on deck, so just simple and stuff.

heh.. anyway, I didn't find a good one. I found lots which were almost right, but none I really wanted to get. the guys at the shops always started off prices of about 8 to 12 dinar, but by the time i'd looked at them all and decided I didn't want to buy, were all talking off special offers, me being their friend, and 3 dinars only.

oh well. Perhaps I'll see one in India or Oman.

We then went and had lunch at a place called "Hardees", which is an American style fast food resurant. I had a salad burger. Then we walked to one of the malls about, walked around it for a while, went to a Haagen Daaz icecream place, each had an icecream thingy (v. nice. I had a waffle with icecream on top) and then walked a bit more, and went home. Over all, fairly relaxed day not doing very much. Then in the evening I played Rummikub with some others, and then hung out in one of the families' cabins with them and just chatted and looked at photos and such. They are a really friendly family, and have people drop round many evenings, and have their door open. They were making a sign to put on their door, with "hi! come in!","we're busy, sorry","not in!","go away we're sleeping" or something like that on it, which they can then put a blue-tacked arrow at the approp. label, on the computer. So I helped with the design of that for a while as well. v. friendly.

anyway. I'm off now. It's nice to have had these two not so busy days after the last 7 days of watch. Normal day deck work tomorrow, we'll probably be starting to get ready to sail in 2 days, so finishing off paint jobs, perhaps loading some of the vans and stuff...I don't know.