Up the gangway part 5

 

We had a Non for profit shop that one of the boys would volunteer to run. It had treats and basic things that were not provided by the company. Batteries, Toothpaste, chewing gum, stamps, pads and envelopes were included so you could write to family.

The only communication home was via the ships Radio Operator. I turned 23 on the Australian Pioneer and 28 on the Australian Progress. I had received a radiogram and we also had a Radphone if I needed to make call. It was expensive!

Both the Pioneer and Progress carried about 34 crew members. It wasn't unusual to rarely see some engineers who lived on another deck. The age of the crew varied from late teens to 65 years of age. I was always one of the younger blokes.

Television could only be watched in the recreation areas. The Cooks and Stewards had a room with a bar that was above the crew. We never had good enough reception to watch it until we anchored somewhere or were in a port. The reason we never had one in our cabin was because of a union policy. It was said to create isolation and most blokes favoured the policy.

The Television we used had a switch so we could tune in to Japanese television. Although none of us understood the language, some blokes would still watch it which was full of commercials. In Australian ports we'd get a bit of the latest news but for many weeks we relied on short wave radio.

Portable Cassette players and ghetto blasters were popular at that time. I bought a Sony Walkman cassette player and a transistor size short wave radio through a Duty Free arrangement. I remember making an antenna using clips and wire from a Tandy store to wrap around a used toilet roll. It became my work of art!

When I was on the Australian Pioneer each department had a projector with cinema scope. We were supplied some great movies for each voyage, and I got to be a volunteer projectionist. In the later years the reels of film were replaced by videos.

We'd travel through Indonesia on most of my voyages to Japan. You'd see volcanoes and fishing boats but we never went close to land. I remember keeping our distance from Buru where they kept the political prisoners. The scenery was amazing and I bought pair of binoculars for amusement.

Occasionally we'd have a BBQ which was to give the cooks and Stewards a break. We still had to prepare salads and organise the meat and clean up the trays. Although some cooks didn't like them it could change the atmosphere for better or worse. The officers were upstairs and the crew would be on the poop keeping a distance. On one occasion the weather was clear but someone claimed it was starting to sprinkle. We all looked up and an Engineer was urinating over the side!

Storms have been known to sink ships and we survived a few of them. In 1982 Typhoon Mac was a category 5 super-storm with winds up to 220 kilometres an hour. It was lurking in our path on the Australian Pioneer when it did some damage in Guam. We don't sleep whilst those navigating had to focus!