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The Generous Roots of Yuletide Yggdrasil

Saint-Roque wrote:
And I'd love to tell some old sea stories.
All sailors have them. The thing is, "land people" find them sometimes too extraordinary. Not only hard to be believed at all, but to be listened to in the first place because they never been there. It's hard to believe people's stories about places we don't know. There is security in common, shared experience, if you know what I mean.
Such a different world. Things work different. We live under quarter schedules and tight rules 24 hours a day, and a hierarchy in close quarters, you must show respect to the cook otherwise you'll pay for it, the ship's plumbing and wiring have colour codes different than those you find on land.

I have seen things in reality that for others are sea tales from an odd uncle who been to the Spice Islands, as it were. Things the land people see on maps and, well, most of times they never really try and get the chance to actually go there.
Maybe they go to, say, the Iririki Island Resort.
They will. But...as tourists and then they'll have photo albums to show. When they go back to Wellington or Brisbane.

Never saw the Kraken. Or the 5-head Shark.
Sy-fy is great to amaze and scare people that way.
No Moby-Dick either. Sorry.

I did see unexplainable phenomena. And I wasn't alone. Thousands of crewmen and women and passengers alike saw it in the South Seas when I was there.

It was huge and brought a sense of awe. From my knowledge of naval architecture, what I saw is. ..it certainly out of this world.
Can describe it, if I want. What I saw.
The Captain put a lid on it.

There is more, but I won't bother you.
Especially the tragic incident with the MV Scandinavian Star in the wee hours of the morning of April 7th 1990.

I may talk about the transvestite prostitutes in the Port of Genoa, Italy. I may mention the five days and nights when Poseidon himself, I can't stop wondering what we did to him, unleashed Hell between Bordeaux and The Azores.

I can even say that I smoked a joint at Singapore Airport. Stupidest risk I've ever taken, could have gone to jail for 15 years for a stupid funny cigarette.

But I won't talk about happenened from Oslo to Frederikshavn that night.

One thing I tell you. When you're the bridge politeness is customary. All men are addressed as Mr., regardless of rank.

And the absolutely brilliant feeling of leaving Lisbon Harbour and sail into to the ever unexpected blue water, like my forefathers did before me.
They built an Empire. Well, I felt I could do something too. Took a photo diary.

I wanted to go back and respond to this post that was sort of forgotten and overshadowed by the raid which occurred a couple weeks back.

I definitely get what you mean about "security in shared experience" and the inability for others outside of that experience to quite understand what it's like. I will never truly understand what life on the sea is like, and others will never know what it's like to have lived my own.

Of course, I do love trying to understand that sea life :) Mainly through old romantic adventure novels. I am especially partial to the works of Joseph Conrad, as his books are not only full of high adventure, but also possess extreme literary merit. The main was a genius.

"I did see unexplainable phenomena. And I wasn't alone. Thousands of crewmen and women and passengers alike saw it in the South Seas when I was there."

That's pretty fascinating-sounding. Although, also terrifying...the feeling of vulnerability when out on the sea must be very real.

I remember someone telling me a story, once, that whenever they meet a sea captain or otherwise life-long sailor, they always make sure to ask them what was the strangest thing they ever saw out on the sea. And they almost always have something to tell. It's a great big world out there in the ocean, and we only know a fraction of it.

"One thing I tell you. When you're the bridge politeness is customary. All men are addressed as Mr., regardless of rank."

Oh, I wasn't aware of that. Sounds quite nice. And classy.

Thank you, Mr. Saint-Roque, for sharing your sea stories with us. I greatly enjoyed reading them. I bet that photo diary is a pretty amazing thing to pour through.

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