Truth be told, I'm really only writing this post to show off a sampling of what I believe to be fantastic photographs of my last two weeks working on a boat. One of the crew members actually had a half-decent camera, and the results (compared to my own camera's paltry offerings) are rather pleasing to the eye. And what's the point of a blog if the readers' eyes aren't pleased?
ARE YOUR EYES PLEASED YET?!
Life shipside was a swell experience, with plenty of scrubbing, sanding, and painting to fill my days. There was a significant lack of cannons, though the daily gin and tonic's at sundown were enough of a nautical tradition to keep my soggy soles satisfied. I fully support reinstating a daily ration of spirits aboard all US Naval vessels-- if we have any desire to maintain naval superiority it's the only way to keep seaman functioning properly. Nothing is perfect though, and after two weeks I decided to cut my intended month short and depart the boat before it was to be hauled out into a slip for hull maintenance. Sometimes people are bigots, and there's not a whole lot to be done about it but leave.
A damn fine tradition.
One night, the crew took a special excursion to land to watch a local Chinese Taoist festival. Starting at the temple, the festival involved hundreds of white-clothed Chinese burned incense and beating drums as a series of brightly-lit floats were prepared. At some super-secret cue, the procession began and the slow winding three-hour parade down to the sea began. Throughout the parade were nine men resembling nine different emperors (when inquiring upon the name of the festival, I was told "the Chinese Festival of the Nine Emperors," so I'm guessing these guys were kind of a big deal), each dressed in a uniquely ornate costume and maintaining a cadence of ambulation that would have permitted all nine immediate entrance into the Ministry of Silly Walks. I shit you not, for the five or so kilometers and how ever many creeping hours the procession lasted, these guys waltzed, samba'd, and cha-cha'd their ways down the cordoned-off streets. One even had a six-foot staff that he spun in the most overzealous of fashions, much to the concern of the possy meant to be escorting him. Half way into the route, the procession came upon a Chinese-owned liquor store where each of the emperors took a detour through and replenished their reserves of sacred Taoist holy nectar (AKA Carlsberg). Once the sea was reached, a giant paper mache boat was lit on fire and everyone promptly vacated the area.
Beware his supreme mystical Danish-beer-fueled powers!
I'd like to take a moment now to discuss natives. I don't mean aboriginal peoples or even local inhabitants, I mean travelers who take the distance from their homelands a little too much to heart. Sometimes they're easily recognizable by the substitution of all articles of clothing with a single sarong. Other times they can be spotted successfully haggling at local meat and produce markets. Yet the one common giveaway that all westerners-gone-native share is their proclivity for slurping. Finding themselves in Asia, where the use of chopsticks and spoons creates an environment ripe with slurp-happy diners, these individuals all seem to decide that the best way to be accepted by the local culture is to slurp as freely and loudly as possible. I've seen it in fifteen-year expats and two-week vacationers. I am at the same time baffled and impressed by how easily they give up what, to me, is a concrete western sensibility. One puts one's utensil fully inside one's mouth. One closes one's mouth. One removes the utensil while keeping one's mouth closed, simultaneously removing the accompanying food. No effort is saved by placing the utensil only half-way in and sucking with violent force at the contents. Slurping is not necessary. Hell, I'll outright say it; slurping is the wrong way to do it. Stop it. Just stop it.
Abandoning ship is the only way to escape such a cacophonous faux pas.
So my dreams of being a swashbuckling privateer conquering Cape Horn and establishing a vast maritime empire may still be a little ways off from realization, but dammit if I won't be able to paint wires like a pro when that time comes. Back shoreside I've been enjoying some incredible Indian food while figuring out what to do for the next two or three weeks before I fly to Istanbul, not Constantinople. Who knows, maybe I'll just grab a sarong and slurp curry 'til the twentieth. As a little reward to my premium readers though, here's a sneak peak at next week's episode of Extreme Painting: Malaysia.
Extreme!
