Chapter 2
Aruba
The first time on a ship, it feels like entering an alien world. Orientation returned to me a few days later. One of the things still vivid in my mind is the Caribbean in the morning sun. A rich emerald-ish turquoise, clear, reflecting speckled flashes of sunlight happily over its crests, as the ship bounced leisurely from island to island, at a rather relaxed 18 knots.
As much as a sailor will always remember his first ship, he will remember the first port she (and he) touched. All those stories he would have heard have finally come true- those faraway lands, Valhalla-esque mountains, magically sprouting from the sea, their peaks bathed in mist. In this day and age, 9 times out of 10, he will return disappointed to the ship, having been to a place much like his own, where there are dirty alleys, and the women aren’t that beautiful and there aren’t that many. He will often see poverty, sweat, and women walking the streets, heavily made up and all too unattractive (even to a sailor). Then he realizes that this world in which we live is a real, living, breathing place. Not a picture from the National Geographic.
Aruba is an island in the Dutch Antilles, the picturesque, proverbial jewel set on the beautiful blue Caribbean. We had just arrived, and emerging from the belly of the beast in my grease covered boiler suit, I was surprised to find the chief, telling me I had five minutes to get ready for a day out on the town. I took less.
Aruba
The first time on a ship, it feels like entering an alien world. Orientation returned to me a few days later. One of the things still vivid in my mind is the Caribbean in the morning sun. A rich emerald-ish turquoise, clear, reflecting speckled flashes of sunlight happily over its crests, as the ship bounced leisurely from island to island, at a rather relaxed 18 knots.
As much as a sailor will always remember his first ship, he will remember the first port she (and he) touched. All those stories he would have heard have finally come true- those faraway lands, Valhalla-esque mountains, magically sprouting from the sea, their peaks bathed in mist. In this day and age, 9 times out of 10, he will return disappointed to the ship, having been to a place much like his own, where there are dirty alleys, and the women aren’t that beautiful and there aren’t that many. He will often see poverty, sweat, and women walking the streets, heavily made up and all too unattractive (even to a sailor). Then he realizes that this world in which we live is a real, living, breathing place. Not a picture from the National Geographic.
Aruba is an island in the Dutch Antilles, the picturesque, proverbial jewel set on the beautiful blue Caribbean. We had just arrived, and emerging from the belly of the beast in my grease covered boiler suit, I was surprised to find the chief, telling me I had five minutes to get ready for a day out on the town. I took less.
Scrubbed n showered, full of that traveler’s energy, I descend the gangway to the concrete jetty, and see several malayalee names painted there, with a date from a decade ago. There are several such reminders across the world, from the largest ports like Rotterdam to the tiny ones like this one, that tell you that sailors have been there, done that, and have been for aeons. Whether they will for the aeons to come remains to be seen. Their names and nationalities will change, but in this sailors humble opinion, somewhere...a few decades down the line, some shippy from some country we probably haven’t heard of, will see the name of a tamilian iyer sailor, which in all probability he wont be able to pronounce and I’m pretty sure he’ll write about it in a blog...or someplace.
Taking a bus packed with some very pretty school girls, we make our way to Oranjstadt, a port town and alleged tourist destination.
After a walk about buying a few engine room consumables,we partake in a hearty pork lunch, sloshed down with pints of Balashek, a beer every Aruban is proud to call his own, we make our way to the town square. I suppose Arubas main attractions are as usual the sun, sand and surf. The sun however I had had plenty of in Chennai. I suppose I didn’t enjoy the long walk there as much as my fellow touristas.
Besides being breathtakingly picture postcard perfect, I couldn’t help but think of it all as a total façade, as unfortunately we sailors get to see the underbelly of everyplace, from the docklands and to the brothels. We know what really goes down.
A flea market, lines the road to the marina. Tiny shops run by Jamaicans selling T-shirts and other baubles, things for people to scream to the neighbors and friends “I’VE BEEN TO ARUBA – look at me I’m so COOL!”
Aruba also seems to cashing off the “Pirates of the Caribbean” popularity wave. I wonder if the people in universal studios will ever make movies about the desperate and lethal members of that profession that hunt the Malacca straits and the coast of Africa. That’s one movie I’d like to see.
The marina was definitely one of the best I’ve ever seen. Intricately built wooden piers jut out to moor the luxury super yachts and speedboats of the rich and famous. Larger terminals service the cruise liners of the world, rather obscenely bedecked and standing proud in their splendor, almost as if competing with each other, like prize peacocks, I don’t know.
I couldnt help but think of my own ship, a rusty oil tanker, hidden far far away from view, her rusty weatherbeaten hull in as much stark contrast to these....like chalk and saturnian cheese!
A string of beachfront restaurants pander to the retirees of the western hemisphere, flush with their cash and pompous in their Hawaiian flowery shirts and straw hats. I wonder if even after a whole life of toil as a sailor, I would be able to live that sort of life. Come to think of it, the first thing that popped into my head, almost by reflex, was that I didn’t want it. It wasn’t the grandeur; it certainly wasn’t a case of sour grapes. It was just something about the age. The fat helplessness. That got to me. but just like my little tanker,worse for wear and these humongous cruise liners, the sailor and the tourist are very very different people. I was a fly on the wall. But this fly has still got the whole world left to see, and probably will.
Taking a bus packed with some very pretty school girls, we make our way to Oranjstadt, a port town and alleged tourist destination.
After a walk about buying a few engine room consumables,we partake in a hearty pork lunch, sloshed down with pints of Balashek, a beer every Aruban is proud to call his own, we make our way to the town square. I suppose Arubas main attractions are as usual the sun, sand and surf. The sun however I had had plenty of in Chennai. I suppose I didn’t enjoy the long walk there as much as my fellow touristas.
Besides being breathtakingly picture postcard perfect, I couldn’t help but think of it all as a total façade, as unfortunately we sailors get to see the underbelly of everyplace, from the docklands and to the brothels. We know what really goes down.
A flea market, lines the road to the marina. Tiny shops run by Jamaicans selling T-shirts and other baubles, things for people to scream to the neighbors and friends “I’VE BEEN TO ARUBA – look at me I’m so COOL!”
Aruba also seems to cashing off the “Pirates of the Caribbean” popularity wave. I wonder if the people in universal studios will ever make movies about the desperate and lethal members of that profession that hunt the Malacca straits and the coast of Africa. That’s one movie I’d like to see.
The marina was definitely one of the best I’ve ever seen. Intricately built wooden piers jut out to moor the luxury super yachts and speedboats of the rich and famous. Larger terminals service the cruise liners of the world, rather obscenely bedecked and standing proud in their splendor, almost as if competing with each other, like prize peacocks, I don’t know.
I couldnt help but think of my own ship, a rusty oil tanker, hidden far far away from view, her rusty weatherbeaten hull in as much stark contrast to these....like chalk and saturnian cheese!
A string of beachfront restaurants pander to the retirees of the western hemisphere, flush with their cash and pompous in their Hawaiian flowery shirts and straw hats. I wonder if even after a whole life of toil as a sailor, I would be able to live that sort of life. Come to think of it, the first thing that popped into my head, almost by reflex, was that I didn’t want it. It wasn’t the grandeur; it certainly wasn’t a case of sour grapes. It was just something about the age. The fat helplessness. That got to me. but just like my little tanker,worse for wear and these humongous cruise liners, the sailor and the tourist are very very different people. I was a fly on the wall. But this fly has still got the whole world left to see, and probably will.
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