[BITList] Fw: hk to bombay!

[HUGH]

Colin, 

I managed to get through my time in BI without coming across any real 100% dickheads. Of Masters I recall precisely none, not a whit - I can't say I ever saw one, let alone met one.  As for Chief Engineers - of those who impinged on my consciousness :  Jock Dewar was brilliant,  Asti Jow Golightly was a gent, Scientific Sid was an unclassifiable experience, and the rest, bar one, had no outstanding personality quirks.  The odd man out was that rare bird (in my experience), a man who conceived a dislike of me with no grounds for doing so. Had I been a fiver, it would have signified nothing, but I was senior 3rd, and I had hardly stepped aboard the bloody ship when the grumphing started. I gathered from colleagues who were closer to him that nobody, principally me, had told him I had my 2nd's ticket. "Hello, Chief, I'm the new 3rd, and I've got my 2nd's ticket." What a prat I would have sounded. Hardly the stuff of vendettas, but that's what ensued until I got myself transferred. The same man was highly regarded by others, and such is life. I recall only one Chief Officer, possibly because we had a set to in the ER one morning at sea.  Of the rest, no situation ever got beyond the immediate - a fracas one evening ended up with an already broken guitar getting worse, and bruised feelings, but it was forgotten within an hour, indeed the ER shouting match with the C/O was never referred to by either of us after the event.  Truth to tell, we were never in each others's company to refer to it.

I've more than once come across the Jekyll and Hyde syndrome, where a man can be a saint to one and a sinner to another.  Alec Demsey in Scotts was, I thought, a genial chap with a sense of humour, ex Chief Draughtsman in Rankin & Blackmore.  I got on fine with him, much to the surprise of others who, they said, found him abrasive and intolerant. I never thought it my duty to work it out.  And one can think one has a certain relationship with others when the opposite might be true.  At a funeral one day a couple of years ago I was accosted by Hamish whom I hadn't seen since I left Scotts in 1980.  He gave me a hearty handshake and greeted me thus, "Still having all those funny ideas?"  He was unable (or unwilling) to explain, so I'm in the dark.

Hugh.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.bcn.mythic-beasts.com/pipermail/bitlist/attachments/20090402/26e1f103/attachment.shtml