Sunday March 27, 2016 – Happy Easter – A nice Easter at sea after an exciting time yesterday in Shanghai. The day started with an expanded Sunday Ecumenical church service with the Captain officiating, however both the Anglican as well as the Catholic priests were in attendance and both participated. This was followed by Graham Howell’s port lecture on Phu My, the port for Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City). A nice roast beef for lunch and in the afternoon Evelyn Evans spoke about how the East India Company literally stole tea from China. The company purchased tea in China and traded it all over the world, (or mostly Europe) however they decided to try to find out how it was produced. The Chinese would not divulge the secrets, so they sent in a botanist to supposedly assist in the propagation, but actually went in to take plants, transport them in specialised miniature glass-houses to India for growing. After some initial failure, success was achieved and tea then was grown in India for the ever increasing demand of the British population. This evening, which was a formal (dinner jacket & long dresses) event, the four of us, together with another Swiss couple (also going around the world) were invited to dine with the Senior Human Resource Manager of the ship – Mark and his wife, Sandra. A very enjoyable evening where we were able to ask and have answered a whole series of questions about the inner workings of the ship’s 1250 personnel. Things like all crew are “Temporary” contract workers, hired from their “employer” – a separate and independent Manpower type corporation. All officers are employees and get paid based on an annual salary, whereas the crew only get paid when they work. There are major complications with the 52 nationalities of the crew and some have relationships / spouses on board with perhaps different working months schedule etc. All very interesting. As soon as that was over, we went to the 10:30PM show – A very amusing comedian – John Martin, who holds the current world record for non-stop joke telling (101 hours and 39 minutes)! He was very good at impromptu humour with the audience and did a terrific job at keeping us all in stitches.
Monday March 28, 2016 – An active day, Roger starting in the gym at 8AM with trainer, followed by a fascinating talk by Evelyn Evans on “Jardine, Mathison & co.” The history of the only trading company, still in existence today, which started in China in the 1820’s. Their headquarters are in London, but their HQ in Hong Kong (where we will be tomorrow) is in a building commonly referred to (excuse the profanity) – The building of 1000 Ass Holes, as she said, one hopes that they refer to the peculiar shape of the Windows and not those who work inside (like her husband)!!! Roy Hunt gave his last talk, before going home to England after 1 1/2 months at sea, on Oscar Hammerstein II. I will be sorry to see him leave as I have really enjoyed his series of lectures on NY Musical theatre (what a surprise)!! Diana did the tour of the ship’s principal galley / kitchens and Colin Williams gave an interesting (content) boring (monotone & emotionless – a different “snooze” chap) on “What do Water, Diamonds and Chocolate have in Common?”. It was an analysis of the critical nature and global commerce in these three elements. The water issues around the world (only 1% of the Earth’s water is useable for human consumption and the population is growing at an ever faster alarming rate); the diamonds (blood diamonds, humans in the trade and the reduction of the DeBeers monopoly); and finally Chocolate – based on the Cocoa production which now more and more is in Africa. Tachy went to a late 6:30 PM gym with trainer session, while we attended our usual 6PM dinner. It was our friend Oliver Lam’s last night (he was the Maitre’D from Singpore who has helped us, particularly Nelson, out a great deal). We decided to make an early night of it and skip the show as tomorrow will be a long day in Hong Kong.
Roger & Anne Travels 