MV Stability

As 1981 drew to a close the hangover that was 1981 lifted and I joined the MV Stability in my home port of Shoreham on Christmas Eve. It was my first trip as a junior engineer, which meant decent pay at last. Finally, after three years, I was back to the kind of money I was making at Hunting. I introduced myself to the Chief, who was quite a young fellow and whom I initially thought a good bloke—especially when he suggested that I go home for Christmas and Boxing Day. I spent the night onboard and then went home until the 27^th when the ship sailed for Schiedam, part of the Europort complex in the Netherlands. The Schiedam complex is pretty small by Europort standards, and after we’d tied up alongside half a dozen of us made our way up to the Schiedamseweg and from there into central Rotterdam. The drinking rapidly got out of hand. The first bar we visited was run by an English guy, from Portsmouth.

“What’s it like to run a bar here?” we asked.

He told us that it was fantastic; not like England at all. In Rotterdam, apparently, the people were much more civilised with their alcohol: they didn’t get obscenely drunk and start fighting like the English did. In fact, he told us, that although English himself he didn’t really like his fellow countrymen and was reluctant to have them in his bar. We reassured him by declaring that one of our number was Irish and that he’d keep an eye on us. I mean honestly, if you believe that you’d believe anything. The Irish, of course are noted for being quiet and sober people! We then asked him if there was a local drink he could recommend. He suggested a local gin called Hoffen. Oh dear—gin!

Well it was bound to happen. As more and more Dutch gin—Dutch courage as it were—was consumed we got louder and more aggressive, and in the absence of anyone prepared to fight us we decided to fight amongst ourselves. It began with me I’m afraid. I told Belfast Pat to hit me with his best shot to see if I could take it. Good Irishman that he was he duly obliged and caught me with a good right that put me on my arse and had my ears ringing. Well obviously I had to reply, and so it went on. We were putting in some big shots on each other, but it was all good-humoured stuff—just young men letting off a bit of steam; nothing vicious. At that point the police turned up and threw us out into the street to the accompaniment of shouts and abuse from mine host. He was ranting and swearing—something about Englishmen! From there on things got a bit blurry. However I do remember another place with a small DJ’s cubicle in the middle of the floor. Belfast Pat, drunk as he was, approached the DJ.

“Play some fuck’n Madness John-John” he demanded in his thick Belfast brogue.

Pat called all foreigners “John-John”. The DJ appeared not to understand, which was fair enough really: none of us could understand him when he was pissed either; it was difficult enough when he was sober. But ignoring Pat when he was drunk was deemed a massive insult, and taking umbrage at this apparent slight, Pat put a big swinging kick into the side of the cubicle causing the needle to slip right off the record. Well, obviously the police arrived again and we were bid fond farewell from a drinking establishment for the second time that evening. After that, I’m afraid, it all gets a bit sketchy.

The next morning I was bruised and hung-over. Nevertheless I managed to make my way down to the engine-room on time and found the Chief and Second already removing a cylinder-head from the ship’s V18 B&W Alpha main engine. The Chief asked me to start taking the fuel injector out from the next cylinder and so I began. I was a strong lad, but struggling to get the thing out—it was stuck fast. The Chief told me to stop messing about.

“Be fair Chief”, I said with a smile, “I’ve got a bitch of a hangover”. I expected a good-natured riposte but instead he went off:

“Who do you think you are?—me and the Second have been down here for over an hour, and you stroll down late and complain about a hangover!”

“Whoa tiger!” I thought, “don’t get your knickers in a twist”.

“No one told me we were starting early” I said, “so how was I supposed to know?”

“I went to your cabin last night but you’d left without telling me” he ranted.

“So that’s how it’s going to be” I thought.

It was true, I was in such a mad rush to go ashore and get on the piss that I’d completely neglected to tell him I was going—which I should have done I suppose. But we should have sorted it out like men, then and there. Instead we let things fester and our relationship quickly went downhill. From that point on I decided to be as sullen and obstructive as possible—doing as little as I could get away with. It was never proven, but the gossip was that he was a queer. He wasn’t married, didn’t have a girlfriend, and never went ashore—so queer or not, he was certainly boring! I wondered if he’d ever been a young man. From then on, especially between myself and the Second Mate—who also disliked him intensely—he was declared a poofter and known as Frances Denise or ‘Misschief’.

            From Schiedam we headed to Botlek—another series of docks in the huge Europort complex—where we loaded soy beans for Erith before heading to Blyth, in northeast England, to pick up coal for Copenhagen. To be honest I don’t remember too much about Blyth, but while at Blyth I was off watch and had accompanied the Irish first mate to the front of the ship where he was in the process of dropping the anchors. I can’t remember why he was doing this in port, perhaps it was to test the winches or something. Anyway, peering over the foc’sle, he saw a small wooden boat with two men onboard milling around right where he wanted to let the anchors go.

“What are these two cunts fucking around at?” he mused.

He shouted down at them to get out of the way, but whether they heard him or not, or whether they just ignored him, or perhaps couldn’t understand his Irish accent I don’t know, but after repeated warnings to keep clear the mate lost his patience and let the anchors go. The little boat was smashed to pieces, and one of the anchors took one of the two men with it down for a short while.

“Fuck ‘em”, he said “that’ll teach ‘em to get out of the fuck’n way next time…what were they doing there in the first place?”

There was an inquiry, of course, but as far as I know nothing came of it—and rightly so. Idiots!

As for Copenhagen, if I thought Rotterdam in January was cold, Copenhagen was even colder! Nevertheless I was determined to enjoy myself, especially as Frances Denise had given me the next day off. So enjoy myself I did! Like Antwerp and Amsterdam, Copenhagen city centre is within walking distance of the docks, so off we set. A few hours drinking with my shipmates soon turned into the familiar blur and it was then that the infamous Copenhagen memory loss incident occurred: somehow I’d ended up in a flat with two girls on the other side of the city close to Lygten Station.

From Copenhagen it was across to Leith, the port of Edinburgh, my favourite Scottish city. It was absolutely freezing that year and I remember arriving in the first of the pubs along Leith Walk with my hair completely frozen. In my rush to get ashore I’d come straight out of the shower without letting it dry. It was that cold that the drivers at the truck stop had lit fires under their trucks. A good few pints of heavy then into a nightclub just off Princes Street—it was a thoroughly enjoyable night. After a couple more the ship sailed north to Sweden where it began a regular liner service between Sweden and Ireland. This took it from Halmstad, Gothenburg and Uddevalla to Belfast, Dublin, Cork and Waterford via Scapa Flow.

Northern Ireland was in the middle of an upsurge in sectarian violence when we first arrived, and worse for us, a year after the Nellie M, the IRA had just sunk the St Bedan in Londonderry harbour and declared all British merchant ships legitimate targets. Rumour was that they had just got a hold of some RPGs and were itching to use them, so Belfast Pat suggested painting a big target on the outside of Frances Denise’s cabin. I thought it was a great idea and asked Pat to knock up a bosun’s chair so I could start painting straightaway. But despite the sectarianism we had some good times in Belfast, even if some things were a bit silly. For example Pat was a Catholic, which meant that he had to leave Belfast docks by a different gate to all the rest of us and take a different route into town. The entrance that the rest of us used took you straight into an obviously loyalist area: you could tell by all the union jacks, orange hands, and UDA/UVF slogans painted everywhere. The city centre, however, was a kind of neutral ground—fenced and barricaded off as it was by the British Army. I remember thinking what a real pity it was that the city was so divided because all of the people I met there, regardless of religious or political persuasion, were friendly and welcoming. They just accepted the violence as a way of life and carried on cheerfully regardless.

The first night, Damien, the assistant steward, got out his infamous black book: apparently he knew a Belfast girl from his time on the cruise ships and was going to give her a call. This was before the advent of the mobile phone and so he went to the nearest phone box.

“Well that’s me sorted” he said on his return. “I’ve to go into town and get a cab to a place called Divis Flats”.

“But that’s a staunch Republican area”, said Belfast Pat.

“Is that good or bad?” asked Damo in genuine ignorance.

“Ever hear of the Falls Road?” came the reply.

“Well it’s OK I’m going by cab”, Damo said.

“But the paramilitaries run the cabs in Belfast”, declared Pat. “Why else do you think you have to go into town to get one?—because he won’t come to this gate, that’s why. So you’re going to head out to the Falls Road in an IRA-run cab, with an English accent and a short haircut. The IRA will know where you’re going before you even get there! English accent, short haircut, not in uniform—they’ll think you’re an undercover SAS soldier for sure, take you out the back and shoot you…nice knowing you mate!”

“Undercover SAS?” said Brian with a smirk. “I doubt it—just look at him, scrawny little git!”

To the rest of the crew’s disbelief Damo decided to go anyway, such is the lure of the promise of sex. To our even greater disbelief he returned unharmed the next morning!

            Our next port of call was Dublin where myself and the Second—having scored a day off—headed into town. While in the city we passed a florist and the Second, a crusty old bastard from Hull, a typical taciturn Yorkshireman that looked like Harold Wilson—cynical, seen it all before, and soon to retire—asked, with that characteristic Yorkshireman’s deadpan acerbic wit, if we should buy her (the chief) a bunch of red roses. I suggested pansies might be more appropriate. Well that very nearly got him: the corner of the mouth was going and it looked like a chuckle was imminent—but he just managed to pull himself back in time! He didn’t like the chief either!

It was lunchtime, and deeming some refreshment to be in order, we entered one of the city-centre pubs where we were accosted by two Americans. They were photographers for some magazine or other, and asked if we’d mind being the subject of their photographs. They said we’d make a marvellous contrast: the young Dubliner and the old Dubliner drinking beer together. We pointed out that we were, in fact, English, but they weren’t too concerned—it was the look and the setting that they were after. So we agreed, but said we needed more beer to make it look authentic. Soon, beer after beer began arriving at the table and we both got stuck in. But despite the free booze the Second didn’t appear to be enjoying himself.

“This Irish bitter tastes like piss” he moaned.

It didn’t stop him drinking about eight or nine pints of it though! Especially as our newfound American friends insisted on paying for them. They were amazed that such a small old man could drink so much beer!

While at sea I carried on with my duties. They mainly consisted of overhauling main engine and generator cylinder heads: decarbonising and grinding in valves, that sort of thing. I also had to test and overhaul the fuel injectors and lap them in if necessary. All of the engine-room pressures and temperatures had to be monitored and recorded, and compressors and other auxiliary plant serviced and maintained. I also started to get myself into shape again. The previous few years’ heavy beer drinking and lack of exercise had seen me get a little chunky; not fat by any means, but then again not what you’d call lean either. It had been particularly pronounced since my return from a trip to Canada and the US where endless cheap steaks, huge burgers and all-you-can-eat restaurants had seen me pack on quite a few pounds. The shoulders and arms that I’d built up at DM Mechanisation were a long distant memory, so I set up a punching bag in the engine-room stores and began to do as many chin-ups, pull-ups, dips, handstand dips and sissy squats as I could. Coupled with a fairly sensible diet, it soon saw the excess baggage melt away and my old physique return. It didn’t stop the beer drinking though, and I remained very much the party animal.

Halmstad was a typical small Swedish town: freezing cold and virtually dry as far as alcohol went—apparently the tennis club was where you had to go to get a beer, so that’s where we headed. Obviously we weren’t in the slightest bit interested in playing tennis, so we went straight to the bar and ordered the first of several rounds of drink. It was hideously expensive but we soldiered on. After an hour or so we’d just about filled the table up with empty bottles and spent a fortune when I turned to my crew-mates and declared that the beer must be piss-weak because I wasn’t in the least bit drunk. It was then that I looked at the side of the bottle and almost fell off my seat in horror—it was alcohol-free!

Belfast Pat was furious:

“The cunts!” he bellowed. “They’ve been fucking selling us fucking reindeer piss disguised as beer! Fucking unbelievable, the fucking Swedish cunts! I’ll fucking sort these cunts out right now!”

We had to physically restrain him from assaulting the bar staff. I meanwhile went to get an explanation. Apparently you had to have a special licence in Sweden to get an alcoholic beverage. Otherwise it was strictly zero-alcohol. That was the last time we went ashore in Halmstad!           

Uddevalla was a little better, but not much; Gothenburg, I can’t say because I never seemed to find the time to go ashore. I always found Sweden boring and the women over-hyped. It was certainly bloody cold: on several occasions the pilot made his way out to the ship not in a boat, but on a bicycle across the ice! Uddevalla was where most time was spent ashore I suppose. It was winter and absolutely freezing, but that didn’t prevent us from trying to find a decent bar. From where the ship was berthed it was about a ten minute walk across some rail lines then a straight road through the snow to the town centre. There was at least one fairly decent bar in Uddevalla, I can’t remember its name but it was a large square building where it was possible to obtain alcoholic beer, albeit at highly inflated prices. On the whole though Sweden’s strict alcohol restrictions didn’t seem to work. One day, while walking through the snow to the abovementioned bar, Belfast Pat and myself were confronted by a gang of drunken young Swedish men walking in the opposite direction. Actually, confronted is probably not the right word: there was a bit of jostling as we passed each other but it was only when they several yards behind us that a voice shouted aggressively “Hey…English!”

We turned to face them, and as we did so Pat looked at me and in his thick Northern Irish accent said “He’s talking to you mate.”

“Cheers pal”, I replied.

But Pat was only joking and amid much swearing we both motioned the Swedish guys to come back and fight. They declined our offer.

One the other hand, these same attitudes to alcohol meant that all those Swedes looking for a party would come down to the ships in the harbour. Of course the girls were welcome; the boys not! Not that these were the typical beautiful TV blonde Swedish stereotypes—no, they were a long way from that! I never met one of those—ever! In fact I don’t even think that these mythical creatures exist. One night in Uddevalla a group of what might loosely be described as women turned up. We invited them onboard, purely on the basis that some female company, however bad, is better than no female company at all, and they proceeded to get stuck into the beer. After a while one of them took me by the hand and tried to lead me down to a spare cabin. I wondered how she knew where to go but didn’t want to ask. I was somewhat reluctant to go however, because I didn’t find her in the least bit attractive (and believe me as a twenty-two year-old merchant seaman my standards were pretty low), but a bet had been placed and the money involved made quite a tidy sum. There was also a certain amount of national honour involved. We went down to the cabin but I just couldn’t do it: not only did I find her physically repellent, but I could hear voices and muffled giggling outside the locked door as they took turns to peer in through the keyhole trying to see if I was fulfilling the obligations of the bet. Fair go to her, she gave it a good try, but I just wasn’t up to that particular job. In the end Jock came in, took over, and scooped the prize! Scotland 1, England 0. Scotsmen—they’ll do anything for money!

The second time in Dublin instead of being berthed on the River Liffey, we were tied up alongside the dock overlooking the East Wall. To get into town we had to cut across the East Wall Road and walk the infamous Upper Sherrif Street, with its burned out cars and piles of burning garbage in the street. At the time we knew nothing of its notorious reputation although it didn’t take a genius to work out that it probably wasn’t one of Dublin’s most exclusive areas.

“Look at that”, said Brian pointing to some graffiti daubed on one of the walls of a block of flats, “what’s it say…Brits Out! Where is this place Pat?” he asked.

“How the fuck should I know” came the reply. “I’m from Belfast not Dublin”.

“Yeah, well, remember, you’re wiv us now mate” said Brian, “so if there’s any aggro I’ll tell ‘em you’re a Protestant—OK?”

A bit further up and we called into a pub. I don’t recall whose idea it was, but being full of the bravado of youth nobody wanted to appear yellow by suggesting it might not be a good idea in that particular area. At least not straightaway. On entering the premises however, we were confronted by Gaelic singing and witnessed several patrons wearing Bobby Sands t-shirts. Bravado or not, it was decided that a group of Englishmen probably wouldn’t be welcome so we discretely made our way back outside, hopefully before anyone noticed us. Finally we arrived in the city centre and the serious drinking commenced. Anyway, the usual happened, we got blind drunk and started to get a bit loud. It all came to a head when we were refused service. I forget the name of the pub, it was on O’Connell Street somewhere, but Pat was incensed and immediately made his way to a public phone box where he called the Garda and informed them in his thick Belfast accent that he was from the Ulster Orange Volunteers and that there was a bomb in the pub.

“That’ll fuck’n teach ‘em!” he declared as he slammed down the phone.

On another visit we found ourselves berthed in the same dock as before—opposite the East Wall Road. We made our way to the road, and this time decided not to run the gauntlet through Sherrif Street, but get a bus. Eventually one turned up with no passengers and only the driver and conductor on board.

“Where to lads?” asked the conductor.

“The nearest decent pub mate” came the reply.

After a few minutes heading north I think, the bus pulled up at a pub that overlooked an expanse of water. It was still empty, except for us.

“Here we are lads” shouted the conductor.

We all got off.

“Comin’ in for a beer wiv us?” asked Brian in his broad Cockney accent.

The driver and conductor glanced at each other briefly.

“Sure lads, why not?” said the conductor.

So off they got, locked up the bus, and came inside the pub to drink beer with us.

Only in Ireland!

            This particular run offered a good opportunity for a reasonably sharp-witted young man to make some extra-curricular cash. I won’t go into details, but when I returned to the UK I went out and bought a brand new RD350LC Yamaha motorbike and a high-quality British-made top-end stereo system, which I still have incidentally. Three months to the day after I joined, I paid off and got a cab to Aldergrove Airport. The cab driver was driving at an insane speed.

“Bloody hell mate—you’ll lose your licence for sure if you get caught going at this speed” I said.

“Nah”, he replied, “the cops have got better things to do around here than chase speeding taxis”.

It was a fair point I suppose. A short while later I boarded the plane to Heathrow.