FAQ - My Job

These are the questions i get from people all around me. I hope this helps :) It is not the sun, sea and the sand.

I have seen that movie 'Perfect Storm', encounter any waves like that before?
No, i am not on a fishing boat. I am on a containership. We choose the safest route possible according to the weather forecast. We don't go for suicide mission, unless we get paid to do a similar movie like that.

How about pirates?
No, i hope not to see one. Oh yeah, if i ever gonna see one, i doubt they will be like Jack Sparrow and his gang.

Do you carry weapons on board ship?
Missiles, mines, torpedos, nuclear bombs, the recent liquid bombs... just to name a few. For close combat, we armed ourselves with katanas, nunchakus, some chinese brand poisoned needles, staffs and even boxing gloves glazed with broken glasses. For extreme cases, we have nominated suicide bombers to execute kamikaze.

What do you do on board ship?
Work, eat and sleep. Like a prisoner.

What do you do when you are free?
Play game, watch movies, read and think of home.

What happens if your engine breakdown?
Troubleshoot and repair.

If still cannot?
Read manuals, see how it works and improvise.

If still cannot?
Look for spares, change parts or renew parts.

If still cannot?
Call for help.

If still cannot?
Abandon ship.

Abandon ship? How?
Use lifeboats, liferafts or with my personal rubber ducky float.

Do you go fishing while sailing?
No, you can't fish with a fishing rod when the ship is moving at 22 knots which is about 40 kph. But you can throw a fishing net and heave it in later.

Have you seen any whales, dolphins or any other exotic animals swimming in the ocean?
No, don't ask me. Please tune in to Animal Planet or National Geographic.

When are you going to be a captain?
I can't be and will never be one. I am in the engineering side. Which is good, I don't want to lose an arm, a leg or an eye.

What if you are the last survivor on board ship? Can you navigate?
In that case, i can manage.

The ship is so big, can you handle it alone?
Why not? Just insert the key, start the engine, put the auto transmission to 'D' and step on the accelerator. Easier than driving a car. 'Cause ships do not have any brake pedal... one thing lesser to worry about.

Ohhh....
Ahh...

How many people are there on your ship?
About 20 to 30. Soon the manning will get lesser and lesser. One of the world's largest containership that i heard, needs only 13 people. One day, maybe we can operate on OMO (One Monkey Only).

Are you sure? I thought there will be like hundreds of people! The ship is so big!
Yeah, i am not on a cruise ship.

How is your radar like? Is it a black screen with a rotating green line and some green dots indicating nearby ships?
No, it is now like playing Starcraft. You can attack those nearby objects if they are blocking your right of way.

So do you play Starcraft to practice?
No, i am a human Warcraft player.

You don't play Starcraft?
No.

Play it before?
No.

Really? Waahahaahahaha...
Herherher...

Hmmm... do you play any other games?
No, i only play Warcraft at the moment.

The ship is made of steel, how come it will not sink?
I think underneath the ship has some buoyant rubber dinghy stuff.

What do you do when there is an emergency on board? Like fire?
We dial an emergency number for help.

Oh, a helpline! That's very good.
But hardly people use it.

Why?
It takes very long. It goes like, "Press 1 for english, untuk bahasa malaysia, tekan dua... bla bla.. press 0 to speak to an officer." Then they will put you on hold.

Have you ever cross the equator?
Yeah.

How do you know if you have cross the red equator line?
We saw a red line there in the ocean and we crossed it.

Do you communicate by sending morse code?
No, we now can use the internet and have live conference meeting. Or you can record your video and put it on youtube.

How about the internal communication on board ship?
We make use of IM and do messaging. If we wanna complain about something, we usually voice them up in our blogs and ask for votes.

In an emergency, how do you call for help?
We have live cams all around the ship. We can activate a talk back to speak to the officer on watch and we wave frantically in front of the camera.

What if your ship loses its internet connectivity?
Then we might have to bring our laptops to the nearest Starbugs and get online.

Have you ever hit an iceberg?
No, all of us have already watched Titanic and afraid that our ship would break into 2. We take precautions. We can hit any other thing other than an iceberg. We can try hitting an island for instance.

Do you carry stowaways?
I am not sure about that. i can't possibly open all the containers and do a search for them.

Do you stop at every port?
No, if we were to stop at every port, the things that you have bought on ebay, might take ages to reach you.

How long do you stop in a port?
Ranging from 6 hours to 3 days. Depending on the facilities at that port. And it is getting shorter and shorter due to modern technologies.

6 hours? Wow... Can you go out?
Can, i then have less than 6 hours to go out.

Any advice to our readers?
Once, my chief engineer said to me,"Do not make any mistakes, one mistake brings you back very far." Yeah, it's true, see how far i've got. Half a globe away sometimes.