Christmas

…At that time, that sometimes happened to you.
Celebrating Christmas at sea.

One time on the ‘Utrecht’ it didn’t happen because we swung so much that everything that was put on the table slipped off again.

Swinging slats and a wet tablecloth did not prevent everything from coming together.
You already needed your hands to save the tableware.
By the way, the cook in his galley couldn’t do his job either.
An additional thing was, that a number of people had little appetite for anything which smelled of food.

But celebrating Christmas on the ‘Groningen’ at a flat sea also had something special.
We sailed as a ‘light’ boat towards Balboa (Panama).
In the Pacific Ocean, far from it all, we were able to make the necessary preparations days in advance.
On the day itself, during the break of 10.00 am, everyone was present in the messroom upstairs, except the cook and the watchmen.
The captain gave a Christmas speech and we were impressed.
Before that time, the ‘old man’ had first christened the messroom ‘Kwinkslag’ with a blow to the ship’s bell which had been centrally hung there for a while.

The result was that it was a box of beer from the ship.
A café as long as Christmas lasted.
The ‘old man’ had become so emotional by his speech that he retreated into his cabin for a moment.
The cook had done his best, it was lavish and tasteful.

On those days we crossed the date line, a strange sensation.

Time zones.

Especially if you had to mention December 26 twice in the journal.
That meant that we could celebrate another second Christmas day.
The captain thought that was a bit too grumpy.

So it became an ordinary working day.