'All my bags are packed i'm readi to go...'

haha... i think i might haf chosen the wrong words for my title. It came frm a pretty sad song (leaving on a jet plane). Yea... i do feel kinda sad now... sad to leave tis not-so-wonderful-but-still-not-bad place... sigh... I'm an emotional beast and always hate to accept the fact that all things hafta come to an end some day. My 5 months stay here wasnt a long period of time, but it was long enough for me to make a few good mates, soul-mates. The course has come to an end and now, every1 will ge4 ben1 qian2 cheng2... will we meet again?

Anyway, My room is packed and readi for removals to ADFA... hope everything will go fine wif my removals tis afternoon. I hav had lotsa of problem wif my removals for the past few weeks, and even till tis morning, it hasnt been sorted out yet... sigh... watever...

It's not far now

Jus one more week... or to b more precise 5 more days excluding today and i'll b on my way home.

Tis week is parade trg week... haven realli recoverd from all the sore and blisters from Exercise Matapan, and hafta immediately jump into full-scale parade trg on sunday. But no one seem to b very concerned by that. Well... it's onli a few more days of bull-shitting that we hafta put up wif and, tat's it... it will b 'The End'. After which we can rest all we wan...

hmmm... how 'fortunate' izzit to undergo two graduation parades in a year???

Prince Henry, The Navigator

(my history essay due today)



Prince Henry (Infante Don Henrique), the Navigator, was the third son of King João of Portugal, born in 1394. He was a very devout man, and was Governor of the Order of Christ from 1420 until his death in 1460. The expedition to capture Ceuta (a Muslim stronghold in Morocco), commanded by him on 24 August 1415, where only eight Portuguese were killed had provided Prince Henry his moment of glory. It was not, however, as a man of war or of politics that Prince Henry had won fame. He was most famous for the voyages of discovery that he organised and financed, which eventually led to the rounding of Africa and the establishment of sea routes to the Indies. He probably never sailed out of sight of land and certainly never ventured farther from Portugal than the closest shores of North Africa. Yet he wondered what lay beyond the known world of his age, and had the money and talent to send people into unknown danger on his behalf.

Prince Henry was responsible for a disastrous attack on Tangier in 1437, which caused the captivity of his brother Fernão, the master of Avis. His brother was imprisoned in bad conditions, held in hostage for the return of Ceuta to the Muslims. For eleven years, the Portuguese debated whether or not to give up Ceuta, until in 1448, Dom Fernão died in captivity. Prince Henry’s military reputation suffered as a result, and most of his last twenty-three years were spent in exploration activities, or in Portuguese court politics.

Prince Henry was a visionary, someone who could imagine something that had not yet happened. He owned a globe when many people believed the world was flat. He knew that Africa was more than endless sand. From the conquest of Ceuta, he learned about the riches of Africa, and started studying the geography, riches and trade of western Africa. He wanted to give Portugal a share in these riches, and if his sailors could circumnavigate the continent, he would even find a water route to India.

Prince Henry knew clearly his aim to discover what lay beyond "The End of the World", Sagres (south-western tip of Europe), and he had five good reasons to support it. Firstly, he hoped to know the country beyond Cape Bojador, the furthest limit of the known world on the west side of Africa of his time. Next and certainly no less important was that he wanted to establish trade with any lands that lay out there, especially if they were Christian lands. Thirdly, he hoped also to catch Islam in a gigantic pincer movement by joining forces with the mythical ‘Indies’ Christian kingdom of Prester John, the wealthy and powerful priest-king of the medieval legend. Fourth, he wanted to learn the extent of the Mohammedan power in Africa. The fifth was to spread the Christian Faith.

Prince Henry was passionate about his grand ideas and was very willing to spend a great deal of money, time and resources to prepare for the expedition. He had to meet the costs largely out of his own pocket or from the revenue of the Order of Christ, and his acts were therefore derided by the many who did not buy his ideas. However, he showed great determination and enthusiasm to achieve what he had set out. He communicated his enthusiasm to his people; shipbuilders and other craftsmen, inspired by their master’s zeal and generosity, worked day and night, and the citizens gave up eating meat so that it could be preserved for the expedition. Prince Henry had great difficulty persuading his captains to sail beyond Cape Bojador. According to legend, beyond this point was an area known as the ‘Sea of Darkness’, where the sun was so close to Earth that a person’s skin would turn black, the sea boiled, ships caught fire, and monsters hid waiting to smash the ships and eat sailors. But Prince Henry never gave up trying. It took fifteen voyages over a period of twelve years until a ship commanded by Gil Eannes finally sailed beyond the dreaded cape and returned.

Prince Henry had made extra effort to learn from history. Sufficient information about Senegal to enable his men to recognise it when they reached it was obtained from some captured natives (Azenegues). Studies were also made on ancient geographers and medieval maps.

Prince Henry knew well the principle of engaging the best man for each task. He enlisted the help of some of Europe’s finest experts to teach him and his sailors in matters of navigation. Several important cartographers and instrument-makers were brought together to create new, more precise charts. Jews, Muslims and Arabs, Italians from Genoa and Venice, German and Scandinavians came to Sagres, which had by then became a high-tech (for the 15th century) base for exploration. This community developed navigational instruments, such as the quadrant, and new mathematical tables to aid in determining latitudes. The nearby port of Lagos saw the development of a new type of ship, the caravel, which combined cargo capability, manoeuvrability and seaworthiness and thus was the ideal ship for exploring. Seamen who knew they were going out in a vessel specially designed for their sure and speedy return were more cheerful, more confident and more willing to risk longer outward voyages.

One other trait that aided his success was his requirement for details in charts, maps and note-taking. On these papers he wanted bearings, wind directions, dangerous anchorages, places where food and water could be found, landmarks, and so on. The Catalan Jew from Majorca, Jehuda Cresques, son of the cartographer Abraham Cresques, was brought to Sagres to supervise the collation of these geographic facts brought back by all the explorers for use on future voyages. This is quite significant, as most mariners of the time did not bother to write down anything.

Most of Prince Henry’s crew had been brought up in his household, and quite a number of them were very close to the Prince’s heart for their courage and resourcefulness. Therefore, the loss of Nuno Tristao and most of his crews, all killed by the natives while exploring the Rio Nuno sixty leagues south of Cabo Verde, definitely brought particular grief to Prince Henry. He gave handsome pensions to the wives and children of the dead.

Prince Henry made his contributions in numerous and varied ways, but one way he did not do it was through navigation, despite his title. He certainly sailed in his life, but most of his efforts were on land where he organised voyages and improved navigation devices and techniques. By his voyages, he removed the imagined terrors of the deep and established the first exploring and commercial companies of modern times. His contributions to navigation were so impressive that it was thought for years that he actually had a ‘School of Sagres’ that focused only on navigation. It is now known that this is not true, but the fact that it was assumed to be, showed how heavily Prince henry contributed.

Prince Henry’s work began the Great Age of Discovery that lasted from the 1400s to the early 1500s. His captains explored the Atlantic islands and coast of Africa to an extent never before attempted. By sending out ships and soldiers he made Portugal into a world power with colonies in Africa, India and South America. Brazilians today speak Portuguese in large part because of Prince Henry’s efforts. The discovery of America by Columbus was also inspired by his achievements. His talent of obstinacy and his power to organise had proved essential for the first great enterprise of modern discovery.

No. of words: 1272

Holy Shit!

I jus ran over a pretty huge snake wif my bike!!!

I was on my way to the lower sports ground where a game of criket was playing. I was moving pretty fast, going downhill on the dirt-track, feeling shiok... I thot I saw a branch or sth across the track ahead, so i tried to stay close to the side. It was when i was like 2 metres away, then i realised it's a snake! i started to kan cheong and deviate from my course and opps... i ran over it...

I haf no idea wat kind of snake tat was... all i noe is tat it's huge and black...

you jing wu xian **raise one eye brow**

Wat else can i do on a weekend...?

sigh... basically i can do nothing exciting... Went to Nowra tis morning to walk walk see see... sigh... still the same... nothing interest me.

There's a history essay due on Monday. But i've finished it on TOBRUK, and i'm satisfied wif my work. I've like gone thru it a million times myself and wif a couple of my oppos... it looks perfect... alright, good to go.

So here i am back in the library playing wif the lousy computer... So glad tat the tag boad is back again. Oh, look! They changed the CPU! But it’s still running on 2000Pro and 56k... (-_-“)



Hope u’ll like the new music: Gu Dan Bei Ban Qiu by Ocean Ou. I'm not a great fan of tis guy... the music jus sounded nicer without his voice. Has he shown his expectedly ugly face yet? I hope no one wld die of heart attack after seeing his face...

Next week is gonna b a tough week for me... wif Exercise Matapan underway from tues to fri. Another outfield exercise to assess our leadership... I like camping in the woods, it’ll b fun. But I jus hate to march around wif those stupid heavy field pack. My legs are built for other stuffs like jumping and running... not pack marching! Tat’s why I’m not in the army. Sigh... they promised they are gonna make it tougher tis time... cover a longer distance and last for a longer period of time... shit...

Off i go to Nowra, again, for another round of counter strike...

NSTD

HeeeHA! I'm back... i'm back... i'm back... YES! I'm back!

How's every1? Getting along well wif ur work, exams, tests, projects and wat haf u? Still kicking? (sori jikok... u can do it soon too) No matter how busy you mayb, don forget to breathe! huuuuuuuuuuuuu... xiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii...

Jus had my final written exam on monday... sigh... i hope i'll pass. i had onli like one night, sunday night, to study a book as thick as our o-level physics textbk... shld haf started earlier. i did brought my book for the sea deplyment, but i'm jus too lazy... so, yuan bu de ren... sigh... the passing mark is 70%, so i reali donno if i'll pass tis time. i'm crossing my fingers, i realli hope i managed to grab hold of buddha's leg...

Forget it, lets tok about my sea training deployment.

ermm...how shld i start? ...? ... ...?

it's a training cruise where we hafta live, work, eat, drink, shit in the same conditions the junior sailors are facing...but at the same time bahave like officers. The experience was very, very diiferent from my last one, where the focus was more on navigation, bridge watch-keeping... Correct me if i'm wrong, i'm trying to recall the routine for my last deplyment...

0530 wakey wakey
0540 EME...rounds and rounds the tank deck wif onli one eye open... 1 2 3 4, 2 2 3 4, 3 2 3 4...
0630 [ . . - . ][ . - . . ][ . - ][ . . . ][ . . . . ][ . ][ - . . - ] and then breakfast
0740 Morning muster... in our perfectly pressed overall...
0800 Lessons... DCX... achoring plan... study... AOPs... sun run sun... gunnery... radar... HF... VHF... UHF...
1630 Dog watch... must look good, so every1 muster at the hangaar and we'll move to flight deck 2gether... more rounds...100 tis time!?
1830 Dinner... Argh, green chicken!!!
2000 Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep... standby mess deck for rounds

...and e night was all ours to work on achoring plan, AOPs, study, task book x 3, port-pre and events preparation, etc... and how could i forget the watches in the MCR (midshipman can rest), the raido room (it's heaven) and the bridge (it's hell)... 1st watch 2100-2359, 2nd watch 0001-0300, 3rd watch 0300-0600. we wld b so grateful when we could get in the first (best) watch and haf 5 hrs of sleep for that night... we had so little sleep during the deployment that our little 'brothers' were not waking up b4 us!... haha... sigh... "sleep is a luxury, not an entitlement!"

^ ^ good old days...

what issit like tis time round?

Well, some things wld never change.

The sea, the horizon and the sky, they haven change a bit since my last deployment... That's all u normally get out in the middle of no where... what do u expect? Mountains? or cars? We did get visitors like sea gulls and albatross once in a while... the clouds changed it's form everyday too... and when we're lucky, we wld also find a dot at the horizon--"hey, we've got contact (finally)!"





The sun rises and sets everyday. They are beautiful and u'll b tempted to take fotos. At the end of the trip, u looked back at the fotos... hmm... which ones are sunset, and which are sunrise? hmmm... which is from monday, which is from tuesday?... and u started deleting those that look similar... but don worry, in the end u're still left wif at least 2 fotos... one wif clouds and one without :p

I was so glad that i din get seasick tis time round like when i was on seahorse, eventhough we'd got to seastate 4 for consecutive two days or so during our transit to Norfolk Is. HMAS Tobruk is a flat-bottomed landing ship heavy... and so it rocks like hell even at seastate two. So it is definitely worst at 4... It was a challenge trying to walk straight. Standing still for both watches wasnt easy too. It was a even greater challenge when taking aim at the toilet bowl! I'd got a few cuts here and there from falling cooking utensils while working in the galley (kitchen)... and i broke a glass too... opps

Other than these, life onboard TOBRUK was kinda different from that onboard RESO. We realli gotta work like a sailor and had lotsa interaction wif them...

In the Executive Department: sanding and painting bulkheads (walls) and guardrails, running around the ship ensuring everyting were secured, cleaning (the whole) ship... We still keep watches on the bridge, but onli for 4 days, and the concepts are kinda different. They have a life buoy sentry standing at the quarter deck maintaining constant look out for man-overboard. They don require lookout in the day, and when they do at night, the lookout stands on the deck above the bridge where 2 super binoculars will b available. It's still a four-hour watch system during peacetime cruising... but tat doesnt mean they hafta do helms or lookout for the whole of the 4 hrs like we do. They rotate every hour, and since the number of ppl on watch is greater than the positions available, they might even get an hour or two free time during tat 4-hr as spare hands in the cafe... watchin DVDs!!

Engineering Department: rounds, and cleaning of machineries and bilge. My watch din get the honour and luxury to experience tat and get our face and overalls black and greasy... prob we're lucky or they were all cleaned... haha... heng1 ar!! heehee...

Supply Department: carrying stores (like beer, soft drinks, vegetable, toilet rolls...) to where they are required, washing at the scullery, frying eggs, skinning carrots, serving the officers in the wardroom, mopping the cafeteria and galley... I'm kinda surprise that there are stewards onboard. They are sailors who take care of the officers--serve them food, do their laundry, clean their cabins... how nice is this? And the CO's has got his own pantry and steward... He is a lonely man though. He doesnt eat in the wardroom wif the officers... they seldom see him too.

I'd got a great deal of free time actually during the deployment... which we're supposed to spend on task book and journal, and 2 assignemnts due after the deployment. We still manage to find spare time for chess, cards, boardgames and tok cock sessions... and time to feel bored and turn insane too. One good thing: i seldom get less than 7 hrs of sleep :p




Vanuatu

This is where i had a little more fun than usual. I paid 1000 Vatu (ard $15) to ba shan se shui to cascade falls where me and another oppo showered under the falls and took lotsa fotos. The beaches are realli nice and the weather is realli good--warm and moist. And so on the second day, i did snokelling and kayaking at hideaway island, for a couple of thousands more vatus... This was my first experience wif snokelling and i swear i love it! ...it is awesome! I definitely wanna learn scuba someday and haf more fun in the water! Any takers? Their eateries and restaurants serve delicious and cheap food too! Yummy!



i only brought 300 sing wif me for tis trip and already i spent 200 here... i bought nothing... all of it was spent on transport and fees and food... but it was definitely money well spent.


Norfolk Island

My stay in Norfolk Island was a short one...jus two hours. Even though we anchored in the bay for three days. First day, i was granted leave at ard 1500, but onli got ashore at like 1600 bcos of long queue for the onli liberty boat! Kinda irony, Tobruk is a amphibious assault ship but she cant seem to get every1 quickly ashore... anyway, and leave expired before sunset. The second day, due to weather inclement, 2/3 of ppl hafta stay onboard. Having granted leave the day b4 (they don care how long), i hafta stay onboard...tough luck! The third day, the weather was better... and 2/3 gotta step ashore... sigh... i belong to the 1/3 who were on duty... ... Wat pissed me off most is tat there were ppl getting 2 full-day leaves...



It isnt an exciting island. It is roughly only as big as tekong and i managed to cover the whole town, looking thru most of the shops in ard an hour and still had time for a brew. In total, i spent less than ten bucks here... It is definitely a very beautiful place... greenery, flowers, i realli felt relaxed in that island... how i hope i could haf one more day, jus one more, to explore the untouched part of the island.


Lord Howe Island

Din get to haf much personal time here too, jus a total of 1hr 50min... sigh... We anchored two days here. The first day i was on duty. The second day, gotta do marching for their Remembrance Day and 30th (?) Anni of their airport, which consist of onli a runway and a small building... ... ...



Tis island wasnt any bigger than Tekong too. It is well-known not for it's town but it's beauti... sadly, i din get a chance to explore the treasure hidden within... And at the end of the day, i looked into my wallet... i only spent 5 bucks!

tat's all folk... i am tired, my brain is half-dead, my eyes are hurting... cant type anymore... i din even bother read wat i haf jus typed... if it doesnt make sense, jus too bad... i'll clarify them some other day... i've got more than a hundred fotos loaded in my gallery too

good night...