Osman chapter 12: Leaving the Ship

We arrive at the final chapter of the story of how I taught English on an oil ship. If you want to start at the beginning then click here.

Time is not on our side.

The weeks were now flying by. I printed in the radio room, saw Uzgur leave and another radio man come. Lots of new Scottish guys arrived as well, they were just as interesting as the others.

I continued to put up ads, about five to six every week but I saw some of them disappearing. I could feel a negative vibe from the crew related to the ads, but I had to put them up. One day the head of security came to me and formally asked me not to put them on the glass part of the door. The complaint was that they couldn’t see a person on the other side of the door. It was a legitimate complaint, so I moved them farther down on the door away from the glass.

They looked like this except more blood involved.

The next event close to leaving was that there was a fight. It was between two students, the only two students in one of the afternoon classes. Apparently one of them had told the other what to do and the one being told what to do took exception to being told what to do and a fight had broken out. The man who told the other man what to do bit him on the head and apparently ripped and twisted his flesh like a crazed animal until he bled. The two were separated, fired and kicked off the ship. I was later told that in the Ottoman Empire whether you start the fight, defend yourself or let the person punch you, that you would still be fired. Thus, if someone attacks you, you should beat their ass.

When the roads cross, which way do you go?

The time was coming for my departure and I was certain that I would be leaving on the PSV again. Then one afternoon I was called up to the radio room where I met the logistics coordinator. He told me the PSV I would be traveling on was actually going to be the helicopter and not to tell anyone, not even my company. It was quite the dilemma because my company would be arranging my flight. They needed to know the time I would arrive, and they needed to arrange a taxi to the airport. If I arrived at the airport and they didn’t know, they would wonder how I got there and why I didn’t take their taxi. I figured it was better to have the guy on the ship mad at me then my company. My company could fire me for lying which was more than the ship could do to me. So, I told them. Then the captain of the ship got mad at my company and the radio man, the logistics coordinator got mad at me and my company thanked me for telling them and then asked me not to tell anyone else.

Ok, so I wasn’t this excited.

Before I knew it, I was plugging ear plugs into my ears, putting muffs on and marching towards the helicopter, careful to avoid its rotating blades. The takeoff wasn’t as dramatic as a jet’s takeoff. The helicopter moved backwards and forwards a few times and then skipped off into the sky, ascending higher and higher. The water was deep down below, and the ship soon disappeared on the other side of the horizon. I looked down at the water and remembered what the radio man told me, “The helicopter training isn’t that important because if the helicopter crashes, you will probably die when it hits the water.” I mean it seemed like there was nothing to worry about now, except the helicopter crashing.

This guy didn’t wait.

We arrived at Antalya airport and quickly got through customs as we went through the VIP section. I had met an Ottoman guy on the top deck of Osman before leaving who promised we would hang out in the city center and leave together since our flight was at the same time. However, as I made it through security, he was nowhere to be found.

It is hard to burn 7 hours in an airport.

I had seven hours to kill in the airport. I took turns reading different books and watching people walking by. Halfway through the layover I went to burger king and ate my food as slowly as possible. Finally, it was two hours before my flight, so I was able to check-in.

The new Istanbul airport

When I arrived in Istanbul, I had one bag with almost everything I owned, no home and one person to contact. It was my boss’s brother, where I would stay until I found an apartment. He was the typical plump Ottoman man; he was friendly and as hospitable as possible, even though he spoke almost no English. My legs were wobbling on land and when I laid down to sleep on his couch that night, I could almost feel my bed still rocking. It was only when I looked up at the ceiling that I realized I was finally back on land.  

A big thanks for keeping up with the blog story! I hope you enjoyed it. This is the end of the story, I’m not sure where I will take the blog next. We will see next week.

Osman Chapter 3: Siem Sasha

Siem Sasha is one of the Port Supply Vessels (PSVs) that bring supplies to the oil ship Osman.

One of the most exciting parts of a flight, when the plane lands.

The plane’s wheels rolled along the tar-mac and soon I was exiting the airport. There was a man waiting with a “UNG” petroleum” sign as had been promised. UNG was the oil company that my English teaching company had a contract with. “UNG” stood for Uzbekneftegaz and it was an up and coming oil company. At the time I started work on the oil vessel, they had around one hundred thousand workers and 102 of them were working on Osman.

A look at Konya-Alta, which is near the port in Antalya.

The location of the port on a map. The port is in Liman.

The man drove me towards the port and as I talked to him, he had several questions; questions very similar to those from the taxi cab driver. Since he seemed friendly, I thought I would use that to my advantage. I told him about moving to Antalya and looking for places there. He pointed out the different districts as we drove across the city. First there was Lara, then Kepez, then Konya-alta, then Sarisu and finally Liman. The main thing that caught my eye during the drive was the mountain range and some of the peaks and mini peaks were quite close to the houses. I immediately thought about climbing some of them and my imagination started running wild.

An aerial view of the Antalya port terminal.

We arrived at the port’s gate and the security guard asked for documents and then asked me to step out of the vehicle. After some conversation between the driver and the guard, the driver got my bag out of the van and sped off. The security guard scanned my passport a few times, my Turkish resident card, he phoned someone and then finally let me through. There was a long sidewalk that led to a shipping area and then there was a terminal a little farther down the road. I was directed towards the working area that had a cafeteria, bathroom and a small lounging area. Beyond these rooms there were many cubicles. At this time, it was a little past nine thirty in the morning and I would end up sitting on the couch for several hours before lunchtime.

This lobby is a bit more luxurious than the one I was waiting most of the day in.

People came and went often, and a few people sat on the couches and conversed in Ottoman and took frequent smoking breaks. I spent the time snoozing and using up the last of my phone’s Internet minutes in between the ten to fifteen-minute snooze sessions. Close to four P.M. a man came and showed me and two other Ottoman guys a safety video on how to use a loading machine that would transport us from the Port Supply Vessel (PSV) to Osman. Then he asked us to sign a document and I asked him where to sign.

Oh. Hi.

Shortly after signing the document, one of the two Ottoman men started talking to me. He said he thought I was Ottoman this whole time, at this point around five hours, and that is why he hadn’t spoken to me. We talked for ten minutes and then went back to the cafeteria for dinner. It was a typical Ottoman dinner; a bowl of soup, bread, and an option of stuffed peppers or stuffed eggplant. A few hours after dinner we were told that the vessel might leave in the early morning or the next day at noon. We could go to a hotel and return at noon and risk missing the boat, or we could sleep on the boat.

The Ottoman guys were upset for some reason and conversing, but I agreed to go. Shortly thereafter they also agreed to go. We waited in the security area for some time before a guy came to check our passports and let us on the ship.

The gang-plank to Siem Sasha.

The look of the dock in the daylight.

The first thing I saw as we exited the terminal onto the dock was the moon and stars sparkling on the water; and a white and red colored ship gently rocking back and forth in the water. There were a few men with hard hats walking along the dock and in the distance was a metal ramp with ropes and metal forging the walk way. It was a gangplank.

As I looked around the ship I found a plaque and other things on the walls.

A health poster which included advice on how not to get Ebola.

I walked up the gangplank behind the others and we entered the small hole to get onto the ship. Inside there was a ship worker waiting with a sign in list. The Ottoman guys shared one cabin and I got another cabin to myself. We were given a tour by a Ukrainian man who turned out to be the second mate of the ship. He showed us the mess hall, which was a small open room with four or five tables, a counter with leftovers and empty steel pockets for the fresh meals. He told us the mealtimes and then showed us the lounge and smoking lounge. It was around ten P.M. so we all headed to our cabins and went to sleep for the night.

My first breakfast on the PSV.

There were lots of stairs leading up and down; the walls in the hallways gave barely enough space for two people to walk past each other. I finally found my cabin again; it was next to some kind of cleaning trough. Inside it was pitch black with the lights out so I kept one of the reading lights on while I slept. I could feel the water below rocking my bed slightly but due to the super long day, I didn’t have much trouble sleeping. I woke up again around four A.M., then six A.M., then 8. I wondered if the others had woken up yet, and so around nine thirty I finally got up out of my bed. After rummaging through the kitchen area for a few minutes I found a few things to eat. There was bread, sausage, cheese and a few onion rings. To my surprise the two Ottoman guys came up the stairs, they had just woken up too. We all ate together and then spent the rest of the day waiting.

I took a stroll around and took a look at what was in the loading area of the PSV

One of the Ottoman guys

A sign that could use some help

The ship never left the dock and we were still waiting by the evening. We spent our whole time in the smoking room, and I discovered their names were Barak and Talan. Barak was from Hatay originally and Talan was from the eastern part of The Ottoman Empire near Georgia. Barak spent the time playing Fifa on the PS4 and Talan spent his time watching videos on Instagram. There were frequent breaks for both them to have another cigarette.

The look from the back of the PSV as it left the dock.

What the PSV probably looked like from afar, as it bobbed up and down among the waves.

We spent another night on the ship and this time I had a harder time falling asleep, as I wasn’t that tired. The next morning, I got up again around nine thirty, but Barak and Talan didn’t come this time. I spoke with the chef who was Ukrainian and several other of the crew members. There was one from Russia, one from India and the rest were from Ukraine. Around ten or eleven the Ottomans came up for breakfast and then smoked. I spent most of the time learning the Russian alphabet on my phone, Barak played fifa on the PlayStation they had in the smoking room and Talan watched videos on his cell phone. By evening time, the ship was finally moving. We all ran outside and watched as the port, the mountains and all the buildings got smaller and smaller. I could feel the ship rocking side to side and had to learn how to walk properly. On this night, I could really feel the water rocking below the ship as I slept. It was as if the waves were touching my back.

Confident on the outside, screaming on the inside. Getting tucked into the frog machine.

By morning, I kept waking up every hour or so after six, because I was sure someone would come knock on my door, telling us we were going to be transported to Osman, but no such knock came. I had another breakfast, another lunch and was preparing to have another supper when we were told to get our bags and head to the main deck. They were loading cargo and the crew told us that we would have to wait until all the cargo was loaded. Then about ten minutes later, they changed their minds.

Unfortunately I don’t have a picture of the frog machine being brought onboard, but it is done the same way as this piece of cargo.

All three of us put on life vests and climbed inside the “frog” machine. The frog machine was a device about seven feet tall and shaped like a bullet. It had four seats and bars that you had to hold onto while being buckled in. The frog machine lifted us high in the sky and the boat looked tiny from above. I wondered to myself what I would do if the line snapped. If I unbuckled quickly and treaded water for three days, I might survive.

One of many new staring eyes, as I made my way to the correct place on the ship.

The line didn’t snap, and the machine lowered us down to the top deck of the ship called “Osman”. We were finally there after three days of waiting. This ship was huge in comparison to the small PSV boat. It reminded me of the titanic, with so many decks, stairs and rooms. I made sure to keep within a few steps of the Ottoman guys as we went to check in. We left our luggage in the radio room and were told to come back for a safety briefing in thirty minutes. I was supposed to find “C deck” and room number five hundred and thirty-eight. It took some time, but I finally found it.

Osman: Prologue

A story of my adventure on the Ottoman Empire’s first oil ship as an English teacher.

The Ottoman Empire in 1914.

The year is 2019 and The Ottoman Empire remains intact. In the year 1914 the Ottoman Empire failed to join the Central Powers even though they had a secret agreement with them. German and Austro-Hungarian officials were both shocked and angered by this but had their hands full with the Allied Powers. However, these Allied Powers were on edge due to the uncertainty of what the Ottomans would do. Thus, in the autumn of 1915 Mehmet V, the sultan of Turkey at the time, was assassinated by Greek and British agents. Ismail Enver Pasha took over the country and declared a state of emergency. While remaining neutral during World War I, The Ottoman Empire started to see a huge descent in their economy’s efficiency. In a meeting between military officials, including officers as low as lieutenant, they began to discuss the country, the economy and drastic changes. The first step of action was to give Arabic states autonomous freedom, while The Ottoman Empire still controlled their foreign policies. The next step was to modernize the country.

Mustafa Kemal

One young officer by the name of Mustafa Kemal, caught the eye of the grand pasha Ismail Enver and he was allowed to start a committee which worked solely on the modernization of The Empire. Over the next decade they improved their education, added more modern fashion and religious ideals to the country. In 1923 Ismail Enver Pasha retired as leader of The Ottoman Empire and appointed Mustafa Kemal the leader. Mustafa Kemal continued his work towards modernizing the country and also took up the path of secularizing it. He banned certain religious garments and put focus on less religious subjects in schools. He also created a more modern form of writing which made it easier for Ottoman people to read and write. With the death of Mustafa Kemal in 1938, the country decided to do away with their authoritarian government style and attempted to copy a western democratic system. From the 1960s to the 1970s they also gave each Arabic country their own true independence.

Osman traveling through the Mediterranean Sea

In the year 2019 The Ottoman Empire is on a quest to find oil in the Mediterranean Sea, under the orders of their new president Recep Tayip Erdogan. They have just recently sent out their first oil ship named “Osman” to do experimental drilling. The purpose of the drilling is to see what is in the waters near The Ottoman Empire and around the island of Cyprus. The country of Cyprus has complained but the European Union does not support them, and The Ottoman Empire ignores them. Half the crew on Osman is Ottoman and the rest are a mix of different foreign nationalities. Many of these Ottoman workers lack the English skills that are needed to communicate with the foreign workers. Therefore, they have created an English program on the ship and hired several English teachers to teach in the workers off hours. In this book I hope to tell you my tales of working and teaching English on The Ottoman Empire’s first oil ship: Osman.