Warship Soap Opera

Warships, large or small carry life as most civilians would know it, but that life is bounded by odd rules and customs which, to the outside world seem baffling.  The things that we take for granted are often not allowed.  Kissing your girlfriend or even holding hands is a no no which gets you up to your neck in it. We live ‘all of one company’, which in reality means you can never really escape your boss.  At 2300hrs the diet coke in your hand may be dis-guarded because the boss wants to review tomorrows plan, again.  Some times he wants to re-write it.  We have a saying, if you’ve pressed PRINT on the plan its already out of date. 

The life of a Warship, big or small has the high drama, jinx and sorrow of any good soap.  Except its real and when people die they really do die.  During an average 7 month deployment, a Ship’s Company may expect to loose one or two of its number.  It may be an accident on-board, an RTA ashore in some foreign port or a serious illness that regardless of location would have claimed Jack or Jill.  Its a strange feeling leaving your home port conscious that not all may come back.  Our land based brethren almost expect it with the fraught tours in Helmend or Iraq, but a Warship should be safe.  Its not and the statistics prove it.  The people most likely not to make it back are the aircrews who fly some of the oldest airframes in the modern world.  The Sea king, in what ever variant is a work horse, but a reliable one.  The Lynx however is known as the submarine of the sky for a very good reason. 

For the most part we look forward to deployments.  Its away from the folks at home whom we miss dearly as soon as we pass the 12mile limit. Its what many ‘joined up for’ and there is a camaraderie(is that how you spell it?) at sea which you get few other places. Don’t get me wrong being away is also really shit.  The hours worked are stupid, the rewards not always clear and we like complaining about not being at home.  We must remember however, the ‘dits,’ (other wise known as stories),  that we can spin on completion remain with us and our shipmates throughout our days.  These dits are legendary, re-spun and embellished for theatrical effect, beating any Soap on the box.  As I’m reminded of Dits from Sea, I’ll post them as such.  I should however remind you that as a schoolie I don’t have many! so the pickings maybe sparse!!!! 

 

 

 

Lets Change our name……… Again.

Its embarrassing. I’m at a conference and I haven’t got a business card to offer the bespoke suited gentlemen standing in front of me who knows so much more about E learning than I do. Why am I embarrassed? I haven’t a Business card, reason; because we’ve changed our name for the third time in the last nine ish months. Its a quick win as management would say. We must be making progress because we’ve changed our names. It’s funny then that every one refers to the Jarvis block collective as ‘was RNSETT’ or the Royal Naval School of Training Technology. We haven’t been that since I don’t know when, maybe 5 years?!

 

Still the suit gets the idea and as I scribble my details down for him I struggle to remember my new number. Of course it changed as part of the restructuring too. The home of the schoolie is both revered and dreaded. We love returning, so many schoolies in one place, but we dread being posted there, as its like a two and a bit year death sentence, where light is only shed by the appointer who gives you a clue as to your next job two years into your sentence. Some get time off for good behaviour, but most have to endure at least two name changes……….

Jack, Jill and Jenny…….. and being a schoolie.

My Name is Jack.

Jolly Jack if you prefer the old ways.

My best mate is called Jack and the girl in my office is called Jack, though she prefers to be called Jill. But in essence we’re all Jack. Jack goes to sea in steely grey warships. Jack visits port and drinks, wobbles up the gangway, passes out in his pit and gets up a few hours later to do it again until the the loud voice says ‘hands to harbour stations’ and the steely grey returns to sea. Jack is the collective for sailors; the tall gangley ones, the short, never going to pass their fitness test ones; the ones that keep those steely greys at sea, beyond the sight of the public at large and beyond the comprehension of most if you haven’t been there yourselves.

Jack asks for little. A 2ft six, by 6ft pit to call their own and some beer tokens in the local ickies will suffice for most. Jack isn’t happy unless he’s complaining. Though to be fair, Jack doesn’t complain he drips…… like a waterfall, about the food, about the cleaning, about the lack of promotion prospects. I am Jack.

Well actually I’m half Jack. But I do train him and his favourite Jill or Jenny. I have the honour of giving these guys the skills to go into harms way (the Dover separation scheme) or into Basra or Helmund province. I am Schoolie. As a schoolie we have our own language, culture and creed. We talk of DSAT and training priorities, of Defence Training Reviews and Operational Performance Statements. We wish more people understood us, and hope in vain that some one might appreciate us. The truth is however, we’re only half Jack but we’re all schoolie.

This is the story of Schoolie and our collective attempts to train Jack.