Putting the boats in the water

Day 5: Well day five turned out to be another interesting day in the Philippines full of new experiences and adventures. To start the day I headed down to the restaurant in the hotel to have breakfast and a cup of coffee. Which incidentally they have excellent coffee here...... and now that I think of it a few cats roaming around the outside of the hotel. Nah, I couldn't be, but on the other hand they do have a wine on the tables here named the Gato Negro (Black Cat), I wonder what other things they make with cat waste here. Just kidding. The whole cat coffee thing has kind of become a joke for me and my coworkers here. One guy said "Hey, why don't we get some of that coffee and bring it home?" to which I replied " forget the coffee bring home the cat". It was funny at the time. Anyway, an interesting thing happened to us at breakfast. While we were eating we kept on hearing a zapping sound and could not figure out where it was coming from until we saw one of the waitresses with what looked to be an electric tennis racket. It's seriously the most modern fly swatter that I've ever seen. You can kill bugs and pretend to be Serena Williams all at the same time. I've included a picture of one of the waitresses with the fly swatter just so you see that I'm not making this up. After, breakfast we headed back down to the port to gas up the boats and eventually launch them. The gassing up part was very fun. I had to sit on the front of the boat and watch to see that no power lines were going to hit the top of the boat as we drove down the road to the gas station. But as we were going along everyone on the side of the road was stearing at me and the boat as we passed by. So, I did what I thought the situation dictated. I started waving at the people on the side of the road. And you should have seen the big smiles I was getting from everyone, adults, kids, older people as I passed by waving at them. I felt like I had landed on the moon or something. Then at the gas station everyone in town seemed to pull up and ask about the boats and I told them as much as I knew about them. Everyone was super nice and I think generally surprised that a foreigner was actually taking some time to talk to them, answer their questions, and even ask a little about themselves. Even the chief of police taught me a special handshake to use. I know that this all sounds corny and some people may have been thinking "is this guy crazy" and actually laughing at me but everyone had a good time and had a laugh. Then it was time to put the boats in the water. Now in the United States the process of doing this is a lot safer. And just for the sake of my mom and my wife I'm going to emphasis the facts that I'm alive and I don't have to put any more boats in the water. That being said, the way they put our boats in the water was by lifting the boat up about 80 feet in the air with a crane and then slowly lowering it into the water. Sounds fine right. Not when your inside the boat. As it turns out I was expected to get in the boat as it was being lifted and lowered because there was no dock to really lower the boat into. And initially I thought they were going to raise us about 20 feet in the air and then slowly lower us. Something got missed in translation and as I'm hanging 80 feet in the air in a boat, that is designed for water and not to fly, something came to my mind : "Wow, this is like a roller coaster ride only there is nobody who knows if this is safe or not, dope!!!" Anyway, it all worked out thankfully and nobody died. Finally, after all four boats were in the water we started loading the boat trailers on top of each other for shipping. But all of a sudden a thunder storm rolled over the top of some near by mountains and poured on us. I jumped onto one of the nearby boats, closed the windows and door, which didn't leak in case some of you where wondering, and sat it out. Actually, I got some video of it which I'll put up. Finally, instead of just staying inside the boat I stepped outside and let the rain give me a shower. It was nice after such a hot and sunny day. And after the rain passed we worked a little longer and then went home tired and smelly. It truly does wear you out working in such heat and humidity. I'm still able to work but I'm exhausted by the time I'm done. I was so tired yesterday that I said "I want to go to my room and drink my shower in my beer". That's tired. Also, here in the Philippines they have a beer named San Miguel that is actually quite good and is a good option if your worried about drinking contaminated water or having soda with bad ice cubes in it. My motto here has been "one beer a day keeps the amoebas away" and it's worked so far for me. Well, I'll blog you tomorrow which could be the first day of my Philippine voyage on the boats.

Philippine Marc