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Nearing South Africa, however, the first-class children’s hostess, Leigh, asked
me if I liked Patricia. “Which one?” I replied – there were two, one young and
lithe, the other, well … frumpy.

“Don’t be silly,” she said, “I mean the tourist chilly-ho.” I grunted.

I recall a philosophical discussion taking place one breakfast when we
were sitting with the Assistant Surgeon. He, Dr Ireland, as a two-stripe officer,
was entitled to his own table, but given the fact that he hated socialising with
any passengers, he was able to find an excuse at virtually every meal to join
the junior officers, FAPs, nursing sisters and children’s hostesses at the generic
junior officers’ table. He, a young New Zealander, termed ‘Baby Doc’, was a very
charming fellow, and this was his first ship (and probably his last, for a ship’s
doctor’s job was unexciting, most issues with which they were faced related to
imagined sea-sickness. But it was an awfully good way to see the world for a trip
or two and then establish a practice wherever one’s fancy alighted). After our
departing Cape Town, he was musing on the foibles of men; “I had a seaman
come to me yesterday,” he said, “who complained ‘Doc, I’ve got it again!’ by which
he meant The Clap, and I began to worry about this, because that wasn’t the first
time it had happened. But now that I think about it,” he continued, “I see an
astonishingly sexual environment around us, and I think that it’s because of the
continuous mild vibration going on all the time on the ship, but we’re not aware
of it. Look at this,” he said and put a glass of water down on the table before us,
and we watched as a slight wobble on the water’s surface became apparent. “Not
much,” he said, “but it’s going on all the time while at sea, and sometimes even
when we are in port because of the generators, which never stop.” I won’t say that
we were all surprised into silence, but I long remembered the discussion; not that
one can do much with the information, but the more I thought about it, the more
I thought it a not unlikely explanation of what I had seen going on. Several of
our table-mates looked on attentively, particularly Patricia (the neatly packaged
Chilly-Ho), Valerie, Linda and Patricia, all FAPs, Leigh, first-class Chilly-Ho,
Isabel, a nursing sister, and Tony Dyson, a 4th R/O.

In ten days or so, we were back in Sydney, but, for me, the incentive of a
vibrating ship for moments of pleasure was now unnecessary. I hired a car, and
Sandra and I drove around to see a few of the local sights; again, I was struck by
the quality of life that Aussies enjoyed. But the stay was short, for we were off
again for a cruise, this one around the Pacific (it was not really a cruise, for it
was to execute a figure 8 around that ocean, but it was a sample of the needed
inventiveness in finding satisfactory uses for these big ships, and such a route did
indeed find a satisfactory Australian response).

After Nuku’Alofa we moored in Honolulu, this time for some twenty hours.
I was able to collect a gang together of Tony, small Patricia, Valerie, and Linda,

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