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spend what was in fact a fairly modest stipend), excellent working conditions, a
great deal of interesting travel, convivial company (and sometimes profoundly
better than that) and could look forward to fairly rapid promotion. The latter,
however, was significant; opportunities for getting ahead came up fairly rapidly
because of mid and senior-officer wastage. It appeared obvious that the life of a
Bon Vivant could become rather flat, especially when I could see that ‘home’ to
many mariners that was at bottom somebody else’s home; one heard too often of
domestic routine wherein the returning husbands didn’t even know where their
offspring went to school. Fortunately, I had by pure chance met up with the most
charmingly didactic companion.
Despite the depredations of Stevie, who was actually quite adept with wooing
the objects of his desire, Judith and I engaged in many conversations about
the future, especially mine! With wisdom seemingly beyond her years, though
she was, as it were, ‘in the business’, she set about charting a course for me that
included university (which I myself had now concluded had to be in my future)
and the end of this mostly rewarding seven years at sea. It appeared that access
to a university in Canada was a much more user-friendly process than it was in
UK, as I knew from David that time was really not of much import to UCCA
(University Central Council of Admissions), which tended to find candidates a
position at a university suitable for it, rather than a position for which one might
choose to apply. I decided that I was going to set the new course of my life as soon
as I could, but not to bother with that awful Corporate Finance hurdle.
On the way across the Indian Ocean (the Shepherds disembarked in
Colombo) and around Africa, I planned, as best I could, my route through the
rest of my life. I read as many British papers as I could find (though they were
almost entirely unavailable in South Africa, most English-language news media
being unavailable because of their anti-apartheid bias and the South African
alternatives being journalistic tripe), with a view to seeing what alternative
careers I could dig up in London, to where many people that I knew commuted
daily from deepest Sussex.
Thus, as soon as I could (which was very soon, as the turn-around occupied
only a few days) I made an appointment with the assistant marine superintendent
for a discussion about any ideas that he might have. He, of course, was an ex-deck
officer, so it might even be that something would come up within P&O itself.
Before my discussion with him I carefully perused the ‘Times’ and the ‘Daily
Telegraph’ jobs and saw that there were a number of job opportunities that
actually encompassed the sort of expertise for which an IPMA diploma might
render me suitable. Thus armed, our discussion was general, but with one specific
job at IBM as the focus of my future planned weltanschauung. Mr Jones, however,
really senior to me by only one year, was dismissive and, I thought, unhelpful.
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