Sailing on wed-thurs~

As forecast, i would be sailing on wednesday, and (phew, thinking about it now just gave me a bout of 'going into the sea-sick phase, of shaking around even though i'm on land' feeling.

Anyways, the shore-leave timing was 10pm, so i showered and got everything ready at 9:40, and set off for the ship.

Reported to RSS Independence again, expecting to see a few familiar faces this time around and i did. Reported to Coxn and was directed to the gun bay. Was joined by 5 ndu and another nsmen medic who was asked to join us last minute.

Didn't really talk to the ndu guys much, but the nsmen medic Patrick, happened to be an accountant, and is quite friendly. He told me he took an accounting degree in Australia, then continued to study for a few more years before he landed his job now in AMD as a financial planner... no i don't quite remember his exact post but something to that effect.

I was telling him about my plans to venture into accounts or management, and he said that going into management is like getting a degree in admin, because its very general, and getting a degree in accountancy would however pay more, since its more specialised.

Understood that, and we chatted a bit more, before the ndu people joined us, and then we got our mattresses up, and tried to sleep. That was after our briefing, and at around 11+pm.

Well, since this was a firing exercise, we were woken up quite a few times as they needed to do things IN the gun bay. Suffice to say we got a bit of rest, though interrupted.

We were feeling the effects of the sea when the ship set off, though it was much worse in the morning where we had to move to the multi purpose hall when they were shooting. The sea state was starting to get bad, and after that we just went back to sleep.

We didn't dare to eat breakfast you see, lest we .. you know, throw up. Continued sleeping til about 1pm, where we decided to have a bit of lunch, which was porridge, by this time the ship was rocking very horribly, and they called it sea state 4.

Sea states are catagorized from 0 - 9, 0 meaning non existant, and 9 being the worst. While 4 might sound mild, you need to try it to believe it.

When i raise my leg to take a step, its like my leg is raised higher, and when i lower my leg, expecting to touch the ground, i have to lower it more instead. It feels a bit like matrix, or maybe an illusion type of feeling.

We spend most of the time lying down, as walking could be quite a nightmare. Lying down minimizes the feeling of well, the rocking, and sleeping takes our mind off things.

Though i had to focus several times not to vomit. The pressure was really bad. And eventually we asked for some marzine from the Coxn.

Marzine is a pill designed to combat sea sickness. I believe it takes effect a few hours later, but i think it really helped.

At the end of it all, when we reached base, it was raining pretty badly, and i'm glad i got some umbrellas from home sweet home. Bade goodbye to the rest, and went back to the med ctr at around 10+

A sailing i won't be forgetting anytime soon this one..