Confessions of a Preteen Powder Monkey - Part 3
Created | Updated Jul 2, 2006
Luckily, after only a couple of days and nearly going mad with thirst, I managed to attract the attention of a passing ship. “Thanks,” I said to the captain, after being rope-lifted onto the ship (pockets generously stuffed with gold), and given a welcome goblet of cool water. “Just drop me off at old Blighty, if you’ll be so good.”
“Eh?”
I explained.
“England?” he enquired, “Not goin’ anywhere near there. We’re heading to the Cape of Good Hope, in the regions still unmapped, and unseen by human eye, or t’least unseen by them as ‘ave lived to tell the tale.” The Cape of Good Hope? I’d never heard of it (my Geography was never very good either). At least it sounded quite pleasant. Good Hope… kind of… friendly, don’t you think? Probably somewhere peaceful, near Venice. I always liked Venice. “Fine with me,” I replied. “Good on yer, lad,” said the captain, “there’s few enough grown men would as would be brave enough to embark on such a dangerous voyage.” At this point a few alarm bells started ringing. This normally happens when I am exposed to such dangerous words as “slight accident,” “outnumbered,” “dangerous,” and, above all, “brave.” I found myself longing for my nice old beach, complete with cannibals, and those blissful hours of quiet starvation.
Slowly, the various ship-men started doing their various shippy things, to their various parts of the ship, and the captain stomped back to his sleeping quarters in the pointy end (let’s face it, I don’t know much about ships either). This left me standing there dazed, and sticking out like the proverbial injured digit. After a few attempts at trying to look as if I was doing something to rigging, and getting hopelessly entangled (having to be cut loose by the first mate in the end) I decided that my ship cred had suffered enough blows for the day, and retired to the sleeping quarters.
Several months later, after being briefly attacked by a pirate vessel and losing half the crew, we arrived at the Cape of Good Hope, and saw land across the sea for the first time in… a long time. By the way, it turned out that several people had gone through this area before, and lived, but the captain was of the school of thought that nowhere has “really” been discovered until it has been discovered by someone in silly clothing, and with the aid of curling yellow maps with “Here Be Mammals!” written on, and none of the crew wished to end his delusions. At first it looked just like any other area of sea (blue, watery, etc.) but then the shippy people started shouting about “har’ ruggins on starford shiv” and I naturally assumed that whatever the “har’ ruggins” were, they were not a good thing. In the course of a couple of minutes, we were enveloped in a storm so fierce that the boswain (at least I’m pretty sure that was what the person who did things to the steering wheel was called) had let go of the wheel, knelt down, and started to pray. Amazingly enough, this only added to our problems.
“Eh?”
I explained.
“England?” he enquired, “Not goin’ anywhere near there. We’re heading to the Cape of Good Hope, in the regions still unmapped, and unseen by human eye, or t’least unseen by them as ‘ave lived to tell the tale.” The Cape of Good Hope? I’d never heard of it (my Geography was never very good either). At least it sounded quite pleasant. Good Hope… kind of… friendly, don’t you think? Probably somewhere peaceful, near Venice. I always liked Venice. “Fine with me,” I replied. “Good on yer, lad,” said the captain, “there’s few enough grown men would as would be brave enough to embark on such a dangerous voyage.” At this point a few alarm bells started ringing. This normally happens when I am exposed to such dangerous words as “slight accident,” “outnumbered,” “dangerous,” and, above all, “brave.” I found myself longing for my nice old beach, complete with cannibals, and those blissful hours of quiet starvation.
Slowly, the various ship-men started doing their various shippy things, to their various parts of the ship, and the captain stomped back to his sleeping quarters in the pointy end (let’s face it, I don’t know much about ships either). This left me standing there dazed, and sticking out like the proverbial injured digit. After a few attempts at trying to look as if I was doing something to rigging, and getting hopelessly entangled (having to be cut loose by the first mate in the end) I decided that my ship cred had suffered enough blows for the day, and retired to the sleeping quarters.
Several months later, after being briefly attacked by a pirate vessel and losing half the crew, we arrived at the Cape of Good Hope, and saw land across the sea for the first time in… a long time. By the way, it turned out that several people had gone through this area before, and lived, but the captain was of the school of thought that nowhere has “really” been discovered until it has been discovered by someone in silly clothing, and with the aid of curling yellow maps with “Here Be Mammals!” written on, and none of the crew wished to end his delusions. At first it looked just like any other area of sea (blue, watery, etc.) but then the shippy people started shouting about “har’ ruggins on starford shiv” and I naturally assumed that whatever the “har’ ruggins” were, they were not a good thing. In the course of a couple of minutes, we were enveloped in a storm so fierce that the boswain (at least I’m pretty sure that was what the person who did things to the steering wheel was called) had let go of the wheel, knelt down, and started to pray. Amazingly enough, this only added to our problems.
