We took arrival in Karachi, Pakistan last night at 0100 and were all fast by 0400. After climbing into my bunk I dreamed we were docked here in Pakistan- exactly where we are docked at the moment- and I was working on the inboard side of the ship, down on the upper deck just aft of the foc’sle head.
There were hundreds of Pakistani longshoreman working on the upper deck. Somehow I became aware that the CMA CGM Benjamin Franklin was inbound on the river (400 meter, 20,000 TEU behemoth), but I couldn’t leave the spot where I was working to gawk like a yokel.
A major mishap involving the Benjamin Franklin became imminent, and the longshoremen began to howl and yap in consternation, running about in terror. Since I couldn’t see the ship, I didn’t know the nature of the incident, but braced for it, nonetheless.
I looked aft down the deck just as all 1,000 feet of steel on my ship began to swing back and forth into the dock, flinging Pakistani longshoremen into the hatch coaming and over the rails to the dock below like rag dolls; trucks, containers, and the concrete of the dock flew about like autumn leaves on a November wind.
An upriver dam gave way as a result of the catastrophic dreamland physics, and a wall of water lifted the bow, parting the mooring lines. I held on, knowing I had to trust the ship- that she could ride it out- but that I had to stay aboard and not get washed away by the surge coming over the breakwater.
Then I woke up, clawing at my face, gagging. I thought someone was punching me in the nose. Left hook, right jab… but no- it turned out nobody was punching me in the nose. The smell of Karachi had been sucked into the ship’s air handlers, injected into my quarters, and then somehow distilled, condensed, and amplified before committing battery on my sleeping self.
The only way I could go back to sleep was to stick my face in my arm pit and cover my head with my sheets to keep a protective cocoon of my body odor around my face. I am one good smelling man, let me tell you!
To describe the impact on my olfactory I must compare it to a time, back at the turn of the millennium, when Laura and I found ourselves in a favela in Rio, hopping from one stepping stone to the next in a river of effluence that ran down the hillside where the shanty town precariously sits overlooking the South Atlantic Ocean and the picturesque beach city.
The only major difference between the malodor of Rocinha (the favela) and the putrescence of Karachi being that I’m not in a shantytown of 100,000 people but a city of tens of millions. In a culture that eats predominantly curry-spiced food.
Concisely- I have been assaulted by the smell of curry flavored effluence, and I don’t think I’ll ever be the same again.
Luckily, the dead donkey that was pinned between the ship and the dock wasn’t there this trip. Nor the massive fish kill that filled the river with dead and rotting fish. Just plastic and effluence and a writhing sheen of oil.
There were hundreds of Pakistani longshoreman working on the upper deck. Somehow I became aware that the CMA CGM Benjamin Franklin was inbound on the river (400 meter, 20,000 TEU behemoth), but I couldn’t leave the spot where I was working to gawk like a yokel.
A major mishap involving the Benjamin Franklin became imminent, and the longshoremen began to howl and yap in consternation, running about in terror. Since I couldn’t see the ship, I didn’t know the nature of the incident, but braced for it, nonetheless.
I looked aft down the deck just as all 1,000 feet of steel on my ship began to swing back and forth into the dock, flinging Pakistani longshoremen into the hatch coaming and over the rails to the dock below like rag dolls; trucks, containers, and the concrete of the dock flew about like autumn leaves on a November wind.
An upriver dam gave way as a result of the catastrophic dreamland physics, and a wall of water lifted the bow, parting the mooring lines. I held on, knowing I had to trust the ship- that she could ride it out- but that I had to stay aboard and not get washed away by the surge coming over the breakwater.
Then I woke up, clawing at my face, gagging. I thought someone was punching me in the nose. Left hook, right jab… but no- it turned out nobody was punching me in the nose. The smell of Karachi had been sucked into the ship’s air handlers, injected into my quarters, and then somehow distilled, condensed, and amplified before committing battery on my sleeping self.
The only way I could go back to sleep was to stick my face in my arm pit and cover my head with my sheets to keep a protective cocoon of my body odor around my face. I am one good smelling man, let me tell you!
To describe the impact on my olfactory I must compare it to a time, back at the turn of the millennium, when Laura and I found ourselves in a favela in Rio, hopping from one stepping stone to the next in a river of effluence that ran down the hillside where the shanty town precariously sits overlooking the South Atlantic Ocean and the picturesque beach city.
The only major difference between the malodor of Rocinha (the favela) and the putrescence of Karachi being that I’m not in a shantytown of 100,000 people but a city of tens of millions. In a culture that eats predominantly curry-spiced food.
Concisely- I have been assaulted by the smell of curry flavored effluence, and I don’t think I’ll ever be the same again.
Luckily, the dead donkey that was pinned between the ship and the dock wasn’t there this trip. Nor the massive fish kill that filled the river with dead and rotting fish. Just plastic and effluence and a writhing sheen of oil.
I see your dreamscape is as vivid as it ever was. Another delightful blog for "the book." Momster
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