Today was my duty day at Ambon. Close up 1st detail. Had a fairly busy morning as the open house commenced at 9am. We expect 50 school children to visit and in the end, more than 100 visited our ship. Show them the A-Gun, 0.5. Also show them the bridge. Finished writing letters for C and J, likely to post them tomorrow. Volunteered for shore patrol at night. Didn't sleep the whole day despite on the ship. In the evening, lifted up the AC ladder. I also tied up the guardrails there. GY was extremely nervous and it do irritates me as I raised my voice a little. I knew I was in the wrong but I just couldn't control my frustration there. He seem to be panicking or doing things too straight. I ask him to help me keep my football magazine because CO was at the brow. He put my magazine on the chair. This annoy me and in the end, CO stared at me when I try to get the magazine to the shore patrol. I went for shore patrol with Pang at 10pm to 12am++. The places that they took us were like slums, consisting of red light district and boxing places. Its interesting to visit the place and do patrol but the conditions there are really congested and smell of bad air there. When I'm back, "somebody" was a bit drunk and began talking nonsense, I ignore him. I was tired and slept for 1 hour plus. I'm 20 minutes late for closeup, Ang seem unhappy (understandably) but he didn't say out. Now its 3.10am and I'm still the QM. Signoff, Weizhong
Doing duty as a QM @ Ambon and took a photo during break
-------------------------------------------------------------On the shipcrew mention, Pang TP was the tech-hand/ME on board the ship. I think he served onboard L202 during OJT phase before becoming a full pledged crew. A fun loving guy.
Ang is the NSF gunner, who is the batchboy of Gunner Wong and joined L202 much later than me. He's a A level graduate with the typical boy next door looks who will be entering Singapore University after his NS stint. Remember he supports Liverpool and play football.
Till this day, I still remember about that joint shore patrol with the Ambon Indonesian police. ME Pang and myself volunteered for this task during our rest hours. Wearing our white Navy No. 3 uniform, we set off in the Indonesian police vehicle, not knowing exactly where will we be patrolling. The Indonesian policeman that was taking care of us was a very tall & muscular guy, which make us looks really unlike soldiers. Haha. The 1st stop was a boxing ring premise but there are nobody competing in the ring. Next, was a remote poorly lit area of a row of houses. The Indonesian policeman were talking to one of the girls at the house. The policeman turned and told us that the girl say we're very handsome. We just smiled and keep quiet.
After completing the round in this area, I think they took us to a nearby disco where we enter it in our uniform. Oh man, this is first time in our service that we did a patrol like this. Inside a disco, all of us went towards a table where the policemen greeted their colleague who dressed in civilian clothes. I can't remember or understand if who is he but guess it should be their police leader or supervisor. We're introduced to him and shake hands with him. After a short while in this disco, we left and continue our patrol to the next area.
The next area is the highlight of my Ambon trip. I find the place strange or unique as it is mainly made up of rocks and many passageways & stair steps that make it looks like a maze. Though late hours, there are quite a few people hanging around this area compare to other parts of Ambon that we seen earlier. There are also karoake shops in this rocky maze.The public eyes were not on the Indonesian police but on the two white uniform guys which is Pang and myself. We felt really weird and uncomfortable with the attention given. Just stick closely with the Indonesian policemen. We made our way up a staircase and to a corridor passageway with many rooms. The Indonesian policemen begin knocking on the doors and questioning the people who open the door. I didn't understand what are they talking about.
Next, the policeman ask me to proceed to start knocking on another room straight ahead. So, I go and knock, knock. A lady open the door and I let the policeman talk to her. In one of the other room that was open by the policeman, I actually saw one old man with two women inside on the bed. I saw many other sights in other rooms that I could not recall now. I realise this area may have been the red light district of Ambon. Its a messy place and I would have got lost in this maze if not for the local policemen. The place doesn't smell good but this is really unique patrol experience that I have in Ambon. It was an eye opener to another part of the world & their way of living.
