Keeping Fit Whilst Still Drinking, Smoking And Doing The Odd Line Of Coke: Book 1: The Crap's Going Down At The Compass Bar

Fit.

Chapter 1     Mavis Boothroyd

Boothroyd Shipping Ltd. Est. 1947 read a polished brass plaque above an unassuming doorway adjacent to the entrance of Mornington Crescent Tube Station, London Borough of Camden, England. Hardly an address associated with Ship Owners, indeed, a Ship Owner still proudly flying a ‘proper’ Red Ensign on its’ vessels, well, all two of them. There again, Boothroyd Shipping was unusual to say the least and of unusual things they, or more correctly ‘she’, Mavis Boothroyd, had bucked the trend of the early 1980’s financial distress that was plaguing the big British Ship Owning names such as P&O, Panocean-Anco, Cunard, Bank Line and BP for example, all of whom, forced to make cuts and cutting as usual, starting with the staff cost.

Mavis Daphne Boothroyd, ‘the’ current Owner of Boothroyd Shipping polished that plaque outside her home, her chartering, trading, technical management and ship operations residence in Camden morning and afternoon with a blob of Brasso on a worn duster. Proud and rightfully so, Mavis and her company remained financially afloat in a well scupper’d and slowly sinking UK merchant shipping industry that saw its’ demise commence in the late 1970’s and continued into the early to mid-1980’s as the national flag was replaced on the gaff of many a poop deck with lesser known colors as ship registry drifted off to non-descript tax havens such as Panama, Monrovia and the Cayman Islands. Here, away from the scrutiny of legislative authority, the qualifications, indeed quality and origin of crews employed under these banners was of no consequence, they simply made up the numbers and more to the point, they were cheap!

In 1983 though, Mavis Boothroyd would proudly say whether asked or not.

Yes, I still fly a Red Ensign on the stern of vessels in my fleet (of two ships, but a fleet nonetheless in Mavis’ book,).

Not one of those International Flags of Convenience that allows the ‘used-to-be’ major British Owners to employ cheap and nasty crews that are swept off the streets or found in the zoos of the third world ……and when on a roll with the explanation that knew many a course but little in the way of boundary, she would, for example, continue:

In my book, recruiting of personnel is a tad more involved than shaking the stem of a palm tree and employing whatever comes down with the coconuts!

…..and this would go further still if her argumental flow enjoyed the influence of her favorite tipple, a Woods 100 rum… or two… or four, where she would draw from a well-worn collection of derisory remarks and state something of demeaning, teetering on the border of racist, relevance:

Have you seen the way they eat?

…..an analogy often lost on an audience unfamiliar with the negligible table manners of a Bangladeshi crew, where nearly as much rice comes out of their mouths as goes in during any one of their numerous daily feeding frenzies. Their attitude that food on board a ship is part of their salary was / is the employed mentality, so seven meals a day becomes commonplace and gaining ten pounds in body weight a month is a target chased with zeal.

And I’m not going to be the one to cause a weight problem in the third world. Mavis would comment washing her hands of the issue until roused further.

Mavis, as her father had for the time he was both Founder, Owner and Master of the original Mavis D, with no room for even the remotest of exceptional circumstance employed ‘British’ British Crews on the company vessel, well ‘White Crew’ as Mavis would say, always endorsing this statement with a sympathetic and equally rather inappropriate ‘non-racial disclaimer’ such as:

Well, I would employ people of Indian descent for example, if only they knew how to swim!

Never said to be non-political, Mavis was swung far to the right of center. Some might say of her thoughts and sporadically stated opinions being ‘a tad to the right of Hitler’ if they were being particularly generous. ‘White’ a la Mavis, broadly meant historic decent from: The UK, France, Holland, Germany, Norway, Australia and New Zealand.

Parking Mavis’ supposed political bias, her use of the word ‘White’ was not in her mind discriminatory at all and she would challenge suggestion to the contrary by citing the example that there was also absolutely no possibility for an East European, a Russian, Portuguese, Greek, Cypriot, Spaniard or Italian to achieve safe passage through her employment filtration system. And even then there were exceptions where three colonial (or used to be colonial except Mavis never accepted them otherwise,) Islands: Malta, Singapore and Hong Kong (actually even that was heading towards two because Hong Kong was fast disappearing off the list) that scraped through the fine mesh she employed to guide her personnel selection criteria.

Where the odd colonial exception suggested did occur and now, in 1983, was to be found ‘exceptionally’ sailing under the Mavis Red Ensign, such had taken on the behalf of said exception an extraordinary personal work performance and dedication where the significant accolade of acceptance, i.e. Mavis’ acceptance, was such that the employer, employee playing field was leveled in every aspect, race included, and forever onward, singularly disregarded. In fact of the fifty or so seagoing staff contractually employed at Boothroyd Shipping, Mavis currently only had one permanent employee that fell outside of her primary list of accepted nations and that was an Able Seaman whom had originated from the (recently and nowhere near enough reluctantly, released,) colony of Malta…. And Mavis considered 1964 recent, when she considered it at all.

Albeit that the sole Maltese ‘repeater’ was three generations British and of a family that had resided for at least the last seventy years in England, didn’t matter, it was his work performance that gained him passage. Historic trends of a nationality and culture didn’t disappear just by changing locale in Mavis’ estimation.

You can build a Toyota in the United Kingdom or the United States Mavis would comment, on the rare occasion her viewpoint was challenged and even years after the vehicle manufacturer had established its overseas factories …..but it’s still a Japanese car! And there really wasn’t an answer to that conclusive (Mavis) fact!

Otherwise, the Chinese that were to be found on ships bearing the company initials of BS on their funnel filled more temporary crewing roles as a ‘Riding Squad’ or ‘Riders’ and even they, or their employment agent, had to clear the scrutiny of severe unwritten Mavis Boothroyd governance principles.

The ‘fifty’ish’ seagoing staff employed by Boothroyd Shipping were split into three crews of seventeen or eighteen such that with her two vessels, two crews did the long hauls (the eight month tours of duty), each crew typically dedicated to one vessel and one crew jumped between the vessels’ doing the four month relief stints, known as the ‘Relievers’ rather obviously. Not every one of the Boothroyd sailors remained a ‘Repeater’ or ‘Reliever’ (the Mavis term for her regular crew) for life, much as Mavis would have liked them to. Occasionally an employee would leave the ‘Booze Line’ (as the staff of the entire competing British Merchant fleet referred to her company for reasons seemingly obvious, but actually nothing to do with the fact that the majority of Mavis’ staff were heavy drinkers,) to go with another shipping company and of course there were those that retired, went ashore permanently to pursue employment other than maritime or were fired.

Mavis, unusual as this was, did her best to develop very personal relations with the men (and occasionally women) working for her on her ships. Her company Boothroyd Shipping offered them unusual benefits when they were on leave, such as loans against forward employment, legal assistance fighting arrest, detention or other cases of financial need Mavis thought was justified.

There were on the other hand, some facets of being an employee of Boothroyd Shipping that weren’t, to be frank, fashionable if desirable. First there was the length of trip on board ship where in the 1980’s the majority of the remaining ship owners of the so-called civilized or 1st world nations were affording their few remaining non-primate crews four or six month trips at sea with at least three to four months paid leave following a tour of duty. With Boothroyd it was an eight month trip and four months leave and that leave on a reduced salary or retainer. Secondly, whilst other company’s crews were guaranteed a fixed salary and some even paid overtime on top of that, with Boothroyd the salary wasn’t that brilliant at all, certainly irregular at best and on paper typically half of that which others paid.

Nonetheless, that which Boothroyd did offer though was an undocumented profit share scheme, where if the company performed well financially, the Boothroyd crews (even the ‘Riders’) benefitted every six calendar months by way of a cash payout, well hidden from the prying eyes of the revenue services. This ‘payout’ was only made when the company ran at a predetermined profit and was a function of exactly how much ‘net’ expendable income the company had after Mavis’ careful calculations. Calculations, whose content and allowances dwarfed those of established auditing firms and in-house financial departments, leaving Mavis with a real EBITDA rather than one purely massaged for stock value or a shareholders delectation and dividend.

Sailors or Repeaters, Relievers and Riders alike, whom had been with Boothroyd Shipping for a number of years would attest to the fact that the Company in fact, always ran at a profit and their ‘take home’ salary’s, once the ‘payout’ was factored in, always substantially exceeded the fixed salaries of others plying the same profession. A calculated gamble perhaps by the ‘Royders’ (of many names for the company employees, this was yet another with blatantly obvious origins that encompassed ‘Repeaters’, Relievers and ‘Riders’,), but one that time had shown to be a safe bet. The last and perhaps most important factor for most Boothroyd devotees was the crew policy where it was ‘reasonably’ assured that almost all the same crews returned to the same ships time after time, year after year because they all knew that whilst Mavis Daphne Boothroyd (senior) was in charge, their jobs weren’t at risk from a cheaper third world substitute and in 1983 that was probably the biggest concern any jolly jack had.

For her ‘Riders’ Mavis, to justify her selection of workers from the two (again, soon to be one as soon as Hong Kong was officially excluded by Mavis,) predominantly Chinese populated Islands when the subject came up in social banter Mavis would explain her choosing of source thus:

They’ve had or have the benefit of being a colony, taking advantage of the culture and morals exuded by Her Majesty’s servants, she would say, though this statement would not apply to any other historic British Colonies in the East, definitely not Pakistan or Somalia for example.

If asked to enlarge on her exclusion policy come contention, she simply wouldn’t in any reasonable detail and would dismiss further dialogue with something along the lines of:

Not on my decks thank you. It is bad enough we have allowed them to infiltrate our mainland, but employed on a Boothroyd hull you’ll not see one!

The Singapore Chinese riding crews (Riders) that Mavis currently employed at sea accomplished work whilst her vessels were trading that would normally be done during a routine ship ‘dry-docking’ or ‘off hire’ period and often involved tasks in extremely confined spaces, hot, dirty and in an air space perhaps not achieving the 21% oxygen content that was required for safe human existence, but seemingly didn’t affect the Chinese.

It wasn’t that Boothroyd regular crew couldn’t have attempted the same tasks, they could. Well, OK, they could if given a higher quality working atmosphere. But the reality was that they simply didn’t have time for them. Both the Boothroyd ships only had the absolute minimum number of crew on board that was permitted by a British ‘Safe Manning’ certificate and as neither the Mavis D nor Mavis L were exactly fresh off the blocks at the builders, keeping them trading efficiently and successfully took a sustained and continual effort by her Repeaters.

And Mavis too, expected high standards to be maintained on her ships’ in every respect and to achieve this whilst being on the border of ‘shorthanded’, her ‘Repeaters’ always went, well had to, go the extra mile to keep all the ship equipment working well and the hulls clean and painted.

The Motor Vessel (M.V.) ‘Mavis D’ and her sister ship the M.V. ‘Mavis L’, were the names of the two vessels Boothroyd Shipping currently owned. The Mavis D which was always referred to as the ‘new’ Mavis ‘D’ had replaced the company’s first vessel which was also unsurprisingly called the Mavis D. Todays’ Mavis D wasn’t very new at all is ship life terms. Close on twenty years since it had left the slips at the Builders Yard, Belfast, Northern Ireland, the vessel defied aging in the hostile marine environment due to the continual and devoted attention come blood, sweat and tears she received from her crew. The Mavis L, or the ‘new ship’ was by comparison a youthful nineteen years of age having been built at the same yard to the same specification as the ‘D’, both vessels unusual in their characteristics to say the least.

In an increasingly challenging commercial environment, both of the Boothroyd ships were highly diversified and could ply almost all trade. From the carriage of bulk liquids, to refrigerated fruits, dry bulk and general cargoes, heavy-lifts and even vehicles, the Mavis D and L could swing into any of them. Vessels of this nature were highly suited to Mavis Boothroyd’s trading activities which in the shipping business would be referred to as ‘Tramping’ a term Mavis had always found rather distasteful.

Not at all coincidentally, the names of the two ships were the Christian name and middle initial of her daughters: Mavis Louise Boothroyd, and Mavis Daphne Boothroyd. This was of course, just the same manner in which the ‘original’ Mavis D, the ship where it had all started, had achieved her name with her father Cedric Boothroyd naming the ship after his daughter, today’s Owner: Mavis Daphne Boothroyd. It was tradition of course that guided her daughters names (her mother was a ‘Mavis Louise’) as well as her ship names and whilst Mavis was often seen by industry observers to be a tad unethical in the manner by which she ran her business, she was definitely thought of and respected as ‘Brutally Traditional’.

Mavis’ (whom herself had never married,) twin daughters, now in their early twenties were currently spending time at the Baltic exchange picking up on trading tactics, though this was only because they both happened to be on leave from ships. Mavis had both her daughters gainfully employed at sea as well as ashore, though not on Boothroyd Ships, in fact on vessels owned by ‘Skips Rederiet A/S Larsen’.

A/S Larsen, a Norwegian company based in Haugsand, had a diverse array of ship types and the Boothroyd twins were there to learn and achieve their sea going qualifications to Master level, exactly the same as Mavis herself had done with her father’s guidance. Everyone knew that Mavis senior didn’t want her daughters on her own ships in case they received preferential treatment, but very few knew why they were on the hulls of A/S Larsen. Those that did kept the reason absolutely confidential, but the fact was that Sigmund Larsen, the wretched alcoholic but creative and brilliant Norwegian Ship Owner, was in fact the father of Mavis’ daughters. Their unacknowledged origin a result of Sigmund’s unusually rampant Norski sausage that was responsible for a small colony of fatherless children of little consequence here. Of import was that Mavis’ daughters were being groomed for the inevitable in that one day they would be running Boothroyd Shipping.

Back to the present and right now, mid-September 1983, there was work to do. Mavis was on her way to the Heathrow Hotel close by London’s main airport, where she was going to have a few drinks (well more than a few to be correct) with and see off ‘The Repeaters’ heading out to Dubai to join the Mavis D. Mavis always used the Heathrow Hotel as the meeting and drinking place for her legendary send-offs. The Hotel was itself unassuming but in Mavis’ mind it had advantages, First there was the Hotel bar, the Compass bar. This was a circular bar and due its circumference her entire British crew contingent could be spaced out around the bar, enabling Mavis at her send-off function to work her way around each one, Officer and Rating alike, and mingle with them all. Secondly, as many of Mavis crew spent their leaves overseas, this Hotel was ideal as it was a point they could fly into and meet. Lastly, by having all the crew mustered in one place close to the departing airport, she knew damn well they were all going to make it on the aircraft and god willing, to the destination to meet her vessel.

It was of course the Mavis’ infamous send-off and her general tolerance for her crews drinking and often raucous seagoing behavior that had competing Owners, nautical observers, other seamen and even the shipping press referring to the company, Boothroyd Shipping, as ‘the Booze Line’. The fact was though that this was not wholly correct as Mavis did not tolerate alcoholics at all but she absolutely accepted and indeed preferred, ‘piss-heads’ even over and above ‘non’ or occasional drinkers. The bonus with the piss-head for Mavis was the fact that they teetered on being alcoholics and the only reason they weren’t was because they worked so damn hard over ridiculous hours just to keep themselves busy thinking about something else other than beer or whisky or whatever alcoholic. And her Repeaters knew, cross that line to alcoholism and it was ‘Out’ with a capital ‘O’.

’The Booze Line’ more correctly, was a nickname coined in the very early days of the company, when Mavis’ father, Cedric, had amassed by a rather unusual means, the finances to buy the original Mavis D during the shipping doldrums post World War 2. Said Mavis D, a very multi-purpose vessel on which todays ‘new’ vessels had been modeled and further diversified, could also carry all types of dry general cargos, refrigerated fruits as well as liquids in two deep tanks in the bowels of the vessel. Cedric’s early and most successful use of the deep tanks was carrying a brandy base from the port of Durban in South Africa to Bordeaux on the west coast of France. Here the cargo had been received by a French distiller whom used this cheap African base to blend with his superior brandy’s and cognacs and eventually retail at vastly overstated prices to the gullible European public whom assumed they were drinking the finest of French liquors. The fact that the deep tanks might have had prior cargos of a hideous Malaysian palm fatty acid or Nigerian tallow made from bits of dead animals and people was inconsequential, after all, no one on the retail end knew. It was indeed the carriage of this brandy base in tanks rather than in drums as had been fashionable up until Cedric pioneered bulk liquid shipments, that inspired the unofficial naming of the company as ‘the Booze Line’.

It was Tuesday September 13th, and with mid-September being the targeted turnover time for the Mavis D crew Mavis was happy that the upcoming send-off was just about right on schedule. Before departing her Mornington Crescent residence she looked at herself in the mirror of her downstairs hallway. It wasn’t that she was vain, more that Mavis, regardless of whether she stepped out of her office for the whole day or not, always dressed for business and was conscious that her overall appearance should reflect that. As a woman of fifty three years of age, just over five feet in height and with sharp facial and physical features; she kept herself trim and fit with daily walks in London’s parks.

She pulled the collar of her dark blue ladies suit to straighten it, looked down at herself and was at ease with what she saw. Regardless of the comparatively miniscule size of the two ship fleet she owned, everyone who was anyone in UK Shipping knew Mavis. With her almost trademark pepper grey hair cut to a number five crop, pink horn rimmed glasses and a preference for dark blue attire she was unmistakable whether that be at shipping society functions or on the various freight and commodity trading floors. But now she was ready to go and meet Captain Smythe and his crew. She grabbed a large brown envelope from the desk in her office, put it in her leather shoulder bag, then walked out on to the Camden street slamming her front door behind her.

Travelling from her West London home come office come shipping headquarters to the Heathrow Hotel, Mavis, regardless of her wealth, absolutely refused to take a London Black Cab. Bunch of thieving bastards! being her generalized description of the customary London Taxi, known to charge exorbitant fares for any journey outside the confines of the central city. So Mavis used public transport out of principle come protest and with pride rather than reluctance. She boarded a Tube Train at Mornington Crescent around 2:30 p.m. for Paddington. She then took an airport bus from Paddington headed for the Heathrow Hotel near Terminal 3. Yes, Mavis enjoyed these ‘send-offs’ too and today she was ready for a good drink with her Repeaters at the Heathrow Hotel bar before dispatching them on the Royal Dutch CLOG Airways evening flight which would find its way to the Middle East via Amsterdam’s Schiphol and a brief layover at the Schiphol Airport Hotel.

The Crew wouldn’t have to be at the Heathrow departures until around 8:30 p.m. so with her ETA at the Heathrow Hotel around 4:00 p.m., well that would be a good four or so hours drinking and socializing with her loyal Repeaters.

Chapter 2     More Mavis

There isn’t a word or expletive available in the English language to describe Mavis’ dislike for Heathrow airport and that’s why she would do anything to avoid the airport itself, another reason she would have her crews that were joining the ships when they were outside of UK waters meet at a Hotel close by. That which was happening at Heathrow airport in 1983 was reflective of what was happening in the UK in general. An orchestrated lowering of educational standards peppered with a tolerance for all creeds and colors was part and parcel of one big governmental conspiracy in Mavis’ mind where used to be colonies were now colonizing the mother country.

A conspiracy conceived in Thatcherian Britain no less, that were it not for her inbred patriotism, she would have moved Boothroyd Shipping overseas (Mavis in fact, would never have moved her company overseas even if Thatcher had been black,). She never did quite forgive herself for voting Conservative at the last election for these reasons and Margaret Thatcher whom she once held in high regard, was certainly letting her down on the schooling, discipline and immigration front. Not to say that Mavis’ crews were well behaved, quite the contrary, but they worked hard and they were white so that made the difference.

To explain her airport contentions though…..In Mavis’ mind, Heathrow was historically and even now, never will be at its unachievable best. The Terminals 1 to 3 are always a ‘work in progress’ with ceilings part taken down and numerous corridors that actually lead to nothing, certainly not a boarding gate regardless of what the signs may say. Mavis thought of Heathrow as an airport that couldn’t make up its mind whether it was in London, Slough or Karachi. Probably ‘Slough Airport’ would have been the most appropriate designation as the complex is closer to the industrial than the glamorous and arguably closer to Slough than it is to London proper in any event.

Justification for Mavis’ feelings towards the UK’s showcase airport may be best summarized using her self-opinionated absolutely flawless, totally incontestable and wholly justifiable explanation as to how Heathrow had gone wrong and indeed, soon the country itself that without correction, was destined to follow:

As Mavis would explain; In the late 1970’s UK, numerous towns west of London had been and were being (on a deliberate basis,) part colonized by the unrestricted import of Pakistani’s, Bangladeshi’s and Indians all of whom found their initial 1970’s employ in the Toilet facilities at Slough (a.k.a. Heathrow a.k.a. Karachi) Airport prior to realizing that selling rotten vegetables at the same time as multiplying and claiming social security for inflated families benefitting from disproportionate welfare was far more profitable and a damn site easier.

With ever eager to assist local governments keen to play the non-racist card with such zeal that it discriminated against anyone with a decent Anglo Saxon blood line, building of Mosques,