2nd Mate said, “Yesterday he came to me and asked me to show him how to use the radar so he can make sure I know my job. I saw right away he doesn’t know anything, not even the simplest things like taking a bearing[1]. I had to explain it to him a couple of times. Then I had to show him the charts, and he found a mistake in my logbook.”

I asked, “A mistake?”

The 2nd Mate chuckled and replied, “When writing the date, I always used the format day.month.year. But he told me that placing a dot after the year is wrong and that I've ruined the entire logbook, etc., etc. What an idiot!”

I said, “But I hear he is the only one to finish education abroad.”

2nd Mate leaned to me and said, “Look, his father was a known mariner. This guy is stupid as hell. He couldn’t finish local schools and they sent him abroad where they had exams with Tic-Tac-Toe. After he came back with all these diplomas but still no brain and no knowledge, he got on board as everyone else. He knew someone from crew management.”

I asked, “Is everyone here some relative or friend from crew management? Shouldn’t they send the best professional workers on ships?”

2nd Mate laughed and said, “You are good kid. You are truly green. Even you came here because your father is famous, but at least you have brains like your father. There is no order or logic in this world, just money and connections. Some other boarding crew management or agents take your first salary.”

My eyes opened wide, and I asked, “What do you mean, your first salary?”

2nd Mate said, “After you work for 1 month, you receive your payment from the company, the salary. Then you send all this hard-earned money to the agent who booked you this job.”

I had enough for that day. The more I listened, the more disappointed I was in the life on this planet.

In the following days, as Captain Don Quixote became more involved on the bridge and learned new things, so did the Chief Engineer. The Chief Engineer, who roughly reminded me of Bud Spencer with his heavy build, had long greasy hair and was always undressed, walking around in a sleeveless shirt and short pants that looked more like underwear. Even below his hairy feet with overgrown claws, you could see some poor, molested thongs. Over time, Chief Engineer Bud started giving bridge officers some nonsensical orders that Captain Don Quixote supported. The whole ship slowly turned into a black comedy show. Chief Engineer Bud slurped his coffee mug and pointed at the ship's route on the chart.

Chief Engineer Bud asked 2nd Mate, “Tell me, 2nd, why are you not going by the map?”

2nd Mate replied, “You mean our designated course. Of course, we are.”

Chief Engineer Bud made his way to the steering wheel, nodded his head, and looked at the automatic pilot, then asked, “Why are we going 30 degrees wrong?”

2nd Mate looked at me over his nose and replied, “Because of the currents, they are strong in this region, and they are pushing us off course.”

Chief Engineer Bud laughed and said, “Currents, what currents? This is a ship. Did you hear this, Captain, like we are some small rowing boat.”

Captain Don Quixote, all shocked, said, “Second, you are telling me you’ve been going off course, due to some currents.”

Captain Don Quixote checked the navigational chart and the autopilot, then corrected the value. The 2nd Mate probably had his brain circuits fried by these two, who constantly created brain farts. An alarm beeped on the radar.

I pointed on the radar screen and said, “But Captain, look, the radar is showing us that we are drifting off course to the mainland.”

Captain Don Quixote silenced the alarm on the radar and said, “Cadet! You don’t know anything, no wonder since 2nd Mate didn’t teach you anything.”

2nd Mate chewed his jaw and said, “Captain, we need to correct our course to stay on course, as the Cadet said, because currents, even the wind, can affect us because we are a RO-RO ship with a big superstructure and small draught.”

Captain Don Quixote and Chief Engineer Bud laughed.

Chief Engineer Bud said, “Did you hear this, Captain, currents and wind like we are some medieval wooden ship.”

Captain Don Quixote tapped Chief Engineer Bud on the shoulder while he laughed, but soon Captain Don Quixote changed his facial expression to serious.

Captain Don Quixote said, “Now you both listen to me, since it seems I am the only one here who knows how to navigate. From now on, you will follow the course plotted on the chart. Did I make myself clear? And now I’m going to ask for you two to be relieved of duties. Try not to sink the ship while I’m off the bridge.”

Captain Don Quixote and Chief Engineer Bud left the bridge.

I asked 2nd Mate, “Second, what do we do now?”

2nd Mate walked to the autopilot and corrected the course, the red light on the radar disappeared. With his jaw tightened, 2nd Mate replied, “Whenever the Captain is not looking or he is not on the bridge, we will have the true course from the radar set on autopilot. I need to talk to the Chief Mate later. Don’t worry, we’ll handle this. Go eat, it’s lunchtime.”

As I ventured down to the messroom, I saw the Cook who handed pancakes to the crew.

The Cook said, “No pancakes for the officers’ messroom, made this specially for you guys.”

Everybody cheered. The officers had a separate messroom floor above ours, and the food was delivered by the service lift. They usually had a mess boy, but now it’s more like a 55-year-old mess-dude who would be more like a waiter. The Chief Mate and 3rd Engineer came down to our messroom.

The Cook said to the 3rd Engineer, “When are you going to fix this damn drawer? I’ve been begging you for 2 months already.”

3rd Engineer spit saliva through his teeth and said, “I looked at it, and you can’t fix that.”

The Cook looked at me and said, “Cadet, I know your father. Can you look at my drawer?”

I replied, “Sure, I can try.”

I opened the drawer and saw a loose drawer guide. I removed the drawer, removed the moving bolts from the damaged plywood, and bolted them in different holes where the plywood was undamaged.

I said, “Here, cook, it’s done.”

The Cook, all excited, opened and closed the drawer. The Cook looked at the 3rd Engineer and said, “What kind of engineer are you? You can’t fix a simple drawer for 2 months. It took the Cadet only a few minutes!”

Everyone in the messroom laughed and teased the 3rd Engineer as he escaped embarrassed. On the TV, there was some news about space.

The Chief Mate said, “There is no space.”

A lot of crew members looked at each other, some of them shrugged their shoulders and continued to eat.

I asked, “What do you mean, Chief? There is no space… then what is out there?”

The Chief Mate replied, “There is nothing, just blue nothingness. Space is just made-up propaganda, it doesn’t exist.”

The ordinary seaman said, “Chief Mate, you’ve been reading too much of those damn books every day.”

The able seaman said, “Chief Mate, don’t tell me that the earth is flat.”

The motorman said, “Or hollow.”

The Chief Mate said, “Who can say for sure if the earth is round or not, they don’t know, they didn’t even explore all the oceans.”

Some of the crew laughed.

I said, “But all that research, what we learn in school about planets, the moon.”

The Chief Mate left and waved his hand on his way out like he wasn’t interested in this conversation anymore.