Crossing The Line Ceremony

Where to start? I’m sure one of you replied to that statement with, “Why not at the beginning?” We are currently making our way up along India’s western coast and the seas have been as calm as I could have hoped, begged, pleaded and prayed for. I have had a few days to think about what occurred on October 20th – other than my brother’s 24th birthday – and I think I have finally been able to put it all into context. I think that I should start off by explaining what the “Crossing The Line Ceremony” actually is. It has been a long standing Naval Tradition to celebrate a ship’s crossing the Equator with all kinds of hilarity, and our ship was no exception. There are two types of sailors; the Shellbacks and the Tadpoles. The Shellbacks are any sailor who has previously “Crossed the Line” and has the laminated, stamped wallet sized card to prove it. And a Tadpole is any dirty, slimy, sailor who is an “Equator Virgin,” so to speak. The Shellbacks are responsible to conduct the ceremony in order to initiate the Tadpoles into King Neptune’s Realm. The oldest Shellback dresses up as King Neptune, some male Shellback’s dress up as Mermaids, another Shellback dresses up as Davey Jones, and there are also Shellbacks to play the roles of the Judge, the Herald, the Doctors, the Barbers, and the Enforcers. This motley crew manages to terrorize, for lack of a better term, the Tadpoles for a 24-hour period. A play is acted out on the Focsle with all the Shellbacks in costume the night before. It basically just sets the stage for what the Tadpoles can expect to encounter the following day. The Tadpoles are then drenched to the bone as the pre-wet system is activated (basically sprinkler heads on the upper decks of the ship). A few fellow tadpoles and myself decided to fight back and managed to charge one of the fire hoses on the Focsle and spray down some unfortunate Shellbacks on the Bridge. It was all rather entertaining… I’ve got some photos. The evening then got a little out of hand and the “line” was definitely “crossed” as the Tadpoles and Shellbacks got into a condiment war in the flats (hallways). 3 Deck was covered in BBQ sauce, mustard, syrup and Ketchup – I’m waiting for them to start complaining that it’s pancake morning and there isn’t any syrup! I was fortunate to have been writing my last Blog entry when to food fight broke out. There were a few injuries. Our head cook fell down a ladder due to the slippery side effect of condiments under foot, an Officer broker her thumb, one of the guys got a bloody nose, and one of my friends from the Electrical department suffered a deep gash in his forearm when some Tadpoles tried to pull him into the Cave (our lounge) through an escape hatch – he received 4 stitches. But morning broke and with it came the actual Ceremony. All us Tadpoles were herded into the Cave for our “Breakfast” which consisted of an assortment of what we were assured were all edible, although cold and crazy coloured “food.” There were red spaghetti noodles with green scrambled eggs with onions, green, cold, boiled bacon, cold, boiled pork sausage, grey/blue oatmeal with horseradish and kippers (small fish) all doused in olive oil, with cold, black coffee to wash it all down. Let’s just say that it did a number on the digestive system, provided you were able to keep it down. We then had to show our empty plate before we could leave. I managed to pull a 5-year-old move, and just push it all around on my plate and out-wait them… I managed to negotiate to eat a couple of noodles and drink the coffee as a sign of good faith. We all then assembled on the Flight Deck for the arrival of King Neptune and his court (I have pictures) and court was brought into session. I was surprised with a subpoena and charged with “Making forged documents for my bosses without making one for myself.” I had made fake Shellback cards for my Chief and the Engineering Officer (EO). I was brought up before the ship’s company to answer to King Neptune and was sentenced to 4 dunks in the pool. I was “shaved” with a mixture of lard, cottage cheese and puréed mussels, which was brushed all over my face and hair, was fed a “pill” by the doctors (a maraschino cherry filled with hot sauce), kissed the fish and was dropped backwards off the stage into a pool of salt water where 3 of the enforcers were there to catch me and toss me into the air for my 4 dunks. Now I’m not the biggest sailor out here and those boys are certainly in the running for that title, so let’s just say that I managed to get some serious height for those dunks. I’d have to say that that was my favorite part of the whole event. I felt like I was in kindergarten again, being tossed into the air by my classmates on the big parachute. After all of the eating and frolicking in the pool I made my way to the Quarter Deck (farthest spot on the back end of the ship) to try to clean off in the high pressure blast of a fire hose. The irony of it all, is I was considered “clean” now that I was dripping with fish guts and lard – go figure. After a nice HOT shower I made my way back to the upper decks were I was presented with a copy of my subpoena as a memento and watched the rest of the 175 Tadpoles make their way through the pool. All in all it was a fun experience, although I am not too keen to do it again. I think I’ll take my laminated Shellback card and promptly put it somewhere safe, so I don’t lose it and have to suffer the fate of a Tadpole again. I’m starting to understand the unusual creature that is the Naval Sailor. I’m not saying it’s been a smooth path of discovery, but it has been interesting!