“Dash Me” A 12 months in the Life of a Cajun Boy Working in Nigeria, West Africa!

I was functioning as a mechanic at Hyster Forklift in New Orleans, La. and a friend of my manager “Mr Pat Horn”arrived by to see him as he was on go away from performing offshore (primarily) and onshore in Nigeria, West Africa. His title was “Deano Pablo Vincent Martini”. He was a character to say the least. He experienced a hefty Italian accent, was brief and stocky and he came to the United states when his submarine was captured when it surfaced in the Gulf Of Mexico and was seeking to invest in gas from a shrimp boat. Martini satisfied his wife at Camp Plauche Jail when she came to produce letters home often to Italy for him. He requested my manager “Pat” if he knew of any individual interested in going to do the job on a Derrick Barge #11 largely offshore in Nigeria, West Africa.

I was single and in my early 20’so I reported certainly! The business that I labored for was termed “Oceanic Contractors” on the door of the creating positioned in downtown New Orleans, but the firm title I signed up with was termed “J Ray McDermott”. They are a hugh, correctly run enterprise throughout the world. I had to go get an intensive bodily regionally, a sequence of agonizing shots for my new global medical file that went along with my passport. The nurse claimed: “get your excess weight off of this leg” my still left, and she trapped a major needle in my rear, then she claimed “take your fat off the other leg”and she caught it in my other cheek and gave me the other half! It was a “Gamma Globulin” shot. Person was I happy that was about! They also gave me some supplements that I had to consider everyday for a thirty day period ahead of I still left to stop me from catching Malaria. I experienced to get a pill every day when I was more than there from a large pill canister located in the galley the place we ate foods and we experienced to choose them when we returned dwelling for 3 months much too.

It took about 7 weeks to get the flight to Nigeria, they experienced a armed service coup and killed the chief of the nation above there. We flew to Charles DeGaulle airport in Paris, France 1st and I scheduled a two working day layover to see the metropolis. It was a fancy airport, they had these massive tubes that shuttled people in several different directions. I went to the Meridian Resort in Paris, at the entrance desk I observed a cab driver that spoke a minimal English, and the girl at the desk informed him a record of all the destinations that I wanted to see in French! We put in 50 % a day driving all around to see all of the sights, and I ended up at the Eiffel Tower. I selected to wander up all of the winding stairs to the significant deck exactly where you could see every thing for miles all around. It was excellent enjoyable! The following day I was walking close to a mall near the lodge and I received some true “French Fries” at a McDonalds! Later, I ran into a blond headed woman strolling all over the mall, her title was “Stephanie”, I started out conversing to her and she was a prostitute!! She took me to a minimal lodge with a French Maid that worked 1 of those people exposed metallic cage elevators that took us upstairs to our place. The place has these big pink lips on the wall and a mattress formed like a coronary heart. They had a B-day, and a rest room, we both equally washed up and you can think about the rest.

The next working day I caught the flight that took off for Nigeria, we experienced to land in Accra, Ghana, West Africa and hold out till daylight to get off again and land in Nigeria. The airport was near Lagos, Nigeria. It was a mess, immediately after receiving off the airplane everybody experienced to run for the Air Nigeria flight! Then, I obtained lucky and caught a Widgeon Airplane for McDermott that took off from land, then was heading to land in the river close to the garden in Warri, Nigeria. It experienced pontoons and it landed in the h2o at the Warri River at the J Ray McDermott garden. They took me to a hotel, it was surprising! They experienced a motel with a rack of skeleton keys for all of the rooms, they had been all the exact same! The watch out the window was a giant pile of trash in the middle yard. When it got darkish, all of the electricity in the area went out, I located out why they experienced a candle in a bottle in the home with matches! That night, I took the mattress off the mattress and set it in the foyer towards the door to the area and slept on it. 2 times that night a person tried using to steal all of my stuff in the space but I was sleeping on the mattress, they woke me up and I punched the door tough and they ran absent. Glad the doors opened up to the within!

The to start with time I went to the Derrick Barge (DB11), I acquired on a tug boat named the “Gulf Wind” with a captain named “Captain Wally Hebert”. It had just arrive in excess of from the United States, and on the way to the Barge offshore near the country of Angola, (utilized to be called the Belgian Congo”. We obtained fired upon throughout the bow of the tug, and were stopped by a Russian gunboat, with a Cuban crew! They boarded the vessel and Captain Wally had a 22 caliber pistol and they took it and remaining. I was seasick as a dog, stayed in my bunk and could not hold out to get off! I received on Derrick Barge 11 (DB11), it was a relief or so I considered, I experienced to go up and down 14 flights of stairs all working day unloading the applications that were sent out on the tug. We were operating 18 hrs a working day and it was incredibly tricky. We concluded laying the pipeline to the shore and we took off likely north and then we read that someone blew up the refinery! Working in these third earth bogs everything can materialize!

1 day the Nationals (Local Workers) all obtained on the tug boat the Gulf Wind and they mutinied! They bought drained of the Camp Boss (a Lebanese dude) serving them sacks of “Gary” (the meals the locals try to eat) being entire of Weevils. They commandeered the vessel back to the dock in Nigeria! They came again to perform immediately after it was straightened out times afterwards. I keep in mind going out with the tug boat “Gulf Wind” to decide up barges of the pipe we laid and obtaining to deliver a significant 12 volt battery and applications with me in case I will need them to start out the anchor winch and get the anchor up. I rode on the entrance of the barge viewing the Dolphins in the crystal apparent blue drinking water as they played as we moved alongside! Most of the barges experienced hydraulic starters though. From time to time the batteries would be absent, yep, another person paddled all the way out there in their dugout to steal the batteries so that they could have lights in their village hut!

There was a medic on DB11, he experienced a modest moveable house up less than the heliport. He had big bottles of prescription medication from overseas, England generally. We used to get: “Cement capsules” to plug you up and “Dynamite drugs” to get you going again! The camp boss and the food stuff was low-cost and inferior! They experienced the hairs nonetheless on the slices of bacon! It was absolutely nothing like operating offshore in the Gulf Of Mexico, they experienced fantastic food items there! A dude that I labored with “Jerry” was hooked on “Darvon” soreness products. He had hundreds of them! Anything that was erroneous with you he would say: “You want some Darvon” he was normally out of it.

We went back to the McDermott lawn in Nigeria for 2 months to improve the swing gear in the Gantry Crane from steam driven, to electric powered pushed. There ended up several areas exactly where we employed to go try to eat in close proximity to Warri, one particular was a put that served mouth watering Escargot, I never believed that I would delight in snails, but they have been truly mouth watering! One more time, we ended up coming back again to the garden and they experienced a significant accumulating of men and women all strolling to this spot the place they executed people today. The policeman said: “You have never ever witnessed an Execution?” We said no and he took out his billy club and defeat all of the individuals out of the way and took us ideal up front to check out! He explained no pictures and we went along with that. They shot a person and a woman that they tied to two large poles with the Warri river in the history. They shot them both equally at the exact time. Just one of them stole a watch, and the other 8 Naira (8 Naira was about 12 pounds at the time). Capital punishment is the identify of the game. It was unreal. I made use of to say:”These days a different dollar, Tonight an additional Naira”. Yet another time I was in a taxi coming again to the garden at night, it was stopped by the police (they don camouflage clothes with AR15’s) I was arrested for murdering a dude at the seaside. I had $112.00 on me and that was what it expense me to get out of it! If a cab driver got in a wreck, the law enforcement would consider him out of the vehicle an beat him appropriate there on the location! These are the most crooked people I have ever witnessed!

A different time, I went in a neighborhood bar with other engineers and when we sat down there had been promptly 4-5 women on us all with distinctive colored wigs, blonds, redheads and so forth. They ended up all grabbing our trousers and hoping to get us to go with them to a Hotel! Unreal! There was a whore household located proper exterior of the McDermott gate, it was termed “The Block Residence” It was generally open to visitors and there have been a good deal of girls there.

I went for a truck journey to this wonderful put to go swimming. There was me, a rigger and a welder. We lower up and split a contemporary pineapple on the experience there. All the when I was singing to myself:”Oops there goes a different rubber tree plant”! We ended up driving by way of rubber tree plantations! The river was a spring that flowed new water that you could consume correct out of the floor and it flowed into a muddy river someplace. We met the Chief who owned the land when we have been there, a true pleasant person, I took his photo and I took many photos of the area and some youthful locals paddled by in a small dugout. I have a photograph of me paddling the compact dugout with a piece of wood for a paddle in the crystal very clear spring water!

When I was leaving Nigeria the initial time, there are guys at the airport where by they choose your luggage absent to the airplane and the guy in my line suggests: “Dash Me, Dash Me” it signifies they needed a Naira suggestion or you would by no means see your luggage all over again! They say “Sprint Me” everywhere you go in Nigeria. Hense the name of this story. After about 6 months I experienced to arrive house for a 7 days and get my impacted wisdom tooth taken out, I did it in the dentist chair and male, was I happy when it was carried out! When we had been traveling back again overseas I manufactured a listening device from a pen and a funnel shaped piece of paper so that I could hear to the flicks they ended up playing so that I did not have to spend for the headphones. I just elevated the armrest up! When the jet landed an elderly Cajun Boat Captain sitting upcoming to me reported: “Hold on there cuz, the shit is hitting the supporter”! The jet blew out a tire when we were landing and the pieces of tire have been flying up around the window! The pilot leaned the airplane over and we landed Okay!

I caught the McDermott Widgeon in Lagos “The Money Of Nigeria” to fly to an airstrip in the middle of nowhere, he dropped me off and reported I will be back again in a few of hrs, he had to refuel the plane and do a few of other matters at the McDermott property in Warri, He never ever came back! I located out and observed the wrecked aircraft later, when landing the aircraft in the Warri River he forgot to pump up the landing wheels that ended up down and when the plane landed it right away flipped about, crashed and sunk! No a person was killed! Thank God, he obtained banged up true undesirable. The plane was ruined, he left me out in the bush, all I experienced to shell out the night time with was a sheet, a area had brought it to me, that was it. I fell asleep that night and when I woke up the sheet experienced moved off my face, I was beneath it when I went to sleep. My facial area was protected with all types of bites and whelps, from mosquitoes largely, and I know that is when I received Malaria!!!!! It under no circumstances got to me till just after I arrived dwelling for very good, (far more on that afterwards) the next day a British “Bristow”chopper experienced picked me up to fly me offshore to a heliport near DB11 where by a boat could pick me up and get me to the Derrick Barge. When the Chopper took off the tail rotor number of off and the Chopper created a sluggish descending spiral into the Atlantic Ocean!!!! The pilot acquired out Okay, the Huge Gantry Crane on DB11 picked up the pretty moist Chopper and place it on the heliport for afterwards repairs I guess??

Right after I completed my a single 12 months contract, I flew to Brussels, in Belgium to choose up my reward check on the way house. An exciting town! After I acquired dwelling I fell in appreciate with a community woman and we were being on Lakeshore Travel at night in New Orleans and we were creating out in my car or truck and that is when I received these awful chills, I was freezing and shaking, then I would get pink incredibly hot, perspiring profusely and I realized I experienced Malaria!!! It is not exciting. They put me in Mercy Medical center and they brought me 4 tablets to choose at any time 2 hours in a small white cup and I gave them the bottle of products when I checked in! An individual at the Hospital termed a attorney and informed them about me I guess, mainly because a law firm called me when I was sitting down in the Hospital mattress! We sued McDermott beneath the “Jones” Act. They gave me back again the bottle of products when I remaining the Medical center.

This whole tale is Genuine, and this 1 yr contract with J Ray McDermott was the most event loaded, fascinating excursion I have at any time been on! I genuinely did delight in it immensely!!!

Robert P Bertaut Sr.