Author: Johannes
Date: 29 January 2020
Geographical position: Bocas, Panama
Nautical position: 9°19.690 N / 82°14.493W
Etmal: 0

The three Fs

As you (parents and others) have noticed, we still haven´t left Panama. You may ask yourself why. Well, let me tell you about our time here and the three Fs.

First, I´m going to explain what the three Fs are:

Fan

Food

Fluffing

Maybe you are confused now why these things would prevent us from leaving.

For the first F

I assume you know what the galley is and what it is for. If you know that you can imagine what temperatures we have in there with a big oven and stove constantly running to provide 43 people with food. Normally, we have a suction fan (Ventilator) running to keep the temperature at max. 30 degrees and to have a circulation of fresh air. Can you guess what happens if we haven´t got that fan?

Right, we have temperatures where no one can work properly anymore.

Why haven´t we got a fan? Well, our old one broke and we ordered a new one. The problem is Bocas (where we are right now) hasn´t got any street names or a post address. That´s why the company said they can´t deliver it. But the crew managed to give them the contact of the local supermarket.

Still, there was no confirmation when and if the fan is going to be delivered. Somehow it arrived yesterday (we have waited for it since Monday, when it should have arrived) and now we have one of the three Fs and only 2 more to go till we can leave.

The second F: Food.

I think it´s pretty obvious that we can´t go to sea without food. The problem with the food delivery was the money. We transferred the money from Great Britain to the USA and then to Panama. But it got stuck in the USA — Addition (30.01): it arrived today in the morning, now we finally have food–

The third F

Well… there´s not much to say about it except it increased a lot in the last days!

But not only that. There is also another reason why we couldn´t leave: The disease. When we arrived on the ship on Sunday, we had about three to four sick people. On the first day this number increased to ten or more. Since then the epidemic has spread and everyday more and more of the healthy ones got sick.

Luckily, the sick ones get better after two days. Now nearly everyone has been sick or is sick right now. Even the crew and teachers. That´s why our ship was on official Quarantine for a day. But since the doctor was here, we have more and more healthy people.

And since the fan has arrived and the food should come tomorrow there is a chance that we can leave then.

P.S.: Außerdem nochmal Happy Birthday Marco. Der tolle Junge hat heute Geburtstag!

P.P.S.: Anmerkung aus dem Backoffice: Inzwischen sind wir aber unterwegs nach Kuba und warten auf die erste neue Positionsmeldung!