Christmas Holidays

[Andre]

Yo, Merry Christmas to ya all! Just been keepin' my mouth shut and staying away from trouble...thought maybe santa might pay a visit if I be good but haven't seen him yet...

So you would come across pirates out there fishing in the South China seas?

Tell us some sea fairing stories uncle Pacfan

Ahh, you mean those ol' fishermen's tales. There's a saying 'do not believe in a fisherman's tales,' you know those tales recounting the fishermen's heroic excapades on sea and nearby shore with lots of booze and gals to go with them. Nope, there are no ship waiting in the middle of the sea with many a nice women on board. There's no mermaid either, only seacows or dugongs which fishermen sometimes mistake for one. Smalltime fisherman's life is actually a bore, just cruising around the shorelines catching mostly cheap fishes. The only thing 'exciting' about it are the dangers that comes with it, like a sudden squall with a tornado like winds and rains coming out of nowhere, is the worst, and it'll give you the shivers. Naw, I guess I'm too old for those thrills now so I've turned into an armchair fisherman, letting others do the fishing for me in our fishing village here and just enjoying my li'l fishing sitting on the bank of the nearby shore, musing at the marvel of the horizon and the world beyond, and of course without the booze and the gals and that ain't no tale. Sorry to disappoint you mate but I guess real world is more of a drab and I'm not fit to weave a fancy tale. But if I can think of one, maybe I just might, lol...

I was under the impression you went out to sea for months on end

I met some pirates once in 1986 out on Ko rock west of Thailand. Machine guns the whole nine yards, lucky for us (as we were some of the first whites ever to go onto the newly opened island) we were with an ex Lieutenant Colonel of the Thailand navy who allowed them a certain clemency if they did their business elsewhere and only visited late after hours. Interesting night on the Mekong with them,still have no idea what they were saying though some of them looked through us like they wanted to kill us and said nothing at all.