Until 10am this morning, I was in a horrible state of limbo...
In December, I joined the Arctic Sunrise in Amsterdam for my second volunteer trip, having been arrested not two weeks previously for a Greenpeace UK action at the Department for Tar Sands. My bail date was scheduled for the 6th February – at the time a date I had no problems with attending but a week later I was joining the ship – always a last minute request – and the bail date would be slap bang in the middle of my 3 month volunteer contract. Damn.
I arrived on the Sunrise on a Saturday evening, hauling my case through the security gate of Oranjewerf, my home for the next two months, and towards the towering bulk of the Sunrise. She seemed huge compared to the old Warrior (she is!) – and for someone who is very new to life at sea, her size was terrifying!
My first week on board was spent participating in the ‘On-board Campaign Training’ – a course for the crew, campaigners and action co-ordinators on how the ship works as an action tool, and a chance to put that into practice with role plays.
The plan was for us to leave the safety of the port of Amsterdam and go out to sea for a week, to make it as realistic as possible but our Captain, Pete, decided the sea was too rough and so staying in port and adding an extra dose of imagination it would have to be!
I got to play at being an action-coordinator for 24 hours. It was so much fun but I was glad for the end of the course, and being boarded by the Norwegian Coastguard (all in the spirit of the role play of course!) made me laugh with relief, if nothing else. Now to celebrate with a party for the crew, course participants, GPI and GP Netherlands staff.
Christmas was soon with us and so a tree was acquired by Texas and I, and decorated – not with traditional tinsel and baubles, but with little pieces of the ship. It looked....different!
Christmas morning came, a quiet, relaxed day with most of the crew rising around midday. Secret Santa came mid-afternoon, looking suspiciously like our outboard mechanic Iain, dressed in a red boat suit and a mop for a beard, and distributed our presents, and then it was time for dinner – cooked by Willie followed by a party for the crew and any Greenpeace ‘refugees’ who had nowhere else to be!
With the New Year came the hard work. The Sunrise was in Amsterdam for maintenance. We were due to have a new galley, fridge and freezer, an engine rebuild and new S-band radar, as well as the standard chipping of rust spots crying out to be taken back to healthy steel and a fresh coat of paint applied.
As a deck hand, we alternated days of chipping and needle-gunning the rust with days armed with a paint brush and trays of paint. Music played whenever it could, we couldn’t work without music, except when the needle guns are out and then you can’t hear anything other than the repetitive incessant thrum of metal on metal.
As the maintenance period due to a close, with only half of what we had planned to get done, finished, for various reasons, we began to ready the ship for sea... A piece of flip chart paper, cello taped to the wall indicated that top of the list was ‘stow, stow, stow’, so out came the lashing lines and ratchet straps, to ready the ship and her contents for a wintery stormy crossing of the Bay of Biscay.
And with it my mind turned to returning to the UK to answer my bail. A journey I had hoped I would not have to make at all, and as the day grew closer and the ship was readying herself for departure, it was with a reluctance I began packing my bags too.
On the 1st of February I hauled my bags down the gangway and then went back onboard to say goodbye to the crew, whom I hoped I was only leaving temporarily but may not see again, depending on how it went at the Police station. Texas, the RO told me it was good that I wasn’t going to be standing on the quay waving the ship off, as that is always really difficult. Instead I arrived in Centraal station whilst the ship was still in Oranjewerf.
But then, as I was stood on the platform waiting for the train that would take home, I saw,out of the window, the Sunrise leave the dock, turn and sail past me. I did watch her leave afterall, and it was probably one of the most difficult things I have ever had to do.
Nine hours , four trains and 4 countries later, I was home, in Telford. The last place I wanted to be. Despite the single bed, wake-up calls, watches and cold showers, I would have much preferred to be on the Sunrise. I felt like I was in limbo; forced to be at home against my will, with my fate completely out of my hands, and wishing I was still onboard the ship....I wasn’t ready to be back on dry land. I felt a little lost.
But then today, the limbo ended. The Police have dropped the case against all 16 activists arrested in November at the Department for Transport! But the best news of all – I am rejoining the Arctic Sunrise on 10th February for another 2 months of adventures, and that makes me happier than anything!
7 days and counting....!
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