In contrast to your European sailors, the crew of the Chinese treasure fleets lived in luxury. The ships were a lot bigger, they grew vegetables on board, they kept live animals on the ships and females did most of the cooking and cleaning.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=15aMTipnbSSn34eAGgUwuSVy0x_SL-OU7FQ

The European sailboats, looked like canoes next to these Chinese four story ships, it was said.