The post is dedicated to my father, Vasily Karasiov, who went missing several months ago during the Russian-Ukrainian war.
For several months now, I don't know if my father is still alive.
Until I was 4 years old, father worked at a factory, and then, in the mid-1980s, he "went to sea", getting a job on the Soviet fishing floating base "Боевая Слава" ("Battle Glory") – a huge vessel about 200 meters in length. So he visited Denmark, Scotland, Norway, Africa (for example, Sierra Leone, a state that no longer exists), and other countries.
The next photo is on the boat deck 👇
The boats are huge, descend on wheels along a kind of "rails". My father told the story of how one day during the training alarm "leaving the ship" the wheel of the boat stuck, and one sailor thought of turning it over, standing on the rail, in the path of the boat. When the boat was unlocked, it (naturally) went down the rail, and the guy's legs were badly injured. Any production is full of similar stories about tragedies that happen due to lack of intelligence.
Off the coast of Scotland 👇
Storm in the North Sea
The next photo is generally epic: in a ten-point storm in the North Sea, before entering the English Channel, dad and friends, decently drunk (and, in simple terms, drunk) got out on the deck to be photographed. Really very lucky that no one was washed overboard.
And in the photo below you can see a huge "bale" suspended with the inscription "Пастырь кольчужный" ("Chain Plaster"). This is a means for emergency patching holes in the side of the ship, if they occur. First, this mail patch is pulled over the side of the ship from the outside, which gives time to make more thorough repairs from the inside.
(A black man in a white shirt, who got into the frame from the back, is a customs officer and Sierra Leone. Naturally, in 1987 there were no black sailors on a Soviet ship: none of the African countries was part of the 15 Soviet republics).
This is how the ship of the RPB "Battle Glory" looked like 👇
Gift photo from the captain:
The inscription on the back of the same photo:
The work on a fishing boat was hard for ordinary sailors: it was necessary to roll 90-kilogram barrels with fish and pack them tightly in the hold. True, they paid well, for one flight it was possible to earn money for a car. Fishing took place, incl. and off the coast of Africa: then on the deck of the tropics, and in the hold the temperature is minus...
View from the "Battle Glory" on the coast of Norway (the photo has already suffered from time. We can imagine what will happen to our old photos in another 30 years if they are not digitized in time):
Santa Cruz
Monument in the form of a cross on the island of Santa Cruz. A kind of day lighthouse, because it is made of mirrors. These mirrors reflect the sun, so the mirror cross and its sparkling reflections are very far visible from the sea, from ships.
Profitable exchange with Africans
In the following photos you can see junks with blacks who sailed up to the ship for exchange (taken from above, from the side of the ship): various souvenirs, all kinds of masks and wooden figurines (handmade) are visible in the boats. Moreover, it was by no means money that served as the "currency" for exchange. Such a mask could be exchanged for an elementary bar of laundry soap or a pack of cigarettes without a filter. Therefore, many sailors, before going on a voyage, tried to stock up on such good things in excess, and could also buy more in the ship's shop. Indeed, in the USSR it cost a penny, but in Africa it was a valuable deficit.
At one time, our entire apartment was hung on the walls with similar African masks. But my mother was afraid that these artifacts were "malicious", that voodoo spirits could settle in them and dwell ... Therefore, when I grew up, I sold all these masks very profitably to one owner of a cafe chain (for entourage). I hope none of the visitors to the cafe suffered from African magic! =)
Denmark, Copenhagen 1987
The next block of photographs are several views of Copenhagen, the capital of Denmark, taken by my father while walking around the city.
Dad sailed on the "Battle Glory" for a short time
In total, my father worked at the "Battle Glory" for about two years. The main reason that he quit swimming was not even the difficult working conditions on the ship, but the fact that he really missed his wife.
In the next photo, my mother Svetlana Karasiova is about 30 years old (i.e. around that period). I am now older than my mother in this photo:
✍ Богдан Карасьов (Bogdan Karasiov, Ukraine), June 19, 2023.
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