My first visit to the navigation centre of the ship, also called the Wheelhouse or the Bridge was when I was about eighteen months old.
My formative years were spent in Port Blair, the capital town of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. My father was a banker on the islands while my mother looked after our home.
We made a trip from the islands to Chennai (formerly called Madras) on the Indian mainland every year to visit my grandparents, uncles and aunts. On this trip, my grandmother was coming with us to stay with us for a while. Airline services to the islands were very few and far in between in the 1970’s and most people relied on the passenger ship for their travel.
The ship we were on was the Nancowry, a steam powered ship regularly plying the route between Chennai, Port Blair and Kolkata.
The Nancowry was named after its namesake island which is part of the Andaman & Nicobar islands. This steam-turbine powered ship was built by Alexander Stephen in 1948 as the Karanja. The ship was capable of a speed of 16 knots and equipped for over 2000 passengers. The ship was operated by the Shipping Corporation of India from 1976 till its demolition at the age of 48.
Photo courtesy: David T Jackson/ Capt Ian Reid (www.shipsandharbours.com
At Chennai, soon after we settled into our cabins, my grandmother preferred to take a nap while my mother was busy unpacking. After making sure I was sleeping on the bed, my father went to the restaurant to buy some hot milk- most likely for me. Sure enough, as Murphy’s law would have it, I was awake before I was supposed to. Crawling around quickly (I realised several years later with my daughter how that can be), I found the cabin door slightly ajar. Making the barest of noise, I slid out through the door and into the corridor. Baby’s day out!
Soon enough I was moving through the ship for a while before one of the sailor spotted the infant on one of the decks. He could not find any anxious parent nearby and took me to, guess where - the Bridge.
Meanwhile my parents had realised that I had gone missing and started searching frantically for me. I am sure my mother and grandmother were in tears, and probably my father too! Where was I, and was I still on board? A ship of that size, built for passengers has over a thousand compartments and it could take over a day to search each and every nook and corner. A ship is not a safe place either; there are numerous dangers - from the swinging doors to the openings to the shipside through which an infant could easily slip though.
Thankfully for my parents, they did not have to search long as they heard the Captain’s announcement over the public-address system regarding a missing child.
Much to their relief, when they arrived on the Bridge, there I was, in the grizzly old Captain’s arms on the wings shrieking in delight looking at the tug boats in the harbour. There I was, unknowingly setting foot on the Bridge at such a tender age, not knowing that 28 years later, I would be commanding a ship, standing at such a very place where an old Captain once held me in his arms.
The Union Territory of Andaman & Nicobar Islands lie over 1300 kilometers away from the mainland of India, stretching over a length of more than 700kms from North to South and consist of 572 emerald Islands and rocks. Only 36 of these islands are inhabited and the rest are maintained in pristine condition. I highly recommend family holidays on the islands. For more information, visit the official website of Andaman Tourism
