Odessa and the birthday that wasn't

Now after a nice journey through Bulgarian port town of Varna we are off to another black sea country not named Russian that looks a lot like Russia. Odessa, Ukraine

Odessa Ukraine is a very nice friendly area in the black sea that is full of beautiful women or at least that's what the other non-married sailors told me since I don't notice such things. I did notice that so far in our travels in both the Ukraine and Bulgaria the population is much more skewed to the female gender I would say 60/40 or even 70/30. I am not sure why that is but it was very obvious. now maybe they are all hidden away in a cave toiling away but my guess is that the men here just produce more girls for some reason or another but I am apparently sidetracking into a genetics lecture so I will get back on track here. Odessa is also a fairly young city born in the 1800s though local tribesman and stuff have been there longer obviously the actual city is fairly new. Now with that in mind it still very much reminds you of the old soviet block building with the concrete slab construction everywhere.

Now you must be thinking at this point wow you know so much you much have walked around and talked to the locals well sadly all of Odessa that I saw was on a 2 hour tour on a bus. though it was a nice and informative trip it wasn't what I was hoping. Due to the nature of ship life I had things to due and duty.

Duty, the dreaded duty, well it so happened that it feel on my birthday. I put in for the day off and everyone said yes but I still had to run a chit (permission slip if you will) and I routed to my boss then it was out of sight. well the day of I found out he had not run it up and that was bad the next thing I know people flipping out with a day off request the day of and it got denied and on top of that I had double watches which turned into triple watches and by the end of the day I had stood 17 of 24 hour on watch and only slept for 3 hour during that time. suffice to say a very very bad day.

well not much else to say other then I am sad that I didn't get to see much of Odessa but all in all it was something new and interesting and I was able to talk to several Ukraine guards and agents and hear what it is like in Odessa and that was pretty cool. people around the world are pretty much the same with different highlights but at the end of the day most girls like fashion and men like explosions and cars. I have yet to see a place that doesn't have at least those blanket rules.

well sorry this one was a little on the short side not much to report. hopefully I will get to see much more of my next port.... which I am writing from..... Batumi, Georgia. homework assignment look it up.

first stop! (kinda)

Well its time, my first report card on deployment. OK I best stipulate the grading, in general being on a ship sucks and being on deployment increases the factor many times over so I will not be grading that aspect but rather the time in port. First up Augusta Bay, Italy well this was just a quick stop no liberty just a fuel and run. but during the short there I was able to go play a few games of basketball and I had alot of fun but at the very end I sprained my ankle and its been kind of tender since. The port was an industrial port and like I said we couldn't leave the pier so there really wasn't anything to look at. So I don't really call that a port visit. Lets just call it a "Pit Stop"

Now to the heart of the matter Varna, Bulgaria. First liberty port Woohoo!! well as you may know from my last deployment I tend to work a fair bit and get one day of liberty to see the town and get things to bring back home. Varna is a smaller touristy kind of town with the look and feel of old Russia with a bit of the euro flavor slowly creeping in. Sadly there was not much to see but this nice church and the little shops strewn about the area. but as far as attractions not much. Thankfully the food was really good and cheap. Mostly meats, sausage and the big thing was kabobs. kabobs on swords, sticks, anything pointy they did it.

The big spot everyone ended up at was the mall. There were two fairly good size malls about a 30 minute walk from the ship and of course everyone gravitated to the paintball area on the top floor, yours truly included. We ended up having a battle between engineers and my division and I can say that we won a few and lost a few but it was good times had by all. The rest of the day we walked around found a nice play to eat by the beach and then headed back towards the ship. I found a couple trinkets and I got to see a knew place in the world. All in all a pretty interesting experience.

Now as you have probably already googled varna and discovered I am in the black sea I will let you know that we have had some interesting interactions so far and will probably do so in the future. But I am ok and I am not worried. And if I am not, no one should be hehe

So I guess if I was to grade this port I would give it a B. Nothing to great, nothing bad and a much needed time off to eat good food and explore. I cant complain and I wont.

This experience in the black sea I think has opened some peoples eyes as to how the world is. It is not a black or white, a right or wrong, or even a good vs evil world. I don't know how many people have realized it and for me it was more of a confirmation since I am constantly reading and studying such things. But I guess if some 18 year old kid is able to finally leave home, see something new in the world and come back with a more worldly view of how things work it can't be that bad can it.

Next stop Odessa, Ukraine. Till then take care and be safe.