It's May Day today and yet another day I'm not allowed to leave the hotel because of the dangers - the third day in the last four. Apparently some rival party leaders, understandably upset at the brazenly open rigging of elections, have decided to have some rallies in the cities of Nigeria, so it's dangerous for me to get involved. They've chosen today because May Day is a national holiday. May Day seems to be a national holiday everywhere, but for what reason? It's not like Christmas or a special national day. It must be because it rhymes. So I might play some more tennis and maybe drink some gin; I probably won't play anymore online poker because the internet keeps crashing and I lose my money. Certainly I'll put a preposterously large amount of food in my mouth at dinner. I'll likely end up watching the GOD Channel. I've become grimly fascinated with this channel and the stadium evangelising. Whether you're Christian or not, I defy you not to find this channel incredibly odd. I think I'm going crazy.
Today celebrates, incidentally, my one year anniversary in this job. But I'm pretty sure that's not what all the holidays are about.
Monday, 30 April 2007
Saturday, 28 April 2007
Sweating In Nigeria
For all the flaws of this grand but faded hotel - the Presidential - I'm staying/imprisoned in while working in Port Harcourt, it does have a tennis court around the back. This one feature transforms days spent in the hotel from idle nothingness to having something to look forward to. My colleage - the "cognac colleague" - is about the same level as me, so we can have some pretty competitive matches. The only trouble is the heat - in the mid 30s, with the sun out, and with high humidity, it can get more than a little sweaty.
Sweat has been rather a feature of the last couple of days. Dripping, pouring, soaked-through with sweat, not through the leisure of tennis but from the toils of work. From hopes earlier this week of being home by now, it now doesn't look likely till early next week. There has been an enormous amount of work to do, preparing kit, made all more difficult by changing demands from the office in Aberdeen regarding what's meant to be happening with the kit. By the end of the day my coveralls have been dripping wet and filthy, and my hands black from dirt and grease. It's most unlike my usual working day of coffee and afternoon naps.
Today is a day off from this though. Not because it's Saturday, and not because we've finished, but because Halliburton have insisted on a shut-down. This means no Westerners are to leave the hotel or compound. The reason is something about run-on elections, and this apparently poses a risk.
To be honest, I'm beginning to think the security is a little too much. Port Harcourt is a violent city, but it's not a war zone, nor is it like one. Kidnappings appear to have descreased. There's been some election violence in Nigeria, but none that I'm aware of here, and none that has involved foreignters. The other day, after going to a meeting in some other part of the city, I had to wait for about 45 minutes for extra security going home. The one armed guard in my vehicle wasn't enough, I had to also have another vehicle with four armed police trailing me. Just for me. It wasn't at night, it was broad daylight in the middle of the city, I think there was a little too much paranoia at play.
Anyway, just a couple more days of this mania, then I'll be back home. Nigeria saps my motivation, and I don't feel being here benefits the nation much. It's certainly a financial boost, but I'll be happy not to return for a while.
Sweat has been rather a feature of the last couple of days. Dripping, pouring, soaked-through with sweat, not through the leisure of tennis but from the toils of work. From hopes earlier this week of being home by now, it now doesn't look likely till early next week. There has been an enormous amount of work to do, preparing kit, made all more difficult by changing demands from the office in Aberdeen regarding what's meant to be happening with the kit. By the end of the day my coveralls have been dripping wet and filthy, and my hands black from dirt and grease. It's most unlike my usual working day of coffee and afternoon naps.
Today is a day off from this though. Not because it's Saturday, and not because we've finished, but because Halliburton have insisted on a shut-down. This means no Westerners are to leave the hotel or compound. The reason is something about run-on elections, and this apparently poses a risk.
To be honest, I'm beginning to think the security is a little too much. Port Harcourt is a violent city, but it's not a war zone, nor is it like one. Kidnappings appear to have descreased. There's been some election violence in Nigeria, but none that I'm aware of here, and none that has involved foreignters. The other day, after going to a meeting in some other part of the city, I had to wait for about 45 minutes for extra security going home. The one armed guard in my vehicle wasn't enough, I had to also have another vehicle with four armed police trailing me. Just for me. It wasn't at night, it was broad daylight in the middle of the city, I think there was a little too much paranoia at play.
Anyway, just a couple more days of this mania, then I'll be back home. Nigeria saps my motivation, and I don't feel being here benefits the nation much. It's certainly a financial boost, but I'll be happy not to return for a while.
Wednesday, 25 April 2007
Slow Progress
I got back onto dry land on Sunday, just squeezing onto one of only three seats on the chopper that day. Since then, life has been a series of drinking, tennis and hanging around doing absolutely nothing, bored out of my damn skull.
The drinking has been fine. I'm with two colleagues, and one is an Indian Muslim, so can't be tempted to pour cognac down his throat, but the other colleague most assuredly can. We had a fairly heavy session on Sunday, my return, in which I retired at a sensible hour and just before I lost my mind, but my cognac colleague failed to do, and from all accounts turned into an ultra-buffoon. And last night, for the very entertaining Man Utd vs Milan Champions' League semi, a few beers were sank also.
The tennis has been fine. My poor Muslim colleague plays like a cripple, so is of no competition, but my cognac colleague and I are finely matched. I lost our first match 6-0 6-2 6-2, but yesterday's match finished at me down 6-2 4-5 but the game had to be abandoned due to some other pricks who wanted to play. This was a shame as the quality of our game had risen to levels that would surely have graced the professional tournaments.
The hanging around doing absolutely nothing, bored out of my damn skull has not been fine. The reason I am still here, a prisoner in Port Harcourt, is because we are awaiting our equipment to return from the rig so that it can be checked and packed away safely. Usually this is a very straightforward and speedy process, but in Nigeria it is protracted to agonising lengths. The three of us go to the base with all assurances that our kit has or soon will arrive, and we wait for the entire day with no result. One set of kit, from a different job, is two weeks late. I know the logistics of oilfield equipment is not entertaining reading, so I won't rant on about this, but rest assured that it is even less fun waiting for oilfield equipment than it is reading about it. Especially when you're in some dire base with no facilties, let alone joyous diversions. It's no fun being in Nigeria in this blinkered existence of hotel existentialism and inefficient base monotony, and I'd quite like to go home, given that I've finished the job, so all this hanging around due to others' inadequacies in logistical handlings is very frustrating.
Still, despite all this, I must remember that my daily bonus works out as more than I used to earn in a week as a dishwasher, for substantially less work. And much more soberly, is about 50% of the average Nigerian's annual wage. So all my whinging is but a childish cry to the far greater anguish of those enslaved in this most undemocratic of bullying autocracies.
The drinking has been fine. I'm with two colleagues, and one is an Indian Muslim, so can't be tempted to pour cognac down his throat, but the other colleague most assuredly can. We had a fairly heavy session on Sunday, my return, in which I retired at a sensible hour and just before I lost my mind, but my cognac colleague failed to do, and from all accounts turned into an ultra-buffoon. And last night, for the very entertaining Man Utd vs Milan Champions' League semi, a few beers were sank also.
The tennis has been fine. My poor Muslim colleague plays like a cripple, so is of no competition, but my cognac colleague and I are finely matched. I lost our first match 6-0 6-2 6-2, but yesterday's match finished at me down 6-2 4-5 but the game had to be abandoned due to some other pricks who wanted to play. This was a shame as the quality of our game had risen to levels that would surely have graced the professional tournaments.
The hanging around doing absolutely nothing, bored out of my damn skull has not been fine. The reason I am still here, a prisoner in Port Harcourt, is because we are awaiting our equipment to return from the rig so that it can be checked and packed away safely. Usually this is a very straightforward and speedy process, but in Nigeria it is protracted to agonising lengths. The three of us go to the base with all assurances that our kit has or soon will arrive, and we wait for the entire day with no result. One set of kit, from a different job, is two weeks late. I know the logistics of oilfield equipment is not entertaining reading, so I won't rant on about this, but rest assured that it is even less fun waiting for oilfield equipment than it is reading about it. Especially when you're in some dire base with no facilties, let alone joyous diversions. It's no fun being in Nigeria in this blinkered existence of hotel existentialism and inefficient base monotony, and I'd quite like to go home, given that I've finished the job, so all this hanging around due to others' inadequacies in logistical handlings is very frustrating.
Still, despite all this, I must remember that my daily bonus works out as more than I used to earn in a week as a dishwasher, for substantially less work. And much more soberly, is about 50% of the average Nigerian's annual wage. So all my whinging is but a childish cry to the far greater anguish of those enslaved in this most undemocratic of bullying autocracies.
Monday, 23 April 2007
Nigerian President
The results of the Nigerian election have come and - surprise, surprise! - the ruling party have retained power with a landslide result. But against all expectation, it seems that a Star Wars alien is now the president. Meet Umaru Yar'Adua.
Saturday, 21 April 2007
The Weeping Chef
I think the chef is depressed. Usually on the cheap stereo in the kitchen, dreadful, pumping mid-90's trance blasts, regardless of which large, middle-aged, bald(ing), failed-in-their-chosen-profession northern-English cook is on shift. But since the most recent one - more a head balanced atop a sphere than an actual man - appeared on the rig for his month's service, the music has taken a turn for the downbeat. We have Pavarotti and classical music, and not long ago I heard The Scorpions' melancholic lighters-in-the-air post-Communist mega-anthem "Wind Of Change". I can only imagine that his wife has left him, or that he's having some other crisis of confidence that I am all too familiar with in chefs, having lost years of my life working in sweaty kitchen with these deeply unstable characters.
I'm pretty depressed myself, as it happens. Early yesterday morning, our carrier appeared on surface and so we got everything broken down, downloaded, and packed away, thus ready to leave the rig. But one too few choppers arrived, and though my colleague escaped, I am left stranded. It's the big election day today - the presidential one - so no choppers, meaning that it won't be till tomorrow I get away. That's two entire evenings of cognac-drinking celebration lost, enough to ignite a fury in anyone. I've probably got another week in the country, as there's two sets of kit to check over in the base.
Chambers liked my shirt.
I'm pretty depressed myself, as it happens. Early yesterday morning, our carrier appeared on surface and so we got everything broken down, downloaded, and packed away, thus ready to leave the rig. But one too few choppers arrived, and though my colleague escaped, I am left stranded. It's the big election day today - the presidential one - so no choppers, meaning that it won't be till tomorrow I get away. That's two entire evenings of cognac-drinking celebration lost, enough to ignite a fury in anyone. I've probably got another week in the country, as there's two sets of kit to check over in the base.
Chambers liked my shirt.
Sunday, 15 April 2007
Update From The Rig
Wireline crew snapped cable (schoolboy error) so no SRO though fortunately no tool damage as it was in the catcher and we'd not yet RIH, but a routine check led to unfortunate galling of threads. Backup MDL unreliable - water damage - so had to do improvised job on mangled threads with help of mechanic and will swap housing and adaptor in the lubricator on Monday. All providing we get the go ahead for SRO - by no means certain as company man seems to have very little faith in the wireline crew. Whatever, hope to be off in less than a week.
Sunday, 8 April 2007
Happy Easter
Happy Easter everybody. I hope everyone is having a delightful Easter, spent with friends and/or family. Of course, I hope you all take a moment during this special time to remember the real reason for Easter – that is, Jesus rolling a big chocolate egg down a hill, or something, for our sins.
For my sins, I’ve been on this rig since Tuesday. Me and bunch of big burly men. Seems to be a theme, doesn’t it? It happens to be the same rig I was on back in January, for my last time in Nigeria. However, it’s a little more comfortable this time round, as I have a room with a window, and the room is being shared with someone who is hardly ever there. In fact, I think he left the rig today, meaning that for the time being I have a room to myself – an incredibly rare thing on a rig. Last time I had to share with a flatulent, impatient colleague with an insane sleeping schedule that messed up my sleeping pattern royally, and took me over a week to eventually recover.
Anyway, this pleasant state of comfort – which I don’t expect to last – has been matched by the leisurely amount of work I’ve been doing. I got on the rig a couple of days earlier than usual, thus giving myself and my colleague this time a generous amount of time to get our tools set up, and an even more generous amount of time to sleep, drink coffee and watch football. Our tools were all run-in-hole today, and I can now look forward to a few days of absolutely no work whatsoever. Everything appears to be roughly on schedule, and if this is the case I can expect to be finished and off the rig in about ten days. Plunged into a Nigeria is the midst of elections.
The elections have been causing a little bit of strife actually; not so much so in Nigeria itself, but a great amount of concern has been shown on the rig because it might affect the helicopters. For at least four days there won’t be any helicopters to and from the rig, but rumours have been abound that this could be as much as fourteen days, and might include all domestic flights. However, most of these rumours have been perpetuated by a pessimistic Canadian (why doesn’t America just swallow up this nation and save everyone a lot of grief?) so I’m not expecting too many problems.
That’s my Easter in Nigeria then, following a Christmas in Nigeria. Truly a festive haven of a nation. I quite want to do something to celebrate this special day, but there’s no hills and, as far as I’ve seen, no chocolate eggs, so I’m just going to chuck some cake down the stairs instead.
For my sins, I’ve been on this rig since Tuesday. Me and bunch of big burly men. Seems to be a theme, doesn’t it? It happens to be the same rig I was on back in January, for my last time in Nigeria. However, it’s a little more comfortable this time round, as I have a room with a window, and the room is being shared with someone who is hardly ever there. In fact, I think he left the rig today, meaning that for the time being I have a room to myself – an incredibly rare thing on a rig. Last time I had to share with a flatulent, impatient colleague with an insane sleeping schedule that messed up my sleeping pattern royally, and took me over a week to eventually recover.
Anyway, this pleasant state of comfort – which I don’t expect to last – has been matched by the leisurely amount of work I’ve been doing. I got on the rig a couple of days earlier than usual, thus giving myself and my colleague this time a generous amount of time to get our tools set up, and an even more generous amount of time to sleep, drink coffee and watch football. Our tools were all run-in-hole today, and I can now look forward to a few days of absolutely no work whatsoever. Everything appears to be roughly on schedule, and if this is the case I can expect to be finished and off the rig in about ten days. Plunged into a Nigeria is the midst of elections.
The elections have been causing a little bit of strife actually; not so much so in Nigeria itself, but a great amount of concern has been shown on the rig because it might affect the helicopters. For at least four days there won’t be any helicopters to and from the rig, but rumours have been abound that this could be as much as fourteen days, and might include all domestic flights. However, most of these rumours have been perpetuated by a pessimistic Canadian (why doesn’t America just swallow up this nation and save everyone a lot of grief?) so I’m not expecting too many problems.
That’s my Easter in Nigeria then, following a Christmas in Nigeria. Truly a festive haven of a nation. I quite want to do something to celebrate this special day, but there’s no hills and, as far as I’ve seen, no chocolate eggs, so I’m just going to chuck some cake down the stairs instead.
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