Living the Dream: Surviving a live-aboard job
Posted By Vladimir Soto on 27 December 2005
Hey, who am I to burst that bubble, but in my experience it would have been easier to come across my own wonder woman should I have trekked solo and blindfolded throughout the Antarctic guided by a pack of Chihuahuas in wooly sweaters. No, no, I'm not jaded. I actually enjoyed my live-aboard jobs. I even got to love them. But after the initial butterflies and background-playing violins subside, any love affair requires much work and effort. This one is no different. Besides, even paradise has an entry fee. So what could you expect? The boat's your world. Your only world.
Like any resort out there, live-aboards come in all kinds and levels of luxury. You have the many-star kind with swanky and lush Hugh-Hefner-like robes (with the mandatory note warning you'll become fish food pâté should you even think of putting them into your suitcase on your way back home) to some that resemble hard core survival camping retreats especially designed for law-troubled young adults. I was lucky enough to be employed by companies with vessels that could roughly subscribe to the first category, and have only heard first person accounts of what it is like to work (read serve hard time) on the last-mentioned category. Your own accommodation, food, work environment and your lifestyle in general will vary greatly according to the boat you're in. The nicer the boat, the nicer the overall amenities that will be part of your daily living. For example, aluminum boats generally require less maintenance than steel boats. I worked on both kinds. Life on the steel boat was framed by menial, monotonous tasks the maintenance of the boat demanded, like de-rusting, etc. I don't mind hard work, but when most of that hard work has little to do with diving, dive teaching or learning something new, the experience looses some appeal. If you're thinking of applying for one of these jobs do a bit of research. Perhaps you couldn't care less if you camp out at sea and take on the role of underpaid and overworked camp counselor as long as you get to dive every now and then.
Every boat out there is different, and each will be a different experience to work on. Not that you might get a much of a choice, but that's another story. If you do care about the quality of life aboard the boat beware of misleading placement advise from those dive instructor farms. You know the ones, you've seen their ads thrice the times you've paged through a dive magazine. They usually care more about the upkeep of their placement numbers, not how swell of an experience you'll end up having on the rust bucket job they just placed you at. Know what you're getting into by knowing the boat you'll be getting on. But you're a "Dive Instructor". Aha! That's really the first catch. If you want to work on a live-aboard, doing for a living what you're passionately addicted to anyway, that's one kind of baggage you will have to leave behind, the "That'll be Mr. (or Mrs.) Instructor to you" kind of attitude. There are only two important kinds of people on a boat. The captain and the guest you are serving with an ever-present smile. I'll talk more about these in a bit, but the important take away is that being a dive instructor, heck, even a course director, is not going to make you very special on a boat.
Running a boat is hard work and the people doing the work are not many. The responsibilities need to be shared. Anybody that's part of the crew will be expected to lend a hand on all boat-running activities, so if you don't have any boating skills you really should look into acquiring some solid ones before you get jumpy to jump aboard. Know at least a couple knots, including a bowline. Even some basic boat mechanics will be helpful. Anything that needs to be done on board will make a guest appearance on your job description; from serving tables to washing dishes to painting decks. But don't worry. You'll still get a chance to be a super hero. Just this time your logo won't be that of a spiffy dive Meister all the time. You should see how thankful and admiring a guest is when you're the one fixing the plugged toilet at 3 am. Donde manda capitan no gobierna marinero. That's a well-known expression in Spanish that roughly translates as "wherever the captain reigns the sailor has no say". Think fascist, authoritarian rule. That's the kind of supreme sovereignty your captain will have. This means a couple of things. One, whatever tone the captain sets for the environment on the boat, that's what will be. Two, there's little you can do about it. Getting along with people is probably as important to this kind of job as knowing how to swim is. If the social skills required to work on a live-aboard were an extreme sport, it'd be 'no-wetsuit shark hugging'.
- Bookmark with :
- what are these?
