Vomit Comet

There are many slang terms for the word "vomit", such as "puke" and "spew". Some of these are distinctly regional - where I'm from, we say "boke". In South Africa, the relevant term is "kotch".

Today, for the first time in well over a year, I kotched while at sea.

I had foolishly agreed to go out with Shaun and a couple of the other students, Evan and Alex, to take some more sun sights for the Ocean Yachtmaster exam. These have to be done out of sight of land, so the plan was to get on the boat at 5am and head directly offshore. The forecast was for a benign fifteen knots of breeze. The intention was to take it easy and perhaps do some fishing.

It was not to be. The breeze built fairly quickly, so that before long we were on a close reach with two reefs and our number 3 jib. The wind wasn't actually too bad, maxing at about 25 knots (Force 6, disparagingly known to salty sea dogs as a "yachtsman's gale"), but the sea state was a mess. We got hit by two proper greenies, one of which lifted me right up in the air before plonking me rudely back on the deck. (For those not familiar with the term, a "greenie" is the sort of wave that makes the whole world go momentarily green as you get completely immersed in water.)

All of this was most distressing, as I have long ago committed myself to a more gentlemanly kind of sailing, which mostly involves loafing around the yacht club bar in a blue blazer, loudly expounding my views on capital punishment and slurping large pink gins. Nonetheless, today I found myself in the sadly familiar position of struggling to hank on a headsail at the wet end of a wet boat on a very wet day.

I suppose things weren't helped by the fact that the L34 is nowhere near as stable a platform as good old Cardiff. It's half the size for a start, and it's really a very light (though sturdy) race boat. It all gets very bouncy.

As did the contents of my stomach. Deviating from the usual script, I was more or less fine as we headed upwind, and only started to turn seriously green when we bore away back home. As always, however, it's better out than in, and the world was a happier place after I fed the fish. It wasn't too embarassing: a couple of the other guys were also sick.

Perhaps it was nerves. My exams are confirmed for next week. Theory on Monday, practical prep on Tuesday and Wednesday, and then a monster twelve hour practical test including night sailing on Thursday. The Ocean exam (incorporating the celestial navigation) is on Friday. It's going to be in Cape Town and Langebaan (about sixty miles north of there) as Durban is not an approved RYA exam centre, so I am catching a flight on Monday.

Obviously, you think, I will be feverishly poring over my books, polishing up on my COLREGS, GMDSS, MARPOL and all the other acronyms that infest sailing these days. No, I won't actually. The good people of Professional Yachtmaster Training have invited me to their Christmas do, which is a weekend camping in Rocky Bay, south of Durban. I believe the plan is to drink beer, burn the flesh of dead animals, and talk rubbish. I suspect it will be a lot better than most office parties I have attended.

So the plan for the next week is to party, and do exams. I feel like a proper student again. Next, I'll be collecting for Rag Week and going to Socialist Worker demos.

Except I won't. Next, I'll be packing up my kit and heading back to the UK. I have come to a momentous decision in the last couple of weeks: I'm heading back to Real Life. It's not really a financial decision, more that I don't want sailing to be a job. I would rather have it as something to look forward to.

So I will be in the job market next year. I won't be going back to the markets, as I have that t-shirt already, but given my skills, abilities and experience I do expect I will be settling into an office job sometime in the next few months.

Yuk. I need to kotch again.