Boat Life
The heavy duties of a captain etc.

Photo: captain, eyes still in rising start up, receives his morning coffee

Sunrise:
If moored: crew jumps off bed, takes toothbrush, goes outside. Look at clouds and wind first, then starts brushing teeth. Put pumps on for bailing, Doi makes captain's wake up coffee. Captain hears coffee machine, waits five minutes then pulls himself upright with half closed eyes and gets his coffee. Philemon starts to brush the entire ship like a horse, whistling and singing. Doi fills a bucket with water and soap, and soaks dirty clothes.
If on travel: crew: checks banana leaf binding of sail, lifts anchors (often with toothbrush in mouth), prepare folmali for lifting. Captain: makes his own coffee, Doi turns the winch lifting the sail, while captain hold the "mains" halyard outside, and shouts SAWA! to Doi when the gaff is up. 

Photo left: Philemon, singing and whistling, cleaning even the stones. For defense we have "soft" stones starboard and the hard ones port. This is, according to Philemon for psychological warfare: when we throw a stone we shout that this is a soft one, and ask whether they would like to receive a hard one. We had no practice yet.
Photo right: pre breakfast frenzy part two: Doi washing, Philemon dissatisfied with anchoring

Sailing:

Philemon is an excellent sailor. He has a good sense for possible chances and dangers considering certain actions. Moreover, he likes to get everything going, tell the boys what to do and how to do it. I could, in principle limit myself to determining the destination. At times when Philemon prefers a different option then me, concerning timing, direction or maneuvering, his option is never unacceptable. If he likes, I let him go his way. Only seldom I see something or have an idea he did not have himself. Usually he is convinced immediately. When not and I insist to do something my way, it is hard to decide who was right, since this is about risks under two options, neither which realize.
There are, however some mzungu gadgets that one feels I should operate: outboard engine, control of the electricity system and batteries, and GPS computer navigation. The latter he only needs outside the Tanzania coast area which is only 40% of Lake Victoria's coast line. On the other 60% of the coast line the computer navigation is ceremonial. I operated the winch for a long time personally, but later Doi applied for the actual turning of the handle and now I am holding the "mains", the line which keeps the over 200 kg gaff&sail up if the winch wire breaks (this actually happened on our way to Majita).
The rest of the captain's task is to keep looking around for possible technical defects and shooting of non standard troubles, though also there, Philemon often is first. This is not to my displeasure. I found that the actual sailing jobs that as a boy I loved to do, like adjusting sails, steering, mooring are boring me quickly. On sail, in the cool periods, early morning and sunset, one finds me on the deck. The rest of the day I am often inside, reading and writing, every now and then coming out for a look, a chat, a change of course or a maneuver.

Photo: work desk with mzungu gadgets, laptop, connected to GPS, showing map with route, current position, distance to target, Estimated Time of Arrival (ETA), speed, etc. (Go To: PrintScreen)

Leisure
Philemon: sleeping, telling stories very elaborately in a theatrical style, playing each role with different voice and gestures appropriate to person and situation, reading lots, among which: Machiavelli, Guide to East Africa, History of Africa, copying data, pictures and maps to teach his children.
Doi: sleeping, Bible (New Testament only, in Swahili), his English exercise books.
Kos: sleeping, Bible (New Testament only, in Swahili)
Captain: sleeping,  Bert Tells What He Reads, Writing greetings-web pages

Photo: temperature experience keeps differing widely among us (left: Kos using my old polo as tent)

Other meals
Crew eats fish and maize porridge only, sometimes with tomatoes. They are cooking in turn. I join the meal symbolically, since they indicate they appreciate that very much. But my staple food is not maize porridge but bread, rice and pasta. Cheese it hard to find except in Jinja, Entebbe, Bukoba and Mwanza. To cover my pasta's I have a box of tin cans.

Public Relations
As reported, we have public relations issues when we moor somewhere longer than one night. Charity and tolerance is, to say the least, not in the African's blood. Suspicions are raised, money is smelled, curiosity peers and indignation (for us not reporting officially and respectfully) threatens . In short: we are a red alert allurement for the African adult male hunter-predator instinct. Crew is in the front line. Tribal solidarity is an important cooler, so at Ukurewe Doi is our man, at Majita: Philemon and at Bumbiri (Dale, mzungu) I am the one. Those are the easy ones. Other places can give more troubles (Rubondo, Kahunda). Here, the greedy "leaders" try to overrule the first line and get at the mzungu. Then I am in the role of important man, laughing relaxed, to show he is not fearing and has the money to get them in jail even for something they've never done, if necessary switch to a good blast (Jinja, Kahunda) then, if totally unavoidable because of both gun presence and threat: pay (Rubondo). Try never to pay: your reputation travels in front of you and you will be a popular attraction and sitting duck for all sorts of officials and "officials"! Our balance up to now is

Go To: Full list of all my standoffs with African officials (juicy for westerners!)
Go To: The standoff language used by expert Africa explorer Henri Morton Stanley (Bumbiri 1875, not less juicy).

Shopping:
Captain: gives money
Crew: going out, buying and bringing to the boat
Everywhere: fresh water (off shore you drink straight from the lake, on approach to shore you fill your jerry cans),
Every village: maize flower, tomatoes, tea, eggs, detergents, soap, matches, cooking oil
Bigger village; on market days smaller village: Bread, Blue Band, soda, beer, kerosene
Towns: milk powder, tin cans, peanut butter, petrol
Towns when you are lucky: roasted whole Coffee beans, cheese
Mwanza only: gas bottles