STANVAC TALES

m.t. “Stanvac Djirak” - SVTM

Our fleet comprises nine ships, kasihan

And the “Mambang” is the tenth, oh kasihan.

Near Saja you’ll run into this lot

Guaranteed seven out of the nine

Chorus.

Signed up with Stanvac, kasihan

Oh kasihan Tuan, kasihan Tuan.

Signed up with Stanvac, kasihan.

(Popular ditty 1950 – 1960)

The Nederlandse Koloniale Petroleum Maatschappij lost all its ships during the Second World War conflict in Indonesia and the Pacific.

To replace the lost fleet the company procured in 1947 four tankers of 4,000 ton DW of the type T1-M-BT2 in the US of A. They were given the names of the tankers lost, i.e. “Benakat “, “Djirak”, “Pendopo” and “Talang Akar”. When the company changed its name in June 1947 to Standard Vacuum Tankvaart Maatschappij (SVTM) the four T1-M-BT2 tankers received the prefix “Stanvac” to their names.

In 1948 two smaller tankers of the type T1-M-A2, each measuring 1,500-ton DW were purchased. They were named “Stanvac Selo” and “Stanvac Ogan”.

Since 1948 Van Uden Shipping Company in Rotterdam also had three tankers of the T1-M-BT2 type operating in Indonesian waters in permanent charter to SVTM. These tankers were named “Tankhaven 1”, “Tankhaven 2” and “Tankhaven 3”.

The “Mambang” was a small motor lighter, built in Australia in 1947, which served mainly on the rivers in Sumatra.

That accounts for the number of nine ships and the “Mambang” mentioned in the ditty.

Saja was a small hilly island just before you entered the Banka Straits, on the port side when coming from Tandjung Uban, the tank installation of Stanvac on the Indonesian island of Bintang near Singapore.

The ditty was right, it was nothing unusual to see most of the fleet near Saja, either coming from the Stanvac refinery in Sungei Gerong, or returning to Sungei Gerong from wherever they had been discharging their cargos in the Far East.

The “Stanvac Djirak”, the ship I served on from May 1953 till April 1955, carried aviation fuel. From the refinery in Sungei Gerong to different destinations all over the place, sometimes short runs between the refinery to the tank installation in Tg. Uban and other times longer runs to ports in Vietnam, then called French Indo China, and Thailand. During my time the ship never called into other ports in Indonesia such as Tg. Priok, Surabaya or Macassar, but would call regularly into Singapore for stores or repairs in dry-dock.

Radio operators on most of the Dutch ships worked for Radio Holland as their principal employer, Radio Holland provided equipment, personnel and services to the shipping companies; in other words we were hirelings!

That sounds demeaning but in reality most radio operators felt that they belonged to the shipping company they sailed with and quite often stayed with the same company for years.

Being a “hireling” had other advantages; you were not locked into a particular company; once you had a few years seniority up you could indicate to RH the type of ships you preferred and which part of the world you wanted to sail in.

SVTM was unique in that their officers’ salaries were paid in US dollars and that no taxes, Dutch or Indonesian, had to be paid. Not that getting paid in US dollars made any difference to the radio operators, we were still on Radio Holland’s tropical pay scales, but we did not pay taxes either. For that we were the envy of the rest of the RH radio operators serving.

Apart from a tanker allowance I also received a US$45 monthly allowance for looking after the catering on board. Normally that job was the responsibility of the third or second mate, but sometimes the captain would ask the sparks if he would like to do that.

Since there was very little radio traffic on these tankers - only ETA telegrams to the agents and the odd telegram to SVTM headquarters in Sg. Gerong - I had plenty of time to do extra work. It involved checking on food and other stores as required by the Chinese Chief Steward, preparing stock and procurement lists and eventually victualling through a ship chandler.

By the way, deck, engine and cabin crew on the tankers were Chinese but the members of each department came from different parts of China.

Provisioning in Singapore was the big thing! Not only did we get our ship’s stores and fresh food on board but also duty free stores. And duty free stores meant only one thing to the crew – cigarettes!

On every one of the tankers cigarettes were smuggled into Indonesia and French Indo China without too many problems.

In Sungei Gerong they had the operation down to a fine art; before crossing the bar in the Musi River cases full of cartons were wrapped in oilcloth ready to be dumped at a predetermined location on the river at night where the small fishing boats were waiting.

We never used a pilot to navigate the Musi and Customs would only come on board in Sungei Gerong after we tied up, as far as the crew were concerned we had no officials on board to check on them and nobody was the wiser!

Of course the officers knew what was going on but the crew were discreet and never got into trouble, obviously there must have been a bit of palm greasing with the Customs in Sungei Gerong.

Don’t think for one moment that we, the junior officers, did not have our share of smuggling cigarettes. Our big deal was the port of Haiphong in the North of what is now Vietnam.

We bought our cigarettes in Singapore duty free and waited till we arrived in Haiphong; Haiphong was a war zone and there were no Customs anywhere to be seen, flogging our cigarettes to the French Legionnaires was no problem.

Going ashore in Haiphong was a problem because the Stanvac oil jetty was a long way from the city and it became no man’s land at night. The French troops returned to their fortresses in the late afternoon and closed all roads until the next morning; we thought it safer to spend the night in Haiphong than hang around a tanker half loaded with aviation gas in striking distance of any Vietcong mortar or cannon.

Going out in Haiphong was cheap and we enjoyed our shore leave there, still, Saigon was a lot better. We always saved our ill-gotten gains to spend big in Saigon; the city was not called “Paris of the East” for nothing!

The entertainment was fantastic, plenty of places to go to. We had made good friends with a pair of French females serving in the army and when we arrived in Saigon they were too happy to share a good time with us.

We bought many bottles of French cognac and liqueur cheaply to be consumed on board later; also Hi-Fi equipment and good fashionable clothes cheaper than in Singapore. Yes, Vietnam was a popular run in spite of the dangers involved.

Another example of penny-pinching mentality of the Dutch shipping companies was the refusal to pay a War Zone Danger Allowance in Vietnamese ports. After a year or more of arguing, they (SVTM and Shell) finally agreed to pay an allowance of 50% of the salary with a minimum of 5 days starting from June 15^th 1954 till July 28^th 1954, the date when the French and the Vietcong signed their armistice. A lousy period of 6 weeks, hardly worth the effort that went into fighting for an allowance!

Life on board was pretty good. I can’t remember ever hearing complaints about the food; however, the accommodation was Spartan, typical of the US mass-produced ships during WW2. Everything was made of steel and in port the heat in the cabins was oppressive, especially when you had to keep the porthole and doors closed. Only an electric fan on the wall and a gulang in bed gave some comfort. (A gulang is a long pillow used to put a leg over – also known as “Dutch Wife”!!!).

Even at sea the bridge, the chart room and the radio room were very hot. All decks were steel and painted in a browny, red colour like the boot top on the hull. The deck above the bridge was also painted in this colour, the dark paint absorbed the heat and in combination with the un-insulated steel structure the top accommodation turned into an oven. I had asked the captain if we could paint the deck above with a silver paint that would reflect some of the heat; at first he was reluctant because he did not want to change the company colour standards but he relented and let us do that. The result was remarkable!! From memory we measured a difference of some 5 to 6 degrees Centigrade before and after!

Talking about company colours. We had an old bicycle on board, left there by a previous deck officer who used it to ride up and down the long jetty in Tg. Uban between the ship and the office ashore. So, the ship inherited the bike and I used it and also looked after it. The old bike had been neglected over the years and it was decided to give her an overhaul. The engineers took her to bits and put it together again and my task was to repaint the frame and the wheels. Easier said than done, there was no bicycle lacquer on board to do the job properly and the only paint available was in the different company colours - grey, white, yellow and red. We got to work on the bike and the result was superb; you should have seen the faces of the guys in the Marine Superintendent’s office in Sg. Gerong when I peddled past the office on my bike done in company colours!

Tandjung Uban is situated on the Indonesian island of Bintang in the Riou Straits some 150 km as the crow flies from Singapore. Stanvac has a large tank installation for storing refined products and distributes these products from there.

The establishment was small and for the recreation of local staff and the officers of the ships in port there was a small clubhouse and tennis court.

The loading and unloading from the ships took place via pipelines on long jetties quite a distance away from the marine office and the club.

Having the bicycle as a means of transport for the short run to and from the marine office or the club was handy, going sightseeing on a pushbike was an other matter.

Bintang is an exporter of bauxite; Kidjang is the port where bauxite was loaded on cargo ships. (I did go back to Bintang once in 1956 on the “Tjibantjet” to take bauxite back to Japan.)

There were no made roads in those days and to explore the countryside I borrowed a Jeep from Mr. Oei, one of the office managers. The roads were graded gravel roads and the gravel was pure bauxite, OK for travelling on in a Jeep but no good for anything else as I found out later.

The gear lever in Mr. Oei’s Jeep was a bit stiff and I managed to break the stick, getting back to base in first gear was a job and a half and Mr. Oei’s displeasure was considerable.

However, next time back in Tg. Uban I conned him into letting me use his motor scooter. I set out on my trip into the country on the scooter and it felt great with the wind cooling me and to watch the countryside glide by.

It had been raining in the early morning and there were still puddles on the gravel road. Where parts of the road had started to dry up the bauxite formed a sludge, which was very slippery; because of the small diameter wheels on the scooter there was insufficient grip on the slippery road and when I took a sharp turn I came off the scooter with an almighty crash. I badly skinned my knees and both hands and because of the bauxite all parts got badly infected. As a result I had to go to the hospital in Sg. Gerong to get fixed up and suffer for a couple of days. Mr. Oei’s scooter did not have a scratch on it.

He was a funny guy this Mr. Oei, a bachelor who used to go to Singapore for R & R regularly and sow some wild oats I assume. Whilst in Singapore he would always buy a big bottle of duty free Channel No.5 perfume, which he used to sprinkle on his bed at night.

“To keep the memory alive” - according to him.

There were a few more eccentrics on those tankers that I have met or heard of in my time.

One captain, I shall call him Captain Frugal, was a strange man to start off with. He did not mingle with his officers and he was miserly. Much to the malign of his deck officers he used to keep chickens on the flying bridge that created a mess and stank. It was the duty of the Chief or second to collect the eggs in the morning. In all fairness to the man, he let the officers have the eggs for breakfast.

One day in port he was leaning over the railing and noticed that someone amidships had been to the toilet and had flushed his business. In those days we had no holding tanks or septic systems, everything went over the side at sea or in port, regardless.

After observing what came out of the sea outlet Captain Frugal ran inside to find out who had used the toilet. When he found the culprit he went into a tirade accusing him of wasting company money; the poor guy wanted to know what this was all about and was then told that he had used 7 pieces of paper and that such wastage could not be tolerated!

One deck officer, who was also heavily involved in smuggling cigarettes into Sg. Gerong, obviously made a packet from his illegal activities. The brand of cigarettes popular at the time in Indonesia was called Marvel and it was well known that this gentleman had a house built for his parents in Holland called “Huize Marvel”!

He also had another reputation. Apparently he was well endowed and he invited others to come and watch him through the porthole perform on the girls who used to come on board in Bangkok. I don’t know if he charged for the show!

The ship made regular trips to Thailand, mainly to Bangkok and occasionally to Sattahip, the naval base of Thailand.

As you old salts well know Bangkok is famous for the girls who come on board to make the lonely hearts on board happy and at the same time make a quid. There was definitely class distinction; there was the Golden Team, another team that arrived per sampan and the individual entrepreneurs who came up the gangway and bribed their way past the Immigration officials.

Captains have tried to stop these invasions but to no avail, as soon as they were sent off the ships they re-appeared again. Therefore it had become an accepted fact they were on board till the ship sailed again.

My first trip, after signing on in Sg. Gerong following a year on the Musi River on Shell tankers, was to Bangkok. All the talk in the mess room was about the girls in Bangkok suggesting to me that this would be a good opportunity to get the accumulated dirty water of one year off my chest.

All this wink wink, nudge nudge made me nervous and I did not really look forward to Bangkok and its promises.

When we arrived in Bangkok everything happened exactly the way it was explained to me, the girls arrived and made themselves comfortable. I got introduced to them and could not believe my eyes, yes, they were beautiful!

Nothing sleazy about them, nicely dressed, well spoken and so sweet.

Well, you can guess what happened and I was a very happy boy after that!

On one of the trips to Bangkok I stood outside the mess room on the aft deck talking to our Chief Engineer, a veteran of the war in the Pacific whose ship had been torpedoed by a Jap submarine and narrowly escaped being beheaded when the Japs picked them up.

An old woman was peddling the boat and as she came closer to the ship I noticed what I though was cooling water coming out of a pipe. I could not see or hear an engine and I remarked about it to the Chief who burst out laughing. “Have another look Sparks, where does the pipe go to?”

The pipe was a hollow bamboo stick that disappeared up the old woman’s trouser leg! The Chief explained that there is a mouthpiece on the other end of the bamboo pipe and that women on the sampans use that to pass water instead of getting up and squatting over the side.

Clever technology eh?

Other strange things happened on that ship that I had never heard of or had seen before. I always believed that one should never run a ship aground unless it was an emergency. Not so in one of the ports in Vietnam, either Nathrang or Haiphong.

We entered the river half loaded and high on the water. As we got to the oil terminal and wharf the banks of the river were very close, too close to turn around I thought. But there was Captain Harry, cool as a cucumber on the wing of the bridge, “Hard a port, slow speed ahead” straight into the mud and the bank. We slid into place and came to a halt. “Full speed astern, hard starboard” and out she came, facing the other way and Captain Harry brought her alongside without blinking an eyelid!

I always believed that when people died on board they had to be buried at sea. Not on our ship! An engineman died of unknown courses and he was put in the cool room waiting to be taken ashore in Singapore.

On board we had an honour system where at the end of the month the Chief Steward would let you know how many bottles of beer you had consumed. The beer was kept in the cool room and as you took out what you needed you ticked it off on the Chief Steward’s sheet of paper.

We were having a drink in the mess room and this time it was the turn of one of the junior engineers to shout, he went, only to return a minute later looking as white as a sheet.

“That Chinaman is still alive, I heard him rattle!”

What happened is that gasses built up inside the body and eventually escaped; there was no doubt that our man was dead but the junior will never forget his experience.

Singapore has always been my favourite city and I have spent a lot of time there. Even now my wife and I love going back there, it is clean safe and full of excitement!

The ship had to go through a major survey and it was found that a number of plates inside the tanks had to be replaced. Also there was damage to some of the hull plates, all in all it meant we had to spend nearly six weeks in dry dock in Singapore.

There is very little to do for a radio operator in dry-dock and I had plenty of time during the day to explore the city, the island and even go as far as Kuala Lumpur on the train.

In those days we had all the different “Worlds” where you could go for entertainment. Just to name a few, Happy World, New World, etc.

Dancing has always been my favourite pastime and you could go wild doing just that in Singapore. Being regulars at the “World” dance halls we did not have to pay the taxi girls because we were the ones that could jive, jitterbug and swing. From them we learned the rumba, cha cha and whatever else was exotic at the time. A great time, the girls did not worry, they had a ball too!

I had extended my time to serve in the Far East to three years but the time had come to find my way back to Radio Holland and Tandjung Priok in order to be repatriated to Holland. I wanted to be back in time for my parent’s 25^th wedding anniversary. I made it just in time but how that all came to be is another story.

I signed off in Sg. Gerong on the 16^th of April 1955, got a temporary transfer to the “Saroena” and then transferred to m.s “Agatha” to return to Tg. Priok where I picked up the “Oranje” again and returned home on her as 3^rd operator.

John Papenhuyzen

July 2005

Acknowledgement:

Photo of “Stanvac Djirak” and Ships’ details from History of the NKPM – http://www.aukevisser.nl/nkpm/index.htm

Maps by Multimap.com - http://www.multimap.com.au