Church's Diary IV

It's been four days since we left Port Fitzroy, and the originally expected six-day voyage may have been delayed to eight days to reach its destination due to some rough seas. However, the most headache in the past two days is not the wind and waves, but the seasickness of many people involved in the scientific expedition.

The Discovery carried a total of 73 people, including sailors and oceanographic scientists who have been at sea for many years, as well as 27 scientists who participated in the ocean-going expedition for the first time, including six very important people, including Mr. Stephen Robbins and Mrs. Larry.

For people who don't go to sea often, seasickness is normal, and it is not normal if you don't get seasick, even if you are an old sailor who has been at sea for more than ten years, there are times when you get seasick. However, if a lot of people get seasick, it's always a hassle to take care of. From the second day of departure to today, more than 30 people have developed symptoms of seasickness, some have recovered, but more than 10 people are not in good condition, especially Lady Larry and Miss Alice.

When we first left Port Fitzroy, we were probably still in the excitement of seeing a rare snowfall at sea, and everyone was in a good state of mind. But in the evening, Miss Alice became unwell. She first said she was dizzy and couldn't eat dinner, and then started vomiting again after returning to the cabin to rest.

Alice was originally to assist and care for Mrs. Larry as Lady Larry's assistant. But now, because there were only two ladies on board, Mrs. Larry had to take care of her in turn. And the most critical problem is that Mrs. Larry is also seasick.

I've always wondered why these people who haven't experienced the storms at sea should be allowed to participate in ocean-going archaeology, and if they didn't have a better choice when it came to selecting people?

Mr. Robbins defended Mrs. Larry, who is the world's best archaeologist and philologist, and the most authoritative expert on ancient Egyptian culture and pyramids, and we need her for this expedition. Mrs. Larry travels between the Sahara Desert and the various ruins of ancient civilizations on the continent all year round, and rarely takes a boat, so seasickness is inevitable.

If the need for an archaeologist is a no-brainer, then I wonder why a marine expedition needs a pyramid expert who is well versed in ancient Egyptian culture. The pyramids are in the desert on the banks of the Nile River far away, and we are on the vast sea on the other side of the world.

Robbins later explained my suspicions to me, and during this time my sailors and I got acquainted with the seasick scientists while they were tending to them, and heard them tell me that about seven hundred nautical miles north of Ghost Island, where we were going, the remains of an ancient structure with an upside-down pyramid were found at the bottom of the sea.

I don't quite understand how the upside-down pyramids were built, maybe they have nothing to do with the tombs of the ancient Egyptian pharaohs, but just the work of nature! So I didn't really care about it, but I'll know when I got there. I am most worried about their health, although seasickness is not a disease, but if it is severe, dehydration, shock and even death can occur.

The others were fine, after all, it was easier to take care of, and the only headaches were Lady Larry and her assistant, Miss Alice. And this Mrs. Larry is so stubborn that men are not allowed to enter their boudoirs, and there is nothing we can do about it except to bring them food and medicine.

Mrs. Larry is notoriously old-fashioned and stubborn. She was German, oh probably from Finn and later married to Germany. Her full name is Larry Jaeger. We were supposed to call her Mrs. Jaeger, but she didn't like her husband's family name and was not allowed to call her Mrs. Jaeger. She was a very serious and difficult person to get close to, and if she were called Mrs. Jaeger, her face would surely become as ugly as rust on an old anchor. I heard that because of this, she and her husband did not speak for three years. I don't know if that's true, but I think she probably didn't like Germany and German names, not her husband.

Alice is a lively and lovely girl, and everyone on the ship loves to talk to her. Alice was very smiling, she had two shallow dimples when she laughed, and I heard that she had a little bit of Eskimo blood, but only a little, and judging by her appearance, she was a true Europa.

But now, both of them were lying in the cabin like sick people, unable to get up, and the man was not allowed to go in and take care of them. We had to knock on their doors while it was time for dinner, and Mrs. Larry would drag her heavy body to open the door, take the food and medicine from us with great difficulty, and hand us the garbage bags full of their vomit. At that time, the serious Mrs. Larry would also have a deep apology on her face. Sometimes I say, I'm sorry for the trouble I caused you.

My crew is always smiling and having fun. People who have weathered the storm at sea will not care about this trouble at all, nor will they intrigue like the old ladies and gentlemen who live comfortably on the shore. In the sailor's philosophy of survival, unity is paramount, and if we do not work together, we cannot face the unforgiving winds and waves of the sea. For the sea, life is just a dispensable wave, no matter how many people, how beautiful a girl, how valuable, how powerful a person you carry on your ship, Poseidon does not care!

Anderson fished two KAA fish and asked the chef to cook the soup for Alice and the others. When I say that we want to eat fish, we have a lot of it in the cold storage, and the meat of KAA is rough and hard, and it takes a lot of condiments to remove its fishy smell, and even the Maori who like to eat KAA do not think this fish is delicious, but only because it is easy to catch and can be eaten in place of red meat to a certain extent.

Anderson said that KAA can replenish the body water and nutrients lost due to vomiting, and cited a strange Eastern philosophical theory, saying that salmon frozen in cold storage lives in the cold zone in the north, so the fish meat is also very cold, and it is good to eat it with heavy mustard or chili peppers, while seasick people are weak and their spleen and stomach are not suitable for eating such cold things, and they cannot eat mustard and chili peppers.

I'm curious to see when this guy learned these strange theories, and seeing that he only knows how to fish all day long, can he sit quietly and fish to communicate with the souls of the ancient Eastern philosophers? His theories were unreliable not only to me, but also to the rest of the crew, except that Mr. Robbins thought it was okay to try it, and that he was going to make it for Mrs. Larry and Alice alone, and the ingredients in the cabin didn't seem to whet their appetites.

Don't say it, after the KAA fish soup was ready for them to serve, they actually ate it and didn't spit it out. I mean, they didn't throw up again from afternoon to night, and it's a miracle that Mrs. Larry came out in the evening to talk to Mr. Robbins for a while!