Marty Machado writes about and photographs the last leg of a 6-month stay working as deckhand (and often pulling the 12am to 4am watch) aboard a container ship

WE WERE APPROACHING Dubai on the third of three 57-day trips from New York to Singapore and back. In typical shipping industry fashion there was a drastic change of plans at the last minute, and it was decided to send the ship through the dry docks in Singapore.

Unfortunately, I was not going to be home for the holidays as planned, and my stay on board would now exceed six months. However, I was going to get to spend two full weeks in Singapore, after which our ship would start a Pacific run, hitting several new Asian ports and eventually sailing back under Golden Gate into my home port of San Francisco.