David White – Slept in, so late to swimming class, forced to jump off top board

One day I was adrift, that’s a Navy word for late, er, slept in because … that’s the other thing is they imparted on you this real sense of responsibility, it’s your duty to get there. Your mum’s not there to wake you up, or “Come on dear, out of bed”, you know you have to be there, it’s your duty to be there and you arrange for a shake and… 

Simon:  A shake is someone waking you up? 

Someone waking you up, so a Sentry will come in, he’s got a big clipboard of all the people he needs to shake and he shakes you. “Sign out”, you sign out and he’s gone if you just do that, you’re back to sleep so the onus is on you.

So I rocked up late and the Instructor says, “Where you been?” I said, “It’s not my fault” I said, “I slept in.” “Laddie” he said, “Everything’s your fault.” He said, “If the Mess had fallen upon your head, still your fault, because it’s not my fault, that means by definition it’s your fault. Top board.”

And I said, “What do you mean?” and he said, “Up you go, top board, jump off.” I said, “I can’t swim!” He said, “It wouldn’t be a punishment if you could swim would it!” And I crapped myself, you can edit that out. 

Simon:  No I’m sure you did. 

But I never … so I’m stood on the ladder and I eventually got up there and I’m thinking ‘He won’t make me do this, I’ll drown’ you know because you know, when you’re at the top board, and Ganges had this huge Olympic size pool, I mean it must have been 20 feet, I’m thinking, but you don’t see the top of the board, you see the bottom and it looks miles down so I’m stood there and I said, “I can’t do it.”

He said, “If I come up there…” he said, “You will go down head first.” I said, “No I can’t do it” and he put one foot on the ladder and I… like a sack of shit you know, fell into the water. So, I’m there and I’m [sounds of spluttering] and he’s got this pole and he’s holding it just out of my reach and I’m [noises of trying to reach] and eventually I hit the side and he said, “You told me you couldn’t swim lad.”

He said, “Well you can now” And I think a week later I passed my test, and the test was, you know, to don a pair of overalls, swim two lengths of the baths and then tread water for two minutes so simulate a ship sinking and you’ve got to stay afloat, swim away from the ship and then stay afloat long enough to get picked up by a raft or a boat or something. And oh, passing that test, you now can stay in bed ‘til quarter to seven, and you can be first for breakfast.