Entertaining yarn of a life at sea
HANS Kilian, 77, worked for many years as a deckhand, mate and coxswain (skipper) around the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town. There were good times and bad times.
In
he relates his affinity to the ocean and countless experiences with people he encountered in an autobiography that smacks of a life as restless as the surging sea.
The book also describes the expansion of the Waterfront – a micro-image of growth in urban South Africa.
Several significant other “water denizens” speak highly of the all-rounder, and Kilian modestly thanks all those who believed in him and helped him to realise his passion.
Having been around water and boats myself, I found Kilian’s bobbing lifestyle, his struggle to make ends meet, his need to work in IT to survive, his wonderful wife Margie (married 49 years), who has stood beside him through wet and dry, the incredible bravery of the NSRI, with which he found his sea legs once when “lost at sea and feared drowned”, and the different boats and places to which he sailed, fascinating.
He received many awards for rescues carried out in violent seas – the Cape of Storms favours none.
Born in Worcester, Kilian and his parents eventually moved to Maynard Street where, unfortunately, internecine strife made matters difficult.
But the young Killian was a determined child and won bursaries for excellent studies, culminating in a first-class matric. National service in the air force eventually ended and his passion for the sea took hold.
Hans Kilian is an independent author and attends meetings of the West Coast Writers’ Circle.
This, his first effort at self-publishing, is an entertaining read.