The Floating Prison

I was half-watching one of those typical submarine movies, with the snappily dressed sailor actors clipping out their nautical lines to each other -- the incessant blip-blip sound in the background lest you forget they are meant to be in a submarine.
I was actually looking at the grey painted metallic equipment and fixtures, and remembering the day I truly felt I had experienced what it would be like to be in the bottom of an empty oil can.

I was on a study trip with a mottled bunch of Parliamentarians, who had arranged a tour of a floating prison a few miles off the coast of New York City. Well, I had arranged it in my capacity as coordinator, secretary and anything - else - they - needed person for this widely representative delegation from the National Committee of Correctional Services.
Someone, in his wisdom, had decided that this may indeed be an option or solution to South Africa's growing prison population, despite the fact that this floating prison was vacant, and was vaguely dismissed by our American hosts as a failed experiment.

Nevertheless, my team was adamant and enthusiastic.
We were duly collected by a squat correctional services vehicle, zigzagged across the city, and deposited on a ferry to the ship. Apparently, this enormous ship had been used as a maximum security prison, and had moved from place to place. More than this was difficult to ascertain. Our hosts were certainly perplexed by our visit, vague in their replies, but polite and overtly enthusiastic about lunch that would be served on the ship.

First, the tour.
It was all gray metal, firmly welded in place. It smelt oily, dead, and very empty.
Oddly enough, everything was spotless. The stainless steel surfaces gleamed and the air was clear and dust-free. We rattled through the bowels of the ship, carefully noting the gates, bars, tiny portholes, and gray, gray, gray.
Our awkward hosts could not seem to tell us why the project had failed, what had happened, who had been outraged by this notion, who had escaped or died. Nothing. Only carefully chosen empty, political words, bandied between two teams of professionals.

And then the much hyped meal. The smiling American team shuffled along gray metal benches, facing the black, white and brown faces of the newly minted members of Parliament. Colorful plates of Southern food appeared and it was good. I had not seen a kitchen pan heating up for frying, heard or smelt any cooking. So, I put on a polite face and ate with grace.

The trip back to Manhattan was brisk and efficient. I wrote a brief report, and it seems that the concept fizzled.
I never heard it mentioned in those corridors again, yet I distinctly remember walking around in the bottom of an empty oil can --particularly when there's nothing on but complicated war movies, late on a Tuesday evening.