My 9 Lives in Scientology

The Flagship Apollo

In May, 1973, I left for the Flagship Apollo, "the sanest place on the planet", I had been told many times.  After getting inoculations for smallpox and cholera, I flew to New York City where I was met by someone who told me what my destination was to be: Lisbon, Portugal.  All this secrecy enhanced my sense of adventure and excitement.  In Lisbon, I met someone else, who put me on a plane to Oporto, Portugal.  I was told never to mention Scientology to anyone outside of the ship.  We were to use the official "shore story", which was that we were company executives being trained by a management corporation, called Operation Transport Corp.  ("OTC", which was a Panamanian Corporation), which offered business courses aboard the ship.

I arrived in Oporto in the afternoon and was taken to the ship, which was at anchor at the time.  Upon boarding the ship, someone took my passport away from me, which was to be locked up in a safe that I had no access to.  I was so excited about being on Flag, I didn't even question this action, assuming there must have been a good reason.  There was: taking our passports made it very hard for us to leave, but that was not a reason I thought of at the time.  After a brief medical check, I was given linen and shown to my quarters, which was a dark, dingy room below decks with bunk beds stacked in three tiers.  About 20 women lived in this dormitory, which was very stuffy.  A similar men's dormitory was across the a hall.

By that time, I had been up for more than 24 hours and was fully feeling the effects of jet lag, as well as the cholera shot I had received,so I was in somewhat of a daze.  I vaguely remember asking someone if there were any better accommodations aboard, but of course, there weren't; not for me.  On Flag I wasn't anyone special.  I was an intern training to be a Flag auditor and there were many people aboard the ship who were as or more highly trained than I was.  The only people on the ship who got private cabins were married couples and very high ranking officers, and even those quarters were very small and cramped, with barely enough room in most them for a bed and a small sink.  I resigned myself to the fact that the women's dorm is where I would be living, which was a very noisy place, with 20 people sharing the space.  For some reason, the particular bunk I had was surrounded by wooden boards on three sides, making me feel as if I were enclosed in a coffin.  I was exhausted and was allowed to sleep until noon the next day.  When I awoke, I was very drowsy and disoriented.  For a few horrifying moments, I couldn't find my way out of the bunk and felt as if I were trapped in a coffin.  The dorm was pitch dark.  Finally, I became more fully conscious and found my way out.  In spite of the dingy living quarters, I was very excited to be on Flag.

I was given a briefing in more detail on the shore story we were to tell outsiders.  No one, not even other Scientologists outside of Flag, was to know the location of the ship.  If someone wanted to write to us, they had to write to the address of the liaison office, either in LA or New York and the letters were forwarded to us from these offices.  This meant everyone, including parents.  I'm sure my parents were frantic, not knowing where I was, but I didn't think about that at the time.  My parents seemed very faraway.

I was taken on a brief tour of the ship.  Directly above the dormitories, still below decks was a lounge called the aft lounge (being located in the aft part of the ship).  It was fairly large and during mealtimes, makeshift tables were put between rows of chairs and the lounge was used as a dining room for some of the crew.  I noticed teen-age girls ironing clothes.  These girls would do nothing but iron and wash clothes all day.  Later I found out that they were in training to be personal messengers to LRH.  Once they made it to the position of LRH messenger, these girls were extremely cocky, drunk on the power that LRH gave them.  Some of these girls are now in their late 20s and among the top executives in Scientology today.

Just behind the aft lounge was a room where the chain locker was.  The chain locker is the place where the chain to the anchor of the ship is kept when the ship if not at anchor, a very small dark place.  Many times I saw people being locked up in the chain locker as punishment.  I'll never forget the first time I saw this.  Some messengers had locked up a terrified young teenage boy in the chain locker.  His punishment was to spend the night there.  I didn't know what he was being punished for, but the whole incident made my blood run cold.  I'll never forget the terrified look in that boy's eyes.  Whenever I think about the current leadership of the church, which consists mainly of people who were raised in such an atmosphere, I can only feel pity for these people, who are really just frightened children.  As badly as I felt about what I witnessed, I shut it out of my mind, explaining it away by saying that LRH could not possibly have known about it.