Funny story;
Back in 1983, in my misspent youth, I was traveling through SE Asia with a Chinese girl from Singapore. We were in our twenties and had no real higher purpose than seeing the world. We were having a grand old time. Well we were nearing the end of our 6 month holiday and decided to take ourselves off to an uninhabited island off the coast of Malaysia.
There were only two or three huts on the island, you had to bring and cook all your own food and arrange a fishing boat to drop you and come back and get you. Once in the bay, you had to jump into the water and carry your goods, over your head style as there wasn’t even a pier. It was very Robinson Crusoe, and we were loving it. There were two other British girls there when we arrived. After about 3 days, and out of seemingly nowhere a motorboat shows up with two guys in it. They tell us they are Captain and first mate of a ship that is currently on the other side of the island, a Malay Navy vessel.
They are pretty happy because they have found 4 foreign young women to hang with and we were happy as they had access to equipment that meant we could go spear fishing and the like. So we spend a few days with them hanging about, we’re all having lots of fun. They spear fish up a ray and cook it up on the beach for us, also a flying fox. Both kind of tasted like chicken really, but I digress.
Now they are never in uniform and we never see any other sailors or anything, just these two in their motorboat. Still, they were nothing but sweet and kind to us, we enjoyed their company and they ours. It didn’t hurt that my friend spoke fluent Malay.
Finally the day comes when we have to think about getting back to the mainland, having just enough funds, at this point to take the bus back to Singapore. At which point they say, “Don’t take the bus, come with us we’re headed down the coast as far as Pulau Tioman, we can drop you there.” This is a great plan for us, we’ll save enough money to spend a few days on that island so we say, “Sure”. 
Next morning, 6 am sharp, as directed, we’re at the beach, and here comes the powerboat, apparently the bay isn’t deep enough for their big ship. Once out of the bay I am astounded at the size of the big steel ship that is waiting for us there. It had 90 some sailors on board and for the first time we see the two of them in their uniforms.
So now they have 4 girls on board their boat, which, I’m pretty sure isn’t standard procedure. I have no familiarity with things naval or boaty so I am way out of my element. For one thing, I keep calling it a boat. :smack: It’s not, it’s a ship (as it was explained to me, ships have life ‘boats’ on board, boats have lifevests). We have free run of this ship and are, as you might imagine, warmly welcomed by the crew, being special guests of the Captain and First mate. They are anxious to show us all around, and there was a lot to see. (Had a lovely luncheon of fresh crab, liberated from the closest fishing boat, in the Officers mess, played cards and napped.)
I was astounded to see huge mounted guns, not unlike the ones that have been linked to in design, only smaller on each side of the ship. They turned 360 degrees and had these cool rails to step up on, and very powerful sights. Equally cool was the, (I’ve forgotten the word now), steering room, tons of radars and night vision stuff, all of it the latest and coolest stuff. It was very interesting. When I asked what the big guns were for and was told “Pirates”, I almost laughed out loud. Alone with my friend, I questioned that there were really any pirates. She assured me that this part of the world did, indeed, have pirates and not that ‘Ho Ho Ho and bottle of rum type’ either. I was still skeptical.
Later, when we were back in Singapore, sure enough, all over the news, brazen pirates had come up on the beach and robbed people who were camping out at an east coast park site. :eek:
When I returned home and tried to tell my friends, in the west about it, they howled with laughter and flat out refused to believe there were pirates. :dubious: