Seasickness and sunburn. Elderly Americans. Lusty sailors. My medical friends did their best to dissuade me. The general consensus was that running away to sea would ruin my career. But in 1996, after five sleep-deprived years working as a junior doctor in Britain’s National Health Service, I was willing to take the risk, justifying it as the gap year I’d never had. Hungry for adventure, I boarded a bright white ship at the dockside in Singapore. With 2000 passengers and crew, she was the size of a small town. A behemoth. I was willing to take the risk when I quit my job, justifying it as the gap year I’d never had. Credit:Stocksy To my relief, the hospital was well equipped with an X-ray machine, blood analyser and even an anaesthetic machine. More worryingly, it also had its own morgue, which I was reassured doubled as a handy champagne […]