Humans of the Sea

By Uloop Guest Writer on August 3, 2015

All of our campuses have environmental groups that focus on the world’s oceans and the worsening state of marine life.

But we rarely hear about the more than 5 million people who work at sea or the abuses, dangers and importance of this labor.

Image via Pixabay

Ninety percent of the products we consume in the U.S. — from iPhones to irons, cars to carpets — arrive by ships. The overwhelming majority of seafood eaten in the U.S. comes from abroad. Almost two thirds of the planet is covered by water, and most of that water is high seas, or international waters, which means no single country has jurisdiction over it.

People make that happen. A recent New York Times series called The Outlaw Ocean highlights some of what those people experience. We meet a cast of characters that typical college students — well, anyone on land, really — rarely hear from. That includes sea slaves and stowaways, poachers and mercenaries. Though there are plenty of laws on the books, enforcement is lax. At sea, people are sold, captured, abandoned. Investigations, let alone prosecutions, are rare.

The most striking part about the series is the people who shared their stories.

The fate of stowaways

David George Mndolwa, an almost illiterate man from Africa, snuck onto an England-bound ship called the Dona Liberta with his friend Jocktan Kobelo. They only had their passports, bread and a plastic bag with orange juice. These men hoped for a better future than selling knock-offs and sleeping on makeshift beds in Cape Town. Little did they know, their future at the sea would be worse.

They eased their way into the engine room and stayed there for five days. After their ears started ringing, they were lightheaded, and the heat was unbearable. They used a shopping bag for a toilet, and food became scarce. They crawled to a lifeboat. Four days later, they were discovered. The captain and crew abandoned them.

They suffered from malnourishment and dehydration. When panic set in, they had nothing to do but pray. Finally, they spotted a wooden boat. Twelve hours later, they were arrested at a pier in Liberia.

When Mndolwa asked about the crew, the Liberian official replied, “The authorities deal with crimes on land, not on the water.”

“Like the wild west,” Mark Young, former chief of enforcement for the Pacific Ocean, said referring to the current state of international waters. “Weak rules, few sheriffs, lots of outlaws.” 

“Jail with a salary”

George Cristof was hired by a maritime employment agency. He had orders to fly to England, where a prepared ship would await his arrival at Port Truro.

Upon arrival, Cristof saw something entirely different. There were no provisions or cargo and barely enough fuel. Florin Raducan, also Romanian, joined him shortly. The two spent several months fishing and begging from passing ships. They could not survive on the sea, and they did not have the documents needed to return home.

They waited for instructions from the agency, but to no avail. Five months later, Cristof and Raducan called it quits. They went back home when Cristof’s children could no longer afford school and Raducan’s wife had to beg in public.

The captains are scary, but the ocean is scarier.

Lang Long’s journey began in Cambodia. After witnessing his younger siblings suffer from a lack of food, he accepted a construction job in Thailand.

In Thailand, Long was held hostage in a room, forced onto a ship and sold for about $530, commencing his three arduous years of captivity at sea.

During this time, Long worked 18 to 20 hours every day, regardless of the weather, in pitch black. After trying to escape one time too many, a captain bound him with shackles every time a boat passed by. Long was resold twice. The longer he stayed on the boat, the more he was worth and the further his freedom got.

Image via Pixabay

Long said that at the beginning he would carve a notch into the wooden railing to keep track of days, but he gave up on that as well.

“I never thought I would see land again,” he said.

Som Nang, 41, attempted to help Long. In late 2013, Nang noticed Long crouching at the front of a passing boat, chained to an anchor post. Nang alerted a rescue group, who then tracked Long down and ensured his release.

*****

College environmental groups advocate protecting the oceans. They are right to be concerned. Rising sea temperatures, ocean acidification, algae blooms, disappearing fish stocks, intentional dumping, coral reef destruction, a boom in new industrial activities like deep sea drilling and mining — the threats are real and growing.

At the same time, college students, environmentalists, everyone really, should be mindful of people like Mndolwa, Cristof and Long, who show us that the lawlessness of the high seas has other consequences too. As the demand for seafood grows, as more products come to us by ship, this lesson will only become more urgent.

 

By: Farhin Lilywala, NYU, Intern for The Institute on Political Journalism 

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