Handcrafted fishing

Traditional families have largely survived and reproduced by taking their livelihood through ancestral knowledge of fishing, whether it be line fishing at the edge of the beach, fishing in the dry tide on corals, harpoon in diving, trolling in waters deep, in the old corrals, or in the crazy ones where they hide octopuses, morays and crayfish. Sailing by boat or fishing between stones and corals, the rich maritime knowledge gave life and longevity to the people of this land.

Worryingly, in the last three generations this knowledge is being lost due to a number of factors arising from progress and modernity. With the arrival of tourism and other economic activities that foment the region due to the tourist boom, the children of fishermen, and often themselves, by being able to change their lives and capitalize less arduously, naturally opt for this improvement in life . Many made money by selling land and retired, others invested the money from selling land in other businesses, many fishermen from yesterday, today work with boat or boat ride with their children. Often children are encouraged to study and obtain higher education by living in a large urban center and thus losing the direct bond with the sea.

Some older fishermen also end up suffering from health and may be unable to continue fishing, some because of old age naturally no longer have the physical energy needed to face the harsh conditions of the fishery. The public policies that should promote the basic guarantees to the fisherman as a sickness insurance or a retirement, practically do not exist. The fisherman's reality is one of the most difficult. Imagine yourself, throwing yourself into the sea with only a sailboat, spending days sailing under intense sun, rain, wind and sea air, lighting the fire and cooking, sleeping, sailing, fighting with big fish, day and night, far family and firm soil.

Precisely because it is an arduous task, the profession of the fisherman should be valued, since above all it is an ancestral knowledge passed down from generations to generations for hundreds of years, forming a set of techniques of high complexity and deep ancestral connection.

Fisherman goes out to navigate the walls to fish the albacore, leaving in the middle of the darkness of the dawn, according to the tide, being guided by the light of the continent, smaller and farther away, changing the boat and watering the sail to win the wind , lighting the fire with dry coconut and charcoal in the pot, cooking moqueca with sea water, on the tide swing, pirão, breakfast, fish, dinner. Being able to stand in the boat with the incessant balance of the tide is already an art in itself, dominated with skill and naturalness by fishermen.

After many hours, the color of the sea changes and you can see the continent far away, a fine spot on the horizon. An ocean cliff has arrived on the walls, where fish are made of bigger and faster fish, of nobler flesh, such as albacore, dentex, whiting and cacao. The albacore bait is made of a splinter of the skin of the belly of the albacore itself, which, when being dragged along the lines in the troll, refers to a sardine swimming away from the shoal. Stretching the lines tied at the ends of the boat and the sail, they are dragged into the endless tide, where the depth is thousands of meters, stretched and running with the boat of wind in the stern, catching the albacoras in the middle of the swift school, one to fill the deposit. Sleeping is given below in the frame of the hull on a lined mattress, the orientation is visual and is given by the almost minimal figure of the continent on the horizon, around, everything is sea, an infinite depth.

The return is not when you want, the return is with the boat full of fish, can last for days. And it is not straight and direct, the wind that sends, shifting, zig zag, down and down, down a little and coming back, it can take hours the return, patience and precision that only fisherman has, that when he steps on the ground firm or allowed to be carried by the balance of the sea.

Unfortunately modernity continues to oppress the tradition. Bringing the fish and then selling it at an increasingly lower price and having to compete with the big suppliers, risking their lives in the tide and playing with death in the open, discourages the continuity of artisanal fishing.

The current difficulties have also created a social and public health problem, because every time there is idleness and lack of perspective, there are also mechanisms of escape such as the example of alcoholism, which can take larger proportions over time, affecting health physical and family life of all involved.

The current difficulties have also created a social and public health problem, because every time there is idleness and lack of perspective, there are also mechanisms of escape such as the example of alcoholism, which can take larger proportions over time, affecting health physical and family life of all involved.

Nowadays the few fishing boats that still remain in the Port of Tibau do Sul and Praia da Pipa are the most traditional fishermen who still have health and who resist changing their way of life. Even if there is no fisheries-related subsistence function today, they do so because they feel alive and connected with the past and with their deepest identity.

Being a fisher is not only an art, but it is also a claw, a way of life and of thought, an invaluable ancestral knowledge that can not be lost. Knowledge can only be transmitted from father to child, from teacher to pupil, in practice and in the grossest and most real way.

To be a fisherman is to honor an endangered class of brave and brave men in full connection with nature and with the balance of the tide that fills and leaks with the winds that blow and the waves that push them.

By Isaac Ache. Text originally published in Bora Magazine - issue 13 - Aug / Sep 2015