Stories: THE LONG NIGHTS ON THE MARMARA SEA

Where the sea is literally in the heart of a metropolis, fishing is the beat. It provides income even to the smallest of boats, the poorest of fishermen trying to make a living off the Marmara sea or the Bosphorus strait. It is these small boats that are left behind when the big ones follow the fish up the Mediterranean. Adem, Cevat and Cinar are a crew of a small five meter boat, rocking heavily on the restless sea of Marmara, searching for fish, dropping the net, guiding the fish in and pulling the net out. They usually don’t do it during the day. It’s too hot for them and the fish. So they do it at night. Gathering at four o’clock p.m. on a boat harboured in the Kumkapi district of Istanbul, they prepare their nets and water supplies, eat a meal and start their day that lasts up until seven a. m. on the next day. They take their catch to the distribution market to sell the fish. But they have to compete with what the big boats brought back from further north. The pay is small, so their rest is short. A day later, they're back on the Marmara sea at night.