He Saw Death and Came Back: Eight Years On, Badurtala Still Waits for Its Missing Fishermen
In Badurtala, a coastal village in Barguna's Patharghata upazila under Sadar union, the sound of weeping can still be heard if one listens closely. From one home to another the scene is the same: grief for a lost husband, pain for a lost father, and a long wait for a loved one. One storm did not just take several lives, it left behind an emptiness that has lasted for years.
Many people in the village depend on the sea for their livelihood. They spend day after day on rough waters to catch fish, sometimes hoping for hilsa, sometimes simply to earn a living. For them the sea is both a means of life and a terrifying address of death.
The mention of 21 July 2018 still makes the air in the village feel heavy. That day a large sea-going trawler carried 18 fishermen. Ten of them returned alive, the other eight never came back.
Missing in that Bay of Bengal storm were Md Masum Mia, 30, Md Hiru Mia, 37, Hanifa, 40, Kabir Mia, 42, and several others. All eight missing men were from this village, some related to each other, some neighbours. Asking after one of them therefore leads straight to another grief-stricken family.
Eight years have passed, yet many relatives have not been able to return to normal life. They still watch the road, hoping the lost men may one day return. In those families one name comes up again and again: Tota Mia, the fisherman who came back alive from the sunken trawler.
Tota Mia was a professional fisherman eight years ago too. Rough seas, dark clouds and storm winds were nothing new to him. But the storm of 21 July was different. It did not only put him face to face with death, it also took many of his companions.
Now over seventy, Tota Mia no longer has his former strength to walk, his body is bent with age and his speech slurs. The terrible experience also changed him mentally; he forgets many things and cannot recall a morning event by noon. Yet, remarkably, he has not forgotten that day: the sunken trawler, the rough sea, the floating buoys and companions disappearing one by one before his eyes.
In his account, seeing the sea turn rough they began returning towards shore, when their trawler was near Mandarbaria char, not far from the coast. Tota Mia says that even before the storm rose he felt something was going to happen that day, the sea was not in a good state. So they tied up the floats, a kind of white floating ball, thinking those might help if danger came.
Within a short time that fear came true. Wind speed rose and waves crashed onto the trawler one after another. Then a powerful wave from the side capsized the trawler in a moment. The fight to survive began. Many tried to float holding parts of the trawler, some clutched floating objects, some a buoy. Many of those thrown off never made it back.
Tota Mia says that when darkness fell, on the boatman's word everyone began swimming, heading west. At first everyone stayed together holding three buoys, and it felt as if they might live. But the force of the waves pushed the buoys in different directions, and the distance between people who had been side by side kept growing. Through cloud, rain and lightning they could still see each other after evening, then slowly each drifted away.
The voices from that night remain alive in his memory. While the buoys were still close, everyone's cries could be heard, someone calling on Allah, someone calling mother, someone father, someone weeping remembering wife and children. All around were only waves, rain, darkness and the plea to live. As the buoys moved apart, those voices also moved away, until no one's voice could be heard any more.
In the end four men were floating holding one buoy. That night Tota Mia saw with his own eyes how terrifying exhaustion can be. One man, exhausted, let go of the buoy and sank before their eyes. Then three remained on one buoy. Holding on against the storm was the greatest hardship, yet in the desire to live they kept clutching it, and in that way the night passed.
Towards the end of the night Tota Mia saw something like a forest in the distance. A little later he felt soil under his feet and understood they had reached a char. They had reached Narikelbaria-Mandarbaria. There, local robbers helped them, not only helping them ashore but also giving them money for transport home.
The experience of returning from the mouth of death changed Tota Mia's life. In his view there are techniques to survive at sea, and those who become impatient will die. In such a situation one must only try to stay afloat; trying to swim to a destination will exhaust a person and sink them. If one can stay afloat, the waves will carry them somewhere. But if there is a tidal surge no rule holds, and if a whirlpool pulls someone down there is no escape.
As Tota Mia told the story of that night, his wife sat silently beside him. For her, her husband's fight to return alive is not an old story. She still considers getting her husband back as Allah's greatest gift. In Badurtala, Tota Mia is one of those who once held death's hand and returned to life, while for those who never returned, the village's wait has still not ended.
