In no time at all, they had changed their minds about Giacomo. In fact, before long the teachers requested a meeting with Rita: “Signora, your son is studying too hard. Is there any chance you might be putting him under too much pressure?” As Rita told them, we had nothing to do with Giacomo’s work ethic – that was simply his way.
I will never forget the day we parted from him. It reminded me of the day my father had to drop me off at Trapani to live with that old woman. The dormitories at the school were gray and bare. I was in two minds about leaving him there, but I could not let Giacomo see it. He did not utter a word in protest. We said a stoic goodbye.
We spoke on the telephone every day, and I could tell he was unhappy. After a month, he found the courage to say: “Papà, I don’t want to live here any more. I want to go and live with my sister.”
At the time, Rosanna was studying at the University of Palermo and renting an apartment in town. She immediately agreed to host Giacomo, and for the five years that followed, she was a second mother to him. History was repeating itself: she was doing for her brother what my sister Enza had done for me in Syracuse. She looked after him in every way. She went to parent–teacher meetings on our behalf. And the time she spent with Giacomo helped to cultivate his passion for studies, particularly in literature and the arts.
When he was nearing the end of his school days, he had to decide on a university course. Rita and I had always felt that our children should choose their own path without our influencing their decisions. That was how Grazia became an architect, and Rosanna a lawyer. But deep down I had hoped that Giacomo, at least, would choose our profession. And that was where I made my mistake. Even though I did not try to impose my preference, Giacomo instinctively felt some pressure to study medicine. He passed the admissions tests at two universities with flying colors and moved to Rome, where he completed both the first and second years at the top of his class.
Then, one day, he paid us a surprise visit. “Papà, Mamma, I have to talk to you.” We knew what it was about right away. “I have tried to make you happy and I do like medicine. But my true passion lies elsewhere and you’ve always known it.” He changed course entirely and applied to study literature in Milan. That was his path. We could not and should not have stopped him, no matter where it took him.
Giacomo is not a lover of fishing. During the summers when he comes home, I always have trouble convincing him to go out on the boat with me. It makes me smile to think of how I had to fish with my father out of necessity, every single time I returned to Lampedusa.
Sometimes Giacomo decides to indulge me, and those are some of the best times we have together. He and I alone. I could listen to his voice for ever. He has the gift of being able to turn even the most banal of happenings into an interesting anecdote.
My son and I have entirely different personalities. He often reproves me for being too impulsive, lacking in rationality, not thinking hard enough about the consequences of my actions. Sometimes when we argue it is as if we have swapped roles, that he is the father and I the son. Giacomo knows all too well that I cannot change, that I cannot do what I do any other way, that I shall never be good at handling weighty questions diplomatically, especially when they have to do with people’s lives and destinies. Slowly, and with difficulty, he is coming to accept this, and I too am coming to accept how he takes me to task. His criticisms make me stop and think, in spite of my increasingly frenetic life.
Arms of giants
Reaching the open seas, casting my lines, and waiting patiently: that is the only way of reconnecting with myself that I know. Often, however, in that absolute stillness, one of the many atrocious episodes I have experienced suddenly comes to mind, resurfacing from somewhere in that terrifying hotchpotch that is coming to resemble Guernica, Picasso’s brutal, violent masterpiece.
One morning on Lampedusa, a strong south-west wind began to blow. A barge was drawing near the island but, as often happens, it missed the narrow entrance to the port and foundered on the rocks near Cala Galera on the point that leads to Isola Dei Conigli.
We all hurried to the clifftop. The waves were like arms of giants, seizing the ship and hurling it against the rocks, tearing plank after plank off the hull, and shattering it. Within the hour, the barge was completely demolished.
We did not see a single person on board. And even if we had seen any passengers, it would have been impossible to rescue them. Our motorboats could not get anywhere near the wreck. It was like a phantom ship that vanished in front of our eyes as suddenly as it had appeared, battered to smithereens and swallowed up by the stormy sea.
Days passed. The weather remained dire. We patrolled the island to see if any survivors had managed to swim to shore, but the search yielded nothing. No one had reached the coast.
After almost a week, the sea began to calm. The motorboats went out again, with divers from the carabinieri on board. They searched the sunken wreckage inch by inch, and found nothing.
But the divers persisted. They widened their search area and managed, once again, to locate a number of bodies, which they brought, one by one, to the pier.
We began the post-mortems. The corpses were in a fearful condition. They had been partially eaten by fish, and were riddled with fleas, other parasites, and even starfish. The long days these victims had spent on the seabed had turned them into pieces of meat, to be nibbled at and rotted away. Two officers from the coast guard had come to help me, but even men of their constitution cannot stand this kind of work.
You do not want to look at them for a second longer than you have to. The awful stench of decomposition invades your brain, makes you feel dizzy, and seems to linger even hours later.
After examining the first five bodies, cleaning the parasites off them, and giving the victims some dignity, I had to go home. The sight of them drifted back and forth in my mind’s eye. I felt sick, could not stop gagging, and the fetid odor seemed to fill my head. I was a mess.
After a short rest I was back at the pier, alone. But the divers were bringing in more and more bodies, and I could not go on that way. I asked Cesare, a young worker at the reception center, to help me. He did so willingly for a while, but after our seventh autopsy together, he too could cope no longer. “Dottore,” he said, “please do me a favor: do not ask me to do any more. I can’t sleep at night, I am miserable, I feel sick . . .” Though he was sorry for abandoning me, he simply needed to stop.
But before he left, I asked him to help me seal the coffins. This is also part of my job, and it is no easy task. It is an immensely significant act, and it must be done with respect for these people. They could have been our brothers or sons, and they deserve a decent burial.
The tenacity of the divers who work to recover each and every body at any cost is also a sign of their great respect for the victims. It preserves the dignity of those who have fought to their final breath for a life worth living.
And so our work went on. On the penultimate day, Cesare returned. I saw him coming from a distance. “Dottore, I have had second thoughts, ” he said. “I feel bad. It’s not right that you should be left to do all this by yourself. I want to help. Don’t worry, I have been getting up the nerve to do this.”
He had brought with him one of those huge pairs of scissors that can cut through wood. They would prove useful, since we had previously had trouble removing the victims’ clothes. We always have to undress the bodies, clean them, and then arrange them in the coffins as best we can.
“Cesare, you’re made of tougher stuff than I thought,” I said, playing it down. He screwed up his face into a grimace that was probably meant to be a smile, but there was no mirth in his eyes. He had been profoundly affected by this experience, and for him it was only the first time.
When it was over, we counted the toll: nineteen young lives lost.
God is not to blame
I am a person of faith who believes that my God is no different from anyone else’s. When I am feeling depleted, I
turn to the Madonna of Porto Salvo, Lampedusa’s patron saint. I ask the Mother of all mothers to give me strength to help to rescue all her children who come to Lampedusa by sea. I ask her to keep them alive, to keep me from having to witness more deaths. I pray that I will not have to hold another lifeless child in my arms.
A few years ago, Lampedusans received a piece of unwelcome news. Our parish priest, Don Stefano Nastasi, was being transferred to Sciacca in Sicily.
Don Stefano had been responsible for bringing Pope Francis to the island. He had played a crucial role in managing the difficult and unexpected phase that Lampedusa was navigating. “Our island is getting ready for new seas and a new journey,” he wrote on Facebook. “As ever, the important thing is to pull together as one, and to be a good crew.” Later, after leaving Lampedusa, he wrote: “The migrants’ vulnerability, their questions, and their suffering, have enriched our lives, helping us to better understand our own vulnerability and our own inconsistencies.”
Here to take Don Stefano’s place was Don Mimmo Zambito. The first time we met, as far-fetched as this may sound, Don Mimmo and I nearly came to blows. The parish had recently started to receive child refugees at a home run by the Christian charitable organization Caritas, called the Casa della fraternità. Recently, there had been a series of unfortunate incidents. Several of the boys had behaved in a destructive way: tearing doors off their hinges, burning mattresses, and even throwing stones at the officers of the guarda di finanza.
Meanwhile, twenty children with scabies had arrived on a single boat. There was no more space for them at the reception center, so we decided to bring them to the Casa della fraternità. The officer from the carabinieri went to notify Don Mimmo, who roared: “You can’t just decide to bring them here! At least give me some time to put the place in order!”
By then, I had already taken the children to the bathrooms at the Casa della fraternità, and was beginning to administer the scabies treatment. Don Mimmo found me there and railed at me until I could take it no longer. I flew into a rage, insulted him, and we almost got into a fistfight.
In that moment, we were both overwhelmed. Our nerves were fraying.
After I had finished treating the children, I went to apologise to Don Mimmo. He too said he was sorry. Since then, we have been firm friends. On the rare occasions when I manage to attend Mass on Sundays, I stop to talk to him, and to tell him of the problems we are confronting. He always finds a way to reassure me, and encourages me to persevere. “Pietro, Pietro, do we even have a choice? Can we ignore what is happening?” he says.
I am often asked whether my refugee work has shaken my faith in a God who permits all this suffering. God? God has nothing to do with this. It is human beings who are to blame, not God. Greedy, ruthless human beings who put their trust in money and power. I am not even talking about the people traffickers. I am talking about those who are willing to let half the world live in poverty, who sanction conflict and even finance it. The problem is human beings, not God.
The lengths they will go to
To pay the extortionate fare to Europe and escape their countries, every day, desperate migrants sell their own kidneys.
At first, I did not want to believe accounts of kidney selling, and dismissed them as sensationalist journalism. But the reports are true, and increasingly the migrants I treat have the scars to prove it. They never volunteer to talk about it, because they are afraid to expose a criminal network that is only growing stronger. We have seen just the tip of the iceberg.
I read up about this, because I needed to understand what is happening. The truth is chilling. Organ trafficking is an industry that begins in Africa and extends to dozens and dozens of places. According to the World Health Organization, almost ten percent of kidneys used for transplants in the West have been illegally harvested. An astounding number. The buyers pay well, and they are willing to put in extra for organs harvested from younger victims.
I was shocked to discover the network of doctors, technicians, analysts, and other professionals who enable this to take place. Removing a kidney and keeping it in good enough condition for a successful transplant is not child’s play. Buyers willing to pay up to two hundred thousand dollars can demand that the transplant go smoothly and that the damned kidney function flawlessly. That means that excellent surgeons, colleagues of mine who took the same oath* as I did, must be part of this dirty business. In fact, if you dig deeper, you will find accounts of missing children and young people who have been kidnapped so that their organs can be sold to the highest bidder – alarmingly, in these cases the kidneys are only the beginning. The traffickers treat their young victims as machines that produce human spare parts. I cannot help but wonder how anyone can live with the knowledge that their body contains a kidney or liver that has been taken by force from the next sacrificial victim in line.
Behind all of this, as always, there is an enormous amount of money flowing in from the so-called “developed” world. The demon of wealth continues to suck the blood of entire populations, leaving the people helpless and subjugated as ever.
Traffic in human beings has progressed to traffic in organs. The way we number, label, and dehumanize migrants makes it easy for them to be exterminated without a trace.
Luckily, awareness of these crimes is growing, and activists are urging their governments to put a stop to them. International cooperation will again be necessary if we are to end this form of trade.
Selling one’s organs is an extreme measure. Many migrants are willing to do other things that are somewhat less extreme, though no less disquieting.
At the time when Omar first arrived on Lampedusa, thousands of other Tunisians came too, fleeing the Arab Spring and the unrest that had overrun their country. They thought they would be in Italy within hours, and that from there they could make their way to other countries in Europe. Instead, most were slated for repatriation to Tunisia, where they would almost certainly end up in prison.
When the migrants realized what was in store for them, many attempted to get themselves admitted to hospital in Sicily by ingesting whatever they could find: keys from the reception center, rusty pieces of iron, even razor blades. The latter were especially dangerous because they could cause severe intestinal damage. On average, three residents of the reception center were sent to the emergency room every day as a result of having ingested foreign objects. We had to transfer them to Palermo so that they could be operated on and have the hazardous items removed.
The migrants had seen that that was their best chance of escape. As soon as they recovered, they would try to slip out of the hospital. They would rather remain in Italy illegally than be sent to jail in their own country.
The helicopter was kept busy taking asylum seeker after asylum seeker to various hospitals in Sicily. But then, the clinic received some comforting news. It was true that the patients had ingested razor blades, as the X-rays showed. But before swallowing them, they had put them in foil-lined cigarette packets. We’d had no way of knowing that, but it did make their gamble a little safer. The foreign objects would be expelled naturally from the body.
When we saw that far too many migrants were attempting perilous stunts to avoid deportation, we discussed this with the officers at the center. They dismantled door handles and removed potentially dangerous objects. We told the migrants that if they went on using these unsafe tactics, they would be treated at the clinic here on Lampedusa. After a few days, the situation returned to normal.
We had done the only sensible thing there was to do, but we also knew that we were condemning them to repatriation. And that saddened me greatly.
* The Hippocratic Oath is a solemn vow to uphold ethical standards in medicine, originating in ancient Greece and still taken, in some form or other, by most doctors today.
When a mayor understands what world leaders cannot
“Dottore, there’s a pregnant woman on board and she’s in labor.”
When I got that call, I hurried to
the pier. We took the woman to the clinic, and I knew instantly away that she would have to be transferred to Palermo by helicopter. We could not adequately deal with the possible complications of a difficult birth here on Lampedusa. The woman was traveling with her husband and seven other children. We explained that they could not go to Palermo all together and that the others would be able to rejoin her the following day, but that she had to leave immediately. Otherwise, she might lose the baby and regret it for the rest of her life. But the mother would hear of no such thing. There was no way she would be separated from her children, not after everything that had happened, she said. Not even her husband could convince her otherwise. Her tenacity was beyond belief. None of us knew what to do, and we were running out of time. We risked watching her die.
We racked our brains. There were too many of them for the helicopter. In my mind’s eye, I could see sand slipping through an hourglass. Just as we were about to give up, a solution presented itself: the Ministry of the Interior authorised a military aircraft to transport the whole family to Palermo. The woman had won. Her stubbornness had paid off, and now no one could come between her and her family. All traces of reticence vanished, and she threw her arms around me, beaming with gratitude.
Not long after this incident, I received another telephone call: this time from the mayor of Geraci Siculo, a small village in the Madonie Mountains. His name happened to be my surname. “I’m Bartolo Vienna,” he said. “I hope I’m not interrupting. I was told you might be able to help me.” This was a story with an unexpected happy ending, and it resulted in a friendship that continues to this day.
Tears of Salt Page 7
