Tears of Salt

by Pietro Bartolo

  It took but two days to bring me back down to earth. Forty-eight hours later, the same story repeated itself, and this time it was even more dramatic.

  A helicopter landed on Lampedusa with a little boy on board. He, too, had been saved from a shipwreck. A Spanish ship picked him up, but he was in a critical condition and would not have survived the journey by boat. I went to pick him up from the landing pad. He was five years old, and he was from Eritrea. His name was Mustafà.

  Mustafà was so ill that paramedics on the ship had not even been able to insert a drip, because they could not locate his veins. His body temperature was 80°F, and he could have died of hypothermia. That left the paramedics with no other option but an intraosseous infusion, which meant inserting the drip directly into his tibia. It is a painful procedure, especially for a child, but they had no choice if they wanted to save his life.

  I took Mustafà in my arms and brought him to the clinic. In his eyes, I could read a mixture of terror and acceptance. He was petrified. He had lost his mother and his younger sister to the sea. Unlike Favor, he had understood everything. He had watched the people dearest to him disappear in the waves and fail to resurface.

  We tried to insert a drip again to stabilize his body temperature. But we still could not find a vein. Then he held out his other arm to us as if he wanted to help us out, to show us where it was. He certainly did not want another painful intraosseous infusion.

  Mustafà communicated to us by gestures that he was hungry. He closed his hand into the shape of a spoon and scooped it up to his mouth. I fetched him some biscuits, and made him some hot chocolate. I fed them to him in tiny pieces, and small sips that would warm his throat.

  He did not cry. He only looked at us with pleading eyes, as if to say: “Help me.” He, too, was an enchanting child. Elena gave him a stuffed rabbit and told him: “This rabbit’s name is Bartolo. He is Bunny Bartolo.” Mustafà took the rabbit and looked at it from all sides. “Battolo,” he said, grinning at us.

  Despite the treatment and the drip, Mustafà was still in a bad way. We could not keep him here on Lampedusa, and he would have to be transferred. I took him to the landing pad. Mustafà was journeying once more, this time to the children’s hospital of Palermo.

  I got into my car and drove back toward the clinic. But then I felt the need to stop and get out. I parked on the roadside and went for a walk. I had to work off my anguish, my frustration, my helplessness.

  I took a deep breath, and turned to look at the sea. Today it was calm. Not a ripple. It was a stunning emerald green.

  There was a group of children on a rock, laughing, having fun. They were challenging one another to a diving contest. Those children were strong, healthy, their skin glowing in the springtime sun. It was the best time of year: school was almost out, and the holidays were soon to begin.

  During the long summer months, the whole island would become their playground. They would not be bundled up in sweaters and jackets against the wind. They would no longer have to spend whole afternoons at home, studying or pretending to study. Instead, they would be at liberty to simply enjoy the beauty of their surroundings. They could run from one cove to the next, from one rock to another.

  I recalled when I was a child, and how much I used to long for warm sunny days when I would be able to go to the seaside with my friends. We played there long before the holidays had even begun. After school, we would go straight to the beach, strip down to our underclothes, and leap into the sea. Nothing could frighten or discourage us. And although we were little, our parents never worried either, because they knew we were all good swimmers. Indeed, how we dived! We would climb to the top of the highest rocks we could find and fly through the air, sliding into the water with perfect form.

  For a few moments, the sea made me feel calmer. And then I thought of Mustafà again, and of the childhood he had been denied. I had not even had time to comfort him.

  The following morning, I went out, bought a newspaper, and sat at a little table in a café to read it. I realized at once that I had become complicit in a world where only appearances matter.

  For days, Favor had been featured by all the news media, from newspapers to television and online bulletins. But there were only a few lines about Mustafà, saying that another child who lost his parents at sea had been rescued, and that he was being treated at the hospital in Palermo.

  When I read that article, I felt that I was an unwitting instrument of the people who decide what is worth calling news, what becomes a story, a symbol, a cause. I had taken care of Mustafà just as I had Favor, but there was not a single photograph of him in my arms. Fate is cynical and unjust, even when it comes to this sort of thing, I thought. Maybe Mustafà will find a family ready to take him in without delay. Or maybe he will spend months and years seeking the affection he needs. Either way, we had collectively ignored a boy who had watched his mother drown.

  When we think of the thousands of refugees who arrive on our shores every day, we struggle to remember that they are people with identities, and not just numbers. We are sorry to hear that they are tortured or killed before they reach their journey’s end. We are saddened to see a lifeless child in the arms of a rescuer. Sometimes we are even moved to tears. But when the show is over, our tears dry fast. We simplify and trivialize the situation. Right now, this is the problem we should be facing up to, and yet we still have not found a sophisticated way of doing so.

  At the time, there was a journalist around every corner in Lampedusa. One of them happened to be in the café, and he noticed that I was worked up about something. He asked me what was the matter, and I told him exactly how I felt. Without missing a beat, he said: “Dottore, do you know how many children are just like Mustafà and Favor? How many lose their parents, at sea or in their own war-torn countries? How many are still living there in orphanages, or in the only building they can find that hasn’t yet been bombed?”

  He was not wrong about that. I thought of a story I had seen on RAI3, on the program Mediterraneo, one of the few that broadcasts this kind of content. It was about an orphanage in Homs, the Syrian city devastated by air raids. Almost every day, another child was brought to the orphanage, as the only surviving member of his or her family. I had been bowled over by one child, who still had the strength to laugh and tell jokes. She looked straight into the camera, proud to be able to count from one to ten in English, a foreign language. She and the other children were being cared for by workers who lived in fear of the increasing likelihood of yet another attack.

  The journalist was still talking, but I was no longer listening. Then he mentioned a statistic that caught my attention. “Do you know how many unaccompanied children and teenagers have arrived in Italy this year? Seven thousand. Some of them left home alone, and others lost their families along the way.” Seven thousand. An astronomical number. A figure that is hard to visualize, and even harder to accept.

  We have long since lost track of the number of rubber rafts that come in. When we see footage of refugees clambering out of rescue boats, we are no longer surprised. But this number is important. Seven thousand children have arrived here, and they have lost every point of reference they have ever known.

  We have to do something about this number.

  * Operation Mare Nostrum was an Italian naval and air mission for rescuing shipwrecked refugees, carried out in 2013–14.

  Lampedusa

  Winter often brings a strong north-west wind to Lampedusa. The waves leap so high that they spatter over the land like mizzle, then come crashing down on the rocky coastline.

  One afternoon many years ago, a freighter was wrecked on the rocks on the north side of the island. The seamen used flares to signal their location, but the rescue boats could not leave the port because the seas were so rough that they would not have been able to reach them. The crew was at the mercy of the tempest and in despair.

  My father and his friends decided to attempt a rescue. The Kennedy was sturdily built a
nd he was sure they could do it. We all gathered on the clifftop to watch the little fishing boat attempt the impossible. Everyone was terrified for them. My mother clasped my hand in hers.

  The Kennedy was in sight of the freighter but could not steer too near, given that it too was at risk of being dashed against the rocks. My father and his friends put down an anchor secured by a steel cable that was connected to a capstan. Then they slowly drew closer to the freighter, until they could help the seamen to jump aboard. They were only a few yards from safety, but getting them there was extremely challenging. The Lampedusan fishermen yelled at the tops of their lungs, continuously testing their limits. We watched anxiously from above, the whole island waiting with bated breath. More than once, we were convinced the freighter and the Kennedy were about to ram each other. Had that happened, none of them would have survived. Despite the extreme risks they were taking, my father and the other fishermen never once considered turning back.

  When they all arrived back in port, they were greeted like heroes. Even though they were exhausted, that evening we threw a large party for them at our house. The seamen who had been saved could not stop thanking our courageous men, who had risked life and limb for their sake.

  It was the night between May 7 and May 8, 2011. To the surprise of nobody, I received a telephone call – this time from the guardia di finanza: “Dottore Bartolo, we are escorting a barge into port. There are too many people to count.” My colleagues and I headed to Favaloro Pier.

  The barge had been intercepted not far from Lampedusa. At that point in time, the EU search and rescue operation was not yet in place, and so migrants had a long distance to travel before they could be spotted. Still, rescuers from Lampedusa’s port authority, the guardia di finanza, the carabinieri, the police, and the fire brigade were continually ferrying boatloads of people to the pier. That night, it was the guardia di finanza’s turn.

  These men do a fantastic job, day in, day out. We imagine working in the uniformed forces must be exciting, and that is often true. But we rarely think about the sacrifices these men have to make, being so far from their families. In the guardia di finanza’s case, they have to be ready to go out to sea at all times, risking their lives to rescue people regardless of the weather conditions. I see them return to port exhausted, having hauled dozens of men, women, and children out of the water, without an ounce of energy left in their arms. They often reach a boat just in time to watch it capsize as if in slow motion before their eyes, hurling dozens of refugees into the sea. Or a punctured rubber raft that is rapidly deflating, and just about to let its human cargo slip down to their deaths. They have to work quickly, even in strong gales, or it will be too late and there will only be bodies to collect.

  That night, two rescue boats had gone out in bad weather. Two soldiers had climbed aboard the barge and were steering it toward the port. One of the rescue boats led the way, while the other brought up the rear. Meanwhile, the sea was growing rougher. The passengers numbered a staggering five hundred and fifty. At last, from the pier, we could make out two boats coming toward us – but the one carrying the refugees was nowhere in sight.

  It transpired that the rudder had malfunctioned. Instead of being maneuvered safely in to port, the boat was stranded on the rocks just yards from the coast, within sight of the Porta d’Europa sculpture that symbolizes Lampedusans’ welcome of refugees.

  We all hastened there at once: doctors, soldiers, volunteers, journalists, and other Lampedusans who had heard what was happening. It was late at night. The waves smashed violently against the shore. The barge was rocking dangerously, which would make the rescue even harder. Those who could swim jumped into the water to save themselves. We made a long human chain to fetch those who were too afraid to move. I shall never forget the way Mimmo, who works as a passenger service agent at the airport, leaped unhesitatingly into the sea to pull out one person after another. The wind and the waves gave us no respite, making our every move hazardous and almost impossible.

  Many of the refugees were women and children, including a four-month-old Nigerian baby named Severin. We had to take him from the arms of his mother as she was struggling to climb out of the barge. We handed him to a journalist named Elvira, who had put down her pen and notepad to join the chain. Elvira then spent all night trying to relocate the child’s mother, who was beside herself and believed her baby was lost.

  At dawn Elvira found her, and gave Severin back to her. It was an astonishing encounter between two very different women, both in tears and united in that moment. For her gesture, Elvira was awarded the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic. I was glad of that: we need symbolic figures like Elvira to make known our cause. We want people to be moved by the migrants’ plight, to understand that they are good people who are grateful for our help, especially when they see us ready to give our all to save them. Conversely, they can be bitterly disappointed when we turn them away and make them feel unwanted.

  It took us three hours to rescue those five hundred and fifty people. Afterward, they were drained – as were we. But although we were dead tired, we had the satisfaction of knowing that we had saved every single one of those lives. Or so we thought.

  Having worked through the night, I went home. Rita made me a cup of hot coffee and stroked my hair.

  Only a few hours later, I received another telephone call: “Dottore, please, we need you to come back to the Porta d’Europa.” I could not imagine why, as by the time I left the rescue effort had been completed and rescuers were surveying the site to understand how the accident had happened. Nevertheless, I dressed and went out.

  The barge was still rocking, but the sea was a little calmer and the divers had already been dispatched. Three bodies lay on the shore. The divers had recovered them from beneath the keel of the boat, running the risk of being crushed themselves. The victims were three young boys.

  We took them to the mortuary by the cemetery. As always, it was my job to examine the corpses. One of them had fractured every single bone in his body, from head to toe.

  I left the cemetery destroyed. I felt as if I had been run over by a tank.

  That day, in the bars and cafés of Lampedusa, people talked of nothing else. The whole island had been mobil-ized to help with the rescue. We were folorn and defeated. We did not even know that the worst was still to come.

  October 3, 2013

  October 2, 2013. A month had passed since my stroke. I was still theoretically convalescent, but a few days after returning home I was back at work. Some of my facial muscles were still a little stiff, one leg occasionally mis-behaved, and a steady stream of unmentionable words escaped me from time to time. Nonetheless, I was making a good recovery.

  On my return to Lampedusa, before going back to the clinic, I did take some time out to think and reflect. I walked around my island. I needed to smell the sea again, to refill my eyes with beauty. With Lampedusa’s unparalleled wildness, preserved like a scrap of Eden. I went out on a boat and was charmed by the dolphins darting about me. I met up with my father’s old crew and talked with them. They had been my comrades in life and labor for years, and we had spent many a long and tiring day together. That experience has stood me in good stead, even now that I am in a different profession and our paths have, to some extent, diverged.

  Lampedusa is not an easy island to live on. It is a small piece of the earth’s crust that broke off from Africa and drifted toward Europe. As such, it is something of a symbolic gateway between the two continents. Its destiny has been shaped by its unusual geographical origins, tectonic movements that determined not only the future of the land, but also the fates of its people.

  The weather was mild on that October night. Two heavy loads of migrants had just disembarked. All of them were Syrians.

  Their arrival created difficulties for the Italian administration. The authorities in charge of the reception center had to take the ethnic and religious differences among the migrants into account. The unaccompanied women an
d children could not be housed together with the men or the nuclear families. This was a serious matter that could not be ignored.

  And so, early the following morning, the Syrians who arrived on those boats were still standing on the pier, waiting for the administration to work out how best to house them. That was how the saddest day in Lampedusan history began.

  At 7:30 a.m. on October 3, I received a telephone call from the comandante of the port authority. “Dottore, please come to the pier right now. There has been a shipwreck, and many have died.”

  “I am already here, Comandante,” I said. “I haven’t left. We have only just finished examining the last two groups. I’ll wait for you here.”

  A quarter of an hour passed, then an twenty-one-foot boat pulled into the harbor. It was the Gamar, and it belonged to Vito Fiorino. I knew Vito well – he was a fisherman who often took visitors to Lampedusa out with him during the tourist season, just as I had done as a boy on the Pilacchiera. The night before, Vito had taken eight people out on the Gamar, and among them was a woman who shares the name of my daughter, Grazia. She often came to Lampedusa at this time of year to visit her sister, who runs a shop here. From a distance, I could see that she was crying.

  They had gone out for a night-time fishing expedition to Tabaccara, a beautiful and unspoiled cove. When it gets dark, the stars in the sky are unforgettable. Tourists usually spend the whole night out there, sleep on the boat, and then come back to harbor for breakfast.

  Near dawn that morning, one of the men had woken Grazia and said that he could hear voices in the distance. It sounded like screaming. “It’s probably seagulls,” she had said. “Or maybe tourists who are even noisier than we are.” Unconvinced, the man had asked Vito to steer the boat in the direction of the sounds he had heard. The closer they got, the clearer and louder the noises became. Gradually, a ghastly scene came into view.