An Unexpected Catch

Seeing him leave the fish hook in his arm was all it took for me to drop my line and run to the bathroom.

I had never been fishing before, in any sense of the word, but was quick to accept the offer to do exactly that one summer with my Italian host father and host sister. The language barrier at the time was fairly substantial, so all I knew about our family outing was that we would be fishing, there would be a boat, and that I needed to be up and ready to go at an hour more commonly favoured by the crickets and insomniacs.

On arrival at our destination, I discovered our ‘boat’ was closer to what I would describe as a ship. Sitting impressively at the dock, its vast presence loomed in the dark over the early risers, of whom there were many. I quickly reached for my Italian-English dictionary, hoping to voice my questions about the family fishing outing that was quickly revealing itself to be something quite different. What if I suffered from sea sickness? How long were we going for? Who were these hard faced Italian men coming with us? My efforts to voice my concerns were fruitless. It was still too dark to decipher the small dictionary print and we were quickly being herded aboard the ship.

Two hours later, after speeding along the water at an alarming rate, I received an unexpected text message from my service provider welcoming me to Croatia. I scratched my head as I registered this information and the boat slowed to a stop. The sun had finally made an appearance and I was keen to unleash the fisherman laying dormant within. I stood up from the deck chair and my professional fishing dreams quickly began to fade. The boat rocked violently with the deep swells and my head spun with the utter lack of land visible on the horizon. I sat down again.

Indecipherable shouts echoed around the boat as the men began casting their lines. Determined, I made my way down to the deck with my rod. Looking to my left I noticed the man beside me, scars all over his dark, weathered face, neck and arms, reeling in to cast out again. I watched intently, wanting to learn. To my horror, as he cast out his hook caught in his arm. He grunted, fished in his pants for a knife, cut the line and...

Cue dash to bathroom.

Eventually I recomposed myself and a creamy mushroom risotto like only the Italians know how turned my shade of green to a healthier pink. I took back my position next to Signore Scarface; hook still in his arm, he still unfazed by it. Strangely, I remember little of the fishing after that, but the small family outing in Italy turned deep sea fishing in Croatia was quite the unexpected adventure, and to be honest, fishing has never been quite the same.