Travel Day 926 – Fort Cochin, Kochi, Kerala, INDIA
One thing I really enjoyed over the last couple of days was watching the fishermen operate the huge Chinese Fishing Nets…
Lifted Chinese Fishing Net in Kochi, India
Initially I thought these spider-like structures were only used for tourist’s sake because people constantly tried to lure me onto their little fishing platforms. While I personally overheard all the calls, expecting only to be asked for money afterwards, I also assumed that money from tourists was actually making these ancient structures worth while and not the fish…
Also considering the general attitude in India towards historic structures, it seemed to make sense that these nets were only in existence because they had become a tourist attraction. But when I was sitting down at the waterfront in the early morning with some take-out Puttu and a chai, I realized that these ancient Chinese Fishing nets were well in operation before the hordes of tourist would show up during the day and even on Vypeen Island where no tourists were around…
Climbing to lower the Chinese Fishing Net
Apparently the tide had to be right for the nets to be effective as a local school teacher told me today who had sat down with me to enjoy the view and share a conversation. While sitting together we watched how 4 to 5 men struggled to operate these cumbersome structures, dipping them down, waiting for a while and then lifting them up again…
The two cantilevered arms were on the one hand carrying the big net, while on the other they would pull up the counterweights. How sophisticated this counterweight system really was seemed hard to judge, but at least the fact that the big stones were roped down at different lengths, should have helped to have a rather smooth transition between up and down because the stones were being lifted at different intervals…
Sunken Chinese Fishing Net in Fort Cochin
Still the fact that it took at least four people to pull the net back up and two people to climb on the outrigger to fully dip the net into the water seemed much too labor intensive for the results it could possibly bring. Instead of working with the current, these nets could really only catch whatever kind of fish just happened to be on top of the net while it was being lifted up and if fact when I looked at the results, it was nothing more than a handful of small fish every time the net was lifter up slowly…
While the nice teacher on the bench next to me was explaining that these small fishes could only be eaten as fried fish and not in a curry, I personally was happy that these ancient Chinese fishing nets were still in operation. Big results or not, they were definitely an amazing sight early in the morning with a chai… : )
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