Journey in Blue: Myths of the Mediterranean

Our first view of the sea is from a hill. The road winds down through pines, opens up to thickets of oleander, a curving landscape of dusty green. Then we see it, shining, turning, bouncing. As if it’s on fire, flecked and scaled.

“The sea!” my mother says, like a congratulation. Happy first sighting! Happy reunion!

This is the beginning of the true summer, however late into the season it may be; it is the beginning of our Blue Voyage—our most cherished ritual, and proof of the persisting myth that we are a united family.

All along the Bodrum marina, captains chat side by side in their boats, occasionally shouting orders to harried cabin boys loading ice. Parents make last minute trips to the pharmacy, children buy snorkels and plastic balls.

On our boat, a few ambitious uncles are going through their fishing equipment for every possible occasion: the open sea and coves, for diving or casting. Their ambition is something of a joke because we already know that their efforts will yield nothing more than a few small fish, barely big enough for bait. They will complain of the weather, the season, the seas drying up.

One morning in my childhood, my father woke up very early, bought a giant grouper from a fisherman, and asked him to hook it to a gig. The fisherman rowed one of my father’s friends—completely illiterate in fishing and diving— far from the boat and left him in the water. When we were all assembled for breakfast, we saw the friend appear from around the bay, swimming towards the boat, triumphantly holding up the speared fish. The uncles were so upset that they didn’t talk to him the whole day.

“I’ll never forget their faces,” my father repeats each year. It is the repetition that has formed the myth of the Blue Voyage, told and retold to the newcomers on board.

We, the perpetuatorsA , with all the rowdiness and loveliness that brings to mind.