Jakub Wasiak
When I was a boy, the sea was still honest.
My earliest memory is of standing barefoot on the wet sand in Władysławowo, Poland, holding my grandfather’s hand, watching his boat disappear into the morning fog. He was a small man with shoulders shaped by storms, and I never saw him hesitate—not when the sky turned black, not when the catch was thin, not even when his best friend was lost off the Hel coast. My father followed him, and I followed my father. It wasn’t a choice. It was just what men in our family did.
I’m 70 now. I’ve spent my whole life with salt on my skin, the Baltic under my boots. There was a time when we landed cod by the crate and turbot so fat they bent the nets. Back then, the quotas didn’t choke us and the sea didn’t stink of chemicals. The water was clear, and the gulls screamed like they knew they were part of something real.
We used to land most of our catch right here in Władysławowo—though Kołobrzeg and Hel always competed hard. The rhythm was predictable: set out before sunrise, cast nets, pull hard, return with enough fish to feed families and fill the smokehouses. The sea provided. It was tough, but it made sense.
Not anymore.
Now we chase numbers. Fishing quotas negotiated in offices far from the shore tell us how many cod we can catch—though some years, it barely feels worth it. Pollution from the rivers and runoff clouds the water. The fish are fewer, smaller. The cod have diseases we never used to see. The young men don’t want this life. They drive tour boats or leave for Gdańsk or abroad. I don’t blame them.
But I still go out. Not every day—I can’t anymore. My knees remind me I’m no longer forty. But I still have my license, and I follow the rules: closed seasons, minimum sizes. I fish less for money now and more for memory. I bring back enough sea trout for my wife to salt, maybe a few turbot if I’m lucky.
Sometimes, I sit on the harbor wall and watch the newer boats come in. Slicker engines, GPS, radar. But their nets are often as empty as ours were in the worst winters. The sea doesn’t give like it used to.
I don’t know if it ever will again.