Growing up on the Caribbean island of Curaçao, with its tranquil beaches where the water is an unbelievable turquoise, you would assume I’d be a natural swimmer. But despite all that splendor, I had a very ambivalent relationship with the sea.
As a child, I loved nothing more than going to the beach, but would enter the water only where it was clear as glass and you could see the white sand below. I was terrified to swim over the “dark spots” where there were rocks covered with seaweed and especially with the dreaded sea urchins and their long, black needles that could pierce your foot.
Swimming over those dark spots, you could not see what ravenous creatures would be lurking among the dark rocks, below you. Of course, there was absolutely no factual basis for those fears, as shark or barracuda attacks on swimmers were almost unknown. And it was way before “Jaws” was made, by which time I had long left the island.
The calm, turquoise beaches are found along the south coast of the island, hidden in protected coves with rocky cliffs on either side. I certainly did not dare to swim out beyond the coves into the open sea - the laman dj’afó, or ‘outside’ sea. There, in those deep, dark waters, you could certainly not see what was hiding beneath the surface.
Learning to swim at age five was a traumatic experience. As I have always been athletic and well-coordinated, I quickly picked up the ability to keep myself afloat and do the movements of the breaststroke in shallow water. Then one day we were told to jump into the deep end of the pool.
Standing on the edge of the pool, looking down, I was overcome by terror and started to cry desperately. I was not yet ready for the jump, the deep, dirty-green water - saltwater from the sea mixed with chlorine - would certainly pull me down to the depths, swallow me whole into an endless void. What if there were monsters down below, predators that I could not see in the cloudy greenish water, that would devour me alive.
It was my swimming teacher, a Dutch ex-marine, who was the shark. “Jump in”, he ordered “Do you think I have all the time in the world?” His yelling grew louder and louder, but I just stood there, crying even more. Then he marched up to me, picked me up like a package under his arm and carried me demonstratively to his office, where he sat me on a chair and locked the door behind us. He pulled out a pair of scissors, and I was sure he would rip me to pieces with the sharp teeth of a barracuda. Instead he cut a large piece of bandage tape and plastered it over my mouth. “That will teach you to stop crying” he said, and went back to his class, leaving me behind near the changing rooms, trembling. I felt deeply ashamed and hid from the others what went on in his office, as if I had done something terribly wrong. Of course, I never returned to that class, while the other children went on to get their swimming diploma.
I might have given up on swimming after that painful incident, but they say you must always get back on the horse when you fall, and my mother, who had been a trained swimmer in her youth, allowed me to practice with her at the beach, and I learned quickly. Still, when she was not by my side, I had to wear that large, bright red swimming vest to my great embarrassment, until I actually got my swimming diploma a few years later, of course with a different teacher, but the scars in my psyche took an immeasurable time to heal.
Even though I was born on a Caribbean island surrounded by magnificent coral reefs, I never went snorkeling in my youth, not even on my frequent return visits. I was afraid. The first time I dared to swim over a coral reef was when I was almost fifty and living in Israel. It was at the Sinai coast, after I had gone trekking for seven days in the Sinai mountains – in itself, an act of overcoming a different set of deep-seated fears – my fears of the desert.
At the famous Blue Hole in Dahab, we rented snorkels, masks and fins. I believe it was the high from my total surrender to the mountains, the sense of fulfillment, the awe in the face of those numinous mountains, that gave me the courage to go snorkeling for the very first time, and to see what I had been missing all my life. I could not believe the beauty of that enchanted undersea world, the rainbow hues of the large parrot fish, the swishing schools of fish in all colors and shapes, the anemones gently waving their tentacles. I was totally embraced by the magic, feeling the silence reverberate in my entire body.
My brother Fred, an experienced scuba diver, took me snorkeling the next time I came to Curaçao, showing me the magical forests of corals near the entrance of a bay, not really far out into the open sea. I can’t say I was not scared, but it is easier to swim over those reefs swarming with fish when you “look them in the eye” as it were - and can admire their beauty, as well as see what is coming, rather than imagine it. Even a barracuda, my brother assured me when we actually saw one, can be like just an innocent aquarium fish, if you just let it be.
There is certainly something sexual in my fear of the sea. Rather than a fear of drowning in waves or strong currents, it is a fear of the violation of my body, of rape. Immersed in water, you are at your most vulnerable - your body almost naked, open to attack from all sides, and with no ability to run away from rapists and murderers. Like the iconic bathroom scenes in movies.
I ask myself if this irrational fear of being ambushed by some sinister creature can be attributed to the way girls were raised in that patriarchal society where I grew up; if those fears were not deliberately instilled in little girls in order to keep us in the protected home. Boys were not brought up that way.
Perhaps there was more to it than a sensible warning to protect little girls from being violated by men, particularly by strangers - we were never told to watch out for men who were close to us. Perhaps the grownups meant to frighten us about the chaos outside the cosmos of the home, a chaos that would certainly awaken our closely guarded sexual desires. Perhaps those fears – of the street, of the wild countryside, of the deep blue sea - were inculcated in us as a barrier against erotic temptations, keeping us far from the luscious beauty and freedoms of the world.
**
Despite all these inner obstacles, I have become a passionate open water swimmer. It has been a long, step by step process. I have learned, already at the age of five, that I cannot jump into deep waters, when I don’t feel ready. I must slowly, but surely, conquer my fears.
It was only in my mid-fifties that I started to swim seriously, when I joined my brother doing laps along a calm, protected beach on my visits to Curaçao. At first, I did not even put my head in the water doing the breaststroke. Back in Jerusalem, I improved my stroke in the local pool, eventually teaching myself the crawl. Then I took a course in Total Immersion (T.I.), the energy preserving swimming method especially suited for open water swimming. That really ignited my enthusiasm.
First, I joined the yearly 4 km “Crossing the Sea of Galilee” swim, where I knew for sure there are no sharks and the water is always calm in the early mornings when the swim is held. Soon after, I started to participate in more and more challenging swims, mostly competitions, off Israel’s Mediterranean coast with its small or larger waves, but at least there were no shark attacks that I ever heard of.
Deep inside, I knew that someday I would have to vanquish the specters of my childhood and venture out in the open sea in Curaçao. The perfect opportunity would be the “Swim for the Roses”, a 2.8 km swim, organized every year to raise money for cancer research and care.
In my ambivalence, I let many years go by, until finally, in January 2020, I buy a ticket to Curaçao. Excitedly, I tell everyone, both in Jerusalem and on the island, that this is my reason for going to Curaçao, after having been away for seven years.
Together with my brother Fred, I sign up for the swim. During the two weeks before the swim, we practice along the turquoise beaches, and easily do the three kilometers of the organized swim in those calm waters. I refuse to practice in the rough, dark blue open sea, as Fred suggests, because I do not want to risk being discouraged before the Big Day. I want to jump in, on that day, and give myself over to the occasion – and only then cope with my fears.
It has been windstill for several days. Great, I think, no waves. But that brings reports of Portuguese jellyfish being spotted close to the shoreline, just where the swim will be held. I am told about the horrors of jellyfish burns by Michèle, Fred’s partner. I think of Diane Nyad swimming from Cuba to Key West, and how she was constantly stung by jellyfish – while sharks followed the boat accompanying her. No way I can swim in such waters.
Fortunately, just a day before the swim, the wind comes back and is blowing from its usual direction, so that the jellyfish disappear into the horizon. But now I must worry about waves whipped up by the constant trade winds. A friend shows me a website with wind and sea measurements for sailors. For the day of our swim, it predicts waves of a meter and a half. I don’t know how I can possibly cope with such high waves, if the readings of the website are correct. My brother, who in the past has done a lot of windsurfing, tries to assure me that such high waves would never be found near the shore. Besides, the current will be with us, going east to west, as always.
The night before the swim my heart is beating fast and I cannot sleep. My anxiety is exacerbated by a profound sadness, knowing I will be leaving the island the day after the swim, and realizing how much a part of me Curaçao still is. How will I be able to swim, if I feel like this?
But I know that I cannot give up now. I have told everyone that I came to the island in order to swim and they all expressed their admiration for my determination. I have been dreaming about the swim for months. Can I allow myself to give up on my dream? Should I quit, my childhood fears of the open sea will overpower me again, and who knows when I will muster up the courage to try again?
Diana Nyad was forced to abort her swims from Cuba to Florida four times, until she finally succeeded, at the age of 64. George Mallory, obsessed with climbing Mt Everest, went back to the Himalayas three times, and perished in his last attempt, so that nobody knows if he actually was able to feel the triumph and liberation of making it to the top.
What drives such swimmers and mountaineers to try and try again? Not everything I attempt is equally important to me and merits such persistence. I know the relief, even the joy of quitting. But swimming in open water, for me, is another matter – as well as hiking in deserts and arctic regions or trekking in the high mountains of the Himalayas. These efforts touch upon much deeper desires and passions, a yearning for freedom and expansion of my soul.
It is this that drives me to try, again and again, to overcome the fears of getting lost, of being abandoned, fears of falling from heights, and most of all, fears of being ambushed, robbed, raped - all fears instilled in little girls to keep us away from desire. It is this drive that enables me to break out of the protected walls of the home, the narrow confines of the island, and to venture into the wilderness, to embrace the wildness at the ends of the earth, and fly.
**
The morning of the swim, my anxiety of the night before is replaced by growing excitement. We drive early to the starting point at the Jan Thiel beach, so as not to feel pressured, and quickly finish with the registration and required medical examinations. That allows us time to jump into the clear waters of the bay, ahead of the start, and warm up by swimming a few laps.
It is indeed reassuring to see how calm the sea is here, so that outside the bay, there certainly won’t be any meter-and-a-half waves. Starting the swim when we are already in the water takes away the tension of the competitions in Israel that start on the shore and everyone runs into the sea at the count of ‘go’ – heightening the competitive spirit, so that you involuntarily fall into the temptation to start out much too fast, and soon run out of breath.
And so, I start slowly, at first swimming beside my brother and another friend as we leave the protected bay, but soon, we lose each other and are on our own in the wide-open sea. I am doing fine, I feel confident, finding my own rhythm that allows me to swim long distances without exhausting myself.
Surprisingly, I do not think of sharks and barracudas and other predators in the sea, perhaps because I convince myself that we are a large group of swimmers who are disturbing the waters, so that all the sharks and barracudas will be driven away. Or because, with my goggles, I can see that no such threats are hidden under the surface. Wearing the white cap with red letters of “Swim for the Roses”, I feel reassured that I can easily be seen from the accompanying boats and paddleboards, should I need help.
There are places where the route takes us close to the shore, and I delight in reefs with impressive elkhorn corals. Even the fire corals that can burn you, do not frighten me. I do not think of jellyfish or the deceptively beautiful, yet venomous, lionfish that has invaded these reefs. I just swim, and swim, my mind in a calm, meditative state. It is this total surrender to the act of swimming, to being in the water, that allows me to completely push my childhood fears out of my consciousness. Nothing else matters but the pure joy of swimming. Nothing else exists.
Despite this discovery that the point of the swim is the swim itself, there still is the sense of accomplishment in reaching the finish line, the proud “I did it”. The announcer, cheering us on as we emerge out of the water, asks me my age. He is not particularly impressed by my 72 years; he is looking out for the swimmer he is told is in her eighties. He does not know that it is not the effort of swimming the distance, but my journey to surmount my ingrained fears of the laman dj’afó, the “outside sea”, that is the real triumph.
my brother Fred and I after the swim, February 2, 2020 with our roses. photo credit: Michèle van Veldhoven
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Rita Mendes-Flohr, Jerusalem, in corona seclusion, April 1, 2020