Being alone for 4 years in a Ship

         Horrible Story of Aisha

Ships are one of the greatest man-made giants. Human transportation has undergone various evolutions over time. To this day, freight is still shipped. The sizes of ships have also transformed a lot.

                 Humongous Cargo ships

Aisha from Syria joined the work in 2017 on such a 4,000 ton ship named MV AMAN. For two months everything went well. Suddenly one day the ship stops at the port of Adabia in Egypt. A letter reads, "The purchase of an anchor weighing 3 tons will cost $ 21,500, and the ship will not be allowed to move until then." Aisha signs the letter as told by the ship captain. "I didn't know then that it was the biggest mistake of my life," says Aisha. Yes, he became the legal guardian of the ship because he signed. Aisha cannot leave the ship until the owner of the ship pays the compensation.

                                       Aisha

Food and fuel are provided to the crew on board each day. The ship's debt continues to rise. Within a few months the number of employees began to halve. No one is paid. If you want to escape from here, you have to return home with bare hands. Many leave with that too. Aisha also takes on the responsibility of cooking for the last four leftovers. Relying on the Syrian embassy in Egypt is also useless. Fearing for his life, Aisha is trapped on a ship, meanwhile the Syrian Civil war has started.

                       Syrian civil war

It is the voice of hope that gives the isolated human beings the desire to live. It came to Aisha from Syria. Aisha's mother described the Syrian war situation daily. She was the one who looked after Aisha without losing faith. Aisha's brother has the same shipping job as him. Aisha has seen her brother sail twice in her four-year solitary life. Aisha's mother who was suffering from cancer also dies in September 2018 and Aisha is pushed back into the void. Two of the four remaining on the ship leave. One of the survivors escapes. 

Aisha, who was looking at the same faces over and over again, was also taken aback. In August 2019, Aisha was isolated as a single man on that large ship. As the months go by her cheeks swell, she loses her teeth and becomes a different Aisha.

                       

Aisha's three meals a day are dry bread. To get through some nights, Aisha needed 12 pain killer pills. Whatever the food or mobile charge, he wants to travel 8 km by small lifeboat to reach the shore. There should not be more than 2 hours. Like a bird reaching the nest, he must return to the ship. Though he cries on the ship, which is orphaned in the calm sea, the voice does not reach the shore. The nights have given him the feeling of a graveyard combined with darkness and silence. ‘Shouldn’t everything be daylight?’ He thought in fear.

                Aisha standing in the shore 

Suddenly one day, the ship starts to tilt 10 degrees. The vessel fills with water. Aisha shouts, for being rescued. Aisha forgets himself for a moment in the joy of seeing a new man approaching a boat. The man who arrived simply took a picture of Aisha and the ship on his mobile and left.

Aisha, convinced that he is free at this moment when the ship sinks, raises the alarm. Perhaps if the ship had sunk before the aid arrived, Aisha would have been buried in the Red Sea along with the ship without being seen by the world as a lone man. Within hours the army came and dragged Aisha to shore. "Arrest me and put me in jail," Aisha pleaded. He knew prison was a better place than a solitary ship. ‘‘ It can’t. You have done nothing wrong, ”the government said. The Egyptian government repaired the ship in 10 days and sent Aisha back to that large prison.

In March 2020 a major storm is blowing. At the speed of the wind the ship moved, releasing its anchor. To this day, the world is driven by a single flashback to the thought of ‘it’s all over’. Aisha sees the storm of that day as the work of the Lord. Yes, the ship was dragged closer to shore. The ship takes refuge near a village in the early part of the Suez Canal, just 270 meters from shore.

                  Interior of MV Aman 

The affair heats up as it gets closer and closer to shore.  Last December, Mohammad Arrashedi came forward to help Aisha.  The trial is in full swing.  Hope is available that judgment will come soon.  In a few days, the news comes that Aisha's grandmother is also dead.  Aisha is finally released on April 20.  As a free man, he set foot on the shore and enjoyed seeing fresh faces.  ‘I never want to see this cursed ship again,’ he says.

                The Cursed ship MV Aman

According to the International Labor Organization, the number of such isolated vessels is over 250.  Iranians stranded in Indonesia, we have seen and passed in the news that 19 Indians are on a hunger strike on a ship isolated in Kuwait.  Aisha is one of them.  It is noteworthy that the owner of the MV Aman ship on which he was, has risked four such ships.

There were many seafarers like Aisha, who were screaming and struggling in their  abandoned vessel, seeking for freedom.