Strange Fish

Strange Fish echoes Billie Holidays song Strange Fruit in which to general indifference violence against colored people is taken as normal with black bodies swinging in the southern breeze strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees In the South of the Mediterranean the feeling is the same The fishermen in Zarzis a Tunisian town on Libyas borders set out each day wondering whether they will find a strange fish in their nets the bloated corpse of a drowned migrant But Strange Fish does not only show this drama with its allpervading indifference It rather shows the deep and human response of the towns anonymous heroes For 15 years these fishermen have helped and saved thousands of people And if we find them already dead we help them as well we bury them says Chamseddine Marzoug