FAO Quotables

"But being right, even morally right, isn't everything. It is also important to be competent, to be consistent, and to be knowledgeable. It's important for your soldiers and diplomats to speak the language of the people you want to influence. It's important to understand the ethnic and tribal divisions of the place you hope to assist."
-Anne Applebaum

Monday, December 22, 2014

'A movie in the making in Comoros' or 'Marooned in Moroni'

I recently watched the depressing and exhilirating "All is Lost" starring Robert Redford.  For those who haven't seen it--it's the fictional story of a man lost at sea whose world progressively deteriorates until...wait for it all is lost (or is it?!).






Well the pics of this poor soul is what that  scenario looks like in real life without the HD cameras
and big hollywood budget.  This unnamed gentlemen is from Poland and he's been stuck in Moroni, Comoros for a few months now.

He bought this boat in Miami (he claimed to have a US green card) and has been sailing around the world since then.  Things started to go downhill when he arrived in Mumbai:

From his profanity-laced tirade (while his english was broken, he nailed the expletives perfectly), I was able to deduce that somehow a corrupt port/customs agent there had swindled him out of nearly all of his money.  At some point he said 'to hell with this' and fled the port.  Somewhere around the Comoran island of Moheli, he found himself shipwrecked.  He claims his ship once had a mast but it looked an awful lot like once of those life boats you see on cruise ships.

































Anyway, the Comoran Coast Guard rescued him and towed him to the port of Moroni on Grand
Comores.

With 100 euros to his name, a broken engine, no living relatives or friends and dwindling supply of canned food--his prognosis does not look good.  His own summation of his future prospects were slightly more colorful.

A month and a half after my last visit, though, I recevied an update from a colleague there who said that the Comoran government had given him a little money and that he was slowly getting his engine repaired.

Stay tuned for more updates in 2015!
The sea-faring wayward Polish sailor



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