Pemba · Mozambique · Photo essay
Low-tide coastal hunt
When the Indian Ocean retreats near Pemba, the exposed seabed becomes a place of work, searching and craft.
“Sometimes I photograph exactly what most people would pass by, because it seems to me that life mostly happens beside the main attraction.”
On the coast near Pemba, I witnessed the greatest difference between low and high tide I had ever seen. When the water retreats, it is possible to walk almost a hundred metres towards the open sea, across ground that had been underwater only a few hours earlier.
People step onto the exposed seabed and carefully search for stones, shells and pieces of coral. The material later finds another life in traditional necklaces, bracelets and jewellery. What looks from a distance like a walk along an empty shore is, in fact, patient work aligned with the rhythm of the ocean.
The returning tide completely changes the scale of the place. Where one can walk easily at low tide, the water may already be over a person's head only a few metres beyond the restored shoreline. In a short time, the sea erases paths, footprints and the temporary landscape it had revealed.
At Chuiba Beach, just outside Pemba, the water has almost unreal colours and the beach is so still and empty that it feels as though it belongs only to whoever is there at that moment. Occasionally, a local fisher passes carrying a net, a handmade tool or a harpoon. Sometimes children appear through sparse branches and young baobabs, curious and certain that the photographer cannot see them.