‘I accepted an impulse job in a New Year’s Eve and ended up trapped in the sea for 6 months’

What would you do if you got stuck on a ship, away from your loved ones and had no idea how – or when – would you come home? Matthias Berg/Lima Segler via BBC is New Year’s Eve in 2019. Giulia Baccosi is at a party with her friends when she rings the phone. The 31 -year -old recently accepted a new job in Sicily (Italy), but is not sure if he made the right decision. “My heart told me that maybe I should reconsider,” she says. “I look at the sky and ask for a sign to the universe, telling me if I’m on the right track.” The message on Baccosi’s cell phone comes from a friend, saying that a freighter ship carrying rum and olive oil is about to make sure from Europe to Central America – and needs a cook. Baccosi had already worked as a cook on a ship and decides to accept this new job instead of going to Sicily. “I’m going with you to Mexico,” she says on the phone to the ship owner, “and then I leave.” It is expected that this stretch of the trip will take about three months. And then Giulia Baccosi intends to go back to her life in Italy. But that’s not how things work. Giulia Baccosi working on the ship’s kitchen. Matthias Berg/ Klima Segler via BBC in early January, increases expectation aboard avontuur. The 100 -year -old schooner leaves Germany and goes to the busy areas of the North Sea. Giulia Baccosi will cook three meals a day for the hungry crew and manage supplies. The first scale is Santa Cruz de Tenerife, in the Canary Islands. The crew can hear the distant drums of the huge carnival of the city. After 36 days at sea, everyone is eager to have fun. And when descending in the port, the crew is surrounded by revelers with stunning clothes. “We were asking, ‘What will we do? Let’s participate in the party!'” She recalls. The next morning, amid a slight hangover, a rumor about visitors on the island that became sick due to a mysterious virus and were placed in quarantine in the hotel. But the crew soon forgot the incident while preparing to go on. One morning, shortly thereafter, Baccosi is cutting fruits and stirring porridge when the night watchman comments with her over an unusual light identified on the horizon. View from the hatch to the Puerto Mogán coast in the Canary Islands. Matthias Berg/ Klima Segler via BBC Avontuur is 45 nautical miles (83 km) from the coast of Gran Canaria and light is too far to be a fishing boat. Quickly arise the control screams, candles are downloaded and the engine, used only in emergencies, is turned on. “What’s going on?” Asks the young woman. “Is that really what I think is? When the light comes closer, she sees a small wooden fishing boat, with 11 men and five women on board, crowding the vessel in such a way that they can barely stand.” They are waving, “says Baccosi,” and we can hear them away. From that nightmare, “she says.” They are the most fragile and vulnerable humans that may exist. “The occupants of the boat had been drifting at sea for more than 10 days. They had no more water, food, no fuel. The wind candles of the wind. One of the most dangerous crossings in the world. Tens of thousands of people try to make this route every year and thousands of them die aboard the avontuur, migrants exhausted receive food, water and medical assistance. ” Called the coastal guard. “There are no heroes … none of them feel like this,” wrote Giulia Baccosi in his diary. “We did what any decent human being should do – and in our place.” The email starts. “The ports are closing, the airports are closing, flights are canceled. Supermarkets, shops, borders-everything is closed. “There is a moment of silence.” We look at each other, somewhat surprised, a little confused, “she says.” What will be happening to our loved ones at home? “The world is starting to close due to COVID-19, but in fact, nobody understands exactly what that means.” Brother, “recalls Baccosi.” I was taken by the fear that something would happen to them while I was in the sea, unable to even talk to them one time. “The only point of contact between the crew and the rest of the world is a satellite daily email, which connects the ship to its place of origin in Germany. And the phone signal is still at least six days away. Navigating to the Caribbean. As he approached Guadalupe, Baccosi sits on the deck and clinging to the cell phone, waiting for a signal. Purchasing provisions. For the crew, it should be an opportunity to rest, walk on land, send messages, send messages and have time to have fun. ” As soon as possible, leaving the crew without believing what was happening. After not being licensed on land after more than three weeks in the sea and still recovering from the news that the world is in Lockdown, the crew worked with what will come ahead. Earth can not mix freely, the avontuur crew is prohibited from descending from the ship in most ports. It is clear that all the planned arrivals and matches of the ship are unthinkable, including Giulia Baccosi’s plan to disembark in Mexico. Difficult, which leaves baccosi worried. How will she be able to feed the 15 members of the crew, now confined to a space with the approximate size of a basketball court, while the tension between them increasingly turns to her loved ones. Insurance out there. “To combat boredom and anxiety, the crew begins to do crafts, draw and play instruments. They set up a charging network so they can swim safely on the stern and some find relief in love relationships.” There is chemistry, there is attraction, “says Baccosi.” Searching intimacy and physical touch is very human. At these times, you can forget that there is something out there that is out of control. “The crew also finds comfort in the wonders of the ocean, such as dolphins and fosters. One night, they receive the visit of a group of friendly minke whales, swimming in bioluminescent water.” They are so close that we can feel their breath, “recalls Baccosi. dreams – even with a fart smell. “At one point, Avontuur needs to do evasive actions to avoid a hurricane and sail north, to the new land on the Canada coast. Food is running out. Baccosi does the inventory and realizes that they don’t have enough dry food to return to Germany. Some products like coffee (” the only thing that drives a sailor “), and she finds out that she finds out. Gas is also ending. “It is our main source of energy for cooking,” she recalls. “And we have no plan B.” Avontuur finally halts in Horta, in the lush volcanic archipelago of the Azores, in western Portugal. I want the grass, I want the bar, I want people, I want to go out and buy chocolate, “she recalls,” the possibility of walking and deciding if you go left or right. “The mood improves between the crew and they start looking at the final stretch of the trip, back to Europe.” We know that we are going home. ” German of Hamburg. The crew gives your hands when the ship dock. “My eyes have been filled with tears,” Baccosi recalls. “We are waiting for so much time.” To celebrate! “At a home return party, the crew wears t -shirts with the words:” The world you know no longer exists. “But Baccosi feels someone else.” I’m back, but I’m not the same person as before. I wonder how I will fit, how a new self, in my old life. “The turnaround of the trip to Avontur did not prevent Giulia Baccosi from returning to life at sea. She did not expect to go back to work as a ship’s cook, but five years later, she is on board again, somewhere near Greenland’s coast. Heaven and asks for a sign to the universe, to make sure he is on the right track.

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