As a former ichthyologist whose career began in the Black Sea, I’ve often heard that once you study fish, you never truly stop. More than 30 years after leaving the world of ocean expeditions, I still find myself viewing global affairs through the prism of the Fish—a symbol that offers a unique and profound perspective on international relations.
This lens is particularly sharp when analyzing the dynamics of post-colonialism. During a scientific voyage in 1990 that took me to several tropical nations, I found myself in countries grappling with their newfound independence. Though formally free from their colonial empires, they remained caught in a web of economic and psychological dependency. In one nation, I was struck by the recurring image of the Fish in local literature, a phenomenon I termed a form of neo-totemism. To me, the slippery, elusive nature of the fish seemed a perfect symbol of the aspiration for true freedom and sovereignty.
However, a conversation with local intellectuals revealed a starkly different interpretation. They argued that their nation’s problem was not subordination itself, but being subject to the wrong empire. The solution, in their eyes, was simply to replace one metropolis with another, more “humane” and advanced one. My suggestion that their national totem was not a proud, independent fish but a remora—a creature that clings to a larger host for survival—was met with offense. Yet, the metaphor captured a troubling reality in international politics: the pursuit of a new patron rather than genuine self-reliance.
This philosophy of looking from the perspective of the pursued, not the pursuer, reframes even our most cherished stories. Ernest Hemingway’s “The Old Man and the Sea” is often seen as a tale of human stoicism against nature. But from an ichthyologist’s viewpoint, the story is not about the old man, but about the fish. The true title should be “The Marlin and the Land.” The hero is the noble marlin, hunted by a cruel old man representing a greedy, extractive land. The fish’s stoic resistance is a fight for its very existence against an unprovoked aggressor.
This raw, existential struggle is more than just a philosophical concept; it is a visceral reality. I learned this during a 1987 expedition off Yemen’s Socotra archipelago. One evening, our team took a small boat from our trawler to explore a shallow bank. The ocean was a perfect mirror, and the water beneath us came alive as a herd of hundreds of manta rays, or “sea devils,” emerged to feed. The sight of their massive, dark wings gliding through the water was both majestic and terrifying.
In a foolish but exhilarating chase, we tried to provoke one into leaping for a photo. A giant manta finally obliged, launching itself from the water with the sound of a cannon shot, its impact nearly capsizing our boat and sending a small tsunami over the sides. Shaken, we drifted into a secluded lagoon at the base of a sheer cliff. Believing the adventure was over, three of us donned our masks and slipped into the calm water to search for shells.
We were wrong. As I surfaced for air, a long shadow passed beneath me. It wasn’t the triangular fin of a typical shark, but a deeper, more ominous presence moving along the seafloor. A wave of primal terror washed over me, and I saw my companions had spotted it too. What followed was a blur of instinct. One scientist scrambled up the vertical cliff face like a crab; another, the ship’s first mate, launched himself out of the water in a near-vertical leap, landing on a ledge in a feat of adrenaline-fueled agility penguins would envy.
I don’t remember how I got out, only that my knees were scraped raw. We later learned the shark had immediately left, uninterested in our noisy group. But in that moment of sheer panic, philosophy and politics dissolved into the singular, desperate imperative to survive. It was a stark reminder that beneath the complex theories of global power lies a fundamental truth known to fish and man alike: the brutal, instinctual struggle to escape the jaws of a predator and live another day.