What if somebody informed you mermaids had been actual?
Neglect the fish tails, we imply girls able to holding their breath for minutes on finish as they dive beneath the ocean a number of hundred occasions a day.
These are the haenyeo divers of South Korea, a group of ladies from Jeju Island who’ve been free-diving (with out oxygen) to reap seafood for hundreds of years.
Now, with most of them of their 60s, 70s and 80s, their traditions and lifestyle are in peril as fewer youthful girls take up the career, and with the ocean doubtlessly altering past recognition.
It’s these info that prompted US-Korean film-maker Sue Kim to crew up with feminine schooling advocate and Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafazai to share their story with the world.
The daughter of Korean immigrants, US-born Kim first got here throughout the haenyeo when she was a toddler, holidaying in South Korea.
“I used to be so struck by them for a similar causes that you just see within the movie – they had been so extremely daring and vibrant and assured. They had been additionally so loud… preventing and laughing, they usually simply gave off this very large power and occupied their area so unapologetically,” says Lee.
“I simply fell in love with that complete vibe and large power after I was a bit of woman. And so I grew up staying fascinated with them. They had been a model of Korean womanhood that I used to be impressed by and needed to emulate,” she provides.
“I used to be so shocked that I didn’t know concerning the haenyeo, like so many individuals didn’t know, I stated sure immediately,” explains Malala, who was a producer on the movie.
“The story actually took on an urgency about 10 years in the past after I came upon that this was in all probability the final technology of the haenyeo,” explains Lee. “It grew to become extra of an pressing mandate to verify somebody documented… whereas we nonetheless had them and whereas they may nonetheless inform us their very own story in their very own phrases.”
The movie follows the ladies going about their gruelling work throughout the harvest season and examines the challenges they face each out and in of the water.
They head out to dive at 6am every day. They maintain their breath for a few minutes, come again as much as the floor and return down once more – between 100 and 300 occasions a session.
Simply think about the health ranges. They harvest for 4 hours after which spend one other three or 4 shelling and making ready their catch.
There are numerous theories as to why girls started to take over this historically male job so a few years in the past. The Go to Jeju web site states that the variety of males was low total within the inhabitants as a result of a excessive portion of them dying on the tough seas whereas boat fishing.
In consequence, there weren’t many males to reap the ocean, so girls regularly took over the job.
‘Unhappy grandma trope’
That is the primary main documentary concerning the haenyeo and Kim says it was exhausting to realize entry.
“The haenyeo communities, they’re very insular,” she explains.
“They’re rural communities that stay in fishing villages. They do not work together with the cities of Jeju a lot.”
Kim discovered a researcher who had a historical past with NGOs and had contacts in the neighborhood.
“So this lady… launched us, then I went down and I principally spent two weeks with… the Haenyeo communities and actually gaining their belief. And I did that by principally listening.
“They really needed to speak about all of the issues that had been occurring to them.
“They needed to speak about the truth that they felt that they had been on the verge of extinction. They needed to speak about what was occurring to the ocean that no-one appeared to find out about or care about.”
Kim says she needed to reassure the ladies that she would not stereotype them or pity them for working into outdated age.
“They love working! They assume they’re so robust and empowered by doing so.”
Kim informed them she would present them of their “true energy.”
“‘I promise I cannot tackle this unhappy grandma trope as a result of that’s not how I see you, I see you as heroes’,” she defined to the group.
“After that, we grew to become a household.”
The dangers are large. There is no such thing as a insurance coverage obtainable for the job, because it’s too harmful. And now the ocean – and the ladies’s livelihood – is beneath risk.
World warming is leading to much less sea life, notably in shallow water; diving deeper is tougher with out oxygen.
A lot of the movie focuses on the ladies’s protests in opposition to the radioactive water from Japan’s Fukishima plant being discharged into the ocean (Jeju borders Japan), which takes one of many haeneyeos, Quickly Deok Jang, on to the UN’s Human Rights Council in Geneva.
The message from consultants is, overwhelmingly, that the discharge is protected and it received the inexperienced gentle from the Worldwide Atomic Vitality Company – however not all scientists agree on the impression it is going to have.
Whereas the haenyeo do harvest marine life, there are laws in place about once they’re allowed to reap sure seafood, which helps to guard the ecosystem.
Another excuse they do not use oxygen tanks is as a result of “they imagine that by holding their breath, that may enable them the pure quantity of marine life that they need to harvest”, Kim explains, which helps keep away from overfishing.
Maybe the larger risk although, is from inside, with fewer youthful girls selecting to pursue this troublesome career.
A coaching college was arrange within the early 2000s to attempt to stem the dwindling numbers however solely 5% of these attending go on to grow to be haenyeos.
All is just not misplaced although. The movie introduces us to 2 younger girls from one other island who’ve discovered a following on social media and level out the versatile hours the job can supply round household life. One in all them needed to be taught to swim on the age of 30 to do the job.
The older girls meet with them for festivals and protests – they name them “their infants” whereas they’re named “aunties” in return.
Yousafzai is impressed: “After I take a look at the haenyeo and the way they work collectively, it simply jogs my memory of the collective work that girls are doing in every single place else, together with the advocacy that Afghan lady are doing to lift consciousness of the systematic oppression they’re dealing with.”
“When a woman is watching this documentary, I need her to imagine in herself and realise that she will be able to do something. She will be able to keep beneath the water for 2 to a few minutes with out oxygen,” she says. “And naturally I nonetheless need to take some swimming lessons to learn to swim! I’m at level zero, nevertheless it has impressed me to contemplate swimming.”
The Final of the Sea Ladies is obtainable on Apple TV+ from 11 October 2024.
