Gone Fishin'

I wasn't a big fan of fishing. My uncle loves to fish and he would drive hours to some destination in Taiwan in the wee hours in the weekend morning to fish in different streams, lakes and coasts. A lot of the kinds of fish that he went for aren't really big... less than impressive, but he raves about it all the time, saying it was a big feat to catch some of the fish that he caught. I guess this was the reason why I was never really interested in fishing.

Then once a dad's friend took me to deep sea fishing. Basically, we hopped onto this fishing boat converted into a private fishing vessel, deposited our passports and paid the captain to take us out into the ocean. It was like a public bus, but the destination will eventually be where we departed from. We had to have our own equipment. Each person had a motorized reel. At the end of the fishing line were more than ten hooks strung together and a very big lead weight dangled at the end. Once dropped into the water, you can see the depth meter on the reel telling you how deep the line has gone. 160m, 200m.... That's pretty damn deep! For the next 15 min, we just clinched to whatever solid we could and try not to fell over the boat. Then, it was time to retrieve the line. 5 minutes. It took full five minutes for the motor to retrieve the line. Now, five minutes may not sound like long, but it IS very long. Finally, we see the fish on the hooks. Fish from 200m below sea level being brought up in five minutes. Remember the movie "Total Recall" where people blew up when being thrown into a depressurized environment? It was kinda like that. The fish's eyes popped.

May be that was why I wasn't a fan of fishing.

Then I came to Florida.

A friend of mine said," Hey, let's go fishing!"
I thought why not! So we went. He had two rods. We set up the lines and dropped them into the water. This was at a water way connecting the Atlantic Ocean and the inland harbor, so the water channel was narrow with water crafts coming in and out. There were quite a few people fishing as well, and this fit my impression of fishing, which is just wait, and wait, and wait, and chill out. We sat around, ate chips, talked about whatever. Then I thought I will check the line. I held the rod and suddenly felt a tension. "I've got something!" I shouted. Just like that, without any work, I caught a fish.

Then fishing became kinda interesting.

I went to Walmart and picked up a cheap fishing rod. I then went over to the next aisle and picked up a starter kit that included different weights, hooks, floats and fake lures. It was really cheap and I thought what an affordable hobby this is!

For a few weeks, I didn't really have the time to go fishing. I saw a lady casting her rod at the small lake beside my apartment, so I thought I should give it a try just to test it out. This was when I realized that there are so many ways to fish. Different ways to arrange the weight and float and bait or lure for different kind of fish and conditions. I was soon sucked into this little world of fishing techniques, trying to look for tutorials online and figuring out the best ways to do it.


My friend's catch, some sort of bass.

It was only when I had my first real experience in fishing when I realized that there is a lot more to what I thought I knew. It was a canal full of hungry fish. You will get a bite as soon as your bait touches the water, but 4 hours went by and we finished a bucket of live baits, we still did not catch any of them. The Gar fish were just nibbling our baits away without really biting. We were out-smart by some creature with really tiny brains.


My achievement.... I think it's called Spotted Sunfish.

And yes, we let both the fish go.

This reminds me of the movie "Gone Fishing" by Danny Glover and Joe Paci, a down to earth blue collar duo whose only desire was to go on a humble fishing trip using their hard earned vacation, but plagued with disastrous but hilarious events that made their trip unique and unforgettable. For me, I thought fishing was supposed to be a relaxing and peaceful experience, but in reality, it was full of frustration.

Last weekend, I finally got to go out there again to try my luck. It was a last minute idea, so we went somewhere closer and bought earthworms as bait instead. It was not a popular spot, so we weren't sure if there were any fish. We then found this spot where the water is shallow and we could actually see the fish with polarized lens. Desperate to get our official first catch, we started to fish... no, more like, hook fish! Basically, the fish in the water were not really hungry, so we lowered the bait right in front of them to force them to bite. It was pretty pathetic I must say. There was no harmony in our minds. We wanted it bad! Again, the fish took small bites and consumed our baits. We tried a bunch of methods. In the end, we decided that we should put as little bait as possible so that the hook can do it job better. It worked, and both of us caught a fish each. They were puny as compared to what else were in the water, but with this, we can officially tell people that we fish!

Here I shall omit the crazy encounter with a baby alligator wanting to eat our floats.

That night, I cannot remember which movie I was watching, but the thought of right or wrong popped in my mind. Some of my closer friends may remember me telling story of me catching insects when I was young and how it turned out. I realized that I wasn't feeling very good about fishing. Why? Because I was building my entertainment upon the pain and suffering of another life form. Now before you start to think I am going all religious and what not, I am not. There has been a debate on whether fish feel pain, so I did a quick internet search and a recent experiment showed that fish not only feel pain, but remembers it. Fish that were subjected to pain feeling acted wary and unnatural, which goes to show that their brains process the pain into fear, just like humans and mammals.

Will I hook a dog for fun? No. So why should I hook a fish for fun? I wasn't respecting the fish as life forms, but saw them as objects.

I did enjoy the fishing experience. The anticipation, the challenge of trying to out smart them(now this makes me sound really low) and the excitement and feeling of satisfaction when I finally caught that S.O.B were what made fishing addictive. This is a violence based non-violent sport, and I don't know if this is for me. I still think about different ways I can try to do better at fishing, but at the same time, I don't really think it's worth the pain of the fish, and the guilt in me. I still have my fishing rod. I may go for another trip of fishing. Or I may just leave it behind and sun bake with the gators when I am out there.