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There were usually several Filipino fisherman on bamboo rafts spear fishing on the reef below us. The reef was never more than 10-feet deep out for a few hundred feet, then sloped sharply down disappearing in a deep blue haze. Sharks stayed beyond the reef. The Filipinos used crude, handmade goggles and spear guns. Each man carried two rubber-band powered rifles and two pistols. Spears were welding rods. I paid one man to equip me and let me go with him. I paid him a peso ($.50) and my catch for the day. When we came up on a school I would fire both rifles quickly, drop them and continue the chase using the pistols. When the fish were gone we would pick up any speared fish and our rifles and spent spears. The rifles would be standing on end on the bottom, waving in the current like living things. You could see them for a couple hundred feet. |
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