Momus - Cockle Pickers lyrics

Yu Hui came from Yangbian, a village
In the north of Fujian, opposite Taiwan
Government requisitions left him with just
One mu of land
Not enough to pay for his family's outgoings
It was humiliating
Yu Hui thought of emigrating
A man working in a bakery in Britain
Can send enough money home
To build a big six storey mansion in Yangbian
Abroad I could save each month
More than I make here in a year

And so Yu Hui made a
Deal with the Snakehead Gang

The wind is strong, the tide is high
In darkness no-one can see the sky

On a forged Korean passport Yu Hui
Flew from Hong Kong to Europe
He dyed his hair to better resemble
The man in the picture
In Paris he tried to find work, but failed
An illegal Chinese with no skills

I went sightseeing, called my family
Told them to pay the snakeheads £7000
This they did, with the help of loans
Secured by relatives and friends

In England Yu Hui thought he
Would have better luck
A chance to earn more money
He came stowed away in a lorry
Through the channel tunnel

I heard that some who do this suffocate
I was afraid it was hot in the truck
I ate a bar of chocolate

In London he worked in the
Kitchen of a takeaway
The boss was hard, and the chef
Although from Yu Hui's own village
Required £200 to give him the job

I slept on a mattress I found on the street
Lived with four others above a takeaway
Had to distribute 500 leaflets every day
Then work eight to ten hours in the kitchen
For two meals, and low pay

When he heard about the
Cockling work up north
Yu Hui assumed it could not be
Worse than life in London
He packed a case and went to Morecambe Bay

This work is very hard
It is cold and hurts my back
I live in a room with forty others
We eat only rice i am depressed
I want to quit, but because I'm illegal
I have no freedom and no choice
Five different Chinese teams
All under the control of a gangmaster
Work different sections of the bay
They work according to the tides
Sometimes by day but mostly at night
In groups of twenty to thirty

The English cockling teams felt threatened
Because we sieve the tiddlers out
Clean our cockles better
They poured diesel on our catch to warn us
They hate us because we are foreigners
So now we work at night
Although it is much more dangerous

They lay the wooden planks on the sand
And shake them to bring the
Cockles to the surface
Harvest them with rakes, clean them up
And drop them in a sack

The wind is strong, the tide is high
In darkness no-one can see the sea

And we knew that the tide was rising
Only when it touched our feet
By that time our only escape was blocked

If I die, who will pay off the Snakeheads?
My family will drown in endless tears
They cannot pay, not in fifty years
Narrator: The hovercraft sent by
The lifeguard was
Beaten back by two metre waves
Twenty bodies were recovered, only
One was saved, clinging to Priest Skier
It was not Yu Hui

The wind is strong, the tide is high
In darkness