Photo: Roger De Marfa, Dreamstime

You never forget the reverberation of a prosthetic leg on a tennis court. It was the sound I woke up to each morning during a two-week family vacation in Durban, South Africa, nearly 40 years ago. I remember padding barefoot to the window to look down at the early-morning game in progress.

On one side of the net, my mother, returning each ball with fearsome accuracy — she would go on to become a club champion. On the other, a man we had met on the beach on our first day.

We had watched him unstrap his prosthesis and hop down to the water for a long swim. When he returned, toweling himself off as he balanced on his single leg, I asked the inevitable question. I was 5 years old. I had no concept of tact. Or volume. “Why does that man only have one leg?”

After strapping the limb onto his stump, he walked over. “My left leg was bitten off by a shark,” he said. “Out there, during a morning swim.”

I decided to keep the story to myself when, at 6:30 one recent morning, I joined half a dozen other tourists aboard a small boat emblazoned with the logo of the KwaZulu-Natal Sharks Board. We were heading for some of the world’s most shark-infested waters.

The Sharks Board was established in 1962 with the aim of reducing the number of shark attacks on bathers along South Africa’s Indian Ocean coast. The most obvious protective measure was the installation of shark nets a quarter of a mile off 38 popular beaches.

“The nets are the last line of defense,” said our guide as we sat at our mooring in Durban Harbour. “The Board is also involved in researching every aspect of shark behavior. The more we understand, the easier it will be for people to coexist with sharks in relative harmony.”

After the introductory talk and safety briefing, we cast off. Within the harbor, the water was placid; but as we chugged along the mile-long entrance channel, we could see huge whitecaps looming beyond the breakwaters.

“We’re already in shark territory,” said the guide. “We installed underwater CCTV cameras in the entrance channel. They’ve shown great whites and Zambezi sharks coming and going every day. They’re probably underneath us right now.”

At last we struck out into open water. The boat rocked severely. Everyone was lashed with spray. Standing at the helm, our guide steered the boat around the seawall to face downtown Durban and the hotel-lined beach known as the Golden Mile.

From this distance, Durban had changed little since our family holiday all those years ago. Yet our faded photographs from the trip revealed some of the unsavory aspects of that era.

When I was old enough to understand, my father sat me down with our Durban album and singled out a few poignant pictures.

There was a close-up of one of the signs beside the city’s famous stretch of sand: “This Bathing Area Is Reserved for Members of the White Race Group.” A photo of me and my brother at the city’s dolphinarium showed, in the background, a group of African schoolchildren tightly corralled into a segregated section at the top of the stand.

Apartheid was scrapped in the 1990s; and although much of the city’s architecture remains familiar, the social fabric has been transformed beyond recognition.

Through all the changes, the shark nets have remained in place. On most mornings, the shark net crews in their bright-yellow boats service the protective barrier, releasing any live fish trapped in the netting and collecting those that have died.

Our voyage took us along the staggered length of the nets, passing close to the service boats. Our guide shouted to one of the crews: “Found anything?”

A crew member lifted a 3-foot-long dead shark. “Young shortfin mako.” The carcass would be taken to the Board’s headquarters at Umhlanga, north of Durban, for study.

On average, 591 sharks are ensnared in the nets along the entire coast each year; 13 percent are released alive.

The shark death toll is the enduring cost of keeping the beaches safe for bathers and surfers. Since the nets were installed, there have been no fatal shark attacks in Durban’s cordoned zone.

Following my voyage on the Sharks Board boat, I returned to the downtown Royal Hotel. I reflected on the irony that today the greatest danger faced by visitors is on land, right here in the city.

The social injustices of apartheid linger in the form of an unsavory legacy: widespread crime. The U.S. Dept. of State website identifies the neighborhood around the U.S. Consulate in Durban as a high-risk area for muggings and advises visitors to proceed with ”heightened awareness.”

Taking a walk from my hotel was like plunging into the ocean. I knew it was a potentially dangerous environment that needed to be treated with caution. I imposed metaphorical nets around the immediate downtown area and stayed within their cordon, limiting my range to familiar
streets. I didn’t walk at all after dark.

Fear can be healthy. My mother’s erstwhile tennis partner had no fear and suffered the consequences. His misfortune was one of the formative lessons of my childhood. Whenever I venture into an alien environment — a foreign city or a natural wilderness — I instinctively raise my guard.

On the occasions that I have strayed into harm’s way — by venturing down a deserted alley or by suddenly encountering a dangerous animal — my pulse reverberates harshly in my ears. Sounding not unlike an artificial leg on a tennis court.