The image fits almost too well with that strange Tuesday in March when global trade briefly forgot how to move. A container ship dominates the frame, stacked high with steel boxes that look orderly, obedient, almost serene, while cranes stand frozen around it like enormous metronomes paused mid-swing. The water is calm, the light subdued, the whole scene caught in that blue-grey hour when nothing feels urgent yet everything quietly is.

Sometimes the ocean feels like a quiet backdrop to our lives, a blue line on a map or a view from a window seat on a long-haul flight. But pause for a moment and think about the unseen highways stretching across those waters, carrying everything from food to medical supplies to the phone or laptop you’re reading this on. World Maritime Day exists mostly as a reminder that modern life, with all its comforts, is astonishingly dependent on the rhythms of global shipping.