A man stands on a rock-strewn beach. In his hand is a clipboard. He squints at it, and then at the line where the water’s lapping inches from the toe of his boot. He grunts, then pulls a watch out of his pocket. He stares fixedly at it for several seconds, watching the hand ticking its way towards the end of a circuit with one eye while the other eye stays on the water.

He calls out a signal and waves. A line of soldiers in heavy gray uniforms streams down the beach, pointing their rifles down at the water and shouting out stern warnings. The man keeps his eyes on the watch and the water. After a minute, he nods and signals for the soldiers to withdraw, just as the water is withdrawing.

A short distance away, two old men sit on a bench feeding bits of stale bread to the shore birds.

“You can say what you want about this new regime,” one of the men says to the other, “but at least they make the tides run on time.”