TWO West African men who dreamed of a new life in Europe, in exchange for helping load a cargo vessel with timber in the Ivory Coast, ended up on a raft in raging shark-infested seas off the Eastern Cape coast before miraculously paddling to shore — and an Alexandria police cell — over the weekend. The men, one from the Ivory Coast capital of Abidjan and the other from Takoradi in Ghana, were hurled off the cargo ship Navigator off Kenton-on-Sea after an argument with the Filipino crew and survived eight hours aboard the raft before reaching shore at Woody Cape where they were found by a local angler. The exasperated duo, held as illegal immigrants, were taken to Port Elizabeth on Tuesday, where Home Affairs immigration officials will decide whether or not to repatriate them.