Photo: Contributed - BBC

A young Sri Lankan man crammed into the cargo hold of a ship with nearly 500 others had only one thing on his mind — getting to the promised land called Canada.

Nearly five years after the vessel arrived in British Columbia, the refugee claimant says he understands the plight of hundreds of migrants who have died in the Mediterranean Sea since April 13.

The man, whose identity is protected by a publication ban, says he paid a smuggler in Thailand to board a ship full of men, women and children who feared they'd drown during a violent storm.

He says he vomited often during the nine-month journey that included little food and meagre rations of rain water.

The man dubbed B188 in Canadian government documents says dying at sea was worth the risk for a shot at freedom, and it's the same chance that migrants heading from Africa to Europe are taking.

He says the fact that an estimated 1,700 people have died at sea should be a wake-up call to the world about the risks migrants face when try to leave behind intolerable suffering for a better life elsewhere.