Ode to the mosquitoes
Trip Start
Oct 08, 2007
1
15
18
Trip End
Ongoing
Andaman Islands, India
Saturday, February 9, 2008
Perhaps this is just island life? Perhaps it's the white sands and the sun and this ever flowing and ebbing of the sea...? Perhaps I've just been too damn lazy to get out of this hammock and cycle the 10 minutes into the nearest market, (until now), to come and write to you? But I realize already that it's been a week and over since we struck the port of Havelock from Port Blair and a week since the flurry and drama of buying our tickets for the ferry when everyone went crazy in the ticket office, jumping around on the desks and screaming...where we fought tooth and nail for our passage to this paradise. But still, it feels like only yesterday...
I'm glad I'm losing time...I have one more week here until I return back to mainland India and hopefully by then I'll be ready to mark my path again once more, this time in a confident, Indian-style way...I will NOT be the chicken fed to the crocodiles as one friend I've met here has said.
But it's good, it's great here and the days consist somewhat of snorkeling in the stunning waters of Beach No.7, (which is infinitely the most beautiful of beaches that I have seen so far in India), taking a bus to the lagoon, walking to Beach No.5 and sampling the local fish in my favourite of favourite café shacks here on the island and then cycling on down to Beach No.2. Sometimes the day feels like it's over before I've managed to move anywhere because it gets dark, and I mean really dark around 5pm.
I've been trekking in the jungle, laughed at the swimming elephant, been bitten by a million mosquitoes and sandflies, watched the elephants being trained in the camp and met some of the funniest and strangest of travelers here. It could happen that I do what some travelers before me have done upon reaching here and burn my passport...
but don't worry mother, island life seems idyllic but I think Im ready for the next chapter.
Someone asked me if I don't find the beggars intrusive or disturbing anymore but I feel like I've been taking a break from thinking and being around that aspect of India for the moment. This is my deep breath before I hit it again. Of course I find it difficult, however, there are slums and slums and the aggression of the beggars is what you have to contend with also but yes, it's painful to see and hard to know that the government's answer is to bulldoze down their communities in order to cut the statistics. The worst I've seen yet are the ones in Delhi...although I'm hoping to move up North again towards Kolcutta which I'm sure will be another experience.
But I'm here for now and I like the small details I notice from this position...the locks on the fridges, the beggars wearing sandels, the blue hues of the huts, the funny construction hardhats you have to wear if you want to ride a scooter ...I like the softness of the locals, the lack of aggression from the children and the community of fellow travelers we've built up...I like the nothingness...the quietness, the dark and beckoning danger of the jungle on one side and the clarity and perfectly untouched beauty of the beach on the other side. I like what the day brings...the gentle pace of life...the nowhere to get to and the no-one to meet...things that I see that don't surprise me anymore, like the cobra that an old lady showed me from her cardboard box under her arm when she passed me, the sea snakes you see sometimes when you swim and the coconuts falling that barely miss you when you're walking in the groves. I like the home-made ice-cream, the choking bidis - these poor man's cigarette and the curd.
Is there anything I don't like...? Well, it's expensive here and claustrophobic and humid...but I like it a lot more than I don't. Of course.
Anyway, this is today and I have to go before the sun sets another day and I miss out on time again...shalom xxx
Comments
Ode to Springtime in England!
Hi Anna!
What an amazing journey and the islands sound idyllic! - a paradise apart from the insects! by the time you read this you'll be back in Chennai on mainland India; it seems we are not entirely free of computer problems either and though I've tried to post from the laptop it always plays up so now I've found a computer where I can actually log in to send a post. All well here though the promise of Spring comes and goes, one day it's bright sunshine the next freezing cold again. Mikey says he envied your snorkelling sessions and visits to the jungle, (glad you take a guide!) swimming in warm seas looking at all that amazing fauna and flora, while we are at our books in colder climes!! When the sun shines though is there a lovelier spot than springtime in English countryside?! Poets have written much about it! Hasta pronto y muchos besitos x x x x x x x