Tuesday, March 13, 2007

A brief glimpse of Paradise

Well....its been quite a lot of time since i was here last ,almost a year in fact! I had almost lost the blogging habit , it seemed as though nothing seemed relevant enough to be written about.By the way, lots of things have been happening around me. Change of work place for instance, I miss Kochi once in a while...Trivandrum may mean home but still Kochi is kind of special to me,it was there that i developed an independent spirit for the first time of my life....

Everytime there is a change it leaves me flustered.I tend to take a lot of time to adapt to it.After the usual complaining and groaning about the new scenario and surroundings to everyone i came across and no one in particular,i have finally resigned to the fact that "Change is a law of nature" and i better not be insolent enough to resist universal laws :) . When nothing changed , i would complain ,oh why is everything the same day after day ,its so damn dull etc etc. And when change did come , i wouldnt be the happiest one to welcome it. I was never en expert at adapting to my circumstances .My dad is a marvel in that case. In his official life spanning 27 years now , he has travelled across India such alot and lived at all sorts of queer and interesting places . And he has equally been at home at each of the places .I love travelling too but i dont claim to be a hard and tough traveller as dad.

Hungry for a change , sometimes I suggest to my brother "Lets plan a trip to Darjeeling next holidays or maybe Simla!" And he scoffs at me "You who cant resist the cold at Munnar!? I would probably have to bury you in Simla :( And what about your famous vomiting sprees and stomach cramps? " I reply with a sheepish grin because he is not afterall,very far from the truth. And yet i have had a few adventurous trips , which i would always hold dear. One of them is the journey to Minicoy island in Lakshadweep 5 years back.Dad was posted at Minicoy LightHouse then and we went with him during the summer of 2001. We set off from Cochin harbour on board MV Tipu Sulthan.It was the first sea voyage of my life.I had imagined it would be really romantic and it proved to be not exactly so. As the ship heaved and slid this way and that , a nauseating sensation came up from my abdomen to throat and i was trying everything from lemons to ice creams to keep myself from vomiting. At times the sea was calm , the ship was more steady and i could relax .One favourite hobby was , standing on the deck and throwing food items into the water below to watch those blue,yellow,red and purple coloured fish surging to the water surface and lunging for them.They were lovely like the ones we get to see in Discovery,Natgeo or Animal planet.

It was about 16-18 hours of journey.The ship was full of islanders who were returning home after shopping or medical treatment.And they were a very noisy lot,talking a foreign language which i later found out was Malay. Next morning our ship closed in on the shores of Minicoy. It was a small island with not sufficient depth to harbour a ship .So we lay anchored a few kms in the sea and boatmen came to take away the passengers from the ship to the shore. There was a brief checking of luggage at the entrance by the Police and we were soon seated in a local taxi ready to go to the Light House which was a couple of kms from there. The taxi was actually a goods autorickshaw with benches fixed at its back for people to sit on , and it had no roof :) .Riding on it , we passed through the concrete road to our destination.The majority of the population at Minicoy which was barely a thousand was of Muslim community.They were originally from Maldives and even spoke the native tongue unlike the other islands of Lakshadweep where Malayalam was the official language.

The Minicoy Lighthouse was built by the British in the 19th century . It stood tall ,towering over time and the view one got to see from its top was breathtaking . If you are seeking out to go to a place which is so isolated from the world and that serves as a hideout and yet is so serenely beautiful as heaven ,then this should be it. The pure white virgin sands on the beaches ,the hard blowing wind from the sea and the memorable evening walks during our stay stand out in my mind ,forever.




Dad once pointed to an island out in the sea from the beach and said that its possible to walk upto it when its low tide.Within no time , I forced him into agreeing to going there. We went there next morning ,the sea was just a feet high , below my knees.The little uninhabited island called Viringly had a coral reef running along it. It was great fun ,walking into the sea,holding hands,splashing water on each other and cracking jokes.There were 6 of us - me , dad,brother,2 of dad's colleagues and one guy who was doing research on marine biology.By the time we reached the island ,it was noon and parching hot. Barely had time to rest , we had to walk back to Minicoy before it was high tide again.So we set off again,this time very tired and with less of fun.As we crossed half the distance wading through the water ,the water level started to rise ,the tide was coming in way before our calculations..... We had to rush now or else we would be drowned unless we knew how to swim.Everybody increased their pace ,I noticed how the water level kept rising , first over my knees ,then over my waist and finally upto my shoulders.Meanwhile brother lost one of his slippers and while trying to retrieve it , fell into the water.There was a slight panick as everyone pulled him out of the water, his leg was bleeding from the fall. Finally,we literally collapsed on the beach when we got there . The first thing we came to an agreement among the three of us was , not to divulge any of the narrow escape we had that day to mom or else she would make hell seem sweeter for us. I slept like a log that night...

The 4 days at Minicoy gave me priceless memories and I was literally crying when we had to board the ship back home.I was so much in love with those blue-green waters and pearl white beaches..............

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

at last i read it...
see... i told u.. itz 'on' only :-)
is that pic the island u ver talking about?
neeth

Pradeep Nair said...

An interesting account.

Blogging is a good outlet for expressing our thoughts. So you are back to blogging?

Soorya said...

Neeth : yes dear , thats the snap of the island where we went walking..

Pradeep : yes,blogging serves that purpose and i wish to blog continuously atleast from now on :-),thanks for your comment

Anonymous said...

Good work sooryamole....a very interesting read...
never knew u cud write this well...
Keep it up...

Neelima

Soorya said...

Thanks for your comment neelima mol :-)

towards zero said...

A very true to life picturisation of the events.....

good work!!!

Try emphasising on the finer details next time....
then i believe it'll be a sure hit!

Soorya said...

Ok boss! great to see that you have begun your own blog :-) . Waiting for your posts ;-)