Lots of darkness, then many lights.

It’s incredible how quickly darkness can swallow a jungle. Three of us were tripping over roots and rocks, trying to make our way home in the pitch black. We were enjoying that thrill of scaring ourselves with thoughts of jungle cats and huge man-eating bats that might jump down on us at any moment. Our headlights were powerful and were scattering shadows around us that kept catching me off guard. I could not remember a time when my legs felt heavier or more tired. My body ached for a comfortable bed, wearily accepting the fact that soon it would feign sleep on a thin mattress in a jungle hut resonating with the very loud sounds of the forest.

Although my rope was nearing its end, the travel gods were about to remind me that (like a line from one of my favourite songs) the darkness defines where the light is. Out of every disappointing or frustrating situation comes something made up of pure goodness – something so incredible it makes you forget the bad things, or at least be thankful that they happened in order for this one good thing to occur. This story will take time, but it ends with a beautiful, light-filled moment.

The day was one of the longest in our recent memory. It began with an early breakfast shared with Paul, our new English friend who would join us on a trek to a local tribal village. We left around ten, giving us what we thought would be plenty of time to go to the village, explore a distant cave, return for a nap then go catch the bats and swallows exiting a closer cave, as they did every night at six.

It turns out the trek was more intense than we planned. For the first leg, we would be following a road. Pat, the woman running things at our guest house, had handed us a hand-drawn map and told us we wouldn’t get lost. In an effort to save 600 baht each, we had opted to explore on our own. The map was relatively clear, we were three sprite young people, the way home followed a river, we were sure we could handle it. Little did we know, the road (which, in all fairness, was marked as “steep ups and downs”) was more of a mountain pass.

It was dirt and rocks and it was straight up. The closest thing to a vertical road I have ever seen. We hiked straight up for an hour, at which point the road finally leveled off and took us past farms and rice paddies with a backdrop of rolling limestone mountains, then commenced the “steep down” portion. Another hour later, as we dragged ourselves through the gate into the village and past the welcoming crowd of lounging water buffaloes, my calves were singing.

The village wasn’t that much different than the village we had left two hours earlier, but we were not to be disappointed. The people (who had beautiful, large smiles) clearly lived a simple, village life. Their houses were all wooden, built on stilts. The women and men wore hand-woven shirts of the brightest colours. Some women approached us as we caught our breath outside a small shop and sold us some beautiful woven scarves. It was very quiet – the only sounds were the distant hollow clunking of wooden bells adorning grazing water buffalo and roosters busy with a crowing competition. We caught our breath then hired a guide who would take us on a further 30 minute trek to a cave called Tham Long Yaow.

He didn’t speak any English, didn’t wait for us and didn’t tell us that we would need to crawl on our hands and knees through mud to enter the deep, dark, damp cave. Luckily he had a strong light (an old-school patchwork made up of a hand-held bulb connected with thin wires to a large battery on a string that he slung over his shoulder). Entering the cave, though difficult, was one of the most awe-inspiring things I’ve done.

The tiny hole we squeezed through opened up into a huge cavern with stalactites dripping from the ceiling, creating stalagmites that occasionally joing with them and form huge columns connecting roof and floor. Our voices bounced from wet cave wall to wall, so we whispered, just because we felt we should.

When we weren’t talking, it was very quiet. Nothing moved, except for the occasional bat that abandoned his roost and darted through our light beams.  As we walked deeper and deeper into the cave, about halfway through, we heard the beginnings of a rushing sound, which was really a small river that would mark the farthest point we could go. The ceiling got too low and the water too deep to continue. Most things were gray, save for our guide’s orange light and the frozen waterfalls of sparkling white, a phenomenon created by a mineral deposit that took thousands of years to form.

Caves are strange spaces – alien landscapes that don’t keep time or know seasons. They just go on forming themselves at their own thousand-year pace.  There’s a lot more to that strange feeling I was struck by inside the cave, the ancientness dripping off the rock around me, but it’s hard to explain. I felt small and very much alive and full of movement.

While walking back to the village, I was aware of my tiredness. My legs felt twice their normal weight, my white shirt was now mud brown and drenched with sweat. I hoped the projected two-hour walk home along the river would go quickly. Hindsight now laughs in my face.

The return trek began with a guide, a one-toothed boy who was on his way fishing, who took us along the beginning of the path as it crossed the slow, muddy stream, then crossed it again, and again. It began as an ankle deep stream. [Hours later, on our last crossing (I think number ten), it was a waist-deep, rushing, rock-bottomed river.] Finally, we got tired of crossing the stream and parted ways with the boy, content that we were on the path that would take us home. Important note: on our map, right under “map not to scale, distances distorted,” it said “impossible to get lost, down stream to home.” Later, over dinner, Paul would insist that we were never lost as we were always along the river, we just lost the path.

We definitely lost the path. I was sure of it when I noticed that the only other prints in the mud were those belonging to buffalo and the creepers and stinging nettles had grown over the path, making us hunch over and scramble. I can now completely understand why you always see men going through jungles with machetes. What I would have done for a machete.

Perhaps I’ll save you the agony of following us on our whole muddy, nettle-filled, wet-shoed journey. Fast forward to the three of us crossing the river for what would be the last time, nearly four hours later. We could see a muddy road with fresh tire tracks and the tin roofs of a village on top of a cliff. A large limestone formation jutted out of the earth, which we all agreed must have been the “Big Knob” marked on the map. We looked at each other with huge tired smiles, sure we were finally on the path we had been evading the whole time. We followed the road until it ended, plunging once again into that damn river. I still wonder, with frustration, what kind of road leads into a river? It did, however, lead us to a farmer, the only person we saw on the entire trip. Cave Lodge, we asked him. He pointed farther down the river. Refusal. Ban (village), we asked him. He pointed straight above his head to the tin roofs. We sat down, only allowing ourselves a few minutes of rest.

(At this point, almost seven hours after we left the lodge, we were worried about the setting sun. It’s one thing to be stumbling along a riverbank, not knowing how far you are from home, in the heat of the Thai day, quite another thing to do it in the dark.)

Wearily rising, we back-tracked until we found a path that looked like it might eventually lead us to the village on the cliff. Through a farm, up a small, muddy incline and we finally found the path we failed to follow. I’m still not sure that before that moment, walking into the village, we were ever on the path. But, I guess the map (and Paul) were right, impossible to get lost. Downstream to home. But possible, even easy, to lose the path.

Then the three of us our eating dinner. The light has faded. It’s now officially twilight. We look at each other with sleep in our eyes. Should we try and catch the swallows and bats, one of us asks. Why not. So we finish our food and, like crazed zombies, we leave the guesthouse again. It’s seven. The hike is an easy kilometer. Sophie and I have already done it twice. My muscles are starting to hurt. They’ve finally caught up and realized what I just put them through. They were screaming at me in protest, blown away that I would force them to work again. Just a little farther. We reach the end – the cave exit, where thousands of swallows are supposed to swirl each night before they enter the cave to sleep. The cave exit, where thousands of bats are supposed to come screeching out as they embark on their night’s hunt. It’s silent. Nothing is moving, nothing is screeching, nothing is swooping. We’ve missed everything. So with sleep stumbling along behind us like an angry younger sibling, we turn around. I’m disappointed and tired and hot. I’m sure we’re going to be attacked by a jaguar. But, the travel gods never let you get too down on yourself. You’re lucky, they remind you. And remind us, they did.

We crested the last little hill of the hike. The jungle around us was black. But below, the trees were sparkling. No, blinking. The forest was flashing with fireflies – not just one or two, but thousands of fireflies. And they were blinking in unison. We turned off our headlights and smiled in the dark. It was magical and beautiful and incredible. It was worth a thousand river crossings. We didn’t speak. The flies lost the beat and started to twinkle on their own time. Paul was laughing – he had seen his first firefly only days ago. Little spotlights of forest floor were lit up under each one. They gave off enough light to make out trees and leaves. I tried to take a picture, but you can never photograph something so near to perfect. You’re meant to appreciate it only once. Then forever try to recapture that perfection. A fairytale moment that is fleeting.

Soon the fireflies dispersed and we turned our headlamps back on and headed for home. And my legs didn’t hurt as much and I wasn’t as hot and I was smiling.

Thank you, travel gods, for once again showing me the light.

Culture shock in seven-eleven

Culture shock is a fickle thing. Like the coolness of the latest fad, as soon as you acknowledge it, it starts fading.  It flourishes in the minds of weary travelers, suffering from the ill effects of new time zones and late-night flights. But once caught up on sleep, those same travelers that before walked zombie-like through the streets or stared gawk-eyed at bright lights and new faces are found striding with confidence, weaving through busy streets, using public transportation, eating like a local.

Sophie and I are in one of three or four 7/11s on our street, sometime during our second day in Bangkok. (Our first day barely deserves mentioning as we spent most of it enjoying the thrill of mattresses with springs.) Bright lights, air conditioning, clearly labeled and fairly priced goods, cash registers – Thailand is a world away from India. We buy a new SIM card (no paperwork, no passport details, no photo required). We get change for a 1000 Baht bill, no questions asked. We step out onto the beautiful sidewalk and cross the street – the cars first slow down to let us pass, then drive by hornless. We are asked if we want a rickshaw (tuk-tuk in Thailand) by a smiling, reclining driver; we say no; he stops asking. I stumble over a depression in the sidewalk and look down in horror to see that no, my foot is not covered in garbage or excrement (neither animal nor human) or something in between. No, Dorothy-akka, despite the Indian restaurants that line the street here in Sukhumvit, we are not in Kansas anymore.

But just as I was beginning to develop a sinking feeling in my stomach, a longing for the land of Ganesh and goats, dosas and dabas, it’s gone. Between the phenomenal street-side pad thais and papaya salads, the zen-inducing golden temples and the beautiful, wide, functioning streets, it doesn’t take long to start seeing Thailand for what it is, not for the way it compares to my beloved India.

Midnight departure

It’s the middle of the night and we are walking down a narrow path to the beach. The only light comes from Alex’s headlight; our hotel manager is guiding us with his bike. We had to wait for high tide for this adventure, as it is the best time to catch baby sea turtles hatching from their eggs and making their way into the sea, under the cover of bright Andaman stars.

We stop for Alex to talk in rapid Hindi with two men on the beach, presumably the men we’ve heard about who help the turtles on their first dangerous journey from sand to sea. They say we’ve missed the turtles by ten minutes. Disappointment creeping in, we walk a stretch to see if we can find any stragglers. We try to use our torches as little as possible, as it is disorienting for the turtles. Just when we’re about to turn around, Sophie spots one turning small circles in the sand.

Alex picks him up and puts him in Sophie’s palm, where he fits quite comfortably. He is anxiously flapping his little fins, practicing for the coming moment when he’ll enter the sea for the first time. He is black in colour but Alex tells us he’s a green Rigby turtle. We take a few pictures and look at him closely before I set him down carefully as a gentle wave rolls up to take him on his way.

Walking back, I can’t help being nervous for him – so small and tossed into a world so big and full of threats he must face all alone. But this is how it has been for generations and generations of sea turtles; he has his natural instinct to guide him. Under the bright stars, with the sound of waves lapping up on the beach, it’s hard not to marvel at the small miracles of the world we live in.

Prayers to the goddess of undergarments

The humidity of the islands has made it impossible to do laundry because it’s never able to dry. Even clothes we haven’t worn yet feel damp to touch. But when we arrived on Neil Island, knowing we would be there for several days, we decided, given that we had nearly run out of underwear, it was time.

Not wanting to hang our underwear outside for all to see, we strung up several clotheslines in our room and hung the clean underwear up above our heads to dry. Two days later, when it’s finally dry, we’re in the middle of taking it down.

“An interesting way to decorate a room,” I say to Sophie as I pick my panties off the line.

“Yeah,” she says, smiling. “They look like prayer flags.”

Not so mad about mangoes.

Sophie has a goal of foraging her own fruit. She’s also a maniac for mangoes. She finds several ripe mangoes on the ground near our beach hut, collects and peels them with her knife. In the very last piece, she finds that she isn’t the only one enjoying the mango. Small white worms work their way in and out of the orange fruit. Her face goes pale. I try to talk her out of being worried, but she can’t focus on anything else and retreats to our concrete bathroom. Sick enough to get rid of the mangoes and worms, but not too sick as to waste the lunch we just enjoyed.

“I reckon that’s good enough,” she says coming out of the bathroom with blurry eyes.

“Did you see any worms?”

“Dunno. Couldn’t tell the difference between them and the rice.”

Two weeks later and she still can’t eat mangoes.

Big Days

It’s the end of a very long day. Up for an early check out, get to the jetty, wait for the ferry, lug our heavy bags onto the ferry, wait for two hours on the ferry, watch dolphins surface in the waves and flying fish dart from the hull of the boat. Get off the ferry, argue with rickshaws drivers for a fair price to our hotel, the last one on a strip of beach. Get out early because the price is too high, walk with our heavy bags down a long dirt road. Arrive at the guest house and get settled in our miserable beach hut with holes and bugs. Drag our bodies to dinner. See some neighbours enjoying a cold beer. Decide to get a cold beer, called Hayward’s 5000 that’s only sold here on the Andaman Islands. It’s terrible. Deep sigh. Sophie turns to me, fatigue visible on her face.

“When I’m here, I feel like every yesterday was the biggest day of my life.”

I smile. I’m so glad I’m here with her.

Beach

I’m sitting on the beach alone, save for the puppy companions who’ve adopted us. We’ve named them Blackey, Batman and Wishbone. Sophie is napping off a sunburn. Two older Indian women walk by, laughing and chatting as the ends of their silk saris flap behind them in the sea breeze. The gust carries smells of jasmine and familiar perfume up across the beach. The dogs notice it first, but quickly it comes to me as well. They smell like mothers but collect shells and giggle like little girls.