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Tuesday, 30 December
Dear all
The intrepid explorer returns, we had a good trip which I shall tell in chronological order:
We set off at 5 AM on Christmas Day and after an hours trip across our lagoon we sailed for another four over the Indian Ocean was rolling swells. We sailed in a Maldivian trading ship and it stunk to high heaven and I’m afraid that two of our party of 12 succumbed and donated their breakfasts to the sea. Our party of 12 consisted of 10 RAF, one Maldivian interpreter and one Maldivian cook who as we were to find out later could make good tea and curry and that was it, for most of the time we cooked our compo rations ourselves, cook’s wages were cheap – all we had to do was feed him. The toilet on the boat was the best I have seen yet it consisted of a wooden box over the back of the boat and in the bottom of the box was just too slats of wood to stand on.
[drawing here - see original letter]
When we got to the island (Fua Mulaku) all our gear was put onto a dhoni boat, which is a big native rowing boat, and taken over the coral reef amidst the huge breakers to the beach, all our stuff got wet, and unloaded on to hand carts which are the only wheeled vehicles they have. Next it was our turn to get into the dhoni and go through the surf, it was very frightening as a huge wave picked us up and amidst the spray hurled us up on the beach.
We were taken to a four roomed house made of coral and not a stick of furniture and a well with fish swimming in it. All the lads stayed in this house the sleeping house but the flight sergeant and I were taken to another house with a kitchen the eating house and we were given a bedroom, it seems they turfed the family out so we could use it but there was nothing we could do about it, the family just sleeps next door, as they had so few possessions I suppose they don’t really mind. The rest of Christmas Day was spent walking about accompanied by dozens of laughing, chattering children.
Everybody went to bed around seven that night as they have a very limited supply of paraffin for the funny little lamps they have, anyway we had taken 5 gallons and 2 lamps with us we just sat and talked and it wasn’t long before we realised that quite a crowd had formed in the darkness and were watching us through the windows which were really just holes in the walls – no glass or anything, that crowd stayed there watching till three in the morning long after we fell asleep.
Next day I tried to go birdwatching but it was quite useless as everywhere you went you had a following of at least a dozen noisy children and a sprinkling of adults to, they would run ahead to warn everyone we were coming so the crowd got bigger and bigger – not ideal conditions for birdwatching. People would rush out of their houses after gathering all the family together as you past they would stare at you, most weird, we were told it’s because they only see one or two white people year so when 10 turn up it’s a big occasion. This is what I found strange – the fact that these people have no privacy at all, they just walk into each other’s shacks, look around then go off, they even walked into our room and had a poke about in the suitcases so often that we kept everything locked up but they did respect shut doors but if you left it open in they would come. We were taken to meet the atoll chief and all the hangers on, a most dignified occasion this, everyone breaking their backs to be polite because they couldn’t speak English and we can’t speak Maldi there were great silences, most embarrassing. I hit lucky ‘cos the chief’s son spoke fairly good English and I spotted a couple of rose plants and it turned out that the roses were a great love of chiefs so I was able to spout forth with my vast knowledge of roses but was shot down when the chief’s son pointed out that they couldn’t put manure on the roses they don’t have any domestic animals – I quickly changed the subject.
We did odd things while we were there like surveying the coral as we (RAF) will be blasting a path through the reef so they could bring dhonis in with less of a risk.
On the last evening we invited all the local knobs for a feast consisting of a chicken and fish curry – we had six chickens and the tuna fish, when whole, was bigger than Colin! Only about 20 people sat for the meal but enough was cooked for half the village. It was a great success with long Maldi speeches afterwards of which we didn’t understand as nobody translated for us.
On the last morning we walked around and all the young women hung flowers around our necks as farewell gifts.
The journey back was uneventful except we saw huge turtles swimming in the ocean as well as sharks and manta ray, I say uneventful the dhoni ride out through the surf was frightening again. We brought back with us a Maldi woman who had just had a bad miscarriage and we got her into sick quarters here.
Well I think that’s about it, by the way my Christmas dinner this year was fish curry on the boat in the Indian Ocean – different eh!
How is Colin now.
I arrive at Brize Norton at 1 o’clock in the morning of January 30, I can either wait till morning to catch a train with you and Elizabeth come to Brize Norton to meet me?
Love to all daddy |
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