Return to Trincomalee
The next morning John and I found ourselves in another minibus, speeding back towards Trinco. John had agreed to come along because he figured I could do with some support. I did my best to sell him the charms of Trincomalee, alas with little success.
The landscape flashed by, a haze of green-on-green. Occasional splashes of colour betrayed flowers, people and villages as the bus shot down the road. John sat beside me on the back seat, wearing a long-suffering expression and earplugs against the thumping bhangra beat that issued from the speakers. Perhaps we should have brought our Iron Maiden tapes along for a bit of cultural exchange. However, unlike him I enjoyed the music, it gave the whole situation a bit of a movie feel.
In Habarana we had to change. John, who is not built for travelling on crowded buses, was in a worse mood because he had endured a metal rod poking into his back for the past 90 minutes. Now he growled at the conductor who handed him the change for the 1000 rs with which we had paid our fare. He did not even glance at the money.
“Wrong!” he exclaimed, holding out his hand for more. I gleaned that we had indeed been short-changed. The conductor handed him another 100 rs. John kept his hand stretched out. He received another 100 rs, and finally another 20. That was the correct amount.
“My God,” I hissed as I pulled him away: “Sometimes you out-travel me! You should be doing this more often!” That earned me a withering glare.
Over lunch at the customary Wijesiri Hotel, John calmed down a little. Good, because he would need to.
We ended up in a blue-and-white CBT bus which stopped on its way through Habarana. It was packed like a Tokyo subway carriage at rush-hour. As it clattered down the winding road, we had to hang on for dear life, holding onto the railing and each other’s limbs and being kept upright only by the bodies pressing against us, swaying in unison as the bus rounded the tight bends. Predictably, John moaned that he was not cut out for travelling.
“My natural state is rest!” he groaned: “While yours is perpetual motion!”
Just after Kantalai, the crowds thinned and we managed to grab seats. Suddenly it felt like travelling in first class. John gently nodded off with his head against the window.
Of course, I had my reservations about this particular trip. But I figured if I showed up at the Port Authority and the ship in person, they would find it hard to say no. As soon as we had unloaded our luggage at Trinco Rest, where Wimalasiri greeted us like long-lost friends, I phoned the PA office. Then I jumped into a tuk-tuk.
The harbour master was on Christmas leave. He had left a gang of young pen-pushers in charge, none of whom looked like they had the makings of a future harbour master. They claimed they had heard nothing from the ship since she left on the 19th of December. As I turned to go back, I thought I heard them snickering. I was grateful for John’s support.
There was nothing more I could do that day. We went out to dinner in a small hotel by the bus station. John asked for a beef curry. I nearly sank into the floor. Evidently, the cows sauntering down the roads had given him the wrong idea. Fortunately, the place turned out to be muslim-owned and they happily obliged.
At ten thirty, the local witching hour when the lights go out and the dogs fall silent, we got ready for bed. John asked for loo-paper and I told him that I hadn’t brought any. That was after I had already informed him that the shower (cold water only) was just a trickle, that there was no sink (“What do you think this is? The Ritz?”) and that he would have to use a bucket to flush the toilet. He was not impressed when I told him how to use the little hosepipe which was attached to the plumbing next to the toilet. I think he truly regretted that there was only a single cockroach in the room and that it was already dead. It was the same one I had encountered during my first stay, I counted the legs.
It was five in the morning and I lay awake. The ceiling fan whirred and knocked. The more we had tried turning it down, the more it swung about and not running it at all was not an option in this stuffy and windowless room.
The guards, three this time, had remained on duty throughout the night. I thought about the precariousness of the ceasefire, the potential muslim unrest, what the newspapers termed the ‘current political vacuum’ and bringing my husband into a conflict zone. And I thought about the boys in the PA office, having a laugh. About the captain of the ship – had he deliberately given me a wrong date? If so, why? The guy wasn’t timid, if he did not want me on board, he could simply have said so. Why would he send me on a wild-goose-chase halfway across the country if he wasn’t even there to have a laugh about it? Or maybe he was here, after all.
When morning finally came, John both surprised and annoyed me by wailing for toilet paper yet again. Had he been holding it in all this time? After a futile search along the high street, most shops were still closed, I finally managed to dig out a half-full pack of handkerchiefs from the depths of the rucksack and flung it at him. By now, I was seething. I rammed the binoculars into my bag and stomped off into the glaring sunlight, taking the first turn in the general direction of the harbour. Unbelievably, yet unfailingly, I got lost. I had to double back and take the scenic route. And I had to slow down.
Through the binoculars I ascertained that neither of the two ships by the docks were mine, which was lucky for the boys in the PA office. It looked like there had been a change of plan, after all. My anger abated, leaving me feeling sick. I rested for a while and looked down into the water. Why could I not study the teeming fish or even the crabs which were scuttling across the mud below? I could be sitting on the pier, sip a cold soda and watch them feed, fight and survive right under my dangling feet. I knew the answer to that. It wouldn’t be challenging.
With the ship no longer an option, my only hope to see the whales of Trincomalee now lay with the Sri Lankan Navy. I doubt that the harbour master could help me with that. I would have to try to make contact with Dr. J.
Tags: The Whales of Trincomalee, Tag Index
Denni