The Turtle Beach
It was dusk before we reached Kalpitya itself, ostensibly the last settlement on the peninsula, but rows of palm-thatch huts lined the sandy track almost all the way to the sea at Dutch Bay. Here, a new sand bank had formed and Maria’s department had been charged with developing it. She had wanted to take a look at it. I had suspected there was an ulterior motive behind our excursion. Like Rob, Maria finds it hard to simply take time off and relax.
Eventually, we left the settlements behind and drove across a wide-open space covered with sparse vegetation. In the murky light, the windswept plain was vaguely reminiscent of Dartmoor, but there was a lot of rubbish strewn about. No people were anywhere in sight, just the odd goat or donkey which gave the place an eery feel.
At the end of the track, Guaratna stopped the car and we jumped out. I nearly landed on top of a turtle shell, right in front of the car door. It was no more than 30 cm long, well below breeding size. It had been smashed open by poachers. I picked the thing up and put it into the back of the pickup. Underneath the carapace, a crab had dug a neat hole — a base from where to feed on the scraps of meat which clung to the shell. It was picked scrupiously clean.
We walked the last few metres to the beach, buffeted by the wind. Scattered on the grey sand were a few more shell fragments. I crouched down to examine them. They were pure bone, bleached white and appeared to be old. Puzzled, I joined the others at the waters edge. As far as the eye could see, the wide expanse of sand was covered in litter. None of it looked as if it had been discarded recently, making it all the more puzzling as to where it had all come from. “You’ll have a job cleaning up this mess!” I said to Maria. She nodded resignedly.
Further down on the beach, a small shelter had been erected and a couple of boats were drawn up on the sand. Signs of human activity at last. Guaratna chatted to a couple of fishermen who had emerged from the shelter while the rest of us went beach-combing. We found pieces of bleached coral and a few pretty shells. The hollowed-out carapace of a small crab lay in the sand. I picked it up and turned it over. It was beige and orange and on its back were dotted three bright red spots as if somebody had dabbed it with fingerpaint. Smaller spots ran in a row just above its tail and to either side of the eye-stalks. It was one of the most spectacular shells I have ever found: a painted crab (Carpilius maculatus). I put it away carefully and walked further up the beach, leaving the others to hunt for more treasures. I had my suspicions that among the pieces of plastic strewn over the sand, I would find many more turtle fragments. I was not disappointed. After a few minutes, I had gathered an armful and stuffed them into a polythene bag which had ironically fluttered by in the wind.
“What do you want to do with all those?” John asked.
“You’ll see!”
I arranged the shell fragments in a small mound, forming an elogated oblong that vaguely assembled a turtle facing out to sea. I stuck some pieces around it to indicate limbs and a tail. Then I took one of my postcards of Scotland from my bag, this one depicting a piper in full dress, standing on a hill with a loch in the background. On it I wrote:
‘MARINE TURTLES ARE PROTECTED BY INTERNATIONAL LAW!’
I showed the note to Maria and ask her to translate it into Sinhala. She thought for a while, then started writing.
“I can’t think of a word for ‘international’,” she said afterwards:”so I wrote that turtles are protected by the laws of the whole world!”
That would do. I secured the postcard between the shell fragments which formed the back of my turtle-monument, making sure that the colours were still visible so that it would attract the curiosity of the fishermen or other passers-by.
By now, the sun had set completely and the sky was illuminated by the Poya moon casting a silvery light over the sea, the beach and the palm trees on the shore. We stood for a while to drink in the moment. It was cool and quiet and serenely beautiful.
Tags: The Whales of Trincomalee, Tag Index
Denni