Kiribati Tidbits
1. First night dive.
I did my first night dive ever at Onotoa. There were just four of us, two of whom had never done a night dive before. I snagged the fantastic Sebastian as my buddy, perfect because he knows me, knows I'm a hesitant diver (but a great swimmer), knows I'm a velcro buddy (depends on him but also will be right there if he needs me), puts up with me cheerfully, and both sees and points out everything to me. It was a perfectly calm night and we just dove under the boat which was only 16 metres deep but even so it was really spooky to start. We went down down down the anchor chain to the bottom, which seemed far further and far darker than I'd expected and it was spooky, very spooky. Scary even. Dark, and silent, and alien, and so very very far from anywhere. When Sebastian flashed "OK?" I responded "Iffy..." which I was, so he motioned "Breathe, relax, chill...". He shone his light directly on both my dive computer and my air gage to demonstrate that they glowed in the dark and then just waited patiently for a minute. "OK!" I told him and we set off along the chain lying on the ocean floor towards the anchor spotting a couple of lion fish and a super weird crab along the way. By then I was good and managed to put most of my energies for the rest of the dive into looking for more cool stuff - though I still checked my computer and my air gage as regularly as if I were OCD. The 45 minutes flew by and, as always, I was disappointed when it was time to go back up. When we surfaced again Nico said something that got us all laughing and Sebastian was thrilled to have found a fish hook he'd lost earlier that day and we were all just happy to have gone.
I stressed about choosing this boat for this spring. There were several free options and this one is 20€/day. But, my goodness, some days I really feel I'm getting my money's worth!
2. Old lady.
Most atolls we visit we are first invited into a house - a raised platform with a thatched roof but no walls - sat upon incrately woven mats and given a young coconut each to drink, a process that takes at least half an hour, before any discussion starts. One day while these initial proceedings were going on there was an old lady hovering, and, as soon as it was polite to do so, she motioned for me to follow her. (I guess she saw in me a fellow old woman.) She took me next door to show me her house. It was a work of art; wooden frame held together by twine made from coconut husks, floor, about two feet off the ground, of slats from the middles of palm fronds secured with the same twine, and a precisely thatched roof the interior of which had all their belongings, from extra clothes to toothbrushes, tucked into it. (As always, no walls, which someone else on another island pointed out was great security as no one else could ever sneak unseen into your house and take anything!) I cannot over-emphasize how the house was built totally from coconut palm pieces, its solidity, the beauty and regularity of the twine-work holding it all together and the skill and time this represented. The furnature consisted of a set of woven mats for sitting or sleeping on, a few pillows, and a low end-table with a kettle on it. We had no language in common the old lady and I but I pointed and murmured appreciatively and took out my phone and asked if I could take a photo of her beside the house to which the response was, 'Yes!! And, also, please come across the road and take a picture of me beside this grave too.' Back at her house her English-speaking daughter showed up and translated a bit of conversation for us. (It's a lovely house! - Yes. Do you live here too? - Yes. How many people live here? - Yes. Do your children live here? - Yes. Or do your children have their own houses? - Yes. How long does it take to build a house like this?' I asked. Finally a question they could understand. They calculated a bit and the answer came back: 1968. Nor precisely what I'd asked perhaps but a fascinating fact nonetheless.) I went back to murmuring appreciation and was shown the fire pit and the beach too. I'm not sure if in the end the old lady was more honoured to have shown me her property or if I was more honoured to have been shown it and I only wish I'd been able to have had a deeper more meaningful interaction with her.
3. My German Men
There are two 40-something German men amoung the current crew, a lawyer and a film-maker, both well educated, well travelled and interesting. Dirk pointed out octapi while buddying with me at Onatoa and Marc did the same at Tanama. While discussing who was going to dive with who at Arorae, and Dirk and I teamed up again, I told him that my expectation was that when I dove with either of my German men they'd find me an octapus. Underwater it was a lovely aquarium, fish and more fish, interesting canyons, and great visibility. Halfway through the dive I tapped Dirk, who'd been peering in to every single crevace, on the shoulder and flung my arms wide to try and indicate my joy. Unfortunately I didn't know the official SCUBA hand sign for 'this is an amazing dive and I'm so happy to be here and I was only joking about you finding me an octapus'. Nonetheless he kept on looking. He pointed out a huge lobster with antennae as long as my arms, an anemone guarded by two brilliantly striped parents and filled with tiny baby anemone fish, a puffer fish, a piper fish, and, chilling under one overhang, the largest pair of parrot fish I'd ever seen in my life. And then, just about as our time was almost up and we were starting to think about swimming out into the blue, doing our safety stop and surfacing, what did he shine his flashlight on but an octapus, a lovely lively large leopard-coloured octapus looking at us as if to say, 'You found me. Really? I thought I'd win this game of hide and seek!'. It made my day, and Dirk's too. We surfaced and burst out laughing, grinning at each other, and talking non-stop of all the underwater wonders we'd seen. It was another good day.
4. Eddy
Eddy, another crew member, and I are SO different from each other it's hard to imagine.
He's from the Solomon Islands in Melanisia. I'd known, theoretically, that Melanisia is so named because the people there are dark skinned (as in melanin, dark pigment of the skin) but I've never been there and I certainly didn't understand. (I'm so ignorant I thought all people with actually black skin tones were of African origin - of course I realize we're ALL of African origin - but, like, within the last millennium. Apparently not.) Eddy's 40, has been sailing for 18 years, is married to a Spanish woman, and has a 13 year old daughter.
He also has a skill set that barely intersects mine at all. He knows where to find fish, can tie a hook to a line one handed in the dark, can gut and clean and fillet in the blink of an eye, and makes AMAZING fish head soups and lobster stews. He can lash anything down with a scrappy bit of rope so it's secure in the worst storm. He can fix an outboard motor with a stick.
On the other hand when he and I were looking at the GPS chart and Clem, who was lying down across the room, asked Eddy when we'd get to the next anchorage at our current speed (it was midnight, we were going 6.9 knots, and had 78 left to go) I eventually replied, 'just after 11 in the morning', because I thought Clem wanted the information and that maybe Eddy'd not heard the question, only to have him, Clem, tell me, quite sharply, that he'd wanted Eddy to try and figure it out. Eddy asked how I knew and I started by saying that I knew 7 times 11 was 77 but then it quickly got all confused not only because of the rounding but also because the fact that 11 hours travel time would get us there at 11 am only worked since it was exactly 12 o'clock which is effectively 0 o'clock... and then I started over and tried to explain how to figure it out again only this time assuming one doesn't know 7 times 11 is 77 (or even that 7 times 10 is 70) which is harder to do than you might think.
I doubt Eddy could tell to me how to fix a pump such that I'd be able to do it - but I'm sure he could show me and I'd know forever.
I wondered if, when he sails, he just gets there when he does.
On shore he usually goes off on massive benders and isn't seen for days (not me). I read a lot (not him). He's very sociable and understands people (not me). I pay taxes (not him). He's good at languages (not me).
But we have a lot in common too. We love to see the world, to be on boats, to take life a day at a time. Both of us get stressed when Clem starts yelling (too often) and neither of us suffer fools gladly. We're both OK without daily internet connectivity. We're each happy to just be.
And, also, most importantly, we both like - and have huge respect - for the other.
 |
| I'd thought we were black and white but see that actually we're black and red! |
5. Shopping
Coconuts can be used for money. A girl goes to the shop to buy something and returns with her purchases. There isn't room in the shop so the collected "money" sits outside in piles. There is no crime so none is ever taken.
A small but typical house.
