turtles

We went last night to see the mass nesting of Olive Ridley Turtles. 'We' being 20 people from my college. We were supposed to leave at 6pm and we left almost on time at 8pm. Not bad. Armed with flashlights and waterbottles, we went out to watch this incredibly weird 'thing'. What is the fascination in watching turtles lay eggs? But we went anyway. It was a 3hr trip to the sea side and we stopped only 3 times. Once for the other car to catch up with us, as our driver was the only one who knew the way, once for the other car to fill petrol and once for the drivers to pack dinner at a dhaba. The other car was more trouble than it was worth. The people in it kept getting out of it and it was the subject of much colourful cursing in our car. We got there in a blaze of hindi music and fog lights. 'There' being the grandiosely named 'Sea Turtle Exploration Centre'. It was a one room building with a bunch of pictures of turtles on the wall and some eggs and baby turtles in formalin. Gross. We then set off with our guides to see the turtles, some 3 and a half hours after we had left home.

This is where the story become a tale of me being grossly unfit for any sort of physical exertion, especially on sand. But it was fun. We walked through relatively hard ground for a while and then on a sand ridge, on both sides water. It was eerie. We were walking in single file and though there was a lot of space on both sides, it was unsettling to see silent water on both sides. By this time we could hear the sea. Man, it was loud. We stopped and had to roll up our jeans and remove our shoes. There was a lot of exclaiming about 'should I remove my shoes?', 'what if there are crabs?' and 'let's go'. A guy was saying something like 'Aah so' and I heard it as 'Asshole'. Apparently it means 'let's go' or 'get on with it' or something like that in Oriya. Stupid me. We walked across some 5 meters of knee high water and climbed up over a sand bund and we were on the beach! I had been at the beginning of the column of people at the start; now I was some feet behind the end. I was already panting and sweating. Not nice. This is when we saw the first turtle.

They had told us to switch off the torches but the dolts I had come with kept turning them on and scaring the poor turtles. Poor mamas. How would you feel if a bunch of 20 ft tall giants came with video cameras when you were giving birth and insisted on saying "so sweet" and kept touch your shell and head?

It was quite dark and there was no moon yet. The sky was scarily huge. It just went on forever. I have not seen so many stars ever. It was fun pointing out constellations. Orion and the Big dipper were easy to spot. I thought I saw Saggitarius a little south west of Orions left foot but I couldn't find it again.

We saw a few more turtles and even some eggs.


Our guides picked up some eggs and fed us some crap about how those eggs had been drenched in sea water and so wouldnt hatch properly if left to their own devices and so they were going to take them back and keep them till they hatch. Ha! They were going to have turtle egg omlettes. We prevailed on them to put them back. They did, after a lot of grumbling. One of the guys said that the forest rangers would let dogs and birds eat the eggs but not people. He said that was hypocrisy, for weren't people also in the food chain? Or something to that effect. Is it hypocrisy? I think the minute we could think and act on more than just instinct, we took ourselves out of the food chain. Comments?

We had to leave soon after for the tide was rising. The moon was coming up over the horizon and it was a weird orange colour.

I almost forgot. There was this really rickety bridge that we had to cross. It was made of bamboo shoots tied together and had wood railings over maybe a quarter of the length. I thought I was in for a major embarrassment. Thank god nothing happened. The first time we went across it, there was no water underneath; but on the way back there was a lot of water. Wet and humiliated! Thank you, whoever built it, for looking out for me. Even if you didn't, thank you.

On the way back we stopped at Chilika Dhaba for dinner. At 2am. It was great food.
Got back at 4.30 am. Bathed. Slept. Woke. Had lunch.

And I still can't get the sky out of my mind. It was brilliant. More than brilliant. It was like an amazing natural infinity pool. The sea stretching out forever, and the sky going on and on. The horizon was blurred. It was impossible to say where the sea ended and the sky began. Awesome.

Screw the turtles. The sky alone was worth the trip.