Andaman Islands

1400km from mainland India and 1000km from Thailand, Andaman Islands are one of the most remote spots on the planet

CHAPTER ONE (23.March – 30.March)

NEW BEGINNING: I go through all the stuff in my backpack and give away my clothes and everything that’s not essential for me to the people at bazaar in Port Blair. They are surprised I don’t ask for any money but for me it’s enough to see their genuinely happy faces. I only need to buy a knife and a hammock before I set off to the wilderness.

IMG_4363I AM NOT ALONE, I HAVE A DOG: The dog called Chess. She jumps on me as I walk and follows me to the toilet and back, sits next to me on the beach, sleeps with me and protects me. Then she disappears but comes back in the night and wakes me up in the morning. Chess makes me a company. I name her Chess for her black spots on the tummy on her otherwise snowy white fur. The dog doesn’t question anything, she follows with love and passion wherever I go. She doesn’t complain it’s too far or the weather is too hot. She stops only when I stop, no matter how tired she is. Having a dog now I decide to walk instead of hitchhike. Cars and bikes often pull over out of curiosity and are willing to take me but not both of us. Due to the high number of stray dogs on the islands, people don’t understand why I travel with a dog. They see dogs as animals that protect properties. As I walk, people stop and ask me where I go, offering me to take me there, even if it involves driving some kilometres extra. But I’m not alone anymore, it’s two of us now and I can’t be selfish. I set off on a 30km long walk south. I feed Chess with biscuits and food leftovers until somebody tells me that Andaman dogs eat only fish curry and rice.

TEXTING HOME FROM THE JUNGLE: Nobody heard of internet here down south and there’s even no phone reception at the place where I am now. All the people point me to the shop which is the only one connected to the land line. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work with international calls. But they point me to the person who allegedly knows how to get 3 bars signal on a mobile phone. It’s a house on a small hill. The guy puts my phone into a specially designated gap in between the window shades and I’m able to text to Slovakia. Mum, dad, I’m in the jungle. Everything is OK! He doesn’t want any money so I give him a pack of biscuits.

IMG_4431HUNGRY IN PARADISE: The music of the jungle was really intense in the night and sounded like a song for a good night. All night long. Waking up with the sun rise never felt better. I get up from the hammock, take my clothes off and go snorkelling with the colourful fish. Living a dream. But I’ve got no food left. There’s only one shop here and all they have is bottled water and a coffee from the vending machine. The closes thing to food they have are biscuits, crisps and sweets. The place where I had rice with dal the other day is closed and they don’t know when they will open again. There are no opening hours, even no opening days. I spend my time hanging out at the beach, eating biscuits and playing with the dog. In the evenings I do what quickly became my favourite activity and that is swinging in the hammock and watching the sun setting down over the sea and islands. It would be nice to have some food, though.

IMG_4478WE ARE AWESOME: I get up early again, go to the toilet, brush my teeth, bury some of my stuff under the leaves and cover up with twigs and tree branches and the rest I put in the backpack and carry with me, leaving only the hammock hanging between the trees. I talk to some people in the village and find out there is a boat with scuba divers leaving for the remote Cinque Island this morning. I join in as the only snorkelling person on board and we embark on a 2 hours long journey south. On the way I make friends with one of the scuba divers, a girl called Padma from Mumbai, who just completed her diving certificate and this is going to be her first dive after the course. She is the first Indian-travelling-alone girl I’ve met so far. Padma tells me about the place called Auroville, a big international community of volunteers pursuing a sustainable life in southern India and it immediately catches my attention. I tell her I came here by foot with a dog and that I camp in the jungle and she thinks its awesome what I do. I think she is awesome for being brave enough to break Indian taboos and travel alone as a single girl.

IMG_4471STUPID GADGETS: We arrive at Cinque Island and to call it beautiful is a serious understatement. I go snorkelling along the reef. When I put my mask on and look under water I feel like somebody plays Finding Nemo movie in front of my eyes! Then we disembark on the island. Imagine a situation that you are on the most beautiful tropical island you can possibly imagine, you’ve got the camera and you want to take lots of good pictures, because you can’t take a bad one at a place like this. You turn the camera on and put it next to your eye to focus, full of excitement you are ready to press the shutter when suddenly the camera gives you a lens error and shuts down. Black screen, no signs of life. It’s dead and there is no way it will come back. Fucking Canon S100! So pissed off! I borrow Padma’s DSLR and ask her to send me the pictures later. I can’t even get angry at a place like this. Few minutes later I put it out of my mind and jump in the sea, forgetting it all.

IMG_4428THEY DISCOVERED ME: On the way back our boat breaks down on the sea and we need to wait for a couple of hours for two motor dinghies to come and tow us back to the shore. It feels good to be stranded on a tropical island. It gets dark by 5pm, the time we make it back. Padma introduces me to her friend, an oceanography student, Arrushi. Her dissertation is about the coral where the clown fish (Nemo) lives and in order to write it she needs to do lots of dives in many tropical islands. What a student’s life! Arrushi asks her friend to drop me off in my illegal jungle camp on a bike. She trusts him and for some reason I trust her, even though we know each other only for 5 minutes. I put my head lamp on and walk towards the camp but I can’t see my hammock anywhere. It’s not there! Quickly, I go to check my other stuff I buried under the leaves and branches. It’s untouched. But the hammock is missing! I’ve been discovered! Fucking hell, it was meant to be my last night here! I’m not so much pissed off because of the hammock, I can get a new one tomorrow in Port Blair, but where the fuck I will get a paracord (a very strong, thin and lightweight rope used on parachutes) to tie the hammock against the trees? I can forget it on the islands! I sleep on the rocks in a very uncomfortable position until 5am.

IMG_4370FINDING HOME FOR A DOG: I pack up all my stuff and I’m off from here before the rangers will raid the place and detain me. I want to go back to Port Blair and catch a ferry to Havelock Island but there is no way I’m walking 30km back on the same road and my dog won’t be allowed to board the ferry anyway so I’m a bit worried about her future. She’s got too attached to me and I’m afraid to break her heart and let her go. As I’m thinking about it I see a familiar face on a bicycle, a villager I’ve met a number of times. He asks me about the dog, whether I’m taking her to Slovakia with me or I have some other plans. I just smile and nod my head in the Indian way, not really knowing what to say. Then the villager says that the old man who fed my dog with fish curry and rice the other day is interested and would like to keep her. That’s wonderful! I have last 1 hour before the bus comes. I need to go and see the old man immediately. It just happens that the old man actually lives right next to the bus stop. We don’t speak any common language but every time he sees Chess he exclaims: Baa! I don’t know what it means but he just keeps saying Baa, baa and feeds the dog with another portion of rice. It works. I gesture that I would like him to look after my travel companion and he gestures back with placing his right hand over his heart. I found doggy a place called home. It was amazing to watch how this stray dog turned into a loving and caring companion who trusted me enough to follow me everywhere I went. Even when she was tired, she still kept the pace and carried on walking with the tongue stuck outside, nearly touching the road at times. When the bus comes, Chess follows and runs after it for a few meters but then stops. Stops and goes home. Surely she is in a better place now. I only still wonder what Baa means.

CHAPTER TWO (30.March – 12.April)

PORT BLAIR AND MY TO DO LIST: There are lots of small jobs I need to do whilst in Port Blair:

  • Buy a new hammock
  • Improvise with the washing line instead of a paracord
  • I need to find a tailor to have my backpack stitched. The straps are slowly tearing apart.
  • My broken camera can’t be fixed here as there are no facilities and qualified staff to repair it on the islands and needs to be send to Delhi. I didn’t expect anything else. Since I’m on a tropical island so far away from everything and I really don’t want to be without a camera, I go to the shop with electronics and choose a new one from the wide selection of 3 (THREE) cameras they have on display. One is too expensive, one is a cheap shit and the last one is a reasonably priced bright pink coloured shit. I buy the pink shit.
  • Internet. I find an email where I’m invited for another round of the job interview. The first round was meant to take place in Malaysia but due to some technical difficulties had to be postponed and at the end I had it in Pondicherry, India. Apparently I passed and now they need to interview me again. I send them an email back explaining my situation on the islands and that it is impossible to use Skype. I give them my Indian phone number to contact me. It wasn’t easy to get an Indian sim card for a homeless person – the staff at the Vodafone shop was nice enough to make me up a fake hotel address I was allegedly staying at in order to activate the sim card!
  • There is lots of stuff I carry and don’t need like my tent (totally useless, I haven’t used it even once), sleeping bag (it’s too hot to use it) and my broken camera. I deposit it all in a lodge in Port Blair until my last day on the islands and I promise the guy to stay there for a night. My backpack is now lighter by 2,5kg!

I take a day off from travelling to talk to my family, do the washing and sleep. I meet up with Arrushi, the oceanography student I met a couple of days go, for lunch. She insists that it’s her treat and feeds me in a nice Punjabi restaurant until I can barely walk. Such a sweetheart! We have some great conversations about life and travelling and the time flies. I’m proud to meet the first Indian female hitchhiker I’ve come across!

INDIAN QUEUING: Tickets to Havelock Island for the same day are not easy to get unless you get up early in the morning. It’s 5am when I’m starting queuing in Phoenix Jetty. Queuing is and overstatement. Indians don’t queue. They group together and the whole crowd kind of swings around the ticket counter. All you can see are stretched arms from behind you, reaching the counter and handing over the money whilst saying something in Hindi and wobbling their heads from side to side. The mass moves a bit to the left and then right and back left so also other people from behind can reach the counter with their arms stretched over my shoulders from all sides.

DSC00077IMPRESSIONS OF THE MOST TOURISTY ISLAND: Havelock really surprises me in a very good way. I was even thinking about not going here at all as I really didn’t want to see the place with hordes of tourists and hotels lined up next to one another. However, that’s not the case at all! I go to Radhanagar beach (Beach no. 7) what is the most famous beach in Andamans and also the place where the majority of tourists hang out. It’s nothing like I imagined it to be – it’s 9am and I’m still the only person around! There are no hotels, no big resorts, no beach bars, nothing like that. There are only a few traditional street restaurants on the road leading up to the beach, a one or two souvenir shops, coconut sellers and that’s it. In terms of accommodation, there is a small number of eco friendly beach huts, but they all fit well into the environment and can hardly be called disturbing.

PLAYING WITH IDEAS: On the beach I meet Knut, a traveller from Norway, who’s just quit his job at TATA in Bangalore before coming to Andamans. He is also a scuba diver with over 80 recorded dives and definitely not the first person I’ve met who suggests me to do the diving course. He puts me through some other people and in the evening I end up being invited for a grilled fish by Justin, an Australian environmentalist, who worked in Papua New Guinea for a number of years. Needless to say, he is also a scuba diver. The risk of hanging out with divers is that you will want to become a diver yourself. Actually, it was my childhood’s dream from the time as far as I can remember. They all tell me that Andamans is one of the cheapest places where to do the open water certificate that will allow me to dive down to 18m anywhere in the world. I’m half convinced already and I promise myself to do it if I will be successful in getting a job.

DSC00057DON’T BOTHER ME WITH A JOB ANYMORE: I’m supposed to have my second job interview today so I’m trying to relax and concentrate. I meet Xavi from Catalonia who studied in Girona at UdG and even on the same campus like I did. He took a month off from work and travels around India alone. He is a diver, like everyone on the islands, and also has been to Auroville and highly recommends me to go there. Not surprising. Nobody calls me. Not really surprising either. I’m really pissed off as I wasted the day by doing nothing because I needed to be around the signal broadcasting tower so I have a reception on my phone since there is very poor signal coverage on the islands. I’ve got no other choice than to go back to Port Blair and check my emails as I have no idea what’s happening regarding the interview. It’s rather late now and I find a beautiful spot to sleep in a tree house. The next morning I come to the jetty early and ask for a ferry ticket back to the main island – they tell me to come back at 2pm, another day wasted! I deliberately came to the place with no internet and mobile coverage to have a break from it all but I found myself in need of both, shit! No e-mail from the job. Fuck this shit! From now on I pledge not to change any of my plans due to that stupid interview!

DETAINED TO THE POLICE STATION: I go to sleep next to the port but I’m really tired so I just lay down on a public footpath and fall asleep. I wake up only when somebody flashes a strong light right to my face. There are 3 people looking at me, all dressed in police uniforms.

Police: Is everything OK, sir?
Me: It’s all great, I’m only waiting till the morning to get out of the city and go back to the jungle.
Police: Where is your hotel?
Me: It’s always with me (pointing at my backpack)
Police: Sir, you can’t sleep on the street. It’s a public place used by the citizens and they might be suspicious of who you are. You need to go with us to the police station.

They point in the way where the police car is and I enjoy a free ride to the police station with the blue and red sirens on for the second time in my life. The first time was in Jordan when I entered Petra (UNESCO world heritage site) illegally over the mountains to avoid paying ridiculous 50€ entrance fee. At the police station in Port Blair I’m put straight in front of the senior officer.

Officer: Why don’t you stay in a hotel? Do you have any money? 
Me: I don’t want to stay in a hotel. It’s not necessary for me as I have everything I need with me. I do have money, sir, it’s my choice to sleep outside.
Officer: But if you have money you can’t stay outside. Only poor people sleep on the street.
Me: If poor people can sleep on the street why can’t I? Nobody knows if I have money or not.
Officer: You are a foreigner and I can’t let you stay outside, especially now before the elections coming up. You need to get a hotel.
Me: Sir, I don’t want to make any problems. I only want to sleep and I really don’t care whether on the street or here at the police station.
Officer: This is not a hotel! It’s a police station!
Me: I know, sir, I’m just saying that I wake up with the sunrise at 5am and get out of here back to the jungle (I’m showing the officer some of the pictures on my camera of places I’ve been staying up until now).
Officer: OK then, I will show you the room you are going to stay at. But I want you to know that this is out of my duty and you need to keep all your belongings with you as no one will be responsible if you lose anything. There are cameras in the corridor so if you want to go to the toilet or leave the room, you always must shout for an officer to come and accompany you. Don’t go out by yourself as everything is recorded on cameras and this is not a hotel so you can freely roam around. I want you out of here by 5am!
Me: Thank you very much, sir, it’s very nice of you! Good night.

NO MONEY, NO HONEY: I leave the police station and withdraw 25,000Rs (300€) from the ATM. I wanted 30k but there are no money left in the cash machine! Why so much? Well, I will need 18,500Rs (220€) for the SSI open water diving course! No conditions. I just want to fulfil my childhood’s dream and I don’t care whether I will get a job or not. I’m on Andaman Islands and I live only once.

DSC00123THE ROAD THROUGH THE JARAWA TRIBE: I get on a bus that will take me to the road that is in my opinion one of the greatest disasters of humanity. The road is cutting right through the land of Jarawa people, the tribe that is native to Andaman Islands and originally came from Africa, over 60 thousand years ago. It is estimated there are only about 250 people left. The road was meant to connect villages and towns (previously accessible only by boats) with Port Blair. Building the road meant massive deforestation of the native habitat of Jarawa people and also their exposure to bacterias and viruses totally unknown before, what reduced their numbers drastically. The road didn’t only make it easier to transport goods and people, it also started a completely new way of tourism – human safari, where people were taking pictures and recording videos of the tribal people. There were even some specialised tourist agents promising their customers to encounter Jarawas. It was going on like that for many years until the Indian government finally abolished any kind of contact with the tribe and imposed very high fines and even imprisonment for the wrongdoers. Now the cars passing through their land have to follow the police escort and drive in a convoy to cross the land. There are 4 exact timings per day when the convoy is allowed to pass in order not to disturb the tribe so much (but still!). The damage has been done. The road is built and there are 4 convoys full of cars, buses and trucks passing through every day for years now.

DSC00118JARAWA PEOPLE: Before entering the tribal area, we read the notice boards telling us not to stop in any circumstances, don’t let Jarawas on board, don’t give them any clothes, food or don’t introduce alcohol in the tribe. It’s 9am and our bus is the first vehicle in the convoy led by a policeman on a motorbike. I hope not to see any tribal people for the peace of mind that Jarawas are much rather engaged in different activities than watching cars passing by. I was wrong. Maybe 20 minutes since we entered their land, we see 5 tribal people standing by the road, watching and waiting. There is a woman, man and some children. Black skin colour, topless, wearing just palm leaves around the hips. People on the bus stand up from their seats to have a closer look at these naked black people. Jarawas knew we were coming. They were waiting for us and we are watching them now like animals in the ZOO. People watching people, even standing up from the seats. Thankfully, there were no more encounters. Watching the environment around the road, I must say I’m pretty disgusted by seeing tens and tens of empty barrels chucked out along the road that once used to be filled in with tar when the road works were still going on. Somehow the workers have forgotten to take back with they what they brought.

RUBBISH AND STUPID PEOPLE EVERYWHERE: When I already started writing about the pollution, I need to highlight the idiocy of some people I shared the bus with. On two occasions we stopped to load the bus on a ferry to go from island to island and at these small ferry ports there are notice boards claiming it’s a litter free zone, that there are fines for polluters, etc. The concentration of rubbish bins is the highest I’ve seen anywhere in India. I mean they are almost everywhere, spread just a few meters from one another. I see a guy throwing an empty cigarette’s packet into the sea. I tell him off immediately but when I look closer, there is heaps of rubbish in that place already. Where are the law enforcers? How do they want to change the people’s attitude if there is already rubbish everywhere? The second case is when another guy throws out an empty plastic bottle in the sea. Here I really kick off and ask him why did he do it if there is a fucking bin 3 meters from him! I don’t get any answer. I’m so pissed off because of these people! I get some nasty looks but what they really deserve is a wake-up slap across the face and then they should be sent back to school for the lack of education and common sense!

NO MORE PARADISE: I catch a ferry to Long Island. It’s called Long because it’s narrow and really long. Makes sense. I ask people where can I get some food and they tell me to follow the blue arrow on the ground. The yellow one points to the beach and the red one back to the jetty. Quite an effective way of navigation for the outsiders. The island has a different vibe and even the houses look different. The blue arrow takes me to Blue Planet Resort. I’m a bit shocked as I really thought I’m the only foreigner on the island but here I found 5 more. The place is really nice looking and the prices are reasonable for what you get. I hang out here for a few hours, eating and reading a book about the love marriages in India and that solely love between the girl and the boy is not enough as the whole marriage is more about bringing the families together. Interesting stuff. Whilst reading, I overheard a conversation of the 5 white people sipping white wine:

If we invest heavily on Havelock, where 90% of tourists go, we will be just one among lots of other competitors but here on Long Island there is no one, but us! If we buy a few boats, and I have a friend in Mumbai who can secure us a good price, and open a beach resort here, we might make a killing! 

People, come and visit here quickly before this bunch of white people will turn this relatively untouched island into a theme park! I ask if I can put up my hammock somewhere here but they all shake their heads. That’s OK, I didn’t expect them to say yes. I put my head torch on and follow the red arrow in the dark jungle. Near the jetty I hear music from the temple. Lots of people sitting together on the floor with banana leaves in front of them, eating sweet rice with chickpeas. They call me to join in and then I end up sleeping in a beach hut.

DSC00198BEACH PERMIT: If I want to go to the beach on the other side of Long Island, I need to visit the Forest Department Office first and ask for a permit. This is a measure the officials took to prevent accidents because of the recent case when a tourists drowned on the beach. For a couple of weeks afterwards, everybody who wanted to go to the beach was assigned to a guide (to walk from the office to the beach) and at the beach everybody had to wear a life jacket. Pretty ridiculous, eh? But apparently they loosen up the rules a bit and now I only need to show the passport and my permit to visit Andaman Islands (issued on arrival at the airport) so I can be issued a permit allowing me to go to the beach by myself. Ridiculous, I told you. On the beach there is nobody but one person. I meet another Forest Department Officer (FDO) who runs after me with a thick book as I’m getting ready to jump in the sea. He copies my details from the permit and offers me a life jacket.

FDO: Sir, can you swim? Are you a good swimmer?
Me: Yes, I can. What about you, do you like swimming?
FDO: Yes, sir, very much.
Me: Great, are you coming to the water with me then?
FDO: No, no, no, sir. I’ve been already. I like to swim in the morning (a big grin on the face).
Me: OK, as you wish, catch you later!

There’s no one on the beach. Only me and the FDO. Whether he really knows how to swim, that will remain a mystery. As soon as he put down my name into his big book, he was a happy bunny. He finished his job and could go back to hit beach hut to relax.

DSC00213DIVING WITH A BUFFALO: Later on, I put up my hammock on the beach, tie it with the washing line and have a mid day nap. When I open my eyes again, I nearly fall out at the sight I witnessed. There is a buffalo walking out of the jungle and heading straight to the sea! I observe the animal first, thinking it is going to commit a suicide, and watch how it dives under the water. The buffalo puts his whole huge head under water for about 10 seconds! He is proper enjoying the refreshing bath and I slowly get closer and closer until I get to the water. At one point, when the buffalo puts his head above the water and opens his eyes, I’m right there, looking at his big surprised eyes. We are facing each other. His head being maybe 10x bigger than mine, I’m a bit cautious about the buffalo’s reaction. I’m not so familiar with the behaviour of these animals, especially with the ones with suicidal tendencies that go swimming in the ocean, so I’m careful! The buffalo is obviously more scared than I am. I can see the fear in his eyes. I slowly touch his neck and horns. He doesn’t seem to mind so much as he resumes to enjoy the dives. We dive together and swim together for some time. Wonderful experience!

WOMEN IN THE WORKFORCE: On the way back I see a group of women dressed in beautiful colourful sarees, sat on the ground and talking. There wouldn’t be anything unusual about it but these women are working, actually working very hard – holding big hammers in hands and crushing rocks to pieces! What the fuck men do here, apart from chasing tourists with big books?!

EVEN A MISSED BOAT CAN RETURN: I’m busy buying mangoes for 25Rs/kg (0,30€), by the way yesterday I got guavas for 10Rs/kg (0,12€), and it’s way too late when I notice that my ferry had already left the jetty! It’s only twice a day service! I start to run, as like I can catch it, but it’s already over 30m on the sea with the engines running at their full power.

Me: Is this the ferry back to Rangat? (asking out loud so everybody can hear)
People: Yes, sir, to Rangat. Where are you going?
Me: To Rangat! For fuck’s sake, I haven’t noticed it’s leaving, I was buying mangoes and now I missed the boat!
People: (whistling, shouting and waving at the ferry, now over 40m far from the jetty)

The boat turns around and comes back to the jetty to pick me up! Unbelievable! I caused them a delay of over 10 minutes!!! I take a bus to Mayabunder but from here I can’t go any further. It’s Sunday and that means no ferries. Also it looks like I might need a special permit from the FDO if I want to visit the islands around here. I want to try to go to Interview Island and live there for a few days, a beautiful uninhabited island with elephants, with its name reminding me of my job interview.

ROBINSON CRUSOE EXPERIENCE: I get up at 5am after the night on a tribune of the cricket stadium. In the jetty I meet a guy who is a muslim and has 2 brothers – a hindu and a christian. Full of expectations I turn up at 9am at the FDO to apply for a permit to Interview Island. First officer tells me it’s not possible here and I need to go to Port Blair to apply. Second officer is not sure whether I really need to go to Port Blair or I can apply from here so he better goes to clarify with the third officer who asks me to sit down and wait because the chief officer is busy now and he knows the answer. Not too late after, I go to the main office and speak to the boss. He tells me I can apply here but the permit is valid only for a day visit. The night stay is not allowed because there are no facilities to accommodate visitors. I try to raise up the question of camping wild but he doesn’t want to hear a thing about it. Well, that’s not good. I’m looking for a Robinson kind of experience where I can stay on the island for a night so I’m not really interested. Oh, and the best thing comes at the end. He forgot to mention that there are no boats to and from the island so I will need to arrange my own boat! That sounds kind of cool. Having my own boat, I can tell the captain to go wherever I like and I can find some beautiful remote places. The idea of stockpiling food and being dropped off in the wilderness for several days sounds awesome. It’s all down to the price and negotiations now. I tell the officer that I will get the boat first and then come back for the permit. It’s fine with him as long as I make it before 2pm, when they close.

DSC00299GETTING A BOAT: How to get a boat? The most logical thing to do seems to be going to the fish market and asking fishermen if they are willing to take me and for how much. I manage to talk to the two and they both quote me 2,500Rs (30€) for the same day return trip and 6,000Rs (75€) for the return 2-3 days after they drop me off. The island is 3 hours by boat from here. Either way, I can’t get an overnight permit and paying 2,500Rs for not even a full day trip (it’s already past 10am) is a bit out of my budget. The fishermen were not so keen on talking to me without seeing a permit. If this is the only thing to make them talk, let me get it! Then maybe I will get better quotes from the fishermen as the competition might be higher (my business mind is kicking in) and maybe we will find some way around it.

GETTING A PERMIT: Back at the FDO, I speak to the first member of staff I see (somebody who looks senior):

Me: Hello, I came to apply for the permit to visit Interview Island
Staff: Sir, I don’t think it’s possible unless you are a scientist or a researcher.
Me: What? I was here 50 minutes ago, I spoke to the chief officer and he told me it’s possible.
Staff: OK, OK, sir. Please, come to my office. Have a seat.
Me: Thank you.
Staff: (giving me a blank piece of paper) Please, write your name, date and the reason why you want to visit Interview Island.
Me: The reason why? OK then, I would like to visit Interview Island for its natural beauty, wildlife diversity and also I hope to spot the elephants in their natural habitat. I kindly request you to grant me the permission allowing me to set my foot on the soil of this unique island.
Staff: Thank you, sir. Please, follow me to the office of the chief officer.
Chief Officer: (reading my reason), (quiet), (writes down something below my handwritten reason), (Permission granted, 7/4/14, signature), (hands the paper back to me), (no facial expression).
Me: Thank you, bye!
Staff: Follow me back to my office, sir (like it’s not enough of bureaucracy already).

He starts filling in the blank spaces with my details on a fancy looking piece of paper. When he finishes, he gives it back to me and ask me to pay 500Rs (6€). What?! None of you guys told me a thing about paying, nobody informed me regarding the price or if there are any costs at all. 2,500Rs for a boat and 500Rs for a permit, its nearly 11am, that would make a very expensive half a day trip! I refuse to pay and he takes me back to see the chief officer just to tell him the same that nobody informed me about the conditions and I’m not willing to pay. Actually, I don’t want the permit, I’m looking for an entirely different experience after all! He goes on about that it doesn’t work like that and that now I must pay as I have no choice. I will show you my choice! And I left. Andaman Islands are not the best place for a Robinson type of experience. I wonder if some ‘charity donation’ or ‘children support’ or other ‘what can be done’ approach would take me somewhere further. No money, no honey!

THE TIMING COULDN’T BE BETTER: I get on the bus to Diglipur and from there I get a lift on the bike to Aerial Bay. The ferry to Smith Island, one of the least visited no-permit-needed islands, is tomorrow at 6am. I sit down on a wall and think what to do next. I check my mobile what’s the time and I see a text message – Vodafone has a coverage here! BSNL network works the best on the islands. The text is from Padma, the scuba diver I’ve met more than a week ago down south, on the remote Cinque Island.

Hey there! I’m coming to Havelock the day after! Hold on, we gotta explore a lotta stuff there! Called you, your phone is switched off. Call me once free, we’ll plan!

Excellent timing! I wanted to go back to Havelock in a couple of days anyway to start my scuba diving course. I get a ferry ticket for 2 days from now, from Rangat to Havelock, avoiding travelling through the Jarawa tribal area. Sorted!

DSC00270SLEEPING ON A BOAT: I’m stocking on some food and walking away from Aerial Bay but not too far so I can make it for the 6am ferry to Smith Island in the morning on time. I find a nice beach with mangroves (trees that grow in salty water) and put up my hammock high up on the tree, almost 3m from the ground so I’m safe and dry when the high tide comes in the night. Some kids see me and come to say hello. I end up playing cricket and football on the beach with the village kids and then the less shy ones grab my hand and walk me through the small village, introducing to people, showing houses and telling me who lives where. They also help me pack up my stuff from the tree and offer me to stay on a fishing boat (on the shore during the low tide) instead. I don’t say no. We hang out on the boat till the evening when the kids go to sleep and I wonder what I will do when the high tide comes.

DSC00540BOILED EGG INVITATION: It’s cold and wet on the boat. Probably I should have rather stayed on a tree. It’s 5am when 2 kids from yesterday come to say good morning. Bless! On the island I’m told to register at the police station. Again, no overnight stay is allowed. The only way I can stay is that I make friends with locals and somebody will vouch for me and be willing to accommodate me and be fully responsible for me during my stay. Something that is difficult to explain to the non-English speaking people. I walk to the beach until I get a house invitation for a boiled egg. I come to the house, sit down, get a boiled egg served on the plate, eat it and go. The son of the family gives me a full bag of mangoes and takes me to the beach. I eat almost everything, they are so sweet and juicy! On the way back, I stop at the police station next to the jetty. The officer lets me in and we watch Bollywood movies together. As I go, he gives me a bag full of mangoes. Another one! Then the officer takes the same boat with me so he would have known if I didn’t leave the island, if I had decided to stay overnight despite the regulations.

THINKING ABOUT A HOTEL: I want to catch the 5am express to Rangat tomorrow. I’m feeling tired and for a bit even thinking about staying in a hotel. I try to get a room in two guesthouses and both of them are completely full. No space left! I guess this is the sign I shouldn’t deviate from my principles and rest my head where the night comes. Come on, be creative, Peter! I’m thinking about the roof of a hindu temple but if somebody sees me I might get into lots of troubles.

CHAPTER THREE (12.April – 20.April)

BACK TO HAVELOCK: I meet up with Padma, who shares her travel stories from Little Andaman and Kitran, who is doing his dive master course. He quit his job as a biomedical engineer so he can tick off dreams from his bucket list. Yes, another scuba diver. Kitran came to Havelock one month ago with the intention to do just the open water course but he liked the experience so much that he stayed and is diving since. He talks about his most recent dive at Barren Island, which is an active volcano and what he saw under the water. I don’t need any more convincing, I’m going to book the course tomorrow and start on Monday. Padma takes both of us on a bike to Barefoot Resort where she stays.

FOLLOWING MY DREAM: I go to Dive India, one of the few dive centres that offer SSI courses (cheaper than PADI and nearly identical, both are world wide recognised) on the island. They ask me if I’m flexible with my time as they already have quite a big group coming on Monday. Actually, they ask me to start tomorrow! Not like I have anything to do tomorrow but I was mentally prepared for Monday. But yeah, I can definitely start earlier! I fill in the SSI form, try on some masks and fins to make sure they have the sizes that fit me and then they brief me through the course. We shake hands and will see each other in the morning.

DSC00461OPEN WATER DAY 1: I get up again at 5am and watch the sunrise full of excitement what today will bring. At 9am I turn up at Dive India. The first step is to watch the video introducing and explaining the diving equipment, effects of increasing and decreasing pressure, breathing under water, functioning of lungs, avoiding panic situations, water movement and so on. It’s a lot of information packed into nearly 3 hours long video. When I finish, I come out and there’s a girl reading Orwell’s 1984 that exclaims my name as soon as I show up. She’s got one of those difficult Indian names that are hard to pronounce and easy to forget. The girl shows me how to assemble and disassemble the equipment. From visual inspection to attaching the cylinder to the BCD (buoyancy control device) and connecting the main regulator, octopus, SPG (submersible pressure gauge) and the inflator hose to the cylinder and BCD. At the end I do it all by myself under the supervision of the Orwell’s girl. Then I’m introduced to another guy who takes me snorkelling and teaches me how to take the snorkel out of my mouth under water, exhale, put it back and blow the water out, all with my head under water.

DSC00479OPEN WATER DAY 2: I come to Dive India before 7am to order breakfast and whilst I’m waiting for the food, I assemble my scuba unit under the supervision of a dive master. I buddy up with a fellow student Avinesh, who’s doing a PADI. He works as a software developer in Bangalore and came to Andamans only for a week as he couldn’t take any more days off from work. We are introduced to our instructor, a really cool chap named Tanuj.

  • Nemo reef. He gives us a quick briefing about what we are going to be up to today and then we go on the deck of a boat and off we go to the confined water (shallow water with calm conditions) to learn a whole set of underwater skills like what to do when the regulator comes off my mouth, how to share the air with a buddy, how to take off the mask and put it back on the face and then clear the water, how to deal with cramps in legs, how to inflate the BCD with the air from the cylinder and deflate, how to wear and ditch the weight belt (most people are positively buoyant), how to achieve neutral buoyancy, how to use the dive computer and so on. It’s not like Tanuj explains it all on the shore, he tells us to put the regulator on and we dive maybe 1 meter under water and using gestures and body language he demonstrates the skills on his buddy (dive master) what he wants us to do and then it’s our turn. No words. Few minutes later, we lay down on the sea bed and play tic tac toe in the sand. It’s really a special feeling to be able to breath under water. On the first dive we spent 39 minutes down there and the deepest we went was 9m. Tea break and samosas feast on the boat.
  • Nemo reef. On the first diving day, second dive is not compulsory but after a discussion we decide to go ahead as we want to practice and see more of the marine life. This time we spent 52 minutes under water. The trickiest skill that takes time and practice to master is achieving neutral buoyancy, when with every inhale my body goes a bit up and every exhale a bit down. Meeting at 5pm for a class with Tanuj and then we are off to bed. In my case, off to a hammock on the beach.

OPEN WATER DAY 3: Me and my buddy Avenish meet Dean who is doing his dive master course. Dean shows us videos from Barren Island and talks about diving. As we sit and chat I find out that actually Avenish is not only doing the open water course, but also the advanced one! It works out cheaper as a package (30,500Rs for both; 370€) and they get me hooked up so much that I can’t think of anything else. By 7:30am we are on the sea again.

  • Peel Lighthouse. We kit up in the water and descend by the line down to 11m. I’m feeling much more confident thanks to the practice and Tanuj’s feedback. The highlight is the old Suzuki scooter dumped in the sea and now all covered in corals! After 71 minutes under water we get back to the boat.
  • The Wall. Beautiful reef! Imagine the feeling of going to the edge of the reef and swimming over the vertical drop, 40m deep, and experiencing nothingness below your feet. Only fish all around and gradual change of the blue colour from top to bottom – so many different shades! Every fish has its own hand signal, for example tuna fish is like when you are opening a tin of tuna! Total bottom time was 63 minutes and maximum depth 17m.

ADVANCED DAY 1: I’ve fallen in love with diving and decided to take it to the next level. I don’t care I will have not enough money to eat when I finish! I swapped my day 4 of open water for advanced course day 1. Tomorrow I will do a deep dive, then a night dive and then I will have 2 fun dives left at the end.

  • MV Mars ship wreck (2004). For the advanced course we have a new instructor called Vikram and he teaches us compass navigation when we swim in a square, count kick cycles and point the direction where the boat is.
  • The Wall. We practice and learn some new skills: perfecting buoyancy, touching a weight in the sand with the regulator, swimming with no weights (I forgot my weight belt on the boat!), achieving neutral buoyancy in horizontal and vertical body position.

The class is at 5pm and the topic is deep diving (down to 30m) and emphasis on watching the computer’s no decompression limit instead of air gauge as we might have 120bar of compressed air left in the cylinder but only 10min of no decompression time left. If we don’t pay attention and the computer will switch to a decompression mode, the whole profile of a dive will change, new safety stop will be set and it won’t be respected, there is a high risk of a decompression sickness. This happens when there is too much nitrogen in the body. In that case the diver will have to go to a re-compression chamber, which is not available on Andaman Islands. After the class we take an exam, 50 common sense questions with multiple answers. After we pass, the instructor opens a beer and we celebrate with the other staff in Dive India.

ADVANCED DAY 2: My first deep dive. The advanced course qualifies you to dive to 30m as opposed to 18m with the open water course.

  • Broken Ledge. Whether at 18m or nearly 30m, it doesn’t feel any different other than we need to be careful about different numbers displayed on the computer. The pressure at 30m is 4x higher than on the surface and by breathing compressed air DCIM100GOPROin such pressure, the body fill up with nitrogen very quickly. At 24m Vikram shows us fingers and the number he shows we need to subtract from number 10 to make it clear we can think straight and are not suffering from nitrogen narcosis (similar to being drunk).
  • Broken Ledge (again). The feeling of being so deep is no different until I look up. Then I realise how far the surface actually is. All I can see is a light shade of blue somewhere far above me and the bubbles I exhale and how they are coming up, slowly increasing in volume as they expand the closer they get to the surface. And the fish. Whole schools of fusiliers, thousands of them. Dancing around as I move closer. Silver in colour, they reflect light as they constantly change direction as they swim. They surround me completely. Sting rays, eels, tunas, mackerels, napoleons, octopuses and many others are in abundance here.

ADVANCED DAY 3: Or open water day 4 or fun dive, call it whatever you like.

  • Whitehouse Rock. We are being taken to a really far away site this time. I kit up on the boat, do the back roll into the sea, swim to the front, descend by the line and wait for the others at 9m below. This is meant to be one of the best locations as the corals are not bleached here and are very much alive. However, the visibility is very low (actually, shit) due to a relatively strong current and massive thermocline – if I swim 0,5m down, the water is really warm but if I go 0,5m up, the temperature drops down rapidly. Initially, I’m not sure if the sudden temperature rise is due to my buddy peeing in the water or it has some other explanation. We are lucky to see a small school of barracudas, almost 2m in length each.
  • SS Inchkeith ship wreck (1956). We are off to dive a wreck SS Inchkeith, a Japanese coal tanker sank in 1956. The highlight, apart from its huge size and some parts being nearly intact, is the toilet where we can sit and a giant propeller. Lots of narrow swim-throughs, perfect for mastering buoyancy skills. Lots of fun!

NIGHT DIVE: The sun is setting down over the Andaman sea. It takes us 20min by a speed boat to arrive to the site called Havelock Lighthouse. We gear up and go through the usual procedures but with the only difference – it’s a dark night. Vikram hands out a light torch to each and briefs us about the dive plan. Back roll and off we disappear in the darkness of the night, losing sight of the boat, surface and everything around me. My eyes are focused only on a small spotlight from the torch I hold in my right hand. I’m slowly deflating and meter by meter descending deeper into the space filled with the black colour that is being sliced through by the lights of my buddies who are already there. Colours are absorbed by the water and you lose sight of red and orange first, the deeper you get. DSC00514But now, even 12m below, red is truly red, thanks to the artificial light source. All the creatures that are hidden in the daytime are out in the night. Starfish of all colours, sea urchins, sea snakes, eels, fish sleeping under rocks and corals, crabs carrying their spiral shells and many more. The thing that struck me the most are worms. There are worms everywhere, in every single cubic centimetre! Literally falling from top to bottom. It looks like there are raining worms. Apparently, they are present also in the daytime but we can’t see them so easily. Often I’m turning around, showing back to my buddies so I can experience the alone in the darkness feeling, 12m below the surface, covering my torch and seeing the pitch black colour in front of me. Listening to my deep breath as I was inhaling the compressed air through the regulator in the emptiness that is in fact full of life. There is no difference whatsoever whether my eyes are open or closed. I see black. I’m blind but I’m in control of it. There is only one way how to know for sure the eyes are open – wave hands. I can wave my hands to magically shine the light of stars on the underwater night sky – plankton. For once, I can reach the stars and move them with my bare hands. I switch the torch back on. Worms everywhere. I turn around to see my buddies but I deliberately cover the torch again for a few seconds to see only the silhouettes and lights of other divers. Surreal experience. After 76min in the water we all get together and hold the line at 5m (safety stop to avoid decompression sickness). We switch the torches off. All I see are underwater stars. We surface and all I see are stars on the night sky above the sea. But those ones I can’t move nor touch, just look and admire. The second night sky, the second world, above the surface. Surreal.

ONE MONTH ON THE TROPICAL ISLANDS

DSC00546It’s hard to believe that it is already 4 weeks since I came to the islands. I’ve been completely detached from reality (or the rat race) living my adventure on tropical islands and it felt great. I came here with no plans and a very vague idea of what the map of Andamans looks like. Everything evolved once I was here. I came here with an idea of living in the wilderness on one of the 572 islands but after a while I realised its close to impossible since the permit (the one I got on arrival) allows me to stay overnight only on a few islands where the tourist infrastructure has been developed enough and the places are inhabited by people. The uninhabited islands I can visit only in a daytime as a day trip with no option of an overnight stay. I only wonder if the regulations would change if I had enough money to bribe the chief forest department officer issuing permits. For the folks looking for a Robinson experience, Andamans aren’t the best choice because you need a permit to go to almost every island apart from the main touristic ones and even the fishermen won’t take you unless you show them a permit. Again, I wonder if a small financial support for the officers would work. On the other hand, I experienced lots of other things. Travelling with a dog was something I wished to try for a long time. Sleeping in the jungle on a hammock was amazing as well as staying at the police station for a night. Swimming with a buffalo was crazy, snorkelling and beaches at some places were out of this world but scuba diving was completely surreal. I fulfilled my childhood dream and now I’m an advanced open water diver qualified to go down to 30m. But it’s not about the qualification. There is something else I discovered whilst diving – there is a whole new world down there! That is, in fact, quite a life changing discovery. Until now, I was trying to travel around the world above but now I’ve also set off on a journey to explore the world below. Having two worlds to travel around, one life is surely not enough! The danger on the islands wasn’t malaria or crocodiles (there are more warning signs than crocodiles), it was something else. On Andamans, there is a very high risk of meeting an unusually high number of scuba divers, sharing so many of their stories that at the end you won’t be able to resist anymore and will want to be one of them. My story.

For more pictures from Andaman Islands please visit the photo gallery (Facebook)

7 thoughts on “Andaman Islands

  1. Hi there,
    Nice blog, nice story!
    Do you have any idea what the weather is like in August in Andaman? We are travelling in India in August and looking for a place to spend a few last relaxing days by the sea after a trip in Himachal Pradesh. Do you think it’s a good idea?

    eli

    • Hi Eli, thank you! August is probably not the very best time to visit however, definitely better than in May-July. In August, you should expect some showers and the sea might be a bit more rough than usual but generally it should be fine as the monsoons shall be over by now. Have a wonderful time and enjoy the islands!

  2. Hi Peter!
    My name is Ewelina, Im from Warsaw, Poland.
    Me and my friends are coming in Feb 2015 to visit Andaman. We have never been travelling outside Europe.. We will appreciate your advice a lot

    I couldn’t find in the Internet common info according to how to reach some islands .. – so we don’t how long we should stay in Port Blair ..
    We will arrive 6th Feb Port Blair and our departure time is 18th Feb

    Port Blair – we will arrive 6th Feb, (Friday). Are there any ferries on Saturday/Sunday?

    The most we would like to visit:

    Jollybuoy
    Cinque
    Havelock
    Neil

    Port Blair- our departure time is 18th Feb

    I will appreciate your support and giving us advice:

    How can we travel to Jollybuoy or Cinque? / price around?
    Is there any ferry schedule to Jollybuoy, Cinque?
    What about permit to visit Jollybuoy, Cinque – it must to be taken 1 day in advance? How we should manage this..?….

    In which order do you recommend us visit all this places?

    Ps. One more question, I am a bit concerned about sandflies – some people are saying that there are sandflies on Andaman and they are horrible, and others that they haven’t seen any…How it really looks?

    Kind regards
    Ewelina

    • Hi Ewelina! Many thanks for contacting me and looking me up on FB, where I tried to answer your questions. If you would like to ask anything else, just drop me a message anytime! I’m sure you will have a fantastic experience on the islands 🙂 Best wishes, Peter

      • I am indian but I am jealous of you. Being an Indian (I am 67 years old) I couldn’t travel even a small part of Indian but you have come from Slovakia & travelled India. Hats off you! Young Man.

  3. Hi pete
    Its a wonderful experience u had and its beautifully written.
    I am planning travel to andaman alone in the next few months but have no clue where to start or where to end but I going to learn diving for sure.
    Chess is adorable and it reminds me of ‘spotty’, a stray dog that got attached to me and lived in my house for four years but died a month ago ..:(
    BTW Baa is a colloquial way of saying Vaa which means ‘come'(in tamil)

    Sudha

  4. Pingback: West Bengal, India | Adventures of Peter Salaj

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