11 August 2005The mountains layered upon themselves like tissue paper, transparent at the base, crisply torn in jagged edged tops against a rose-streaked sky. We were returning in wooden boats that threatened to break apart, lifting off each water trough to smack down again in a jarring rattle that would flick spray around the edges and onto my lips. Everywhere, I tasted salt. I was sun-soaked and water-logged, staring rapt at the way the clouds had formed in lines to accent the sky, as if writing its denouement in warm yellow lines, threaded with orange and pink.
We had left that morning, banging across the water in the same fashion, almost seeming rude intruders to these deeps. It was warm, and already the sweat was trickling between my breasts, through my bikini underneath those dark clothes. We arrived at the island after about thirty minutes; my ribs felt tight from the seizing, the clutching, but I did not mind. I wished I could fold inside out with the smiling, contentedness well-rooted.
The men dragged our boats up out of the water, after navigating us through the reefs close to land. We stepped out onto powdery white sand, silky dust, and walked to a clutch of palm trees to set up camp. I marveled at the sharpness of colours, how the dark and bright greens of the trees in the forest razored against each other, how the pale sand was lapped by crystal water, which in turn was lined with midnight blue to mark the drop off. A narrow sand bar ran from the island toward another, larger land mass, as if reaching out for it.
We finished the task of sorting our few belongings beneath the trees, where they were already being investigated by red ants the size of my knuckle. Then it was time to strip down, peeling off layers of clothing in brisk anticipation of the cool water. It felt awkward and delightful, standing there in only a bikini in Indonesia, where I always have to be well-covered. My skin tingled with the humid breeze; if I stood still, it gathered moisture and beaded on me.
We walked to a landing dock, the now-empty home of the Frenchman who owned this island. I proclaimed to those nearest me that perhaps I would make enough money to buy an island of my own one day -- half in jest, half not. This place was wondrous. We climbed down to the wooden stage closest to the water and prepared our snorkelling kit. This was my first time of proper snorkelling, and I was slightly nervous after all the tales of poisonous sea snakes, barracudas, deadly fish and anemones. Add to that my lifelong fear of sharks and deep dark water (if you could not see the bottom, it didn't mean that it couldn't see you), and my body-shiver before I entered the water was part delight, part nerves.
Those first few seconds I clung to the stairs of the dock. Then I dipped my head under to test my mask and breathing tube. That first glance calmed me -- I could see so clearly, so much detail. I saw a fish dart to one side, it was banded violet-blue and black, and without thinking I sunk into the water and followed it. I remember how my body felt, with the sun warming my shoulders, my calves, my stomach cool-gliding through the water, the bubble rush I left behind as I kicked slowly, sinuously, with my fins. The sound of my breathing rasped, low and steady, and I paused between breaths as if each one required thought.
I could see my friends around me, and stayed close to Jo or to Catherine, both of whom were enjoying this as much as I was. We would see something interesting and point and make gutteral noises, trying to talk through our tubes and failing, but allowing our discoveries to speak all their wonders themselves. The coral was alive, moving, twitching, breathing. I commented later that some of it looked like a human brain, to be told that it was called brain corral. In these bits of 'brain' there were slivers that looked like open mouths; every few moments the mouths would snap shut and open again. Brilliant blue spikes adorned several puffed creatures, some coral stood stiff and proud with its green barnacled decorations, while others looked like Christmas trees -- all spikes and branches, with each tip glowing a bright violet, as if decorated with lights. I did not know the names for most of the things I saw, but seeing was enough.
If we swam in closer to shore, the coral was much closer to the surface, and I had to keep my body a straight plane. Something as simple as a knee coming down could get cut on the coral, so sharp it was in places. So I kicked from my ankles, maneuvering with the fins and lying flat on the water. Still, this made me nervous, my body on the reef, my skin exposed. I moved out closer to the drop off. To my right, nothing but darkness. You could not see into the deep, and cold currents came up from it to mix with warmer blasts swirling from shore.
All of a sudden I saw it move on the edge, just below me. I pointed to Catherine, snake! snake! It was bright blue and black, striped down its whole body, slowly making S-shapes to glide through the water. I heard her scream and move away, and I lay still, perfectly still, watching it wind below me. I felt no fear, knowing that it would not attack unless provoked, comfortable around snakes as I had held them for years (my father, herpetologist by hobby, had given me that). When it was gone, Catherine pulled me to the surface, and told me repeatedly that if I saw another snake, I was to move, away, slowly, and, keep, moving. She punctuated each word with her intent, and would not stop saying it until I agreed.
In between snorkeling, I would sometimes pull myself up onto the dock to warm in the sun for a while. Just when I would feel my skin start to dry and crisp in that hot stare, and the warmth would have seeped into my fingers and toes, it was back into the water again. I saw angel fish and azure blue star fish, as if the heavens had decided to reflect themselves in the sea. I saw clown fish and yellow fish and flurescent turquoise fish, as if rainbows and humour could be found here too. I swam through schools of sword fish, thick in groups near the surface, their long silver bodies and black eyes darting when I came near, reaching out as if to touch them. They let me swim with them; I was this big brown thing in a pink bikini surrounded by fish all colours and shapes, an awkward giant in a land of a more beautiful and graceful people.
Sometimes you would see clusters of fish dancing together, two smaller ones weaving around one larger. There were funny little flat fish that stood up, moved with tiny fluttering fins in vertical lines. There were fish that looked to be made of satin, so iridescent and soft their colour, and others whose scales looked like metal.
By the afternoon, my skin was tired, stung countless times by the jelly fish remnants that had been floating around. I felt baked and soaked, as if both sun and water had reached my insides. But something else had reached me, too. I had grown tired of cities, of buildings, of exhaust and chatter and the pressing-in of busy life. In this ocean all was quiet but for my own breathing and the thud and hiss of bubbles, and life was rich and dancing before me as if oblivious to all else but its own beauty. What purpose, these bright colours? For what reason, all this vibrant difference? The simple answer: Life.
And the pressure of to-do lists and to-be lists slipped down beyond the drop off, where I could no longer see them. It was just me, my body in this water, my eyes on those fish darting past, my senses feeding on colour and quiet and soft liquid touches. It was just me, my body in this water, my heart thick in my throat and my soul sunk past me, quiet and still, into the deep.
