Palayam. Photo: Jai P., Urur Kuppam
In the world of a fisher, there is no telling where science ends and faith takes over. In one of our many conversations about god and the divine, Palayam anna – ever critical but respectful of my lack of faith – challenged me to find a sea-going fisherman who was an atheist. In the six years since we had that conversation, I must admit that I have not met even one.
Unlike the hubris of institutionally educated minds, the fisher’s knowledge map is rooted in humility, an admission of ignorance and a constant and vocalised awe of the elements. “How can we say this is how the ocean will behave? It is impossible for ordinary humans to fathom why the ocean does what it does. I may learn a thing or two, but I will never learn the whole story.”
அது ஒரு கடல், அண்ணா. “It is an ocean brother!” he said referring to the Tamil colloquial for describing the unknowable, immeasurable ocean.
Yesterday, we were walking across a sand bar that had completely blocked the Adyar river mouth. Under the influence of the southwest monsoon, the north-flowing nearshore thendi current carried a drift of silt that incessantly added to the sand at the river mouth. Reduced to a sluggish pool of shit-water, the Adyar had neither the volume nor the hydraulic heft to breach the bar and meet the sea.
A cool steady kodai (கோடை) breeze was blowing in from the west. This is the breeze of the monsoons, what the fishers refer to as the Kerala kaathu (breeze from Kerala) to help laypersons like myself understand. A hint of the rains that the month of Aadi would bring was in the air. Palayam had come armed with an umbrella. You never know.
The breeze reminded him of a story from his younger days, when he was apprenticing with Murungakkai – a man of renowned fishing prowess and sea-knowledge. Murungakkai is an unlikely name for an aasan, a guru. It is the name of a quintessentially Tamil tree – the Moringa oleifera. In streetspeak, it is also disparagingly used as a nickname for skinny kids. But Murugakkai, the veteran fisher, was called Murungakkai, and that was that.
Murugakkai and young Palayam were out deep at sea well beyond the continental shelf on their wooden kattumaram. This is where the prized kola (flying fish) is to be found by the brave, the patient and, more than anything else, the lucky. I pressed him for the location, and he described the waters. “I can’t tell you the depth. Our plumbing lines don’t go that deep. But the water is clear. இரண்டு மூணு மஹாபலிபுரம் தூரம் இருக்கும். It’s about 2-to-3 times the distance to Mahabalipuram,” he said. They must have been more than 20 km out at sea in their kattumaram, a hand-hewn raft of about five logs of the buoyant Albizzia tree lashed together, and powered by muscle and wind.
It was the month of Aadi or Aavani (between July and September), he recalls. It was nearing the end of a tiring fishing day with little to show for it in fish. “In this season, the breeze if any is mild. We call it Thennal kaathu. It starts out as gentle gusts, and if we’re lucky it rises to a steady eeran breeze blowing from the east (eeran – east).” With the thennal blowing into the sails, the ride back home would be a breeze.
There was but a hint of the thennal in the air. The sail they had erected folded limply like a wet towel, barely flapping. They had to return home, and without a breeze to power them, the long paddle home will be punishing; their pain-wracked bodies would need at least a week’s bed-rest to recover. They had already waited quite a while for the wind to pick up, when a faint gust blew.
Murungakkai eagerly turned his face east, into the breeze, and began whistling softly. A frustrated Palayam mocked his senior. “”என்னண்ணா, ஒரு காத்தும் இல்லை, ஒரு மண்ணும் இல்லை. நீ ஜாலியா விசில் அடிச்சிக்கிட்டிருக்க.” (What the hell, brother. There is no bloody breeze, and here you are joyously whistling.”). Murungakkai was very upset. “Don’t ever curse the wind. The wind is our friend. Never use harsh words and drive it away. If it is staying away, you must invite it gently, lovingly. You whistle to it with love; it will lose itself in the melody and waft towards you,” he counseled, and resumed his whistling.
Young and cocky Palayam was still dismissive. “You and your whistling. Your friend has abandoned us,” he said derisively.
Within minutes, even the faint breeze dropped and did not pick up again. A much angered Murungakkai cursed Palayam heartily, as the two paddled all the way home. Sore buttocks, sore arms, sore shoulders, chafed palms and swollen wrists. Murungakkai’s only regret is that he had no strength left to smack Palayam. Everyone in the village knew of how his partnership with the cocky, disrespectful Palayam condemned the duo to muscling it all the way home from the deep. A little more love, and the wind may have helped them.