St Martins: Country's lonely outpost

Introduction of KEARI Sindbad, a SOLAS (safety of life at sea) ship of KEARI Limited, in Teknaf -Saint Martins route is a remarkable addition to the tourism sector in greater Chittagong. The sea going (classed) passenger vessel starts operating in this route today.. PHOTO: STAR

The island almost shell-shaped but for a connecting strip with the coral island, offers wonderful empty beaches washed by the sea, hoards of live shells, fresh coconuts, and a ravishingly beautiful night, if the moon shines or even not.

The island is unbelievably serene with a cool pleasant wind blowing all night, and a little eerie too for the sound of the waves, which you can hear (nay, even touch) from your room at Hotel Abakash or from any other dormitory.

The island holds forth virgin charms, yet though the best beaches where the waves lap on adorably on the bathers do seem slightly wrongly located.

At St Martins the sunrise and the sunset occur at the wrong ends of the island, that is, the beaches at these two ends are difficult to walk on for the coral riffs. The water of the sea anytime is a brilliant blue, and near the coral island the white beds of the corals can be seen through the transparent water.

The island has a small population of 6,000 people, and it is a union with an elected chairman. A small contingent of police is stationed here, quite sufficient as the island is peaceful. Most of the families are engaged in fishing, besides growing coconut gardens. The people are illiterate and simple-minded, but quick-tempered and certainly intimidating.

An unverified story goes that writer Humayun Ahmed was not much taken to by the islanders, his modern attitudes having arisen their dislike. Humayun's bungalow is now vandalised, doors and windows gone. Prospero's culture will not take its hue on the islanders (and, it's true for the whole country)!

The only highway inside the island must be that three-kilometer long road built of concrete slabs starting at the fish-market and ending at Hotel Abakash. It's about a foot high from the ground with no supporting mud bed on the edges.

So, when the sea-truck from Teknaf unloads the tourists at the island in the early afternoon, the van-rickshaws become mad to catch passengers, and on this dangerously narrow strip of a road they run, overtake, collide, skid and fall and, sometimes, break down causing injury to the helpless tourists. At night, if the moon is not shining, these van-rickshawalas simply drive in the dark without a light. The whole thing is pure aggression, and you may like it for that all the more.

In the fish-market at the entrance of the island there are a dozen restaurants selling freshly fried lobsters, crabs, flying fish and other indigenous fishes. Rice is thick grains, and with dal and fish at Salam Meah's Park Restaurant you will surely win the bargain for your meal.

After dinner, you again mount on a van-rickshaw to return to Hotel Abakash awaiting the most precious night of your life, only to discover the ruining fact that a generator, howling in a disagreeable manner, supplies electricity to the Hotel until ten or eleven at night.

In the end, the generator goes to sleep, calmness sweeps back, and you pull up a chair in front of your room, resting your legs onto the railing of the corridor, for a whole-night rapture with the sea, and a line from Jibananda floats itself into your memory: "Samudrer jaley deha dhuye nia tumi ki ashibey kache priya?" (Oh dear, won't you come to me after washing your body in the seawater?).