On Uprooting and Relocating

VIZAG VIGNETTES

The airplane hovers over

Cranes, conveyor belts, cooling towers

Jetties and docks, flames and fumes

Welding sparks and city lights

The industrial gaze of Vizag

gears up to gobble me

*****

Black and white.. and red

Coal and sulphur... and iron ore
open-air stacks of fine dust

like giant heaps of rangoli

bedeck sidewalks

Toxi-city

*****

Polythene bags and frazzled fabric

Clog the roadside nullah

Barfed by thousand factories

Blackened slurry and slush; in it

wading unsullied, a snowy egret

*****

Harried existence

Uprooted, struggling to drop anchor

Waves wake up on shores, gently

Unhurried, unnoticed

*****

The houses I have lived in

Have made home in my psyche

And I, in turn,

Have lent them my Identity

*****

I buckle under the burden

Of the baggage of our itinerant lives

My pace slackened I lumber to a grinding halt

For the moment, I am content

To watch dolefully, as the world races by

*****


Often, lights fade out

And fans die on us

Mother of pearl moon

Beams on the patio -

Bay breeze fans sweet dreams

*****

Trawling language zones

from Kiswahili to Konkani

we  now sashay into
Rainbow Sagarika RJ's
Telugu desam

*****

Gongura and Thottakura

fiery Andhra chilli
Greens from hawkers' market

titillate the palate
and lure me to local flavours

*****

No buses, no autos, no school

Bandhs and blockades

Protests and price rise

Between Samaikyandhra and Seemandhra

The T-word threatens …

to disrupt “normalcy”, indefinitely

Unsafe streets

*****

Political collusion and Pollution 

incites disquiet...

Notwithstanding - 

On Dolphin Hill

I get my eye-piece of the pristine bay

And I am good to go

*****


On Dolphin Hill

You don’t count butterflies

You only feel them

flutter your heart!

*****

Uprooted from Goa

Washed ashore Visakhapatnam

Mandovi Hill to Dolphin Hill

From West coast to East coast

The journey comes a circle

Begins all over again

*****

Naturally Resourceful Nation SINGAPORE

Supertree Grove at Gardens by the Bay

Singapore is one big Universal Studio with several theme parks. This thought occurred to me, not on the better known Sentosa Island, but at the island city’s latest tourist draw, Gardens by the Bay. The flower domes (propagating flora of Mediterranean region), cloud forests (montane rainforests) and state-of-the-art ‘supertree’ groves at Gardens by the Bay are a great education and recreation, for locals, particularly the young, and tourists, alright. In that, they are studio recreation of earth’s diverse and niche ecological habitats which betray gianormous effort and technological skill sets that have gone into its development. In the absence of its very own natural resources, Singapore has been resourceful enough to bring Equatorial Africa and Australian outback centrestage in its citizenry’s consciousness. 

This attitude manifests itself, particularly, in the country’s desire to showcase world flora and fauna at every available space and opportunity. Therefore, public spaces are landscaped to just the right degree and uniform shade of green. The boulevard trees, many of them consciously native, are trained to behave like the everyday vehicular traffic that sticks to earmarked lanes and regulations. The roads are flanked by majestic heritage (those hundred or more years old) trees such as rain tree and mahogany but, like our host remarked, if they do decide to spread their tentacles a bit tawdry, they are promptly pruned to size.

The famed Botanic Gardens, the original avataar of the overriding theme of  “Garden city”, are the cultural legacy of the British with their penchant for manicured green spaces. They were envisaged early on in the initial town plan by Sir Stamford Raffles, the ‘founder’ of Singapore. So while they do host indigenous dipterocarps of the primary rainforests, the gardens are actually a tribute to world tropical diversity. The same goes with the breathtakingly beautiful National Orchid Garden which boasts of nearly thousand species of tropical orchids. Like much else Singaporean, technology and innovation is deployed here too, to create new hybrids. It is therefore, apt, that the national flower of Singapore is a hybrid - Vanda Miss Joaquim, eponymously named after its creator. Of course, the world-renowned orchid garden is still a rich repository of wild orchids, the last vestiges of the lowland rainforests that the island was once covered in. 

Singapore was once a tropical island rainforest, but the urban sprawl saw it diminish greatly. Today, only a small pocket lies preserved in the Bukit Timah Nature Reserve, which unfortunately, I did not get to see. To meet the demands of the increasing population, urban Singapore has had to reclaim nearly 200 sq. kms of land from sea. On the one hand, Singaporeans seem to be spending little time on procreation and the “precious jewels” (the natural resource of children) are becoming scarce. The state has to woo and incentivise couples to bear more children. On the other hand, the government has opened its borders to immigrants. That, in turn, has led to disgruntlement among the settlers and the new generation who feel that migrants dilute the fabric of Singapore society. Today, Singapore has one of the highest population densities in the world! To accommodate its people the Housing Development Board (HDB) develops high rises at dizzying speed as housing is a national priority. This has seen verticalization of, not only buildings, as one might expect, but even horticultural farms!

In my 10-day sojourn in Singapore I saw crows, mynas, pigeons and orioles on my regular jaunts, but not much else, despite the verdure. I thought Jurong Bird Park would educate me on the local avifauna but I should have known better by now. JBP, too, is a cauldron of different bird species of the world, from turacos to toucans. The highly popular High Flyers’ show featuring macaws and cockatoos of the Amazon rainforest, though spectacular, left me feeling a bit low. The birds were shitting time and again, nervous as they obviously were performing in front of a mass of humanity. I shuddered to think what rigour  they had to undergo and over what workday they had to rehearse such a precise and synchronized show. At the other show, King of the Skies, which featured predatory birds – hawks and vultures – I could see the leash on the birds’ feet! The exhibits were even more depressing though the enclosures were squeaky clean and the birds well-fed. The ‘World of Darkness’ enclosure of owls proudly claimed: “Enter the darkness of night, in broad daylight…” Imagine seeing the owls in dim light in broad daylight; owls are nocturnal but they do not stay in darkness whole day long. The scarlet ibis (looked like flamingoes to me!) looked sadly out of place on the faux wetlands at the Park. But, it also set me thinking. Were these minority specimens not any different from the migrants that came to Singapore from erstwhile Malaya, or India or China? Migrants, who got uprooted from their native land and were transplanted into an alien culture and habitat due to unforseen circumstances? And who over a period of time, over generations, got naturalized to a new foreign identity, like the Peranakans, perhaps? They are no different from migrants of yesterday who become today’s card-carrying citizens imbuing the city-state with entrepreneurial energy and can-do attitude!

Back to pavilion after the show as the free-spirit myna (above right) looks on

 After these encounters with nature, I was glad I did not go to the Singapore zoo and night safari. It would be an understatement to say that after my safari in Kenya’s Maasai Mara, this would have been a come down. For a country that has little wildlife, such attempts to procure and display wildlife, may be commendable, but also puerile. 

Having done the tourist circuit, I am glad we went off the beaten track, to visit the Marina Barrage, as it took me closer into the psyche of a nation that is environmentally conscious and concerned. I truly admired the chutzpah of the nation that imports 50% of its water requirement from neighbouring Malaysia, its ambition to achieve self-sufficiency in water supply in the coming years. For some reason, Singapore does not have a sustainable groundwater table, so currently its water needs are satisfied by desalination plants, apart from water imported from Malaysia as per two bilateral accords. The Public Utility Board, the national water agency, is not hedging its stakes entirely on its neighbour and has built several reservoirs and water catchment areas for harvesting rainwater. Marina Barrage, the latest reservoir doesn’t just collect rainwater but also prevents flooding by separating seawater from freshwater. This project is not just a staid state project operating behind-the-scenes, it is an engineering marvel that is being peddled as prime recreation club. Even from where we stand we can see youngsters flying kites from the green roof terrace of the Barrage complex. Children play in water and families get together for sailing and other water sports over weekends, we are told. When they do so, they also visit the Sustainable Gallery which is a “sensory extravaganza” to educate public on importance of water cycle and water recycling.

Green roof-top terrace of Marina Barrage overlooking Singapore skyline

What is particularly commendable about PUB’s efforts is that they realize the importance of self-reliance when it comes to generating this precious resource, especially in the light of history of strife with its neighbour from which Singapore separated to form an independent nation. And they make every drop count. Thus, recycling used water and treating it for reuse for industrial and even, household purposes, is also top on the agenda. Recycled water, currently meets 30% of Singapore’s water needs. The PUB product NEWater is high-grade bottled ‘treated waste water’ which surpasses WHO requirements for drinking water. The PUB has designed and developed an ambitious programme for generating water resource and is co-opting NGOs to spread awareness and take the message across its people. Today, Singapore is recognized as a model city for good water management and is global hydro-hub (which means it has domain expertise in water management and is in a position to share it with or help water-stressed countries). PUB won the 2007 Stockholm Industry Water Award “for their holistic approach to water resources management which made water use sustainable for different sectors of society in a unique and challenging urban island environment.”

Singapore is singularly wanting in natural resources as illustrated above but that hasn’t hampered or hindered its progress in any way. In fact, precisely for that reason, today, it values them more and is conscious of environmental housekeeping. The nation, by nature, is resourceful enough to tide over the shortfall and create plenty.

Reverse Gear on Lunatic Line

Iron Snake tearing through the Tsavo savannas

Cutting through a sward of savannas with their grazing giraffes and gazelles and lion prides and leopards, the journey on the erstwhile Uganda Railway was a customary tourist trail for Kenyans post-independence. Our Kenyan friends regaled us with stories of their weekly picnics to the Indian Ocean coastal town of Mombasa from Nairobi, and back, by train: “When school closed for weekend, we would set out for the Coast, packing  children’s uniform so that they could head back to school on Monday, straight from the railway station. The rail journey itself was part of the fun... a wild life safari in style. Meals were served with fanfare in fancy crockery and with silver cutlery... we dined while gazing at the game outside the window.”  Railway journeys are replete with romance and if they be a track from history then even more so.

Off-late, general decadence and negligence had set in and tarnished the UR – a British exercise in colonial aggrandizement - and our friends dissuaded us from embarking on this Kenyan adventure. The next best thing to do then was to traverse the important ports of call, which we did, not by any method but spontaneously, over three years. And though it wasn’t particularly intended as such, we ended up traversing backwards, from Kisumu to Mombasa; from Lake Victoria to the East African Coast – in reverse gear that the Line itself was built. Simultaneously, we traced the Railway back in time through archives, relics and history books.

Unlike in India and other British colonies, in East Africa sovereignty came before territory. Land was snatched from gullible African headmen through inducements but territory and terrain still needed to be explored and antagonists subdued. The Source (Lake Victoria, Jinja, Uganda) having been ‘discovered’ by the explorers, the Great Lake (Lake Victoria) now seized the British imagination leading to the grand idea of a railway cutting across the hinterland connecting it to the East African coast. The reasons were strategic, the vision romantic and the implementation full of adventure and toil. The “Lunatic Line”, as the detractors nicknamed it, actually presaged the birth of a Nation – Kenya. As the then British Commissioner Charles Eliot remarked:  “It is not uncommon for a country to create a railway, but this railway actually created a country”.

Kisumu Railway Station

On our sojourn in Western Kenya, we found ourselves at the Lake Terminus, the Railway’s tail end. The erstwhile, Port Florence on Lake Victoria was a hub and web of activity. Steamers carrying cargo of cooking oil and soaps were heading to Mwanza in Tanzania. The UR did not reach the shores of the Source (at least, in its first incarnation) as envisaged but ended on the eastern shores of the Lake, in present-day Kisumu, in Kenya. Kisumu is the third largest town in Kenya after Nairobi and Mombasa. The station itself was somnolent.  An incongruous picture of cows on tracks – grazing grass growing between the sleepers – and even a car parked on the railway station greeted us. Relics such as the old railway clock, lantern, weighing scale and a plaque commemorating the inauguration transported us down memory train.

In fact, it is in Nairobi’s Railway Museum (NRM) with its assorted odds and ends that we get a real sense of the railway-building history. The wagons, coaches, engines, signals, clocks, communication equipment, inspection trolleys, even silver cutlery and ceramic crockery carry tales of events and episodes in one of the most ambitious projects that the British undertook in any of its colonies.  Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, too owes its existence to the Railway. When the railway plate-laying reached present-day Nairobi, it was a swampy, marshy wasteland. The Maasai’s, which was one of the chief tribes in this area (Southern Kenya), called this stretch ewaso nai 'beri (stream of cool water) which the British in their characteristic twang and whim twisted to Nairobi. When the railway moved here with its stores and yards, the enterprising Indian dukawallas (traders) set shops to cater to the everyday needs of the predominantly Indian labour force. Eventually, the British Administration too shifted its headquarters from Mombasa to Nairobi and the beginnings of a township emerged. This was a century ago when Nairobi town radiated outward the railway station. Ironically, today, the town has burgeoned to an extent that the railway lines lie buried into the city’s backyard, partially forgotten. Today, the only vestige of the fertile past is the Nairobi National Park on the periphery of the city that still boasts of lions and rhinos.

Tsavo Railway Station - deserted and dilapidated

Of all the stations we visited, the vote for the most adventurous (for the workers though it spelled misadventure) will undoubtedly go to Tsavo - of the man-eating lion notoriety.  This is perhaps the most deserted and isolated of the ones we have visited thus far.

The Bridge over River Tsavo

The building of the Bridge over River Tsavo was one of the most intriguing features of the UR. Tsavo Park was the biggest game preserve in Kenya, teeming with game, which the “Iron Snake” (clairvoyant of its destructive propensity, local people termed the line thus) sought to rip apart into two. This gross intrusion into exclusive lion territory could not have been without its consequences. For ten months, as the railway party – the indentured and indigenous labour – camped here, two felines held it hostage in a “state of siege”. The drama of the sordid affair elicited a book by Col. Patterson, who finally concluded the saga by killing the lions. The book “Man-eaters of Tsavo” was later turned into a movie, “The Ghost and the Darkness”.  

To visit Tsavo station we have to alight into the heart of the Tsavo National Park. We were provided a gun-toting askari (sentry); after all, this is lion territory. We walked the tracks and crossed the bridge over River Tsavo to get to the railway station, a modest kiosk-size shelter, all the time looking over our shoulders. The station-master was taken aback by visitors (he didn't get any) and was eager to show us around. I was only concerned about one thing: “Do lions still stray this way and aren’t you scared?” “I do hear lions roar at night but they do not come near the station,” he had replied unfazed. Brave man this, I remember thinking, who cannot be shaken by a lion’s (which in all probability carries the man-eating genes!) war cry in the dead of night. He was surrounded by old memorabilia which formed panoply of his current dispensation. The antique-collector husband ventured to ask if he had any that might be junked. With alacrity the station-master disappeared into the siding yard and returned with a trophy - an old signal-lantern with its red-gelatin niche - and handed it over to us!

Few kilometers away from here another well-documented incident took place where Charles Ryall (then Superintendent of Railway Police) fell prey to the perpetrators he had sought to prey upon. At the NRM, we had stepped into Ryall’s shoes when we entered the carriage in which Inspector Ryall lay in wait at night ready to shoot the marauder. On that fateful night, nearly a century ago, the elusive man-eater had managed to hoodwink Ryall and dragged him out of the carriage precisely when his guard was down and he had dozed off momentarily. The lion’s territory and reach also extended to Voi near Tsavo. We took Voi in stride when we had gone on a Battlefield Tour from Sarova Salt Lick. This back of the beyond railway station is a junction where another line was built around the time of the Great War. Voi was one of the important theatres of World War I, and even today, war debris - from bullets, rivets and even glass shards of lemonade bottles - from that era lie embedded here. Voi town also boasts of a cemetery exclusively to commemorate Indian soldiers who fought in WWI.

Mombasa Station: the beginning of Uganda Railway

Considering we had done the UR journey reverse in time and space, it was only fitting that we ended the exploration at the beginning. We finally visited Mombasa railway station only in Nov 2011, though we had visited this coastal city several times before. The platform here seemed endless. A passenger train was standing on the platform and the station master showed us around the train. Though this was a relatively new train of the Kenyan Railway, it was a shadow of the past with its demarcation of third class passenger compartments and first class dining cars with plush toilets! Mombasa is a bustling town where the old and the new co-exist like a bridge between past and present. It was here, at Mombasa Port, to be precise, that the rolling stock of material for the Railway was offloaded towards the end of 19^th century. This was the doorway to East Africa. 

The UR was the umbilical cord connecting India and Kenya. While the Grand design to build the UR was British, Indians fitted the nuts and bolts on the Kenyan soil thus paving the way for a second wave of Indian diaspora. It is a little sad that a railway so rich in history lies in near shambles, both physically and in people’s imagination. Our railway journey was truly complete when a close friend and collector of railway memorabilia presented us with an original number plate of an engine of the erstwhile Uganda Railway. That and the Tsavo souvenir grace the Africa antiques corner of our home and will keep this slice of history alive in our imagination. 

Encashing on the Tsavo legend

Nameless Tsavo Station 

Car Park at Railway Station - Kisumu

Erstwhile Uganda Railway is now Kenya Railways - Mombasa Station 

MOMBASA MSAFARI - PART II

OLD TOWN 

If Gede is time standing still, tending backwards, then Old Town is time carried forward in a past-present continuum. This becomes particularly evident from where I am standing - at a junction where four strands of Kenya’s historic past meet. On my left is the 16^th century citadel, Fort Jesus, built by the Portuguese; behind me is the colonial (British) Mombasa Club; and to the right is the entry point to the Old Arab Town that boasted sizeable Indian population and influence when it sprung up by the East African coast of Mombasa around 18^th century. The junction, itself, a traffic island, is an oddity as it immortalizes, not a person, but a legendary institution. A giant golden coffee pot stands in tribute to a ritual from the hoary past, of people that cherished its kahawa.

And here it is, in a macrocosm away from the hum of modern Mombasa, right next-door, that I rendezvous with Taibali Hamzali, an old-timer Old Town-er. An architect with a yen for heritage conservation, he has been working towards preserving the buildings and the ethos of Old Town, which is today a UNESCO heritage site. Brought up in its intimate and intricate bylanes and alleyways, there couldn’t have been a better guide, for me, today. As we step into the Old Town, it feels as though we have stepped into a film studio from yesteryears, and it may well have been a Bollywood tableau! Fragile, dainty single-storey houses with overhang balconies and balustrades, ornately carved doors and even Art Deco buildings momentarily confound me. Is this Kenya in Africa or am I in small-town India of the colonial era? Either way, I am excused. Because, this settlement which sprouted by the waterfront and grew organically, a century ago, is a rich amalgamation of the varietal peoples and their cultures - Arab-Omani, Indian, British - that touched its shores, not to forget the indigenous Swahili influence!

As we meander through the lanes flanked by heritage houses, coalesced into a colony, we come across the 16^th century Mandhry Mosque, the oldest mosque in Mombasa, still in use. In the days of yore, its obelisk-like minaret could be seen from afar and served as a beacon to Arab dhows trawling the ocean waters, guiding them into the busy harbour and Old Port of Mombasa. “Old Town Mombasa grew as an Islamic trading post, and by the 1900s, finely-crafted stone buildings had been constructed along the main streets,” says Taibali. Standing by one such building - the Government Square by the Old Port, I take in the few vessels dotting the harbour. These are the “small coastal trading vessels” sailing to Zanzibar or Somalia, going by the information provided on the plaque. But in its heydays, when Mombasa was the entrepôt to East Africa, the harbour would have seen hundreds of ships as explorer Richard Burton observed in mid-19^th century. Charles Miller in his book, The Lunatic Express, on the Uganda Railway brings alive Mombasa harbour in the opening pages, thus: “…great fleet of Afro-Oriental sailing vessels which were crammed into the claustrophobic Old Harbor, and which now seemed huddled about his own ship like a plague of waterborne locusts... For most part, these crafts were huge Arab dhows from Persian Gulf… but there were others, cargo lighters and flimsy dugouts, manned by Swahili and Bajuni boatmen who wore sarongesque kikois and seemed engaged in a shrieking contest.”

Old Town Alleyway 

Mandhry Mosque

 

Old Port over Mombasa coast

British colonial soldier stands guard

Further North, by the waterfront stands the majestic Leven House, the seat of erstwhile British colonial administration where missionaries such as Johann Krapf and explorers, John Speke and Richard Burton, stayed when they passed through onward to hinterland. Today, this renovated building is the office of the Mombasa Old Town Conservation Office, which is doing a fine job of preserving the past. 

As we wind and wend our way through ever-thinning pathways we are thoroughly awed by the fretwork balconies and the doors - mainly the teak doors with brass studs. Adorned with Arabic-Koranic inscriptions at the top and designs of floral vines twirling throughout the framework, these were crafted by Kutchi craftsmen. I am intrigued by one particular carved door as this is on the periphery wall and is sealed, incongruously, and must open into the ocean. Taibali reveals the ugly secret behind this closed door, a black mark on Africa's history. Slaves were shipped from this point to Zanzibar. 

Wares over carved doors

This door hides an ugly secret

The street-scene is enlivened by Swahili women in buibuis, and others flaunting boldly patterned khangas in floral prints. Little school-going girls, innocent and giggling, covered from head-to-toe, cut a cute picture in sync with the character of the old town. The men, in their kikois and kanzus go about their daily activities of trading and selling wares, which in today’s times translates as curios and souvenirs for the tourists. In fact, most of the buildings house curio shops on the ground floor, dealing in wood carvings and handicrafts, trademark of Kenya’s Akamba tribe.

 The only way to wash down such a time travel is to sit with a cuppa coffee and mull over its import. Jahazi Coffee House presents that perfect intellectual space as it is not just a café, as the name suggests, but a cultural meeting ground. Jahazi, Persian for ship, is a Swahili adoption, like other umpteen words that populate the KiSwahili tongue and are borrowed from the Persian parent or even Hindustani, for that matter. Bedecked with Lamu benches and coffee tables, Persian carpets and settees, it creates an ideal setting to idly watch the old world go by. And then, there is the kahawa, of course. Sitting by the painted glass window of Jahazi house, sipping coffee, a whisper from the past gently nudges me. I can see it all vividly now. At the end of the day’s work, men, women and children - Old Towners - sit by the ocean and unwind in the evening breeze. The coffee-seller carrying his trademark brass coffee pot with coals blazing in the brazier beneath peddles strong ginger-cinnamon brew to the strollers and idlers.

Even as I end the day at Mombasa’s Sailing Club, amid coconut palms and almond trees, I see local boys in red jerseys playing football in the historic precincts of Fort Jesus, which had witnessed many a battle between Omanis and Portuguese. As the ocean waves crash onto the fort’s façade the setting sun freezes the moment into a perfect picture - a pastiche of present peeled out of the past.

    

Old Town meets modern Mombasa by the harbour

  

Jahazi Coffee House

Coffee Pot immortalized

Also read: Mombasa Msafari - Part I 

Ancient City - Gedi Ruins http://www.padmaja-earthletters.blogspot.in/2010/08/mombasa-msafari.html

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