The pile of crab in the bucket is growing at a sorry pace compared to the vast quantities of broken plankton and sea-grass that is been chucked aside, steadily.
Manuel and I keep tugging at length after length of net, and we gently untangle fish and crab that have been caught. I have already decided to buy the crab for lunch, but it is a sad looking heap. The fish caught today is not even worth 500 rupees apparently, so he will just take it home and cook it for the family and a few others.
Manuel is originally from Dungalpitiya, over 100km away. He settled here after marriage and fishing has been his livelihood all his life. He is 69 years old.
During the war, though others migrated to southern waters, or into the smuggling trade due to poverty, he held back.
“When we were ordered not to enter the water for security reasons, I dug deep holes in estates for Two Rupees each, to plant coconut; and survived on a bowl of porridge for the afternoon,” he says. “Rather than sell my conscience”
Now the fisherman camp out for weeks at Uchchamunei, Baththalagunduwa and other islands seasonally. It is as far as Manuel migrates, and the islands welcome them all.
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| Dislodged marine flora |
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| Fish & Sea-grass |
The biggest threats to the declining fish stocks that effect especially the small time fishermen, are the bottom-trawling technique used by a few boats from the Kalpitiya end, and the overuse of chemical fertilizer by the farmers, from the lands’ end, which is washed into the lagoon when the Maha monsoon roars in from the East.
10 days of annual downpour is all this arid area receives even so, but it is a deluge like none other.
Though the authorities and the Navy has been constantly updated and complained to by the fisherman regarding illegal fishing techniques some of the disco-dal younger crowd employ for fast returns, and the excessive agro-poison flushed in, nothing has been done so far.
The future state of the lagoon is in peril.
Every November, when the Anguluwa fish arrive at its breeding grounds to lay eggs, the bottom trawlers will wait with nets and trap entire shoals along with eggs and habitats. Very soon the species will be extinct.
The nets rake and dislodge the underwater breeding grounds of marine algae, grass and plants the eggs need to nestle safely within. The dislodged tiny eggs are carried by waves, their delicate state cannot withstand crashing against the shore. In a few years’ time the Lagoon will be empty of many species.
What Manuel and I are chucking aside mostly as we speak, are the destroyed marine flora of these habitats from the nets.
I am horrified. Manuel is hopelessly sad.
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The people of the area are a mixed bunch - predominantly Muslim and almost all speak Tamil.
As I travel the beautiful roads through paddy, farmland, chena cultivations, salt flats, dry zone forests, reservations and fishing villages, it is dotted with villus (small lakes) and the widest and longest river network for this area - the Kala Oya
Most communities in this coastal belt had to move during the war, with the LTTE forcing Muslims to vacate their traditional lands in the Wilpattu, Mannnar areas, within 48 hours’ notice.
The displacement brought them southwards.
This has created some chaos.
Although some are resettled successfully, there are many in limbo facing a barrage of abuse from many quarters due to being resettled by their leaders in areas though being their traditional homelands, and are now declared as buffer zones and reservations.
The abuse and the misery they have faced, continues from new quarters.
My thoughts and sentiments grapple with issues of environment & wildlife against groups of my countrymen being herded into territories where they cannot practice their livelihoods nor return to their original villages, and now have to face and fight new threats and systems, all peppered with large doses of partisan politics and religion.
Nothing seems fair.
The solution has to work better, for both displaced, struggling villagers and wildlife & environment.
Or else, it can never be a workable or sustainable solution, nor a successful one.
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The waves jack hammer the hull and I hold on to dear life trying not to be thrown into the deep water.
The sun is ebbing westwards and the water is churning and rushing steel and silver, as we cut through.
I have opted to hire a boat from Karaithivu to get to my base, as it is faster; the boatman fires the engine as he has to drop me off and go lay his nets for the night.
On my right across the expanse far away, a stunningly beautiful low ridge runs along for miles, bright reddish brown against the pewter blue water of the evening, carrying a deep green forest on top.
I travelled over and along it, near Kala Oya a few hours back, but from this vantage point it is more compelling and stunning.
There and beyond lies Wilpattu of many a fame.
While on the road in the afternoon I visited some fishing villages, established for the fleeing refugees from Wilpattu and beyond.
They are picturesque.
In the village of Silavathurai, nearly 1200 displaced Muslim families were settled from Mannar.
I am told with a smile, of one Sinhala family – the tailors, and one Tamil family – the barbers.
Approaching Karaithivu along the lagoon on a road that disappears in intervals, is one of the high points. On my Left and on the banks is a landscape with vegetation like no other and it is a bird paradise.
Occasionally I come across fallen concrete markers - attempts of city folk with influence to buy up chunks of land and "develop."
The villagers tear them down repeatedly and now this state land is declared a sanctuary.
The village of Serakkuliya has more of a mixed ethnic demography.
Down the main road in the village, there are signs on the walls, barring the Colombo garbage from being dumped in these areas of greater Wanathavillu.
“kabalen lipata” (From the frying pan to the fire) comes to mind for these people, and I am glad of the organized resistance.
I am further convinced of the duplicitous dream, Clean-Colombo is.
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