A buoy in the water

Pai spent what seemed like ages on a sail-less (row-less & motor-less) boat floating helplessly in the expanse of the Pacific Ocean. Though he had initially thanked all the stars for providing him with the presence of mind to run for the safety boats while the ship was tilting, he now curses all the gods for putting him through this misery of slow death. The safety boat, that he is on, moves very slowly only with the little movement on the ocean surface. The boat seems almost still. Pai wishes that the relentless sun would at least fry-off his noisy brains at least. Severely dehydrated, hungry, sun-burned and hallucinating, he contemplates suicide. He once jumped out of the boat to drown himself only to instinctively swim and pull himself back in…curses his father for teaching him to swim when he was six. His father had taught him never to give up in life.

After a few more miserable days: He sees something on the surface. He was just able to sit upright only because his thirst was quenched by a drizzle that blessed his boat’s location a few hours ago. What’s on the ocean surface is flotsam…a piece of tarpaulin…a sail! It’s what was lost of the safety boat in the violent drop into the water. This will certainly help the boat move at least in some direction. Something is better than nothing. Some progress is better than being stationary. Pai realizes that it is coincidental that the sail & boat crossed (in the least of probabilities…considering the sheer expanse of the ocean area). There should be some surface current carrying what floats towards a particular direction. This current carried the boat and sail in the same direction.

[After a few more weeks] Pai was sure the boat is moving now; but was it still in circles….towards nowhere? Pai could make out the difference in the water color and the surface choppiness. Wondered where the hell in the world he was, was he near land? He could see nothing in the horizon except water. He was starting to give up hope.

[After a few days (?)] He was sleeping too much the last couple of days, so was up when the first lights came up the horizon. Pai almost sees something and then it disappears. Was it hallucination? Whatever it was that's his only glimmer of hope, he has to try and reach whatever it is. Energy explodes into his being and he tries his best to use the sail to direct the boat faster towards that possibility. Occasionally he uses his hands as row. After what seems like an eternity, he sees it clearly this time…on the horizon…it's a top of a coconut tree! Thrilled and now brimming with optimism we works as an athlete would. As luck has it one of the rows, that was also lost earlier in the violent fall, is also found floating...this is too much of a coincidence, does the ocean have intelligence? He picks it up and put it to use like a man driven by a vision.

Pai has to reach close enough to bring himself to the notice of the few people on the island. He gets the feeling they would soon leave on the yacht anchored close. He shouts, waves and beats the water frantically with the row until one of them finally sees him. He is saved ! And he praises his stars repeatedly for getting him back to civilization.

 

Musings: Life is meaningful in pursuit, else it is like a flotsam

The Hubulkok Effect

The hubulkok is a colourful bird. It travels a long distance, on an instinctive route, to mate and nest. En route this long flight, only some 700 kilometers before touch down, it passes over the hot and sunny beaches near the Great Pillar cliffs. Here, if the sea lashing the cliffs brews up something special a few hubulkoks may stop for a travel break. An oceanic rubbish sludge current sometimes crosses the local gulf eddies to cough up a humid stench. A very thick storm of flies hovers over the seas. The swarms of flies and the stench also attract fishes of all kinds and in turn these fishes attract the sharks. The situation normally stays only for a couple of hours or a day if it happens at all. If coincidently the hubulkoks fly over this place at this time, then the some of the hungry hubulkoks dives down into the fly clouds to swallow in mouthfuls. Then these snacking hubulkoks with their bellies full are unable to continue with their overhead friends on the remainder of the journey. They decide to nest on the nearby land itself. They fly an hour inwards into the greener parts of this land and settles near a farming village. A reason to select this place is also the access to seeds, grains et al in plenty in the barns. Just before the mating there is a cooing-the-female ritual with a display of its pinkish wings and a cry that goes 'hulhulhul'. Now, the villagers who heard this cry are tense! The elders of the village have taught them that to hear the 'hulhulhul' sound is inauspicious. And it is not wholly false; they were hit the following day with the news that one of their beloved was killed in a shark attack the day before!

Local Superstition: Hubulkoks augurs death.

How can the harmless hubulkok signal deaths?
The islanders here are mostly agricultural and close knit, mostly related one way or another. They have their own religion, traditions and superstitions. One such superstition their grandparents passed on to them is the relation between death and hubulkoks based on actual sea death incidences observed through the centuries. Many islanders have also lost their fishermen folks to the notorious whirlpools. This too happened after sighting the hubulkoks nesting near their villages. They accused hubulkoks to be death itself.
The reality is that: it is the time of year when the islanders' produce are brought to the old market ten miles off the beautiful sandy white beach near the Great Pillar cliffs. Having made their sell many of them decide to take a day off and go swimming or boating. Normally it is quite safe but not if it is the sea mood is as explained above.

Rationality: Hubulkoks sightings on that island may signal dangerous seas nearby.

Musings: Thankfully, for this particular case we can observe and understand the whole scene on a macro level. It can be explained with appropriate scientific principles we know. But imagine a situation where it involves sciences beyond our understanding or maybe even those we haven't yet formalized. Then superstitions and omen readings could just be reliable.

Morals of the story: Don’t ignore everything you can’t explain today, there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy.