Authentic backwaters
By Lonneke — November 16, 2015 12:56 pm
Walking down the winding road from the trainstation of Munroe Island, one thing stood out the most: the absence of chaos and clamour. Sure, a rickshaw or motorbike would pass us once in a while, but other than that, it was so quiet and serene! Scattered in the green jungle-like surroundings are colorful, well maintained houses. A man that got off the train with us walked a few metres ahead of us, greeting and chatting with everyone he encountered: clearly this island is a small community, where everybody knows everybody.
At the first junction another man walked up to us and told us he has a guesthouse, we followed him and he led us through backyards and over bridges, past cows with their faithfull companions the egrets and there it was, a small room, right by a narrow canal, inhabited by a flock of ducks. Villagers were paddling by with all different kinds of goods.
Are we hungry? We follow him again, this becomes the pattern for the next two days, he's a man of few words, we just need to follow him. To a house where a woman cooks us thali, served on a banana leaf and she pours us a warm pinkish drink, which supposedly is good for the stomach. To a cashew factory, where so many women sitting on the floor participate in all fases of processing these delicious nuts, from roastering to cracking, from sorting to selecting. To a wide waterway where we can see a houseboat, which are now only used for the tourists, no local lives on one anymore. To a shack where he treats us to a ginger-lime-pepper-soda, also good for the stomach.
Next morning we got into his boat and he punted us through the most tranquil waterways imaginable, now and then getting ashore to visit a coconut refinery (they use every last bit of these fruits, for rope, fuel, oil, food, drink, liquor, honey, cleaning articles). As he explained it, the people of the island live and breath the coconuttree. On we go, gliding through the water, admiring the lillies at the tiger prawn farms (he plucked them with his feet and then snapped the long stem in such a way, that it turned into a necklace), spotting watersnakes and lots of eagles, encountering many trade boats and showing us different types of trees and plants.
We really got a taste of the villagers and their ancient watery highways.
