Kijana Read online

  ‘Gnarly,’ Josh said behind my shoulder. He was right, but it wasn’t a word I’d heard from him before. Beau and I turned our heads to see him smiling. It’d only taken a few seconds of hearing the roar of near-perfect waves on a remote Indonesian break to turn him into a surfer-lingo-speaking dude.

  Beau dragged out an awful American accent in an attempt to add a line from the movie Point Break: ‘And your balls man, they are this big’. It wasn’t what he said but how he laughed at his own joke that cracked us up.

  Maria didn’t have to put on an American accent, as she already had an accent of her own. ‘Go back to the valley, man.’

  What a great feeling it was to hear her getting into our cabin-fever humour. It was a further sign that she’d become one of us.

  All eyes turned to me, the only one not to have said anything surfy. The pressure was on. I knew the movie but couldn’t think of any lines so I said, ‘Totally wicked’.

  No one really laughed, not even me. Josh was able to muster one of his nervous giggles at how lame my effort was.

  ‘Let’s go ashore,’ I quickly added to cover the silence.

  The village was called Nembrala. Its location seemed to be a closely guarded secret in the surfing community, only shared by the surfers who frequented the village.

  Over the next couple of days we became familiar with the layout of the village. It was small and basic. The streets were gravel and the houses neatly arranged, with the border of each property marked by fences of wood and blocks of coral placed on top of each other. There was no mains electricity and only the wealthiest families could afford to run a generator for lights.

  At night we could pick out the few privileged homes by the intensity of light coming from their windows. The rest of the houses were lit by the dim glow of hanging lanterns.

  The village centre was marked by a dusty soccer field that doubled as a market square twice a week. Beside this field sat a church and a small school. Most of the townsfolk walked everywhere, with the occasional motorbike sending up a cloud of dust. These bikes always appeared to be hooning along, but I think the fact that they were so rare accentuated their loudness and speed.

  The landscape was very dry. Were it not for the coconuts that fell from the tall palms shading the village, the pigs, chickens and goats may have starved. The covering of palms fronds 20 metres above the ground provided a type of air conditioning for the village. The ocean breeze blew under the palms making the heat more bearable, rustling the leaves to create a cooling effect.

  The only place with a television was a home-stay close to the beach. The family that operated it had built extra living quarters and provided clean sheets and meals to the band of surfers who lived with them for a few weeks or even months.

  It was a peculiar little community, where local Indonesians and sun-bleached surfers lived in harmony. Many of the surfers had been visiting Nembrala for years and spoke fluent Indonesian, while many locals had, in turn, picked up the art of surfing from these visitors.

  On our second day we eyed the nearby waves with a mixture of desire and fear. We’d watched a constant stream of surfers disappear into the thunderous surf of the southern reef. Wave after wave would pass by with no sign of life until a rider would suddenly appear, carving out a ride with apparent ease. It looked so easy and heaps of fun. But, at the same time, really treacherous. The waves were twice the size of the surfers, and were breaking over a razor-sharp reef. Also, these guys looked like they knew what they were doing. This was not a case of going for a day at the beach with Dad on a boogie board. These guys were doing all the moves I’d seen in surfer magazines.

  We decided we should tackle the northern break first, as its waves were half the size.

  As we discussed which break to try, a launch approached Kijana and pulled up alongside. It was the skipper from the big power boat, which we soon discovered was a charter vessel. He admired Kijana and told us he’d heard of us leaving Melbourne. Did we want to come over for an ice-cold beer? Of course!

  The charter boat looked even bigger once we were inside. Steve, the skipper and owner of the charter business, introduced us to his five crew and eight passengers. The youngest on board was his eight-year-old daughter who had her own full-time nanny, who also doubled as a school teacher. Each week they picked up new passengers from Kupang and cruised around the best surf breaks offering first-class food, accommodation and, of course, surfing.

  His clients were a different breed of surfer to the ones living in the village. They were generally older men with business backgrounds, who probably had once lived the surfing life on the beaches of California. But after university their busy corporate lives swallowed every spare moment, so instead of bumming around the beaches and hanging out, they would embark on this annual ‘surfari’ in search of the ultimate wave. If that meant flying to the other side of the world and paying big bucks to get to the best waves, well, so be it. They could afford it. For them, time was more valuable than money.

  It had taken us two days to sail from Kupang to Roti. The big power cat could get them from the Kupang airport to those same breaks in six hours. On the rare day when the surf was not performing, DVDs, air-conditioned cabins and a full galley complete with microwave oven kept the edgy surfers in comfort until they could hit the waves again.

  We were each handed a beer as we sat at a table littered with surfer paraphernalia – digital cameras, surf magazines, you-beaut board wax and fashionably expensive polarised sunglasses.

  The passengers were intrigued by our trip. We told them where we’d sailed so far and where we were headed – Africa, South America, then through the Pacific back home. We explained how we were filming and updating our website, and about the schools that were studying our trip.

  I could see the dreamy look in their eyes, the look many people got when I told them about the trip. To those blokes it would no doubt be the ultimate surfari.

  ‘If you ever need crew ...’ one of the older men said, ‘I’ll drop my job in a heartbeat.’

  Steve invited me up to the helm to look at the navigation station, which had every navigational device known to man. He checked the latest weather fax.

  ‘Wind should die off to 5–10 knots tomorrow – nothing!’ he said. No wind meant no waves, which was bad for business. We discussed the route of Kijana and, upon hearing that we didn’t have any detailed local charts, he lent me his to plan our route through the rest of Indonesia.

  Back at the table, the inevitable the topic of surfing came up.

  ‘How do you like the waves?’ we were asked.

  We looked sheepishly at the other. We were about to be exposed as posers.

  ‘Yeah, they look great don’t they,’ I answered. It was a pretty safe answer. I hadn’t seen waves like them anywhere. Out at sea they never curved over in such a perfect oval shape.

  ‘Poetry in motion,’ I added, this time more confidently, thinking I was tapping into the surfer mindset.

  ‘So you don’t surf?’ The question sat there like an ice-cold can of beer. They were on to me. I thought about mentioning the ‘practice’ we’d had hanging off Kijana the previous day, but I decided to cut my losses, and ’fess up.

  ‘Well, not actually on a wave . . . that’s moving. We’re thinking that northern break is looking pretty good.’ I nodded to the pathetic waves that had died down since the morning.

  Steve stepped in to save us.

  ‘Would you like to go out with some of my guys?’ he offered. ‘When the swell dies down – possibly tomorrow.’ Two of the men eagerly volunteered their services.

  We gladly accepted the offer, on the proviso that the swell was not too big. Steve agreed to collect us in his launch when he was ready. We thanked our hosts for the drinks, then headed for the dinghy and spent the rest of the day cleaning Kijana.

  The morning brought with it three great reasons to get up and enjoy the day. Firstly, the wind had died off and the sun was spectacular; secondly, we were going to lea
rn how to surf some gnarly Indo waves, and finally it was 26 August 2002 – my twenty-first birthday.

  Maria and Josh each gave me a homemade card decorated with drawings and photos from home. I wondered when they’d made them – I thought I knew everything that went on aboard Kijana! Beau handed me a plastic bag that contained a jar of dill cucumbers – my favourite.

  ‘Sorry your birthday wasn’t like this,’ I said to Josh as I offered around the cucumbers.

  Josh didn’t look like he’d slept too well, for something more important than organising my birthday presents had occurred during the wee hours. Josh and Beau battled each other to tell their story. Their cabin, they blurted out, was infested with ‘bed bugs’!

  After we’d all headed to bed, Josh tossed and turned as he was attacked by what he thought were mosquitoes. About midnight he let out a frustrated sigh that woke Beau.

  ‘Can’t sleep, hey?’ Beau asked.

  Josh then switched on the light, sending Beau immediately scurrying under the covers of his bunk.

  ‘What the hell are these?’ Josh cried.

  Beau got up and immediately saw what he was talking about. Josh’s bed was crawling with little bugs, about one-third the size of a ladybird. They were everywhere, darting into any dark crevice they could find. However, some of the spots weren’t moving. On closer inspection, Josh realised they were blotches of blood on his sheet.

  ‘That’s my blood!’ he cried, as he began to slap every bug he could see, leaving even more red marks.

  Despite Josh yelling ‘kill ’em all!’ Beau decided on a more humane approach. He ran to the galley and grabbed a cup from the top shelf.

  By the time he got back, Josh’s tally was five. The rest had managed to scramble away. Beau trapped one under the cup.

  ‘Kill it,’ Josh demanded. Beau had other ideas. He was becoming a Buddhist and had to respect all life.

  ‘He’s done nothing to me. I’ll let him go up on deck.’

  ‘Yeah, but it’s been biting me,’ an exasperated Josh declared. ‘If you don’t kill it, it’ll climb back down and bite me again. Let me do it.’

  They argued about whether to kill it or save it. Finally, they agreed to leave it in the cup until morning.

  As they told the story, I put my jar of birthday cucumbers on the galley bench and lifted a plate from the top of the prison cup. Inside was the famous bug that had caused such a rift among my crew.

  ‘Don’t let it escape!’ Josh yelled.

  It was just a bug. Did it have to cause such a problem to our harmonious existence?

  ‘There’s heaps more of them anyway,’ Beau said, as if that was some sort of argument.

  It wasn’t moving, so I tapped the cup. ‘I think it’s dead,’ I said.

  I touched it with my finger. No doubt about it. I looked at Beau and felt slightly sorry. I then looked at Josh as he scratched his bites and felt less sorry for Beau.

  ‘Let’s hope they die naturally from all the salt,’ I said, in the hope that would put the issue to bed. As long as they weren’t in my bed, I thought as I flicked the bug overboard.

  During breakfast Josh and I discussed how to film the surfing. Should he get the underwater shots or should I, or was it too dangerous for any of us to go near the surf with scuba gear? We agreed the logistics of filming in the surf were complicated and it was better to get a feel for what it was like before dragging the camera along.

  As we chatted, a small dinghy pulled up to say hello. The people on board were from one of the other yachts anchored nearby. They’d come to tell us about a ‘dong night’ on the outskirts of the village that evening. All we had to do was meet at the home-stay at 7 p.m., earlier if we wanted a meal. Without hesitation we agreed, although we didn’t have the slightest idea of what a dong night was.

  By the time Steve motored over, the waves had dropped and were looking good for learners. He dropped us at the southern break with his daughter, her nanny and the two men who’d offered to teach us.

  We found ourselves with boards in hand entering the water without a clue as to what to do. Stand up and surf was as technical as our instructions got. The paddling was hard work but the waves looked safe – from a distance. It wasn’t until I got out there and faced a two-metre wave head-on that I realised what I had got myself into.

  On my first wave I paddled and felt the surfboard increase in speed as white water crashed on my left. The water was sucking up towards the curling wave and below, less than a metre from my face, the coral reef raced by. I jumped to my feet and surprisingly found myself standing up. I veered left and raced down the wave. I was riding the wave! Then I wasn’t. My dumping was as violent as my ride was exhilarating, tossed about in nature’s washing machine until I finally came up for air.

  What a feeling! I reckon I was only on my feet for three and a half seconds, but gee it was worth it. I could see how people became hooked on surfing.

  I paddled back out to see Beau and Josh taking off. Throughout the afternoon we each had about five dumps for every good ride. A highlight was paddling back to where the others sat on their boards and explaining in detail what had happened on our last wave. Then another swell would arrive and one by one, we’d disappear behind a wall of water leaving the others to wonder if they were going to be OK.

  Before we knew it, Steve returned in his launch. One coral cut on Josh’s heel, two litres of salt water swallowed and a handful of half-decent rides were sufficient to make us feel satisfied.

  As we headed back to Kijana I asked Steve about the dong night.

  ‘It’s a waste of time,’ he said matter-of-factly. ‘I’ve been to them before. The locals dance around and get you pissed, then ask for money.’ It seemed a pretty brutal assessment. He was leaving for Kupang the following morning to collect more passengers, so we thanked him again for the surfing and said farewell.

  Despite Steve’s opinion, we were committed to going to the dong night. It was not just a night out for us, but a chance to get some footage for our documentaries.

  We planned to arrive at the home-stay in time for something to eat but somehow managed to get the dinghy tangled in the seaweed farm, so we arrived as everyone was finishing their meal. There were about 20 people gathered at half a dozen tables. The woman who ran the home-stay welcomed us and ordered her daughter to quickly fetch some food.

  Half the crowd were yachties, the other half surfers. We scoffed our food in time to board an ancient minibus that pulled up outside. Everyone crammed in until it was set to explode with passengers, forcing six people to climb onto the roof. We were driven north out of town along the main track, coming to a halt at a dry riverbed. The driver announced he wasn’t sure if the bus would stay upright as he headed through the riverbed, so would we mind getting out. He didn’t have to ask twice. We ambled along, watching in horror and amazement as the bus jolted at precarious angles until it was safely on the other side. We all jumped in and on, and set off again.

  We continued on a little further, then took a track to the right, away from the beach. We arrived at a house lit with floodlights. In the distance I could hear the hum of a generator.

  Near the house was a bare area that looked like a dusty dance floor, around which dozens of locals sat on homemade benches. As we joined them, an old plastic jug with a matching cup was passed around, with everyone expected to take a stiff shot of a clear alcoholic drink, called sopi. It didn’t leave a taste but gave a hot flush, the sort I’d experienced with tequila. It was handed out by a guy with an Australian accent. He was a tall, weather-beaten man aged in his fifties with a broad friendly smile. He reminded me a bit of Paul Hogan, the actor.

  Kijana at anchor in Thailand. I never got sick of looking at her sweeping lines.

  Me, Mika and Josh.

  Beau

  Me and Maya (at Maya Bay).

  Nicolette

  Maria

  Swimming with the Yolngu kids in Arnhem Land.

  A cheeky face on the beach. We had a lot
of fun with Gayili and her family.

  Gayili teaching Mika and Nicolette to weave.

  Our final night in Arnhem Land. We could hardly wait for our feast to cook in the underground oven.

  Josh, me and Maria. A typical cockpit dinner aboard Kijana.

  Arriving in Kupang, Indonesia, felt like we were stepping back in time.

  Trying goat brain during preparations for my twenty-first birthday party on Roti.

  Some of the Roti kids guarding the dongs before the evening celebrations.

  Me peering at skulls in one of the Torajan burial caves.

  Josh shaving in the outdoor shower area in Toraja. We got used to doing without creature comforts.

  The whole funeral arena was packed with buffalos for the village chief’s funeral.

  In Toraja, buffalos are sacrificed to honour the dead.

  The family of Punans that the Blair brothers had met in the 1970s, and my inspiration for our trip into Borneo.

  Grandfather Kila helped us realise what we were really searching for on Kijana.

  The canoe trip down the river in Borneo was perhaps one of the greatest days of the voyage but, for me, it also held the biggest disappointment.

  Our quest to meet the traditional Punan people took us into the deepest jungles in Borneo, where river travel is the primary form of transport.

  Beau and I decided to get a permanent reminder of our time in Borneo.

  The island of our dreams and the location of Maya Bay in Thailand.

  Arriving at Maya Bay.

  My best friend and me.