Kijana (15 page)

‘Do you know what I mean?' he asked Josh.

Josh had lowered the camera. ‘Yeah, it's kind of fake but in the docos you can't make everything absolutely real. We're aiming this trip at students and young people. How do you expect a school to endorse our study kits when there's footage of one of the “role models” smoking?'

I interrupted before Beau could answer.

‘I know what you mean Beau, but no documentary or film can be totally real. Robert McKee (a world-renowned scriptwriter) even says it's only an interpretation of real life. So if that means we have to hide a smoke so we can get the good message out about young people achieving dreams, then surely that's not a big deal.'

I was relieved when Josh put the camera away. I knew Beau had to be handled gently.

Josh picked up a screwdriver and joined us under the keel. It was two against one. I knew in any other circumstance Beau would have stuck to his guns, but my opinion held sway with him. I knew what he was saying and I even agreed with him. It was just that I needed support from both guys and didn't want the argument to escalate. With the girls gone I had a much better chance of making the trip ‘real' for all of our sakes.

We got the keel prepared for the shipwright to fix the damage, then gave her a few extra coats of anti-fouling. While I supervised the work at the dry dock, Josh and Beau distributed an advertisement for a crew member at every backpacker hostel in Darwin. They even hung around bars handing out leaflets to anyone who looked like a traveller.

Over the next week we interviewed a few people, but there was only one who filled our main criteria – a foreign female. Her name was Maria, and she was a backpacker from Denmark. She was working at a pub when Josh and Beau met her. Josh shouted over the bar above the noise as he handed her a leaflet. She read it, then came back to their table with a free jug of beer and her phone number.

I met her two days later and, knowing Beau, was not surprised to discover that she was good looking. She was 22 years old and had been travelling in Australia for several months. She had blonde hair and tanned skin with a slim figure. She also had a heavy accent, which would prove very entertaining as we got to know her better. She'd finished her studies and was travelling before working out what she wanted to do with her life.

At the outset I stressed that we were considering her for a two- to three-month stint only, which I made sure I told her a number of times so there would be no confusion later.

But it was not a one-way interview. She had to be convinced we were legitimate – not just three guys trying to pick up a pretty girl. She wanted to know exactly what type of filming we were doing. ‘Our travels,' we told her, which must have sounded suitably suspicious. We gave her the Kijana web address for added assurance.

She must have been convinced, for she accepted our offer on the spot. She had to return to Darwin to meet her brother in about three months, so the timing was perfect. She seemed pretty laid back and we all had a good feeling about her. She also told us she was a hard worker, which was all we could hope for. We made plans to leave in three days' time, despite the fact that she hadn't even seen the boat.

I phoned the office and told them of our choice. They had a short chat with her and seemed satisfied with our decision. Not that there was much they could argue with. She was Danish and a girl. Two of their wishes had been granted.

Over the next few days Maria gave notice at the pub and packed the bulk of her belongings into storage. She updated her immunisations and Customs officially checked us out of the country.

Finally, we were off. After more than a month in Darwin, and five months after beginning our journey, we were leaving our home shores in search of adventure.

Being on
Kijana
as she heaved up and over a swell had become an unfamiliar feeling. The guys even commented that they'd forgotten how to sail. We had to make a conscious effort to remember our sail-raising routine. But it was good to be home.

Our destination, the city of Kupang, lay 600 miles north-west across the Timor Sea. Kupang is the capital of the West Timor province of East Nusa Tenggara. West Timor, in turn, is part of Indonesia. We chose Kupang as our first port as it was the closest place to Australia we could get our papers stamped by Indonesian Customs. From Kupang we planned to cruise along the hundreds of Indonesian islands, stopping in to check out the notorious komodo dragons as we headed towards Sulawesi on our way to Thailand. There, in the southern islands of Phuket, we planned to hang out at Maya Bay, the location of
The Beach
, before we began the long haul towards India and onward to Africa.

Maria felt a little queasy as we got underway, but she hid it well. We showed her over the boat and she practised raising the jib and unfurling the foresail.

The wind died down on the second day out of Darwin and we were forced to motor. By the third day the water was oily calm. We motored through big patches of fish breaking the surface of the water on either side of the boat. Beau and Josh unpacked the fishing rods and tried casting a lure to the place where the most recent fish had disrupted the surface. They tried for half an hour with no luck.

The lack of wind made it very hot. The book I was reading was dotted with wet patches where sweat was landing on the page, so we rigged an awning over the cockpit to enable us to read in the shade. Josh was reading about a man who lived with a tribe of Indians in the Amazon Basin. Every now and then he'd read out a passage, then relate it to us.

Beau was reading the Buddhism book
Zen and the Art of Living
with Fearlessness and Grace
. He'd already clocked up four Buddhism books since leaving Melbourne. He was trying to work out which strain of Buddhism he wanted to follow. Maria recommended her Stephen King novel to us, while I found relief reading about an Arctic dog-sledding adventure.

The searing heat of the tropics made night the best part of the day. The soft glow of a hurricane lantern reflected off the canvas awning, lighting our little cocoon of a cockpit. The moon was nearly full in those first days and sent a searchlight-like beam across the water. It was beautiful and warm and everything was under control. I couldn't remember being on the ocean on more beautiful nights.

Josh put on the George CD for about the twentieth time since leaving Darwin.

‘Who is this?' Maria asked.

‘George,' we told her, as if the band was an old friend.

‘I like this one,' she declared.

We took it as a compliment. We told her George had played at the St Kilda festival back home and reminisced about what it would be like sitting on the grass with friends listening to George play live. Maria produced her selection of CDs and shared her favourite songs with us.
No Woman No Cry
by Erykah Badu and Jimmy Cliff was a favourite, as well as The Cranberries. She explained that her brother had made a CD for her before she left for Australia, which she constantly played as it reminded her of him. We liked her music and she liked ours. It was a good sign.

I'd taken over the back cabin since the girls had departed, which allowed me to stretch out for the first time on the trip. I wasn't too keen on heading back to the main cabin when Maria arrived, but I graciously offered her the back cabin. She insisted we share, which I was happy to accept, as it was a damn sight more comfortable than the couch I'd been sleeping on, and at least I now had a spot to store my own gear.

The next day the wind picked up enough for us to raise the sails. Maria was delighted when a pod of dolphins swam beside our bow for a while. In the afternoon Beau noticed the fishing line was tight and Maria pulled in a small tuna for dinner. It was our fourth day at sea. At our current sailing speed we expected to arrive in Timor the next day.

We had a competition as to who would be the first to sight land. The winner would get a whole can of Coke at dinnertime. Before lunch on the fifth day Beau claimed the prize.

We were all excited, but Josh displayed it the best. Whenever he got excited he made us all feel good.

‘More tea!' he exclaimed in his best taking-the-mickey tone.

Beau, Maria and I looked at him. I didn't get the joke, but the way he said it was funny enough.

‘
More
tea,' he said again. This time I wondered what the hell he was on about.

Then, in his loudest voice, he pointed to the land on our left and shouted: ‘TEA MORE.'

We fell about laughing. (You probably had to be there.)

It was a great feeling. We were finally in another country, we were a strong team and the journey of Kijana was heading in the direction I had always hoped it would.

CHAPTER SIX
CELEBRATION

KUPANG WAS LIKE ANOTHER WORLD. SITTING
on the western tip of Timor, it is the major trading centre for the region, with a population of 148,300 people.

We anchored off the main beach, which we were surprised to discover was covered in ratty piles of junk. On either side of the beach were tall cliffs that contained what appeared, from a distance, to be termite apartments burrowed into each face, their small windows facing the sea. As we got closer, we realised they were significantly bigger than we had first thought, and there was washing flapping in the breeze from the windows.

Nestled into the left-hand corner of the beach was a shack made of rubbish. Driftwood was combined with faded plastic sheets and rusted corrugated iron to make something that I could only describe as a chookhouse. Where the sand of the beach finished, concrete steps led up to street level where hawkers gathered and buses and bikes flew past.

We arrived late in the afternoon and there was only one other sailing boat anchored off the beach. We decided to say hello and ask how we should check in with Customs. It was a large steel vessel with a dark blue hull, owned by two Australian men aged in their forties.

As soon as we arrived on board they took one look at
Kijana
and told us to take our quarantine flag down immediately. This flag indicates that a vessel has arrived in the country and requires Customs to check the crew's papers. We'd raised the flag to abide by maritime law but our new friends gave us a quick lesson in the Indonesian way of things. The local authorities, they told us, didn't like to do any work and if we flew the flag, they were obliged to come out and see us. And this would make them angry. ‘Just check in over the next few days,' they told us.

We chatted some more about the local nuances, then bade our farewell. Our departure came with one final warning.

‘Your boat will be safe here. Just make sure you lock it every time you go to shore.'

We rushed back to
Kijana
to lower the yellow flag, then made our way to the beach.

A few kids gathered to watch us arrive. We jumped out of the dinghy and began pulling it up the sand. The children stood around watching us strain to lift the heavy outboard until a small, old man pushed them aside to help us up the beach. Following his lead, the children swarmed around the dinghy and together we hauled it above the high-tide mark.

We asked the small man if it was safe to leave the dinghy there, but he didn't speak English. He looked around at the kids, but it seemed neither did they. Using a few hand gestures, I pointed to the man, then at the dinghy and joined them together, then pointed to us and did a walking signal with my fingers. He said something and nodded his head. I smiled at him and he smiled a big toothless grin back. We had to trust him and his friendly demeanour.

We said goodbye to the small man and climbed up the steps onto the street. The sun was quickly disappearing and the traffic headlights had already been turned on.

There was no point in trying to locate Customs so we found a small eating place and ordered dinner. Maria came back from the bathroom with a puzzled look on her face. She was unsure if she'd ‘gone' in the right place, for all she'd found was a floorboard missing in the corner with a bucket of water and a scoop next to it.

Josh and Maria didn't eat much of their meal. It was all weird stuff, and most of it contained meat, which automatically put Josh off. The guidebooks recommended eating only well-cooked meals and to steer clear of meat if we weren't sure where it came from. Of course, how can you be sure of where any meat has come from unless you have caught it and killed it yourself? Beau and I, on the other hand, ate every morsel on our plate. Asian food has always been a favourite for both of us, and the Kupang offering was no exception.

As we returned to the beach I was relieved to see our dinghy still on the beach. The small man was nowhere to be seen but a sheet of plastic had been wrapped around the motor for protection.

The next morning we woke to the sounds of loud engines roaring past
Kijana
. The new boat in town was attracting quite a bit of attention. Small Indonesian fishing boats were scattered from the shore out to sea, laying fishing nets and pulling in their catches. While they waited, they would dash past our boat, their motors screaming as they waved madly at us.

After a breakfast of cereal, Beau checked the emails. There was one from the office reminding us of the need to find something interesting to film for the first episode of the documentaries.

But before that could happen, we needed to get ourselves organised. We needed to replenish our fresh food stores, then find Customs to stamp our passports. Only then could we explore and find some adventures.

One of the blokes from the other yacht came over to check how we'd managed since we last spoke. We told him about the small man who'd covered our motor for us.

‘He lives on the beach,' he told us. ‘That shack made of rubbish is his home.'

He gave us directions to get to Customs, then wished us well.

On the beach we were again greeted by the small man. He smiled broadly, revealing what appeared to be a mouth full of blood. We later discovered it was actually stained from chewing the betel nut, a form of stimulant chewed like tobacco.