Madras Ramblings: Andaman Diary - Day 1

10th February 2024

Scrambling to finish work the previous day and a start to the airport at an unholy hour. Thanks to Srinivas, we travelled in comfort and without the stress of will the cab show up or not.

8 naturalist friends, coordinated by Umesh, on a "birding and photography" sortie to the Andamans. Six bazookas at check-in, and I had my new 10x binoculars to try out.

5am Air India flight. We board smartly. Desigan is in our row, and so we chat, snooze, the breakfast is fine, the coffee is well quite appalling.

The sunrise is spectacular - reminds me of Pink Floyd's album cover - Dark Side of the Moon.

I see the first little island - lovely beach, even the coral reef is visible, so clear is the water. I think this is Boat Island, off the western coast of the main island.

Lower down now, skimming over the main Port Blair island. I suppose this is Manjeri RV and the bay in the background. I recalled now all the Tamil and Kerala names for the places - there is a Calicut and a Kamaraj Nagar - besides the Bengali names as well.

Port Blair came into view. Colourful buildings and water everywhere.

Large signs in the airport accompanied the Air India announcements - "No Photography" of the airport which is also a defence airport I believe. In this day and age of satellites, seems a pretty pointless restriction, but I complied.

The airport terminal is new - from the time we were here last, in 2017. And was pretty standard. Pick up and bags sorted and in 10 minutes we were at our hotel.

Sheesh! thats how I read it first and I wondered why the exclamation - Sheesh, you shouldn't be here, or Sheesh, so good! Sekar gently said, "It is Shreesh, my dear."

Shreesh was where we stayed for the first couple of nights. A clean, nondescript place, where the rooms were neat and the food was average. For some reason, the request for preparing our meals would only start after we came to the dining room despite Umesh having informed them when we would be there. So we would send an advanced party to go occupy tables and hurry the chef along. All in due course, what's the hurry.

This was the view at the rear of the hotel past the corridor of rooms. Next to our room were Desigan and Srinivas, and I think there's had a tiny window which showed a bit of Junglighat jetty in the rear.

In the course of the two days, there were many lost in translation moments with a newbie waiter and fresh lime order - we tried English, Hindi and Tamil on him. The crucial Bengali competency was missing in our group - where is Sagarika when you need her?). Hindi also was a problem for most I hasten to add.

Srinivas was ready to bird at 9 am - but alas had to wait until post lunch. So off we went to the Cellular Jail instead. (We birded there too, let it be known.)

We drove around in two Xylos for the trip, comfortable cars that have a real rolling suspension which would be tested to the hilt in our later adventures. We drove through "Aberdeen bazaar" - do check out Faizabad stores - an interesting set of activities and products!

This is how a proper pavement with a rainwater drain looks like, dear Chennai Corporation. I was very impressed.

I loved the Andaman Police uniforms

Even the goats were well behaved and walked on the pavements!

Looking down to Marina/Phoenix Bay

Cellular Jail

it was hard for me to imagine this calm and now serene facade as the scene of cruelty and struggle.

Here is a couple of boards:

NATIONAL MEMORIAL
THE CELLULAR JAIL, THE INDIAN BASTILLE, STANDS AS A MUTE WITNESS TO THE UNTOLD SUFFERINGS, VALIANT DEFIANCE AND UNDAUNTED SPIRIT OF THE FIREBRAND REVOLUTIONARIES AGAINST THE BRUTALITIES OF THE BRITISH BARBARISM.
THE NAME CELLULAR IS DERIVED FROM ITS UNIQUE FEATURE OF HAVING 698 CELLS, EACH ONE MEASURING 13.6".

THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE JAIL WAS TAKEN UP IN OCT 1896 AND COMPLETED IN 1906 AT AN ESTIMATED COST OF Rs.5,17,352/

AS A MARK OF RESPECT TO THE FREEDOM FIGHTERS, THE CELLULAR JAIL WAS DEDICATED TO THE NATION BY THE THEN PRIME MINISTER, SHRI. MORARJI DESAI ON 11TH FEB. 1979 AND NOW IT STANDS AS A NATIONAL MEMORIAL OF GREAT HISTORICAL IMPORTANCE.

CELLULAR JAIL

The Cellular Jail was constructed to deal effectively with the freedom fighters who revolted against the British Rule during India's First War of Independence. This site, being located just opposite to Ross Island, was found more suitable for construction of the Jail. It was also better suited in terms of security of the jail, as more than half of the outer wall was bounded by sea.
The construction of the Cellular Jail began in 1893 and completed in 1905-06. The Islands were formally occupied on 22nd January, 1858.

Spread as seven spokes of a bicycle wheel, this unique three-storied structure was the first of its kind in India, it was based on Jeremy Bentham's idea of the Panopticon. 693 cells in the jail were specially built for solitary confinement of the Freedom Fighters. The freedom fighters brought to the Cellular Jail rebelled against the jail authorities. Finally, the Government decided to close down the penal settlement and all the political prisoners of the Cellular Jail were repatriated to their respective states in mainland India by January 1938.

Only two spokes are retained as a memorial. There is a hospital where the rest of the jail probably was.

I wondered if this peepul stood from those days.

Japanese occupation of the islands, Bose's alignment with them has somehow been portrayed as him freeing India from the British...

Andaman Shimbun....2602

The Aberdeen bazaar clock tower now.

One wing had not been touched up and had the old look. There were sparrows chirping among the undergrowth, several mango trees, banana and coconut too.

11am and the sun was sharp - it felt warmer than Chennai actually. We decided to walk up the watch tower. Spiders had made elaborate webs in the archways. Bulbuls flitted in and out as did Mynas and one Oriole flew across from the mango tree. Swallows dived and swooped.

The names of political prisoners are listed on the walls - a huge contingent from Bengal.

The jail I'm sure has a lot of significance to many Bengali families - we saw busloads of them. More about them in a bit, after I share the gorgeous views from above.

I involuntarily gasped when I emerged onto the watchtower platform, from the stairs below. Out of breath after the steep stairway, this further took my breath away. (The blue-roofed buildings are a hospital, in parts of the old Jail.)

The wing retained as the Jail - in the distance is Ross Island.

Ross Island. How could the prison guards have been cruel in the face of this extraordinary beauty, I wondered, as I soaked in the cool breeze, the beautiful waters in different shades of blue, the soaring and gliding White Bellied Sea Eagle up above, and the philosophical discussions among some young people relaxing on the platform.

As I gazed, they discussed Nietzsche and Bose, Gandhi and Jinnah, Communism and freedom struggle; religion and God as manmade constructs and so much more. The beauty around made me contented and their words kind of crashed around me, not really registering what they were saying.

It was time to head down. Umesh and Desigan had also come up, and they clicked away and we took some selfies too.

We proceeded down one flight when suddenly, there was an upsurge of tourists - they kept streaming up, and the stairway was too narrow to allow for two way traffic. The platform above seemed to creak and groan, and I hastily moved away from the watchtower stairwell into the safety of the brick and mortar cell corridor! After what seemed like an interminable amount of time, we saw a break and Sekar and I scampered down, but Umesh was still stuck up there!

We rejoined the doctors and Suresh and Desigan in the chairs put for the sound and light show and waited for Umesh, and this led to the Incident of the Shrike.

Ravi mentioned he saw a shrike with a orangish vent and wondered what it was. Sekar piped up quite casually oh that must be the red vented bulbul we saw. Oh the horror, the horror! The complete dismay in Ravi's voice - his birding competencies being dismissed like this - a bulbul and a shrike...any self respecting birder would know the difference! It was pretty funny to all onlookers except Sheepish Sekar and Riled Ravi.

Umesh finally escaped the Bengali busload and joined us and we set out to return to lunch at Shreesh.