I can’t sleep. It’s 6:15 in Raja Ampat, West Papua, far to the east of Indonesia, somewhere above the center of Australia. There are 5 tiny Melanesian villages on this quiet, forested island of Gam and the one 15-room eco-resort I’m at. I find myself in strange corners of the world sometimes, listening to it turn, hearing whispers where there are none.
From the verandah of my stilted hut, I’m looking down at 2 feet of rising tide below me. Through clear ripples I see sea-grass on the sandy bottom. There are 4 steps that lead down to the water. Two small black crabs live on the last rung, conducting an orchestra with huge claws. There was a starfish here two days ago, now a thousand-strong swarm of small grey mackerel, swirl like a single wavy note around the stilts of the hut. Tiny waves crumple and crush in applause on the soft sand on the shore.
I almost step on a staghorn beetle the size and color of a lychee-seed on the polished balcony floor. I’m trying to make out the tiny huts on the far island of Mansuar across the rippling channel. An eccentric gecko laughs madly from somewhere in the palm-mat roofing, he’s been laughing since I got here.
There’s a clear birdcall on the morning breeze — maybe a red bird of paradise, maybe an eclectus parrot; somewhere in the dense rainforest on the limestone cliffs behind this narrow strip of resort, an even stranger bird trills to a rising sun.
Breakfast and a long walk up the wooden pier, and we’re loading onto a twin-engined boat and heading to Fam Island. It’s a bumpy one-hour ride with a bank of grey rainclouds behind us, lit from within by lightning. There is no thunder so far away, just the blustering wind and the chop-chop of the sea.
Fam has a small jetty, a ticket booth and 300 new wooden steps to reach a viewpoint above a rainforest. Green hillocks, ringed by shallow coral reefs rise out of the dark-and-neon aquamarine water — pretty in a picture-perfect touristy way. A few minutes later, a group of well-dressed Indonesians arrives on a two-hour boat from Sorong, complaining, talking, laughing, taking pictures. Far away isn’t far enough sometimes. Back at the jetty, a local fisherman displays 8 big purple coconut crabs, struggling silently in individual net-bags — they’re on the endangered list, silent struggles seem apt.
A short boat-ride away is Fam Wall — a vertiginous, under-sea cascade of coral, sponges, huge sea-fans — all the bluster and bloom of a healthy reef. You can hear the ever-present tic-tic-tic of millions of tiny beings feeding in the nutrient rich waters that swirl through Raja Ampat.
Our second dive spot is Melissa’s Garden — a fairytale forest of soft and hard corals, raining fusilier fish from the surface to 20 meters below. Large trevally and tuna hunt smaller prey in mid-water and the swish of darting shoals is faint past the inhale-exhale of my own breath.
Lunch is on a deserted island, watching 2-foot long monitor lizards — dark with yellow-green spots. Time tells a silent story of ancient dinosaurs. Two baby sharks of the same size swim in the clear, peaceful shallows of the lap-lapping beach. What will their story be?
The ride back lulls — the engines roar and whine, the boat thuds and splashes and the wind whistles, pummels and shouts. I wrap my head in a towel, the noise muffles and distorts, my eyes close, and in the rubble of sound I can hear a long sonorous chanting Om, mixed with a chorus of hymns — bizarre, melodic and utterly unexpected.
