2222222222222222222
Shortly after messaging Jay Yip of Nature Society (Singapore) “In time, I dig out from my memory the thousands of leatherbacked turtles I seen crawling out of the beach at Rantau Abang Trengganu in 1969 . That now can only exist in memory. But at least I was witness to that once upon a time
“
I remembered I wrote about them in my Livejournal about 12 years ago. Memory then a lot more fresh than memories ten years later such as now.
From “Turtle watching at Raz Al Jinz and Riamfada independence “
https://shanlung.livejournal.com/83108.html Nov 9th 2008
Plagiarised partly below.
Our destination was Ras Al Jinz, the most Easterly part of Oman and just beyond Sur. Shortly after leaving Sur, our GPS that we called Marianne got into a catatonic fit. Kept asking us to make U turns. I stop the car in a hamlet near Sur and this Omani gentleman walked to us and I explained our problems. He said thats no problem and since he was going our way, we could follow him. He got into his car, and at the part that Marianne asked us to make U turns, stopped his car to explain us how to go on.
Omanis are just so incredibly warm and helpful. I suspect he deliberately drove to show us the way as he then got back into his car to go back where he came from.
There was then a wonderful drive on a great road that skirt the shimmering waters of the Gulf of Oman. Even if this part was not mountainous, the desolate sweeping views of raw scenary brokened occasionally with splash of green from low tussock herbs were breath taking. This road was not 'recognised' in Marianne brains who seemed to 'know' the roads of Oman 6 years ago. Which was why she went catatonic earlier on.
It was 60 km later that we found ourselves in Turtle Beach Resort at Ras Al Hadd where we would stay for that night. This was a very rustic and basic place. A very comfortable place in beautiful setting, at the edge of a small white sandy beach with crystal clear sea lapping the shore.
We reached that place in fading light of late afternoon. Just enough time to check in, chill out a bit, have our dinners before driving the 22 km to the Turtle Conservation center at Ras Al Jinz and the turtles birthing beach there.
To minimise disturbances to the turtles, you need to book a day in advance at that center or you be refused admittance. People who had not made their bookings had to drive back to where ever they were staying at Ras Al Hadd. Groups of 30-40 were escorted by guide and minders from the center to walk to the beach about 15 minutes walk away behind high sand dunes.
It was a half moon that provided enough light to walk by, aided by the red light torches of minders. We waited away from the beach to the sound of crashing breakers while other minders walked on the beach to locate a nesting green turtle laying her eggs. We were then taken to form a semi circle around her. No flash cameras were allowed.
That turtle was about 1 meter long. We were told she was not exceptionally big, as older and larger green turtles nested there. It was a holy moment to see her in the depression in the sand that she made slowly dropping egg after egg into a deeper hole she made. We kept away from her head.
I looked down the beach, to see a few other tractor like tracks made on the sand by other turtles. I walked on in solitude, which I wanted, away from the group of people I was with. Then the guide called out to me, to join back with the group. I understood, and came back. I knew I would be careful about not disturbing other turtles. But if the group was allowed to split and all wandered about on the beach, turtles just emerging from the water line might be spooked enough to abort their nesting.
Great as this spectacle was that night, I could not help revisiting the memories I had of an even greater event. Very sadly, that event which I took for granted at that time, will never ever be repeated again.
That was back in 1969, the year I completed my A levels. I drove with a group of friends to Ratau Abang in Trengganu on the East Coast of Peninsula Malaysia late that year. That was in an old Ford Anglia, made much older by me and my friends, but gave us all as much if not more pleasure and fun than a Ferrari would have.
In that late evening, we found ourselves to be the only people on that beach, other than for 3-4 fishermen from a nearby village. They had a small fire brewing coffee and roasting cuttlefish. I exchanged my cigarettes for their coffee and cuttlefish and waited with them in convivial quiet conversations waiting for the leatherbacks to climb onto the beach.
My emotions at the first sight of those gigantic turtles as they came up was indescribable. They were huge. They appeared larger than the 3 meters that they were described to be. I felt I was in the presence of Volkswagen sized creatures. In rituals that they had done since time immemorial, climbing and setting the next generations of their kind on their birthing beaches.
Then with the 2nd, and the 3rd, and the 4th , and the 5th , they all crawled up to lay their eggs which were taken as they dropped by those fisher folks. There appeared to be no end of them and their tracks as they hauled themselves up the beach. I think we saw well over a hundred of them coming up and laying their eggs within the hour when the first started. In thoughtless stupidity of those times, we sat on those turtles without seemingly no impact on them when they moved back to the sea. We hold their flippers to be thrown effortlessly by them when they moved.
The hundreds was only the start of that night. And the tail end of the breeding season. How many more of them came before dawn broke we never would know.
About 7 years ago when I went to that beach again with some friends, there must have been 2000 people on that beach waiting to see those leatherbacks.
In what was the peak of their season, not a single leatherback appeared.
I do not blame the fisherfolks that night that took the eggs. They were simple kindly people surviving as best as they could. They did not eat all those eggs.
There is this advertisment on the TV. And the message that give is so meaningful. "If the buying stops, the killings will stop too."
After all, if you eat their eggs in the past, you robbed the future of their present.
And if you discard your plastic bags , which washed down to the ocean and appeared like the jelly fish the leatherbacks feed on, they eat them. The plastic blocked their intestines and they die needless deaths. Because of the 'convenience' those throw-away plastic bags that offered us, less and less and less leatherbacks, and other creatures will appear for us and our children.
If we allowed unbridled 'developements' on seashore without proper environmental assessment because it is good to make money, Earth and her creatures pay the price first, followed by us and our children later on.
That evening in 1969 will never be repeated again. None in Malaysia will see those leatherbacks anymore other than in photographs.
In the darkness at Ras Al Jinz, little turtle hatchlings were sometimes seen scrambling in the sand towards the sea. Where with luck, they might be back in years to come to do their part in their cycle of life.
The tour was over and we were guided back to the center. I told my wife and Paul that it was a pity that night was Thursday night and not Wednesday night. The Taurids meteor shower was supposed to be spectacular and peaked on Wednesday night. My wife said then she thought she saw a shooting star. I turned my head to try to make out the constellations better against the half moon to find Taurus constellation to locate that radiant.
And in that moment when my head was turned away, my wife saw two shooting stars, confirmed immediately by my friend Paul. Those must have been fireballs as otherwise they could not been easily seen by half moon light.
I felt sheepish I missed that totally. But happy that my wife and friend saw them. I knew the magic of seeing shooting stars. And if you have not seen them before, look up on a dark night. Perhaps you might be lucky when I was not.
We got back late to our resort that night.
The next morning, I swam just off the beach of that resort. The water was crystal clear. There were patches of corals in waist deep waters just off shore. I regretted not bringing with me my optically corrected diving mask with snorkel. Even so, a simple swimming google I borrowed from MarieAngel was enough to open the sights below the waves.
3333333333333333333333333333333333333333
No photos taken then. A year later we went back and lots of photos taken in “
Riamfada - Overnight with her to Turtle Watching at Raz Al Jinz “
https://shanlung.livejournal.com/102845.html
