Water Hyacinths

Tiger Footprint

When Bangladesh Amateur Radio League or BARL applied to be the host for the SEAnet Convention for the first time, everyone had to think hard.  Bangladesh is the country in South Asia, not South East, and we hardly know about her.  However, the reason they gave to the convention was that this convention would be another way to help establishing amateur radio in Bangladesh more firmly. 

I must confess that, at that time I was so naive to whatever it was in the ham society and activities.  There were so many things that, when I looked back, I would not have dared, or cared to do.. Dr. K.N. Singh, 9M2KN, was my very healthful Elmer.  He had always taught and taken good care of me in everyway he could.

To this convention, he told me that he planed to take a trip to Sunderban, the world's largest mangroves forest, together with some friends a few days before the convention.  Ken said it was a good chance to see something in each country that we were going to, instead of only to attend the convention.. I remembered my very first trip to SEAnet convention in Darwin, we, DF5UG, 9M2RS, 9M2KN and his daughter Natasha, were going to Barabase Island for the IOTA.  Ken said I and Jeet E20KXX, should join.  At that time, I had not even got on the HF frequency.. knew nothing about DXing.. We had a very good time and I had learned so many things.  His suggestion was always good.

I don't remember much about the trip, how I reached Bangladesh and how I had managed to be one of the groups.. I was just following.  My memories started to record when I got into the boat.. Everything was new to me.. The room in the boat was small and the bed should be called a bench.. round windows.. and the opening to the kitchen underneath.  Apart from a couple, there was another lady, Heidi.  I felt very close to her because of her name.. I read and like that book - Heidi - very much. 

As I said, that everything was new to me.. my memories had recorded some part very clearly, but not continuously.. The boat went along the river and its branches. Both sides were a lot of trees.. Ken said that were mangrove.. I was surprised.. I thought mangrove was something similar to mango.. The only similarity was that they were trees with green leaves.

We saw crocodile, birds, and along a small creek, the guide pointed to the tread of animal came to drink and climbed back.. He said it was the Bangal Tiger that had just left.. There was a fishing boat that had many otters.  They did the fishing for their boss.. They were so cute to us, but not to the fish.

Sometime there were a lot of water hyacinths.  Their very gentle purple flowers was really pretty.  I had tried to pick some.  One of the clews jumped into the water and brought me a big lot of the plants.. :-) Our dinner table was then decorated with the sweet delicate purple flowers.

The food was mainly Nan and Dahl, and fresh vegetable and fruits.  We also had coffee or tea break..

The next thing that I remember was a house in the middle of the forest.. that had black iron bed, no electric.. and we had to take a bath in the middle of the room.. I did not remember staying in that house.. probably it was that night that I went to the tower in the forest to see the animals at night.  The tower was cold and quiet.. We saw many deers.. and heard the sound of the tiger here and there, but non came to our sight.

That morning was so wonderful.. the forest was full of mist.. It was gentle and serene.. I asked for permission to get down from the tower to take pictures.. They told me not to go out of their sight.  That was one of the best mornings in my life..

One of the night, they brought us to a small boat.. got right into the middle of the water that surrounded by mangrove trees.  And there, the breathless beauty.. In the middle of the place was a large tree, with hundreds thousands of fireflies.. blinking quietly in the serene sound of the night.. That was also one of my very best nights.

After breakfast, we then walk across the field.  It was the bright day, but the weather was comfortably cool.. along the walk way, a few hundreds meters away, was the forest.  We sometime saw the movement behind it.  The guide told us not to be far  from the group.  Big Bangal Tigers could appear any time.

Sure I was very obedient, walked closest to the guide.

Until we reached the thin forest before the beach.. I was released.. for it was not  the forest, the tigers' land any more.. I walked ahead of the group to take pictures.. There was a groups of trees that looked very nice.  I went there...
.....and right in the middle of the trees was a space of white sand,
with a lot of foot prints of big cats!!  Some were bigger than my hand.

comparing to my pen

The guide read it and told us that there were a tiger family, ltaht left this place about 2 hours ago..

My goodness.. You can imagine how closer I was the guide after that.

We walked along the beach.. where we were going to but the beach was so natural.. Some trees fell down, their roots was about 5 to 6 meters tall..

Next thing that I remember was the fisherman's house.. made from straw and clay, smoothen with "bull shit" :-) They made some sweets with dough and sugar.  Then I saw a long fence, and many long lines of fish hung drying there..

I went to the fence to take a perspective picture of the lines of fish.. When I looked through the viewfinder, I saw a long line of small faces, dark skin and white smiling teeth along the fence.. How did they appear there so fast?  I could not help laughing and took that very lovely pictures..

Until now, I still could see all that cute smiling faces very clearly..

I could not find this slide, the only left was this printing in my magazine

We got back to the boat somewhere there.. Many dolphins jumping around when we left the island.. The sun was setting, the light shone nicely on the fishing boats.  People were working.. and a bit further were a lot of deers came to drink in the last light of the day..

On the way back, we stopped at the guide's house.  The lady in the guide's family was cooking.  I asked for permission to try making food from the dough in their kitchen.  That was also a very best time before coming back to the city life..

Heidi was the 2nd from the left and I was the 2nd from the right

I only saw the footprint of the famous Bangal tiger.. never a real one.. but the trip was real impressive.