Oddly Occupied
Light from darkness
In his concluding article of this series, Udena Atygalle sets sail to the magical Little Basses

A lighthouseIn the days of the Impe-rial Lighthouse Service lighthouses were manned by "lighthouse families". T.M.M Hamin, Stores Officer at the Sri Lanka Ports' Authority is part of the present generation of one such family. "It's part of the family history, a tradition. If you say Hamin nobody knows us but if you say lighthouse Hamin everybody knows us," he explained.

The Vasgunewardena, Jayawardena, Weerarathne and Hettiarachchi families are the other clans still in the service of the lighthouse. In the early days, the period at sea was six months. Communication with Kirinda was via a firebrand with the aid of Morse Code. This later changed to a five-cell torch and then to the VHF radio sets of today. The various flags used to warn ships of the imminent danger of shipwreck too have been made redundant by the radio equipment.

Mr. Hamin recalled how his father, when at home would talk mostly of the loneliness of the six-month stay. "Bad news was never conveyed to the lighthouses even if someone had died," he disclosed.

The staple diet of the lighthouse-keepers had been potatoes, dhal, butter, corned beef and the fish caught, out at the tower. Today the diet is more balanced and includes vegetables and wheat- based products.

Mr. Hamin maintains, "The dried fish from the lighthouses are the best I have ever tasted." Even today fishing is a major side income source for the keepers. Lobsters are caught and kept in cages, until a fishing boat would come near enough for a swimmer to go across and sell them.

The Little Basses as promised did have an inexplicable, rustic magic about it. The faded fortifications of the tower broke the billowing waves into a thousand pieces of white froth. Yet the gentler waves, they allowed to seep around the tower, unresisted.

The lights atop the 135-metre tower gave a double flash every 10 seconds: a warning to ships that were getting too close to the reef. Although we had travelled more than 30 kilometres from Kirinda, the desolate, almost virgin beaches of the Yala nature reserve were in clear sight. I was left wondering whether the sight of them so near, yet so inaccessible made matters better or worse for the weary keepers.

Chief Lighthouse Inspector B. Piyasena said, "Although it is so near to the semi–arid coastline of Yala, the lighthouse itself is in a wet zone area." It felt wet, the salty hot wind blew here too, but was mollified by a blanket of humidity. The lighthouse was the same format as the Great Basses with a few differences, like a freshwater tank with an increased capacity of 5000 gallons.

Yet here, beneath the romantic aura there seemed to be an underlying desperation among the keepers.

The Principal Lighthouse -keeper (PLK) A.P.L Vasgunewardena, a former navyman said, "We get annoyed, almost angry when the relief operation does not happen on the scheduled day. But the rough seas during the monsoon sometimes make it impossible for a relief operation to be completed in one day. On these days we go ashore at the Yala beach with the permission of the wildlife authorities."

Towards the end of an assignment at a Basses lighthouse, things sometimes do get unbearable. Recently there had been a confrontation where the PLK in charge had been on one side and the rest on the other - almost a mutiny.

Although things have improved with TVs and VCRs helping to while away the time, Vasgunewardena says, "It would help if we were given cell phones so that we can be in touch with our families." In fact, some cellular phone services did work on the lighthouse with a few keepers having their own private phones.

The keepers are given training in firefighting, survival at sea and first-aid. The rest is "on the job training".

"There were 800 applicants the last time we advertised for the post. The first test is a sea swim, which most fail and it makes our job of choosing much easier!" Mr. Piyasena said.

The chosen candidates should be "handymen". They have to handle every emergency, every situation themselves. Going ashore doesn't come into the picture. "Almost three out of 10 leave the service after a Basses assignment. There doesn't seem to be the same dedication as in the olden days," he adds.

Although the trend around the world is to 'unman' lighthouses, unmanning the Basses would require the building of helipads and solar panels, plus throw up the problem of security. In fact this coast area is known to have been the site of some LTTE activity during the past. The keepers too were worried about their security.

The seas were rough and the journey back was going to take longer than expected. By now, almost four days of continuous travelling both on land and sea were taking their toll on us. Limbs were getting heavy and eyes tired. Yet it would have been a shame not to soak in all there was to see as we navigated around the alluring Yala coast. And so up in the gallery area I was, when a lighthouse-keeper returning home, struck up a conversation.

His name remains an indiscernible scribble in my notebook. But I remember him mentioning that he used to work at the stock market. He inquired whether we would be heading for Colombo that day. By now it was well past 6 p.m. and with around 10 hours of sleep for the past three nights we were going nowhere but to bed that night. He would be going home to Colombo and unlike us he had precious little time to enjoy at home.

As we chatted he explained why the lighthouse-keepers were dressed so scrappily. The answer was simple. "It isn't practical anymore. At the Basses we have to do the work usually done by other workers as well." The smart merchant navy uniforms of yesteryear had been scrapped.

Usually it is to the Dondra or the Beruwala lighthouses that Senior PLKs get there final assignment before retirement: a tribute to a job well done.

By now we were back at Kirinda. A final round of goodbyes and we were ferried to the jetty. As we trekked towards our vehicle I could not but wonder what those eight men we had left behind at the two towers in the middle of the ocean were doing.

In the service of giving light and direction to the nautical world, could their own lives be directionless and in darkness?


Oddly Occupied
Ocean vigil
Udena Attygalle concludes this series with a two – part article on the lonely life of the keepers of the lighthouse

LighthouseFor us it was all what we had expected – an adventurous excursion to a place we would probably never see again. But for the four we left behind it would be a long wait till the next relief operation, with probably another curious visitor with loads of questions.

The Sri Lanka Ports' Authority (SLPA), which operates and manages the coast lights, agreed to accommodate us on its April relief operations to the two offshore lighthouses at the Great Basses and Little Basses. That was only after we signed indemnity forms assuring the SLPA that we would not hold it responsible for damage/loss to life and property.

A view of Pradeepa from the lighthouseWe set off from Kirinda to the Great Basses aboard the SLPA vessel 'Pradeepa II' guided by Master Joseph Selvanayagam. Pradeepa was loaded with barrels of fresh water, diesel, vegetables, fish, paint, dry rations, mechanics, helpers and most importantly the four men who would take over the job of lighthouse-keepers.

While most of the first-timers were bent over double being seasick on the morning of April 28, I managed to resist the urge by taking a deep breath of salty air. Then I caught up with S.M.M.Mirzan on his first assignment as Junior Assistant Lighthouse-keeper.

His interest in this odd line of work had been sparked by the conversations of his uncles, all seafaring men. "Forty-five days of work then 45 days of holiday, where else can you find such a job" was an enthusiastic way of looking at things. Newly married he would be stranded on a tower in the middle of the ocean for the next six weeks. "I am taking some books so that I can improve my spoken English," he says. As the junior assistant it would be his job to keep the kitchen fires burning during the stay at the Great Basses.

Time for teaYet, the 'pros' at this business, J.P Padmasiri, the Principal Lighthouse-keeper (PLK) and B.K. Rahuman, the Assistant Lighthouse-keeper were less than enthusiastic about being caged in.

"Once, I accidentally cut a finger badly. The PLK at that time signalled a fishing boat to come near the reef, swam to it, went ashore and returned with help," Rahuman says, explaining the inaccessibility. He is the champion swimmer among the lighthouse-keepers. A bit of spearfishing is his relief from the loneliness of the long vigil.

"We get up around 6 a.m., switch off the lights, get breakfast ready, radio the Dondra lighthouse at 9 a.m., do the necessary maintenance work, lunch, rest, radio again at 5 p.m. and then switch on the lights again," Padmasiri ran through the daily routine at the lighthouse.

By this time the freshly painted 125-metre Great Basses lighthouse which was just a flash seen every 10 seconds during most of the voyage was in clear sight. Four 'dots' were vigorously getting things ready for the landing.

Unshaven men in rubber boots and fishing hooks, hurricane lanterns and jealously guarded potted plants floated into my mind; the images formed long ago through Secret Seven books.

Suddenly the daydream was over, it was action time. The tug could go no more towards the shallow waters near the reef. The rescue and whaler boats that we had been dragging behind us suddenly moved into the fore. The provisions were loaded onto the whaler. The whaler was then dragged by the powerful rescue boat towards the lighthouse. The whaler anchored a few metres away from the lighthouse and the unloading began, using the crane at the lighthouse. Meanwhile, we whizzed along in the rescue boat and boarded the Great Basses, thanks mostly to the skill of the two who handled the boat.

And we were there. This was the destination of our one-and-a half-hours at sea, the home of our oddly occupied men.

The base of the tower was a huge tank where all the rainwater collected in the gutters would end up. Clambering up this base we were in the gallery/storage area of the lighthouse. It was full of cupboards and barrels with a trapdoor to the water tank below. Climbing up a narrow staircase with the brass parts as shiny as they would have been when it was built in 1872, we reached the noisy generator room. Next was the panel room with all the controls of the generator and backup systems, an aromatic smell signalling that the kitchen was above. On the next floor was the PLK's room. The rest of the crew slept in the room above this. Farther up was the visiting room complete with TV, VCR and the controls of the lights that were in the dome above.

The gallery around the visiting room provides a spectacular sight: deep blue waters all around except for the lighter patch we were on with a splashing white boundary around it. We spotted a group of dolphins enjoying the abundance of fish around the reef. With binoculars in hand this is a favourite gazing spot for the lonely keepers.

On the floor below, settling down on a cosy bunk with an unending carpet of blue and its inherent hiss coming through an open window I struck up a conversation with Assintant Keeper Bandula Prathapasinghe. "We are like birds, well-fed but trapped in a cage. We can't even go out for a kottu rotti if we feel like it. Our freedom is very limited." His main grievance is that their turn at the offshore lighthouses brings them no added payments, even though it's a much harder life than that at a lighthouse on the mainland.

The long stay at the lighthouses cripples their mental capabilities. Boredom and loneliness form a vicious circle, with even those determined to make good use of their time, getting trapped in this feeling of uselessness, he adds.

"We even get socially isolated when we go back home. We have missed weddings and funerals and so on. We find it hard to pick up the threads again. And just when we are settling down we have to come back here." For Prathapasinghe who had marvelled at the lighthouses while working on merchant vessels, the magic had all but vanished.

The meal prepared for us was appetizing. It was fresh water to drink and sea water to wash your hands. The rationing of fresh water is one of the many hardships faced by the keepers. Bathing in the sticky salty water day in, day out provides little comfort.

By now it was time to go back. But this time round the sea was too rough for the rescue boat to come near the reef. So we hung on the crane, three at a time and made a perilous swing towards the whaler. A sudden rush of a wave and the ropes attached to the crane were dragged far across the reef. So there we were hanging on a rope right between the reef and the whaler with a heaving sea below us.

It was some time before the ropes were gathered and we were swivelled towards the whaler. Still swinging madly we had to let go of the rope at the correct time or we would land in the sea or atop barrels and cans! We landed safely, though not very gracefully.

Then it was back to the Pradeepa II and Kirinda. Early the next day we would head for the Little Basses. A 30-kilometre trip, crossing the shallow reefs, in to the deep sea and back. A trip that could sometimes take a gruelling five hours meant that 'outsiders'were rarely encouraged to visit. However, Chief Lighthouse Inspector B. Piyasena assures us that if the Great Basses looked masculine the Little Basses were the more beautiful and feminine.

(To be continued)