Island Moments

I've just returned from a trip to my island home.

I'm managing my post-goodbye blues by jotting down odd moments, memories and snapshots before they fade.

We landed in Mauritius just before Divali. The airport had a display.

I dusted off my rusty Creole and successfully got through Customs with the Customs officer understanding my Creole and me not having to resort to too much Engli

I discovered there are LED diya lights 🪔 powered by water. These were magical!

There were traditional diyas too.

When jet lag works in your favour and you can get in some 6am beach walks.

Some of the things we saw on the early morning sands.

L-R  clockwise: sea urchin, crab hole with wee crab prints, sand ants!!, careless coral garden, pretty coral find.

I ate my body weight in samosas, gulab jamuns and lalo (okra). As you do.

There are geckos. Making beautiful colour choices.

We saw lots of amazing flowers.

And trees.

And a very grown up, moss-bedecked  mango tree that was a mere sapling when I was a kid.

There was frog song ASMR.

There was a crazy French show on the TV about Smurfs. T'as le bonjour du Schtroumpfs. I found a clip on YouTube. In addition to paint, there were questions, more yelling and punch-ups. I'm sorry for sharing, I really am.

There were some head-turning brand names.

There were a couple of road trips with big personal meanings. 

To Trou aux Cerfs, an extinct (very dormant) volcano that was a local walk away when I was a kid. It was nice to show this to LittleOne.

To my mum's childhood village, where part of the childhood home's garden wall was found still standing strong.

A grandmother neem tree who witnessed my mum's and her siblings' childhood, is also still standing strong and wise. Moments of hearts and roots and routes and all things fragile and intangible and forever.

And there were a few hours here and there by the beach. 

A French family of mum, dad and toddler asked me to take some photos. I hope my photos were less clumsy than my French words.

LittleOne got a delightful wee suntan tickled across the nose and cheeks. Meanwhile, I got sunburnt on half of the back of my calves. Just half. I can still hear the sun sniggering from here.

I also saw a little fish in the clear shallows. It was the same colour as the sand and had cute black eyes and 4 wee vertical black  stripes along its body. It was casually swimming about the shallows, its little shadow on the sand faithfully mirroring its darting path. I do not remember ever seeing fishes in the lagoon during my childhood trips to the beach. So I was more excited about seeing this fishie than LittleOne. No photos. But it looked a bit like this.

I don't like goodbyes. I took photos of the skies in the car to the airport.

It rained after we left. I'll pretend the skies were crying too.