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Catamaran Adveture

When I first set foot on the beach, the day of my arrival, I was approached by a friendly, but very persistent guy, trying to persuade me to go out on what to me looked like a rickety vessel, a Sri Lankan catamaran. A little apprehensive, I warded him off with a smile and a non-committing “maybe later”. After that, every time I crossed the beach to get to the ocean, he popped up out of nowhere, following me back and forth, pleading with me.


This morning I had no plans, there was less wind than the previous days, so I was actually tempted to go when he, as was now his custom, joined me on my way to the water. I was tempted, but also a little reluctant, or to be both more honest and precise, scared. He said the conditions were perfect and there would be only me on the boat except for the crew. I didn’t like that much either: If I was going to get eaten by a shark (which they keep telling the tourists are “way out there”) or being thrown overboard and drown, I wanted to make it a social event and do it in the company of some like-minded people. I was, in not so many words, able to convey this to him, and he seemed to understand my predicament. He pointed to a group of people threading water and told me that they had just been out, I could talk with them. It turned out they were all Russians, didn’t speak any other language than their own, and my sign language did not seem to go through to any of them. If they had ever been out on a Catamaran, they had totally and completely erased the memory from their minds.



The guy then pointed in the direction of the hotel gardens, indicating a man seated at a table, enjoying his beer. When I asked him how he had liked his catamaran trip, he looked at me blankly. Oops, wrong guy. My friend down on the beach was now waving frantically, pointing towards a relaxed looking fellow, with long hair, red t-shirt and shorts, coming towards us…



To read more, go to Catamaran Adventure

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