I wished we could be so lucky.
Actually, it wasn’t the jungles of India we were invading, but the Andaman Islands, two hours away. The Andaman Islands, an archipelago, was home to North Sentinel Island and the Sentinelese. And our Mowgli, if you want to call him that, was Simon.
We were taking British Airways. We’d have to take another airline to get from Cleveland to New York, but BA would get us where we needed to go. I had been so afraid, since the Andaman Islands is not a well-known travel destination, we’d have to take some unknown airline. And that it would be overfilled with chickens flapping around in wire coups, sweaty, greasy passengers, rickety seats and an engine that coughed its way across the Bay of Bengal. Instead, we flew with “free food and drink service and the latest in in-flight entertainment.” We relaxed in a seat with “adjustable headrest, lumbar support and recline.” All that in Economy class! (Greg’s usual, “You watch too much TV, Justin,” accompanied by the shaking of his head, was his response to my surprise at such nice accommodations. But he had never been on an excavation with me in the middle of nowhere, where those things wouldn’t be so far-fetched).
The only bad thing about the flight was that between the flying time and the layovers, it took the better part of two days to get there. Cleveland to New York. New York to London. It was sixteen hours from London to Chennai, India, then to Port Blair in the Andaman Islands.
Flying into the Veer Sawarkar Airport on Fort Blair was beautiful. The weather was eighty degrees, and the landing strip might have been 3,000 feet of concrete but everything around it was green. Verdant. Beautiful.
Simon was friends with anthropologist David Mhasalkar, the Director of Tribal Welfare. Because of that he was able to set us up on a “Contact Expedition” to the island.
The Sentinelese did not like outsiders. But, what the government had been doing, with good results, according to Simon, was coaching the Sentinelese out. The government would visit the island, then leave gifts to lure them out and hopefully ameliorate the hostility they had shown to outsiders. Simon had told me that we had picked the perfect time to come. That the expeditions were going well, they were working. And the Sentinelese were responding just as they had hoped. I decided to trust him, and felt like maybe this trip, unlike my trip to Israel, would yield something worthwhile. I believed Simon when he said he would help me do what I wanted to do.
Greg, however, had his doubts. Unfounded as they were, according to Simon, he still believed that past hostility of these people warranted caution.
We were taking a helicopter out to the island. So, Greg said, he was getting off the helicopter first. And if he felt it was safe, then I could get off.
North Sentinel Island was nominally part of, and administered by, the Indian Union Territory of Andaman and Nicobar Islands. In practice, however, the Sentinelese exercised complete autonomy. Still, it didn’t stop the government from trying to have a relationship with the people of the island, which was a good thing for me.
Simon had recommended a bed and breakfast. Chaukhat, a stylish and comfortable six-bedroom property that was located close to the airport. We booked the entire property for the week. With its air conditioned rooms and balconies, Wi-Fi capabilities, cable television and en-suite bathrooms, we didn’t feel like we were in the middle of nowhere.
We did the first round of our contact expedition the day after we got there. I had never flown in a helicopter, and when we got in this one, I was stunned. Here we were in a third world kind of country, going to see people who we weren’t even sure if they knew about fire, and we were riding in this luxury helicopter. It was definitely something for someone way above my lifestyle.
The inside of the helicopter reminded me more of a limousine than an aircraft. Contour high-back bucket seats that were creamy-colored leather, gave the inside of the helicopter an elegant feel. It was a five-seat turbine, tour grade flying machine that had thick, Berber carpet covering the reinforced metal floor. I just wanted to take my tennis shoes and socks off and run my toes through it.
Greg climbed in behind me and nodded as he looked around. I’m sure he wanted to ask someone where he could buy one. I pulled the shoulder harness across my chest and fastened it into the clip by my hip. I leaned my head back against the soft headrest, stared out of the oversized window, and thought what an anachronism this would be once we landed on that island lost in time.
The helicopter pilot checked with us, told us to put on our headphones to knock out the noise, and we took off.
The plan was to circle a few times around the island, let the Sentinelese get use to us up there in the air. Then we would fly off, pique their curiosity, and come back. Hover over different places, observe and then come back the following day.
Although both me and Simon had degrees in anthropology, I took my archaeology concentration more to heart. I had, in all my years of working, dealt solely with dead people. I dug up their remains, and, as my brothers put it, “their cookware.” Simon, however, had embraced anthropology. We had spent time digging together and writing scholarly articles on our finds, but he had also spent years of studying people. People who were still alive, and their culture. That’s why I needed him.
When we flew over the first few times, I could see their dwellings. They had shelter-type huts with no side walls. From what I could see through the binoculars, the floors were sometimes laid out with palms and leaves. Some of the other living areas were larger, probably communal dwellings.
We could see javelins and flat bows. Those kinds of weapons had high accuracy against large targets. Like humans. Thank goodness they had calmed down when it came to outsiders visiting. And they had harpoons that we actually got to see in use.
After we had flown over a few times, some that had been fishing, threw down their harpoons and started throwing the fish they had caught up in the air. I guess for us.
A few of them came out as we continued to circle around. And after we left the area for a while and came back, even more come out to see us. Perhaps this was working. At one point, one of the women went to one of the men sitting on the sandy beach, and held him in an embrace. Other women then paired up as if it were some sort of community mating ritual.
I looked at Greg. “Time to go,” I said. I didn’t want to see what they might start doing next. “We’re all set to come back tomorrow. They know who we are.”
Chapter Fifty-Two
North Sentinel Island
Andaman Islands, Bay of Bengal
“Justin, you stay in the chopper. Me and Simon will go first.”
Greg was just reiterating what he had told me earlier. I guess he said it more for Simon, who had insisted, almost to the point of threatening, that I had to be the one to try and make contact. Greg talked over the beat of the rotors, the helicopter descending; they were slowing down, but still noisy. Once we hit the ground, Greg took off his earmuffs, unfastened his harness, ready to climb out of the hatch.
“Yeah, I know. You already told me that,” I shouted over the noise. “But,” I thought I’d give it one more try, “Simon thinks I should be the one to go.” I glanced over at Simon. He seemed nervous. I knew that he just wanted this to go well for me. He had said that the reports of them being hostile were old. That now, after the contact expeditions had started, things had really turned around.
“It’s not safe.” Greg still hung onto that idea. “I heard that they don’t like visitors,” Greg said, still talking loudly. He looked at Simon, almost daring him to repeat his reasons from the night before about me going. “I’ll go first, just to see. Once we’re out, if it seems safe, then you can come out. Just give us a minute to test it.”
“You don’t know what to do. What are you going to say to them?” I asked.
“What were you going to say to them?” he asked.
I opened my mouth to answer, and closed it again. Good point. What was I going to say to them? I couldn’t speak their language.
He looked over at Simon. “Y
ou ready?”
Simon nodded his head, and Greg drew in a big breath and looked at me out the side of his eye. Simon hopped out of the helicopter first, Greg followed.
The two of them bent down and trotted out until they cleared the rotors. I leaned out the door, bracing my arms on the sides of the doorway, and watched.
There was a group of twenty or thirty natives about three hundred yards away from the chopper. Simon and Greg stood still for a few minutes. Watching. Waiting. Nothing happened. The natives didn’t move. Didn’t say anything. So Greg and Simon started to walk out across the field, and the natives started walking toward them.
Greg and Simon got about twenty yards out, and everything was calm. I saw Simon say something to Greg, who nodded, and then turned back to me and beckoned for me to come. Greg stood there and waited for me after I stepped out of the chopper. Simon kept walking. The small group of Sentinelese natives was still walking toward us, moving at a slow pace.
Good, I thought as I got closer, they seem okay. The contact expeditions must really be working well. I pushed my satchel, with the Voynich Manuscript tucked away inside, up on my shoulder. Maybe even someone in this group will understand what’s inside the book, or even recognize some of the pictures, I thought.
I was really getting excited. Dealing with “live” history was a bit different for me. Simon, because he hadn’t waited for us, was farther up than Greg. And, as I got closer to Greg, he started back to walking toward the natives. I was starting to get butterflies. Maybe we were about to meet the people who knew our history, who knew about our migration from Mars.
“I think everything is okay with them,” Greg said, over his shoulder. I was still a couple of yards behind him, but with the helicopter noise absent he was easy to hear. “They’re calm enough.”
I wanted to say, “See I told you,” but couldn’t because just then three of the natives broke rank and came running out from the back of the pack, spears in hand. Still about two hundred yards away, they started yelling something that sounded like a war cry.
I started yelling, too.
Greg didn’t miss a beat, he turned and ran, and when he got to me, he grabbed my arm, and yanked me around so fast that I stumbled over my own feet. He caught me before I hit the ground, and said, “Run, Justin.” But I didn’t have to run, he was pulling me.
I knew my heart was going to jump out my chest, it was beating so hard. I was too scared to look back. I didn’t know what had happened to Simon. After Greg pushed me up in the helicopter, I looked back across the clearing and saw Simon just standing there. He must’ve started running back, I guessed, because he was closer than where he’d been. But it looked like for some reason he had just stopped. He looked at me, then he turned back to face the three that were heading toward him, then back to look at me.
Why would he have to think what to do?
“Run, Simon,” I started yelling. He just stood there. His body turned at an angle, like he couldn’t decide.
So I started yelling at Greg for him to help him. Greg shook his head, pushed me back into my seat, said, “Buckle up,” and turned and yelled at the pilot, “Let’s go.”
“Noooo. Greg! We can’t leave Simon.” I was pleading with him, and pointed back toward Simon. Just then I saw that Simon was making a mad dash back to the helicopter.
“Justin, he’s got five seconds. Five . . . Four . . . Three . . . Two . . .”
“Simon!” I screamed, trying to get out of my seat. Then I saw that he was close to the helicopter. “Here he is! Here he is!”
I ran to the chopper door to help Simon get in.
The pilot was looking back at us, to make sure we were all in, and then he took off amid spears hitting the glass and the side of the chopper.
I closed my eyes and started to pray. “Please, God,” I said. “Let us make it out of here.” Opening one eye, I looked down at the natives. More had started running toward us.
I glanced over at Greg. He was leaning back in the chopper, his eyes closed, and his lips were moving fast.
When he opened them, he peeked out of the window and then over at me. He busted out into a nervous laugh.
“Girl, you are going to get me killed!”
Chapter Fifty-Three
After our disastrous experience with the Sentinelese, I thought about what Addie had said about finding our Mowgli. Simon didn’t seem to be that person anymore. I didn’t know what was going on with him.
Seemed like he had a death wish.
But I couldn’t worry about him. I needed to concentrate on what I had come there to do. I had a new plan. The Jarawa. I thought that maybe they might be our Mowgli.
The Jarawa had “came out,” as it were, and were now in regular contact with the outside world through settlements on the fringes of their reserve. They even had daily contact with outsiders along the Andaman Trunk Road and at jetties, marketplaces and hospitals near the road. I had read about them and thought they might be a good choice. They had been an uncontacted people for thousands of years, until just recently, and their island home in the archipelago was close to where the Sentinelese lived.
Simon didn’t like the idea. He just wanted to go to Brazil. Forget the Andaman Islands. “We’d do better in South America,” he had said. “And send your brother home.” No matter what I said, he couldn’t be moved. So, me and Greg went. I’d talk to Simon and smooth things over with him after we got back.
We took a bus down the truck road sponsored by one of the tourism companies that had sprung up to bring tourists close to the Jarawa’s secluded areas. As soon as we drove up, the people on the bus with us starting yelling to the natives. The natives were mostly women and children, and just a few men clumped together in groups by the side of the road. The women’s breasts were exposed, and many of the adults wore only flimsy loin cloths, their buttocks completely exposed. And some, as were the children, were completely naked. Their skin was dull dark brown and they were covered in the brown dust of the land. Then a policeman started shouting at them, apparently encouraging the natives to dance for us so that we’d give them food.
“Throw them food,” he yelled to the people on our bus. “Watch them dance.” He grinned at us, and then started yelling at the Jarawa in a language only they understood. Many of them started singing and dancing, their body parts’ jiggling as food was thrown at them. A few, however, didn’t dance. Didn’t sing. They stood there, covering themselves with their hands, and on their faces, a look of bewilderment.
“Stop,” I cried out. “Leave them alone. Are you people crazy?” I turned and looked at the people on the bus.
I had no idea stuff like this would be going on. “This is horrible, Greg,” I said, turning to my brother. Maybe that was why Simon didn’t want to come. But he should have warned me.
“I want to go,” I said to Greg. “Make the bus driver leave from here. Tell him something.” I pushed Greg to get up out of his seat.
Of course Greg couldn’t make him leave it was a scheduled tour that people, including us, had paid money to take. And, of course, I cried all the way back to the bed and breakfast where we were staying.
I crawled into my bed in my room and cried some more. I heard Greg yelling at Simon. Then I heard a door slam.
What was I doing? Is this what this has come down to? Exploiting people to find the answers? Humiliating them all for the sake of science? This was not me. I prayed, “God, please forgive me.”
I woke the next day, not remembering much except a phone call from Simon in the middle of the night, saying that he and my brother had had a falling out. And, reiterating that perhaps just he and I should go to Brazil. I tried to tell him I didn’t want to go, not after what happened. But he insisted. Said that I needed it for my treasure hunt, that he would take care of me, and he wouldn’t take no for an answer. I finally relented and told him okay. And that I agreed Greg shouldn’t come.
Lying in the bed with the sunlight peeping through, I knew I had to get up
and get ready for my flight to Brazil. And, I had to tell Greg he couldn’t come.
How would I do that?
Then Greg burst into my room.
“Get your stuff together, Justin, we’re going home.”
“I can’t Greg. I have to go to Brazil with Simon. And maybe you shouldn’t go.”
“Now I know for sure you’re crazy,” he said, voice booming. “You’re not going anywhere with that twit. You’re going home. I had your husband cancel your flight from here to Brazil and I booked us a flight home.”
“No. Greg. Listen.”
“I am not listening to you. I know you’re not thinking about going somewhere with that guy and he set you up to be killed by those savages yesterday.
“They are not savages.”
“And, on top that,” he said, without acknowledging me. “All that balling you did yesterday, crying like a sick little kid, I would think that you’d know for sure that you just need to stick with dead people and their stuff. We’re not going. You’re not going.”
I really didn’t want to go.
I just didn’t like Greg telling me I couldn’t go.
“And,” he said, “I talked to Mase. You’ll have him to deal with if you try doing anything but going home from here. He’ll go to Brazil if he has to and get you from there.”
Actually I was more scared of Greg.
“And I will be there to help him.”
My heart skipped a beat.
“Justin,” he said, seemingly fed up with me. “You can walk onto that plane home of your own accord, or you can go slung over my shoulder after I choke the living daylights out of you. Your choice.” Then he turned around, walked out, and then turned back around, heading into the room again, and shouted, “Get your stuff packed. Now! We’re getting out this place just a fast as a cab can get us to the airport.”
Irrefutable Proof: Mars Origin I Series Book II Page 22
