there's something wrong with the sea

my parents left two days ago. after they left i took four local buses for almost 5 hours and ended up in a small dusty middle of nowhere town called gokarna. it's a place that's been recommended to me to see. there was no one around. it's the type of place that closes down randomly in the middle of the afternoon. i spotted some rickshaw drivers and hopped in one. i was headed to kudle beach. he brought me to the edge of the mountain/foothill. i was confused. this didn't look like beach. then he pointed to a footpath down the mountain. i grabbed my stuff and hiked down the footpath. it opened up onto this beautiful beach nestled between two mountains. a cove of sorts. it was like a secret beach world. barely anyone there. just a handful of foreigners. this was kudle beach.

i walked a few hundred meters and saw liesbeth, a friend from dharamsala, sitting in a cafe, smoking a cigarette and drinking a coffee. it was good to see my friend again.

two days later, i woke up and went out to the beach. it was early for here so there weren't many people out except for a group of young indian student tourists playing together in the waves. i went for a walk with my friend dov along the beach. while we were walking back when we saw this israeli girl standing there crying and pointing toward the water and panicked. she said that they was an indian guy drowning in the water and her boyfriend went in to save the indian guy. then several girls from the group i saw earlier came running over to us screaming that their two friends were in the water and couldn't swim and were drowning. they were frantic, crying and screaming, help us, somebody call an ambulance, call the police, save them, please, please, help us, go save them, please somebody that knows swimming.

we were running back and forth along the beach trying to find someone that could help, but remember we're not near civilization at all. the closest town is a 20 minute trek along a rocky path, and even that place is like a ghost town.

more and more people came out to the beach to see what was going on. there were about 5 people who were trying to go in to the water, but the waves were too strong. they relentlessly came one after another. and i stood there holding the girls whose friend it was in the water. he was so far out in the sea. we could all see him struggling. it was clear that swimming out there would be impossible. there was a old wooden rowboat beached on the shore. dov ran to it and screamed to people standing near to help him. There must have been 40 indian men, standing around, and none of them helped him. it was tourists that were running quickly to come help dov, finally they got the boat to the water, and dov and a few others tried to get the boat past the breaking waves, but it was just too strong.

everyone was out on the beach watching what was going on. there are only about 30 foreigners staying on this beach. the rest of the people here are indian construction workers, and cafe/restaurant workers and other locals.

all this time, none of the internet cafe people or restaurants, who all have phones, called the police or an ambulance. i was running up and down the beach trying to get service on my cell phone to call the police. i finally got through and explained what was happening and that we needed an ambulance right away.

a tourist, i think he was american, was able to save one of the indian guys from the water. it had been at least half an hour by now that he'd been drowning. where were the fucken police?? we were at the closest beach to town and they should have been there right away. we called again and again, and they said help was on its way. but so much time passed and no one showed up.

we immediately started cpr on the first guy that came out. he was a young man, probably in his early twenties. between myself, the american guy that saved him, and this french guy, we took turns giving cpr. everyone crowded around us. there was no doctor, and no one who knew anything about emergency medical care. the indians just stood there, looking at us, not helping, just staring.

there was just so much water in his lungs. sea water was foaming from his mouth. we pumped his chest and turned him to his side to drain him of all the water. after most of the water was out we gave him mouth to mouth recessitation. i was doing the pumping and the other guys were breathing into him.

i kept wondering if there was still a chance for this young man to live. he'd been in the water for so long, and didn't have a pulse for so long and he wasn't breathing for so long. the brain can only live without oxygen for so long. but we kept on going until the police arrived. but the police did absolutely nothing. the victim's friends went screaming for the police to come help. but they just stood there. we screamed at them to get an ambulance. they just looked at each other, not knowing what to do, not knowing what number to call, doing nothing. i can't describe how unbelievable it was. then they said there was an ambulance waiting at the top of the foot path. we got a sheet, and put the young indian man on the sheet to carry him to the ambulance. we were on the opposite side of the footpath. it was about 600 meters away. several foreign men came to help, but among the 100 able-bodied indian men standing around, not one of them came to help us carry him, even though we were struggling. it was me and another girl, dov and two foreigner men. we were all barefoot and the footpath is entirely uphill made of jagged, sharp rocks. it was so hard to carry him. we had to put him down a couple of times and then the sheet we were carrying him on started to rip. people passed us, and no one helped. at one point the guy at the front and his girlfriend said that he was already dead. he was foaming at the mouth and nostrils. he was excreting greenish yellowish fluids. after the sheet ripped they said maybe we should just leave him there. i couldn't fucken believe it! leave him on the footpath!

we finally got him into the ambulance.

during the time that i was helping give cpr, dov and michal, along with some other saved the israeli guy that had gone in to save the drowning indian guy. he too, got swept away by the water. his girlfriend was hysterical and crying, but he would be okay. they pulled him out, and as we walked past them on the shore while carrying the first indian guy, i saw that he was coughing up water, breathing, and was able to respond to questions. another group of people carried the israeli guy to the ambulance soon after.

completely shocked and fazed i walked down the footpath back to the beach. went home and took a shower. i came out to the cafe in front of my guesthouse and was sitting there with liesbeth. then we see a crowd of people standing in front of our cafe pointing in the water. they were pointing at a floating body in the water. there were about 30 indian people standing there and none of them did a thing. when liz and i realized what they were pointing at we ran from the cafe and into the water to pull the body out. it was the second indian guy, the other friend in the group of indian students. she and i struggled to get the body out of the water. it was so heavy. all those people stood around and none of them helped us pull him from the water and onto the beach. we yelled for the guy at the cafe to call an ambulance. but he just stood there and said he's probably already dead. i couldn't believe these people. she and i didn't know what to do. an israeli guy came running over and tried to drain water from the young man's body. i ran into the cafe to tell them to call for help. finally he did. we got a sheet, and put the body on the sheet. i know that he must have already been dead when i pulled him out of the water. but we still needed to get him to a hospital. it's like if we didn't do anything, they would have just left him there. we eventually some other tourists came over to help us and they carried him to the ambulance waiting at the top of the footpath.

afterwards i went back to the cafe to sit down. then i heard news that actually there was another person still in the sea. he was a half english half indian man who lived in the area. i had no idea there was a fourth person who drowned. his body has not turned up yet, and we're not sure that it will. we found his backpack with his wallet and car keys in the sand.

the rest of the day dragged. i guess people saw me help give cpr, so when i took a walk in the afternoon everyone was asking me if i was okay. i guess my face couldn't hide that i felt twisted up inside. i can't describe it. i just feel it.

it's very ironic. a few days ago i finished reading Blindness by Jose Saramago. I had this book for years but never read it until now. Throughout this entire ordeal, I kept thinking about the story in Blindness.

A city is struck by a sudden blindness. Everyone is the city goes blind except for one woman. The government starts to quarantine the blind in a prisons until eventually even the government goes blind. The story tells about the terrible things that people begin to do to each other because they are only concerned with themselves and their own survival. It talks about greed, and fear, about violence, about apathy, and about the perverse and twisted lack of humanity that pervades the people struck with blindness. but despite this, there still is the glimmer of love and compassion that exists between the people who selflessly help each other.

today i lived that story.