The Stories of Five Visitors
Contents
The Story of Visitor #1 (an anthropologist)
The
Story of Visitor #2 (an anthropologist)
The
Story of Visitor #3 (a linguist)
The
Story of Visitor #4 (a scientist)
The
Story of Visitor #5 (a shipwreck)
The
Story of Visitor #1 (an anthropologist)
This story was related by Zga-ben-Žga, an elder of the
coastal group, one of the Storytellers of the Village-near-the-Sea, who
witnessed these events as a youth. It was recorded by “Visitor #5” in her diary, and subsequently translated into English by Professor ——.
One day a boat appeared. There were men in the boat. One of them left the boat and came ashore with some belongings. This is the man we call the “First Visitor.”
Of course, we all came to the sea to greet the man, as he was a guest. It was clear from his attire that he was a stranger to this land. The younger village chief—that was Bo-ben-Žgola, who died some years ago because a fever spirit took him, despite the best efforts of the old Shaman, the grandfather of Bo-Lassa‘al, who is now the Shaman of the Village-near-the-Sea—came to the beach where the stranger was standing, and greeted him.
He said, “O most honored guest, we welcome you to our humble home. In spite of its meagerness, we offer you the hospitality due to one of your high status, and grant to you our houses for rest and protection and the fruits of our fields and the grains of our rice. Please, O honored gentleman, come with us, and let us feed you as you must be hungry after a long and hot journey to our humble home.”
And the First Visitor reached out with both hands and said, “Gloṕäh, Gloṕäh, Gloṕäh.” That is what it sounded like to me.
The younger village chief said, “O most honored guest. Surely your throat is dry and you could speak if you drank some water.”
He gestured to one of the women standing nearby, and she ran and brought a gourd filled with cool fresh water from the stream, and gave it to the First Visitor.
He looked at the gourd, and smelled the water, and then drank a little and smiled. Then he said, “Gloṕäh, Gloṕäh, Gloṕäh.”
The younger village chief stared at him for a long time. To smell the water offered by a host is a rude thing. And, no one could understand what the stranger was saying. Why was he making noises like an animal? Why couldn’t he speak, and accept the kindly offer of the younger village chief?
Then, the older village chief came. The younger village chief spoke with him. They talked softly and I could not hear what they said. Then, the younger village chief went to the stranger and grasped his arm. He pulled him. The stranger followed like he was a little child. They walked to the Village-near-the-Sea and the young men and young women rushed to set out tasty žilliṕäx [baked rice balls] and cool water, and they placed it before the feet of the stranger. The stranger sat down and tasted the žilliṕäx and he smiled and nodded his head. Then he said, “‘en jo, ‘en jo, ‘en jo,”—or that’s what I remember.
Everything the First Visitor said was nonsense. It was as though he was a baby who could only speak the talk of babies. For several days, the stranger lived in a field in a tiny house made of cloth. Every day he would walk around and watch us work. Sometimes he would wave his arms in the air and say, “Gloṕäh, Gloṕäh, Gloṕäh.”
Maja-ti-Nula—she was an old woman then, but she still lived with Maja-ti-Ṕoṕa, her daughter-in-law, who is now a grandmother herself—said that she thought that the stranger had fallen on his head as a child, and this would explain why he had trouble speaking like a person. Other people thought this seemed reasonable. After all, the skin of the stranger was very pale, maybe his parents had hidden him in a cave after the injury to save him from embarrassment, and that is why the sun had never kissed his skin brown.
People were sad about the plight of the stranger. Perhaps the other men in the boat on which he arrived were his uncles and they decided that this was a clever way to get rid of this useless man. For whatever reason, this poor man had come to our land, and now as a guest we had to feed him and take care of him.
The next day, Maja-ti-Ṕoṕa, her heart filled with pity, went to the tiny cloth home of the stranger, and took him with her. As she did her work she talked to him like a baby. She gave him the words for “rice,” and “mortar,” and “pestle,” and “flour,” and taught him how to speak. Day by day the stranger learned the way people speak and stopped making sounds like an animal.
He never did learn how to speak like an adult. He would ask simple questions, just like a little child, and answer when spoken to, but he was uneducated in the ways of politeness. When introduced to a the older chief of a mountain village, rather than saying, “O most honored leader, my eyes our graced by the sight of your honorable wisdom,” as a proper person would, he would say something like, “I am happy to meet you,” without giving any honor or recognition to the chief at all! Clearly something was wrong with the spirit of this stranger, since the ways of politeness are what separate the people from the animals.
The
Story of Visitor #2 (an anthropologist)
This story was related by Zga-ben-Žga, an elder of the
coastal group, one of the Storytellers of the Village-near-the-Sea, who witnessed
these events as a youth. It was recorded by “Visitor #5” in her diary, and subsequently translated into English by Professor ——.
After the First Visitor had departed—and we were all relieved to see him go—I apologize for the harm my saying so may cause—and after four or five seasons of the sun had passed on by, another visitor arrived in the same way, on a large boat that flew over the sea. This visitor was a woman. She had the same pale skin as the First Visitor, but ever whiter, as if she had covered her body with the dung of seagulls. Even her hair was pale, a yellow color like the glaḱöglaḱö butterfly that lives in the warm seasons. And it was straight too, like the hair of animals, not like the fine curly hair that people have.
This woman—the Second Visitor—could speak the talk of the people. She was not like a baby, like the First Visitor. She sounded odd when she spoke. In a week or two her speech was better. A Shaman said—I do not remember who it was—that the good speech was caused by the sun. The Second Visitor’s skin had become brown, and perhaps the good friendship of the sun had healed her tongue as well.
The Second Visitor had a very odd habit. She walked around carrying a little black box. When she was speaking with someone she would push on the box and hold it near the one who spoke. We did not know why she did this. It seemed when she held out the black box that she was offering it as a gift—Why would anyone want such a useless gift?—but she never parted with her box.
One day, as I was threshing the jiš [a species of wild rice], she followed me and watched what I was doing. Then she held out the box to me and asked, “O honorable gentleman, whose face is a pleasure for my lowly eyes to behold, what are you doing?” I replied that I was threshing the jiš, as she could see. Then she asked me why. Such questions! She was like a child who asks why the clouds make the rain fall or why the birds trill to their beloved mates. One must be patient with a child, of course, so I answered, “O most honored guest, by separating the grains of jiš from the stalks, we prepare it to become the nourishment that our lowly bodies require.”
She nodded her head, and then asked if I wished to listen to myself. I was curious about the meaning of her question. I could hear myself whenever I spoke, like every person can. I said, “O most honored guest, that which you wish is my sincerest desire.”
She pushed on the box. And it spoke! I know that this belief is difficult. You think, how can a box speak? But—I swear by God in the sky and in the earth and in every place between—that I heard it with my own ears! The box spoke the words I had just said—and in my own voice!
I dropped the threshing stick. My heart was beating as fast as the wings of a memekopo [a small indigenous bird, that hovers while it feeds on nectar, provisionally identified as the olive-backed sunbird]. This was magic. This was something that only a Shaman or a Priest, who could summon the power of the God in the sky and in the earth and in every place between, was permitted to do. My face showed the fear that I felt in my stomach.
The woman stepped away. She put the black box in her sack. She said, “O most honorable gentleman, I offer you my sincerest apologies for the harm that I may have caused to your eyes and to your heart. May I beseech your forgiveness toward my most humble self.”
I said the proper thing, “So granted. We speak as equals.”
I withheld the secret of the black box from the people. I thought that they might feel fear toward the Second Visitor, who was our guest. Fear is outside of the laws of politeness. The laws require that we be kind and loving towards a guest at every time. Yet I say that I am forever grateful to the Most High God that the Second Visitor never showed me that box again!
The
Story of Visitor #3 (a linguist)
This story was related by Ka‘akaḱi‘i, an elder of
the coastal group, one of the Storytellers of the Village-near-the-Sea, who
witnessed these events as a young woman. It was recorded by “Visitor #5” in her diary, and subsequently translated into English by Professor ——.
My husband and I welcomed the Third Visitor into our home as our guest. He shared our food; he shared our water; and he watched little Gliki [note: Glikoṕoḱu (Gliki is a nickname) is now a grown man with children of his own] when we were busy with the harvest. He was a peaceful, young man with pink skin.
The visitor had brought with him many white leaves which were sewn together. He called these things, “notëbokës.” Every evening, before he slept, he made marks in his notëbokës, on the white leaves, with a stick. These marks were the same as the marks that the Second Visitor taught us. Some of them I could understand, but for others I was curious.
One day, Dlež-ben-Dlož, the parallel-cousin of my husband, and a great Shaman, came to our house. My husband welcomed him, “O most honored parallel-cousin, to whom all turn for knowledge, before whom sit the birds and animals to be enlightened, to whom apply all who require judgment, I beseech you to be my most honored guest in our lowly home and to share our lowly meal.”
Dlež-ben-Dlož said, “O honorable parallel-cousin, I accept your most kind offer with the greatest gratitude. May the spirits of the sky and of the water and of the air and of the earth smile upon your kind heart and bless the eyes of your most dear children, that they may grow and become peacemakers famed throughout the land. I offer you my gratitude that you see fit to accept this humble one to seat himself with your family and share your meal. Let us now speak as equals.”
My husband said, “Let us now speak as equals.” Then we all—Dlež-ben-Dlož and my husband and myself and the Third Visitor—sat down before the food I had laid out—žilliṕäx mixed with gasso and läballo‘o [note: gasso and läballo‘o are indigenous plants gathered and dried and ground and used as spices], and pancakes, and honey collected from the bees that live where the trees become short on the side of the mountain, and four perfectly cooked ṕiṕa [note: the eggs of the domesticated zgellispo lizard]. We ate until out stomachs were happy.
Then Dlež-ben-Dlož spoke to the Third Visitor. He said, “Are you content, O honorable gentleman, in the service you receive from Gli‘obene,”—my husband—“and Zdeli [note: the name of the narrator]?”
He said, “O most honored gentleman and knowledgeable Shaman, the service I have received and do receive is the best and most goodly service that a man could want.”
He said, “Very good. If it is within the laws of politeness to inquire, what do you do with your time?” He said this because he knew that the Third Visitor did not busy himself with the harvesting or the threshing of jiš or the building of houses or even the collection of ṕiṕa.
He said, “It is a polite question. I write in my ‘notëbokës’.”
He said, “If it is a polite request, may I be allowed by your honorable person to see the ‘notëbokës’?”
The Third Visitor gave the notëbokës to Dlež-ben-Dlož. He looked at the marks on the white leaves. He looked at many white leaves. His face became dark. He said, very quietly and peacefully, “O honorable gentlemen, why do you make drawings about the women in the bath? Why do you write marks about the boys who eat the ṕiṕa instead of bringing them to their homes? Why do you make drawings about the žamžam [note: this is a Beltös word that denotes the act of sexual intercourse] of your most gracious hosts?”
The Third Visitor’s face became dark. Because of his pale skin, his face was red. He said, “O most honorable Shaman, I do such to increase my knowledge. Is not the growth of knowledge a good act?”
Dlež-ben-Dlož frowned. His heart felt a lack of peace. He said, “O most honorable gentleman, who has traveled on a boat on a long journey crossing the sea without boundary, to make marks such as this is outside of the laws of politeness. May I ask you to give to me the ‘notëbokës’ so that I burn them in the fire and may harmonize the world by doing so?”
The Third Visitor was silent. He took the notëbokës. He put them in his sack. He turned his back on Dlež-ben-Dlož.
To turn the back on a Shaman!
Dlež-ben-Dlož stood up. His face was very dark. He nodded at my husband. He said, “O honorable parallel-cousin and his wife whose beauty rivals the t́aleṕä [note: an indigenous species of parrot] who takes flight upon the first morning kiss of the sun, I offer you my sincerest apologies for the harm that I may have caused to your honor. I now depart.”
I felt such surprise! Usually after a meal the people linger and talk. I was silent. My husband embraced his parallel-cousin. Then he left our home.
That night, the Third Visitor’s sleep was troubled. He spoke strange words. He threw his arms and legs around the floor. In the morning he awoke and his face was very white. He went outside and he vomited. Then he had diarrhea. He took a black box out of his sack and he talked to it. That afternoon a big boat came and the Third Visitor went onto the boat and he left.
Some days later, Dlež-ben-Dlož came to our house and shared our meal. He was very happy. I asked him what had happened. I said, “O most honorable Shaman, to whom all turn for knowledge, before whom sit the birds and animals to be enlightened, to whom apply all who require judgment, if it is within the laws of politeness, may I inquire what caused the Third Visitor to leave us so quickly?”
Dlež-ben-Dlož smiled. He said, “O honorable gentlewoman and beloved wife of my parallel-cousin, the Third Visitor was upsetting the balance of the world with the marks he made. I sent him a zgellispo spirit in his dream to ask him politely to leave.”
And that is the cause of the hastening back to his home of the Third Visitor.
* * *
Upon receiving this story from [name withheld], this compiler contacted Visitor #3 who now is a professor emeritus at the University of ——. Upon hearing this narrative, there was a long pause on the telephone. Then he said, “That’s the absolute truth. How could anyone know what I dreamed?”
I asked him what he had dreamed and this is what he related: “I was standing in a zgellispo paddock when the largest lizard I had ever seen, taller than me by at least a half-meter, walked up to me. The zgellispo spoke to me in a deep voice in English. It said, ‘You have broken the laws of politeness. It is now required that you depart this land at once.’ I was filled with a terror that I have never before, nor since, experienced. When I awoke my heart was pounding and my bowels were churning. I called my emergency contact on the satellite phone and was picked up that very day. Strangely, as soon as I was aboard the ship, a feeling of peace fell over me and my health returned immediately.”
“And you never told anyone about this dream?”
“Never before.”
I will leave it to the reader to interpret this story as he chooses.
The
Story of Visitor #4 (a scientist)
The following diary was discovered between the leaves of a
dog-eared copy of Principia Mathematica in the stacks of the Hunt library at
Carnegie-Mellon University. It was sent to the compiler of these stories by a
student who had attended one of his guest lectures. The author of this account
is unknown—and certainly not an accredited anthropologist.
My theories are correct! The instruments can’t lie. From the private plane I’d chartered, I was looking directly down at a magnetodynamic dome, hovering above an isolated region of the South Pacific. I whipped out my jerry-rigged night-goggle binoculars, and focused on where the vector magnetometer indicated. Much to my surprise, at the edge of the shimmering surface of the magnetic anomaly, I could spy a spit of land, wavering as if behind a wall of heat. There must be some sort of deserted island beneath the dome.
The chance of a magnetodynamic dome forming on the surface of the ocean was rare, but the likelihood that it encompassed an island was inconceivably small. It meant that I would have an outpost on which to set up my instrumentation and to take more careful measurements. I couldn’t let this opportunity pass by.
I signaled to the pilot to put down the plane on the waves. He shook his head. “You paid for a flyover only,” he yelled. I reached into my back pocket, took out my wallet, and gave the entire contents, over three thousand dollars in good American cash, and handed it over. “OK, bud,” he said. “It’s your funeral.”
He nosed the plane down onto the slow swells of the South Pacific and we coasted to a stop on the pontoons. I took the inflatable rubber raft, pulled the plug to inflate it, and threw it though the door. I loaded my instruments on it, buttoned my sea slicker, and jumped in. “Pick me up here in 24 hours,” I yelled. “Roger,” replied the pilot, as I removed the oars from the velcro strapping and started to row toward the island.
I couldn’t see the island at all from the ocean surface. The strange optical properties of the magnetodynamic dome blocked all emission of light. In fact, any electromagnetic emissions below the megahertz range.
But I had seen where it was, and using the skills I’d acquired as a member of the crew team on the Charles, I rowed toward the spot. Fortunately, the wind was at my back, so that in less than a half-hour I hit shore.
I beached the raft on the shingles, and looked for a level spot to set up the instruments. I walked inland for a bit, and found the perfect clearing, and was unpacking the geostabilizers when I heard a footstep behind me.
I turned my head. Behind me, there was a boy. Maybe eleven or twelve years old. Wearing nothing but a loincloth and carrying a hand-woven basket partly filled with fruit.
“Who are you?” I exclaimed.
The boy just stared at me. He was as surprised as I was. Then, he turned on his heel and sprinted away. “The island is inhabited,” I said to myself. “How is that even possible?”
I continued setting up the instruments and mounting them on their tripods, when I heard rustling in the undergrowth of the thick forest. I couldn’t see anything, but I knew they were watching me from the cover of the trees. Then, a man stepped out from the edge of the thicket.
He spoke. It sounded something like, “Sas-sis-si-shi-shash-shash-ezzh.”
I held out my arms, palms out, and smiled. He looked at me and repeated what he said. I smiled bigger. I didn’t come out all this way to get a spear thrust in my gut. I needed to show my peaceful intentions to these people, so that they would leave me be to set up the instruments.
The man gestured with his arm and a half-dozen more men stepped into the clearing. Some of them had staffs, but I wasn’t sure whether they were pointed or not. The tops of the staffs had parrot feathers tied to them, but I couldn’t see the business ends.
I pointed to my instrumentation, smiled and said, “I come in peace. Let me work here for a day. I will not bother you.”
This started a conversation between the men. I would term it an argument, but with an agonizingly slow pace. No one interrupted the other. They all took turns and each speaker gave what seemed like a short speech to the others. After some rounds, the oldest man came up to me. He reached out and took my hand. I made sure not to make any movement that could be misinterpreted as aggressive. He pulled on my hand and gestured to the forest.
I stood my ground. I didn’t want to be led away into the forest to who-knows-what. What if I ended up in a giant stew pot?
I tried to withdraw my hand but the old guy wouldn’t let go, He just kept on tugging, and the other men walked behind me and silently encouraged me to go with the old one. I gave in. Six to one were bad odds, and I didn’t have a weapon. And even if I did, I knew I wouldn’t use it. After all, I was the intruder here, not them.
I followed the old man through the forest. It was verdant with fruit trees and climbing vines. The shrill trilling of birds could be heard from every side. After a short walk the forest thinned out and we were in a pasture, a relatively flat field of tall grass that resembled rye. There were some dark green mounds scattered throughout.
One of the mounds moved and I just about jumped out of my skin. The “mound” was a huge lizard. It looked like a gigantic iguana, but it stood almost five feet high at the shoulder, and counting its tail it must have been over thirty feet long.
When they saw me jump, the men all laughed. One of the young ones nudged another and they both hid their smiles behind their hands. The old man was serious, though. He ignored the lizards and tightly grasping my hand he kept on pulling me along.
We walked though some thick brambles at the other side of the pasture and we arrived at a dirt clearing, around which stood a dozen or so poorly constructed, makeshift huts. They were built mostly of branches and bark and thatch, stuck together with clay. The old man brought me to a circle of logs and pointed at one of them. I got the idea. I sat down.
All the men scattered. The youngest one sat down in the dirt in front of me. I smiled at him and he smiled back. The old man returned and beside him walked a large, muscular man. He was dressed in a tunic, on his head he wore a knit cap, his feet were bare and his legs uncovered. He seemed to be middle-aged, and he walked with the step of authority. Perhaps this was the chief, I thought. I waited to see what would happen.
He stood in front of me and gave a speech. I don’t have the slightest idea what he said. It sounded like, “Shhh slizzz gah-ah zozz soss shhh…” That’s the best I can remember.
He spoke for a long time. I smiled throughout the entire thing. When he finished, I bowed my head and said, “Thank you. Thank you.”
The old man said something to the chief. The chief nodded. The he faced one of the huts and yelled something. A girl and a boy came out. The girl carried a large gourd and the boy a big chunk of flat bark on which there was some food. They had obviously been waiting for the call. The girl gave me the gourd. It was filled with water. I took a swig and smiled at her and handed it back. The boy proffered the bark platter. On it was a pile of what looked like baked matzo balls, and something that resembled scrambled eggs, but oilier.
I took one of the balls and took a bite. I was resolved to smile and enjoy it no matter what it tasted like. It seemed to be cooked wild rice. Oddly seasoned, but edible. I took another bite. I figured if the food didn’t kill them then it wouldn’t kill me.
After I ate a second rice ball and took another large gulp of water, I tried to indicate that I wanted to return to my instruments. I stood up—slowly—and pointed back the way I had come. I kept on pointing and saying, “Please, please, please,” even though I knew they wouldn’t understand me.
The chief seemed to get the idea. He recited another long speech and pointed the same direction as me. I nodded and turned around, and cautiously made my way back.
I walked though the pasture, careful to stay far away from the huge lizards. Boys and girls followed me, overcome with curiosity, I’m sure, as they probably had never seen a foreigner on this strange island.
It took me a while to find my way back through the forest, but I have a good sense of direction and I could see where the sun was in the sky through the canopy of the trees. Eventually I found myself back in the clearing where my instruments awaited. Untouched. I breathed a sigh of relief.
A few of the children watched me unpack the rest of the instruments and set them up. They stayed a respectful distance away as I mounted the instruments, stabilized them, and prepared to take some readings.
When I flipped the switch on the vector magnetometer, and the battery power light glowed red, the children grew excited. One of them pointed at the light and they all started jabbering in the shush-shushy way they had. I quickly took some readings. They were off the chart. The magnetic anomalies were huge—I mean really huge!—and they were fluctuating before my eyes (that is, the digital readout kept changing, rather than settling down to a single value, as usual.)
My theory now had quantitative proof. It was possible for a magnetodynamic anomaly to allow unidirectional transmission of electromagnetic waves. I was on a hitherto unknown island, which received its full measure of sunlight, but from which no light was ever emitted. It was like a local, terrestrial black hole (but one for which the gravity was normal). From the outside, the magnetodynamic dome would appear like a perfect mirror, reflecting the light from the sky and the ocean back to the viewer, so that nothing under the dome could be seen; but from the inside of the dome, everything appeared completely normal. It was only through the accurate measurements of the magnetic anomalies using the quantum-entangled Hall effect, that this phenomenon could be detected at all. (I suppose I might add, humbly, that the quantum-entangled Hall effect vector magnetometer was my own invention.)
For safekeeping, I recorded the measurements in my pocket notebook. Just in case the memories of the instruments were erased, at least I would have a paper copy to refer to. As soon as I took out my paper notepad and pen and started to transcribe the measurements, one of the boys got excited. He pointed to me and squealed something to his friends. Then he sprinted away.
I was packing up the instruments, and getting ready to pitch my tent, when the boy reappeared. He was out of breath and he was holding something in his hand. He held it out to me. It was a notebook. A plain spiral-bound paper notebook, just like anyone could buy in any convenience store.
The boy held the notebook out to me. I took it gingerly. It was old. The pages were yellow, and the cover was curled from moisture. The writing on the pages was perfectly clear, though. I started skimming through it.
They were field notes, apparently from an anthropologist who had visited this island some years previously. There were pages of what appeared to be notes on the language spoken by these people (which I skipped), and some pages devoted to their customs. I was sure this notebook would be a valuable contribution to the anthropologists and other scientists who studied exotic cultures, so I slipped the notebook into my backpack.
The boy who had handed it to me grew upset. He started gesturing and pointing at my backpack and saying something which I couldn’t understand. The other children became involved. One of them walked behind me and was tapping on the pack’s pocket where I had put the notebook.
I wasn’t sure what to do. I could tell they wanted the notebook back, but its contents could be a valuable contribution to the advancement of science. I was standing on what must be the most isolated location on the entire planet, surrounded by a people whose culture and language had developed with no contact whatsoever from outsiders, and the notebook was the key to all of that. On the other hand, perhaps the notebook was revered by these people, some sort of totem that had been brought ashore by an unlucky explorer many years ago. If I tried to steal it, things could go sour fast. And if that happened, no one would ever know about the magnetodynamic dome that existed right here on the surface of the Earth. There would be no citation of my research, except maybe a footnote in an obscure journal saying I had been lost at sea after what had started out as a promising career in physics.
I opened the backpack and returned the notebook to the boy. Everyone settled down at once. The boy, tightly grasping the notebook, bowed his head and slowly gave a short speech. I guess he was thanking me for returning it, but I truly had no clue, or why the speech went on for so long. Then, to my amazement, two other children also gave speeches. Why would anyone need to be thanked thrice, and in such verbose terms? Maybe they weren’t thanking me at all. Maybe they were inviting me to a banquet dinner. I wish I had studied a bit of linguistics when I’d been an undergrad.
Since the sun was setting, I finished pitching my tent and crawled inside, placing my instruments near the entrance so I could stop anyone from stealing them. Early the next morning, I woke with the early sun, and returned to the shingled beach.
A few hours later I saw the plane as it swooped low in circle—but didn’t land. Of course, the pilot couldn’t see me; I was inside the dome. No light could exit, so I was effectively invisible.
I got back in the rubber raft and started to row. Unfortunately, the wind was against me and the waves were much rougher than the day before. I rowed as strongly as I could, hoping to penetrate the dome before the pilot left the area thinking that I had drowned in the ocean.
Then, I saw the plane turn north, back to the Cook Islands, where it was hangared. I wasn’t sure I had breached through the magnetodynamic dome, but I knew I had only one chance. I took the flare from my life vest and ignited it. I stood up in the raft, despite the rough sea, and waved the flare back and forth hoping that it would attract the eyes of the pilot. It did—thank goodness—and he swung back towards me, getting ready to land.
But then, a particularly large wave knocked me off the raft! I surfaced and swam to the raft and clung to the edge. I knew the waters were infested with sharks—and who knew what other hungry fish—and I tried to pull myself aboard. But the sides of the raft were too slippery and I just couldn’t manage to get myself over the gunwale.
Just as the plane coasted close to me on its pontoons, a shark surfaced and bit into the raft. It immediately deflated, and it was with true shock and dismay that I saw my instruments sink to the bottom of the sea. The pilot was gesturing wildly to me and I swam as quickly as I could the few yards that separated me from the plane, terrified that the shark, unhappy with a mouthful of rubber, would take a bite of me next. The pilot gave me a hand, and I climbed gratefully into the passenger seat of the plane, soaked through and through.
There was no sign of the raft. Everything aboard had sunk out of sight. As I fastened my seatbelt and the pilot revved the engine, I thought, “At least I was clever enough to make a paper copy of the readouts.” I took out my notepad, and my blood froze in my veins. I swear my heart stopped for a beat. The ink I had used had run in the saltwater, and nothing I’d transcribed was readable.
I had failed. I’d spent every last penny of my savings on this experiment—which had been much scoffed at by my colleagues—and now I had nothing to show for it. Not a blessed thing. No one would ever believe me. I had never felt so miserable and disheartened in my life. What was the point of going on with it all?
(Here ends the account by the unknown author of this
journal. No one can say how these pages appeared in the Hunt library, or
speculate as to the identity of the author. There is no record of a
“quantum-entangled Hall effect vector magnetometer” (and the physicists whom I
queried laughed at the very idea). Nevertheless, this compiler feels that it is
obvious that the diarist must have visited the island of the Beltös people, and
so has preserved these notes verbatim.)
The
Story of Visitor #5 (a shipwreck)
These pages were found in the office of Akelo ——,
Professor of Linguistics at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, upon his
untimely death from heart failure. They were subsequently delivered to the
compiler of these stories of the elusive Beltös people.
The scotch was gone and so was the vodka. My head throbbed like a Harley without a muffler. Michael (not Mike, and never Mikey) was such an idiot. “Let’s take a little joyride on a yacht,” he’d said. “It’ll be such a buzz!” I’d just met him the day before, and after a woozy night, and not a very memorable one at that, and a bleary morning with the sun already pounding on my eyelids, it seemed like a great idea. What a lark! Borrow some rich dude’s yacht, and off we go, leaving the harbor on Maui for tropical parts unknown, and unencumbered by the fact that we were both low on the greenbacks, and neither of us dared use the plastic because we might be traced.
Two days later, I was lounging on the deck of a luxury catamaran, sucking down the last of the modestly stocked bar, and wondering where the hell Michael had tossed my black leather bikini. “Never trust a drunken sailor,” was something my mother had told me, and she had been proven right, yet again. On the other hand, the reason I existed at all was because she had trusted a drunken sailor.
Where the hell were we? Michael had claimed he knew his way around a boat, but I could see the desperation in his eyes. We were lost, somewhere in the south Pacific, and all I could see in any direction was the deep blue of the sea and the equally deep blue of the cloudless sky.
This had all seemed like such a killer thing to do. Sure, steal a yacht and escape the troubles of modern life. Now we were probably going to die out here. Why the hell couldn’t Michael get the radio to work? He’d said something about a missing battery, but what the fuck, didn’t they have spares? I clamped the shades over my eyes and scanned the horizon which was as flat and featureless as ever, except for some heat waves off the left side (oops, the port side) of the boat.
“Hey, look at that,” I said to Michael, pointing.
“Maybe it’s land,” he said.
He went to the cabin and pulled some levers, or whatever, and the boat turned around toward the heat shimmer. It was choppy going now. I hoped he was right, but with his luck, and mine, it would probably just be a bunch of sharp rocks and we would crash and drown.
I don’t remember what happened next very clearly. The heat shimmer got bigger and bigger as we got closer. Then all of a sudden there were rocks. Lots of rocks! And the hull of the catamaran smashed into some and I was in the water. The waves kept pulling me under, and I smashed my head on something, but I didn’t pass out, and I kept trying to swim to the surface to get a gulp of air, and then I felt gravel under my feet, and I pulled as hard as I could to get out of the surf, and then…
I woke up with a huge headache, plus a hangover the size of the Ritz, and two men were staring down at me, and I could tell they sure weren’t Hawaiians from the way they were dressed, wearing nothing but loincloths and shell necklaces, and then I tried to move and a horrible sharp pain went through my right arm and I saw that it was bent backwards, and one of the men reached out to me, and then I passed out again.
The next time I opened my eyes it was evening, or maybe early morning, I couldn’t tell. I was lying in some kind of hut, on a grass mat, and I could hear voices outside. And the birds, I could hear birds chirping and chirping and there were just so many. I tried to shift up on my elbows to get a look out of the doorway, but my arm was bound up with some sort of cloth like burlap. I must’ve broken it. And where, where, where the hell was Michael?
***
The next days were sort of a blur. Partly, because I’d almost drowned. Partly, because I had no idea where I was or what was going on. But mostly, because I really, really needed a drink. At least my arm was a lot better.
Anyway, the people were really nice to me. Girls and boys, almost teenagers but not quite, would bring me food on a wide piece of bark and water in a gourd. They would try to talk to me, but I couldn’t understand the language. So I nodded and smiled and they smiled back.
I figured Michael was dead. It made my head hurt to think about it. Or maybe that was the lack of vodka. After a while, I started to get out of bed every day (if that’s what you call a pile of straw on the mud floor of a hut), to walk around and say hello to people. They would greet me back. It sounded like, “She shay she something, something, something.” Or maybe they would mimic me and say, “Ello” or “Ah-ello.”
I noticed some women and one guy forming pots of clay and then baking them in the coals of a hot fire. I knew how to do that, so I sat down among them and grabbed some clay and started molding a bowl with my hands. They nodded to me and smiled.
My bowls weren’t as neat or smooth as theirs, but no one complained. When I handed them to a woman to put into the fire she smoothed out some of the bumps, and didn’t make a big deal about my cruddy work. I noticed the man looking at me from time to time. He was probably nineteen or twenty, I guess, and pretty cute. And he had a surfer’s body. Not a pinch of fat on him.
Bit by bit, I got accustomed to the routine. I started to help with some of the sewing, too. I thought I knew how to sew, but they used needles made out of thorns, and the thread was really coarse, and it took me a while to get the hang of it.
I learned a few words of the language. I could say hello (yams) and thank you (diznash) and please (pam-ih-eh) and a few other words like clay (izboldammoan) and bowl (segem) and fire (zes-ahm) and thread (tijmemzeh). But, for the life of me, I really couldn’t understand their lingo at all. It sounded mostly like they were shushing each other, “Shh shh shh. Zzz Zzz,” was how it sounded to me. More or less.
The life was pretty simple. They gave me a place to sleep, and food, and I could get my own water from the brook and wash myself, but my clothes were getting pretty tattered, and I figured I’d have to go native pretty soon in a toga like all the women wore. I made bowls and platters out of clay, and I sewed and mended clothes with the rest of the women.
That cute guy who helped out with the clay work started looking at me in that way men have when they’re interested. I waited for him to make a move, but nothing happened. It’s probably pretty hard to feed a girl a line when you don’t know the language. But I knew what he wanted. And it had been a long time for me. A long time. And Michael was gone. So I started giving him the same sort of looks back.
Some things are the same in every language.
***
Akelo was shy at first. That was his name, Akelo. I told him my name was Sarah, but the closest he could do was Sallah. Shy or not, he knew what to do once he got started, and his body was as firm and muscular as it looked. Pretty soon, I was sleeping every night at his place in the corner of one of the wood houses in the village. The same straw on a mud floor as usual, and not a shred of privacy, but life seemed softer and kinder when Akelo was lying beside me.
Anyway, the women who I sewed and potted with started looking away from me. I figured they were jealous. Then one day, an old man wearing some sort of goofy knit hat came up to me and gave a speech. Damned if I knew what he said, but it was clear he wanted me to follow him. All the women around the sewing circle were quiet and watching me. I figured I didn’t have any choice anyway, so I followed the old guy.
He brought me to one of the big buildings in the village. It was made out of branches and mud, like the others, but it was three times the size. There were a whole bunch of men and women sitting inside, around a small fire. Most of them were the old people of the village, plus one younger dude I’d noticed before, who wore a whole bunch of shell necklaces all the time, and never seemed to do much work. Akelo was there too. He was sitting in the far corner. As soon as he saw me he looked down at the floor.
The old man who had brought me pointed to a spot near the fire and I sat down. Then he said something to Akelo. He got up and gingerly sat next to me, but he didn’t raise his eyes. The guy with the necklaces got up and gave a speech. It was really long. As it went on, Akelo’s head sunk lower and lower. I had no idea what was being said but I could sense that punishment was coming. If not for me, then for Akelo for sure.
The necklace guy asked something and waited. Without raising his head, Akelo said, “Jizdah,” which I knew meant “I’m sorry.” Then there was another question, and Akelo said, “Jizdah” again. It went on like this for a while. Necklace guy asking a question and Akelo apologizing. I knew he was apologizing for me. I wasn’t sure what was going on, but I knew we weren’t going to be together any more.
Then the dude with the necklaces looked straight at me and asked something. I just stared. Akelo whispered “Jizdah” so I said that aloud. This happened a few times and then he asked me another question and before I could say I’m sorry yet again, Akelo nudged me. I looked at him. He whispered, “Jayshay tedadaj-han-ee.[1]” I said that aloud. This happened twice more.
Then the entire group said something that sounded like, “Yo, ya hendaj-han-hin shet-dabazkolos,[2]” plus more that I can’t remember.
Necklace guy sent Akelo outside. Akelo didn’t even turn his head, but I could tell by his slow walk that he wished he didn’t have to leave my side.
Then necklace guy gave me a bowl filled with a dark green broth. I tasted it. It was as bitter as sin. I glanced up and he was staring right at me, without blinking, so I chugged it all down and tried not to gag. He took the empty bowl from me and said something that sounded like, “Ya-ho hoka hinblogem bos jetis shemmah-e-o zim-ha.[3]” All the people in the hut repeated that aloud. Then he raised both arms and everyone got up and filed out the door.
It was almost sunset. I walked back to the hut where I had slept before I was with Akelo. My stomach was upset and I felt groggy. I lay down on the straw and fell asleep.
And then, I had the most vivid dream I’ve ever had. I was standing in a field. I recognized it as the one where those huge lizards lived. They were apparently tame, as the children would walk around the field without a care, but the sight of these gigantic iguana creatures terrified me. In the dream, the biggest lizard I had ever seen came to me. It was like a horse in size. Or even an elephant. Or a dinosaur. The lizard spoke to me – in English! It said, “You must go home. You must go home. You must go home.” I nodded my head and said, “I’m sorry,” three times. The lizard flickered its forked tongue at me.
I woke up. It was early morning. I was on a beach. Naked and sunburnt all over. Some fat white guy wearing a Hawaiian shirt and khaki shorts was standing over me, staring at my boobs. “Were you shipwrecked?” he said.
I squinted in the sun. Even that hurt my face. “You’re, like, totally burnt all over,” he said. “You got to get some shelter.” He helped me up and led me to a beach cabin. “I’ll call for help,” he added.
“Where am I” I managed to whisper.
“Paako cove.”
I thought I hadn’t heard right. “Where?”
“Paako cove beach. In Maui. Hawaii. You’re all disoriented, I guess.”
Yeah, I guess.
***
Eight months later, my son was born. I named him Akelo.
The birth of my son changed my life. Now I had someone who needed me. I took a job as the greeter at a fancy tourist restaurant in Maui. I knew the only reason I got hired was because of my figure and my smile, but I needed the work. It wasn’t much of a job, but it paid the bills. I found a girl to babysit little Akelo during the evenings when I was at work. She speaks native Hawaiian and I’m encouraging her to use it around Akelo so that he can learn it too. It doesn’t sound anything like the language of Akelo’s people, but it’s the best I could come up with.
Akelo’s still a baby, but someday he’ll want to know where he comes from. He’s going to figure out that his dad wasn’t white. I’m writing this diary to give to him, when he’s old enough to understand. Maybe I’ll be alive when the time comes, and maybe I won’t. I’ve long gotten used to the idea that life is not predictable, even in the slightest. Life is just weirder than we ever imagine, that’s about all I can say. Maybe someday Akelo will find his father. I can only hope.
Although there is yet a need for anonymity, a need which
surely will continue until the day of her death, the author of the above
narrative feels that her personal story of the Beltös people must be recorded
for posterity, and has dictated it to her son. This parenthetical note has been
inserted at his insistence, for he likewise feels that his mother’s story must
be heard. The author freely states, of her own admission, that her visit to the
island of the Beltös people was unplanned and unintentional, and although
something good resulted that forever changed her life for the better, the
experience is something that she would never wish upon her worst enemies.