“Duck!” calls out Annamalai. He crouches under thorny underbrush and gestures for us to follow suit. “ Illati parandhiruvanga — or else they will fly away,” he explains, his eyes focussed on a floating pink cloud of hundreds of greater flamingos ahead of us. They saunter on the shallow Pulicat Lake, their beaks bent into the brackish water to catch fish and shrimps. It’s an other-worldly sight; but Annamalai’s excitement to show it to us is much more than ours. His eyes widen and face muscles tense as he points to the magnificence he is witness to, every day of his life.
A fisherman who catches shrimps for a living, Annamalai was born in Annamalaicheri, a fishing village by the Pulicat Lake. The 35-year-old started fishing in the lagoon when he was six years old. “I had to stop school to support my family,” he says. Shrimps are his lifeblood and Annamalai shares it with his bird-neighbours for whom shrimps are part of their chief diet. He has a fascination for the birds, and ensures that this rubs onto those who visit his village and fellow villagers.
“ Enakku parava na interest-u — I am interested in birds,” he says as he walks on a mud track that leads into a clearing by the edge of the lagoon. Annamalai enjoys ferrying bird-lovers across the Pulicat Lake on his boat to see flamingos and photograph them. “I did it for almost eight years,” he says.
City-folks come to the village seeking him; they would give him a couple of hundred rupees or more for his services and Annamalai would be with them from dawn to noon and sometimes treat them to a meal of shrimps prepared by his wife Nadhiya. “I would skip fishing that day,” he explains.
Initially, it was the visiting bird-lovers who triggered his interest in flamingos. But Annamalai gradually developed a passion for them that he observes their every movement — he knows their moods; understands their behaviours. He can tell you English and Tamil names of the birds that visit his village and talk about their features. The guy with a red beak, the one with a black body, that which sings non-stop at dawn…he talks about them with a gleam in his eye.
Annamalai feels that the flamingos that visit his village should not be disturbed. “They direct us to places where there are a good number of shrimps,” he says. In this patch of water where man and birds harvest each other’s share of sea life, people such as him ensure that there’s harmony. The birds are protected; their presence supports the people, who in turn support them. The people of Annamalaicheri have taken the cue from Annamalai — several fishermen have come forward to take visitors around the lagoon to see flamingos. But the villagers maintain that only one boat does so at a given time; a practice that ensures that the birds are not disturbed.
“There was an auction this year to decide who has the privilege,” says Annamalai. Participants had to pay a few thousands to the village temple to be given the licence to ferry bird-lovers on their boat. “I lost,” he says, as he rows us some distance into the water. “But I will bid next year and win,” he adds. We see the flamingos a little distance away and are tempted to move closer for a better look. Annamalai gently refuses. “I can’t go further,” he gives a toothy smile. “ Oor kattupadu . And let’s not disturb the birds.”
