Waterfront

No overnight rain in Chennai, reports Mu with a screwing of face at the the counter this morning. Two hundred kilometres and ten hours out, the position was not so dire for Muttalib’s family. It was a surprise to find Chennai, the former Brit. era Madras, so far north on the Tamil Nadu coast, quite close to the border of Andhra Pradesh. The roads of course inland where Mu likely hailed from remained in very poor condition. Another report recently mentioned a famous six kilometre beach it may have been at Chennai which attracted thousands, or hundreds of thousands, daily. It had been the KV Auntie who had first mentioned the beach at Chennai. Visiting her sisters for weddings in recent years she had remarked that the beach was right there where they lived; they were almost beach-front. You were nobody of course without a prospect on the water, if not the beach itself. Here at the East Coast housing towers, where the development sat on reclaimed land, the occupants looked out on the steamy water where the prospect presented something rather like the Allied landing off Normandy 1944, with the container ships and tankers queueing for entry. Up in the ancestral village in Montenegro the Bastard Zarko had told of his famous conquest of a young wife from the Herzegovina in his late middle age. In presenting his case to the lady Zarko had listed all his assets: his extensive herd, his fields, money in the bank and house with a prospect on the water. At the lower end toward Morinj a few hundred metres from Zarko there indeed could be caught a glimpse of blue that must have been out toward Kotor or Tivat perhaps. A descent from the heights of near an hour for a woman in order to reach the coast; if she was carrying produce for selling at the market a good deal longer following the animal track. Like so many of the old timers, Zarko was a great raconteur. None could spustit ti, slip one on you, like a shepherd, Babi had suggested. All day up on the sides with the herd that was all they thought about, formulating their witticisms and ripostes. Last winter only two or three of the houses in the village had been occupied; all the others had descended to the water, or the lower slopes at least. As the Spring has come on the planting has started, a couple of weeks ago Zoro sending a beautiful picture of his potato field sitting in the rich, dark alpine soil. Ubajska krtola, tatters, continued to fetch premium prices down at Novi and Kotor, the fancy restos often buying.