In the Time of Madness by Richard Lloyd Parry

Author:Richard Lloyd Parry [Unknown]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
Published: 2005-11-03T04:00:00+00:00

THE SHARK CAGE: EAST TIMOR 1998-1999

THE CROCODILE

In Dili, a few months after Suharto’s fall, I met a young woman named Rosa Soares who worked as a reporter on the local newspaper Voice of East Timor. I asked her about Timorese legends, and she told me this story.

Long ago, in this part of the world, there was no Timor and no Timorese, only a tiny isolated island in the middle of the ocean inhabited by two little boys. One day they were playing on the beach when they came across a great crocodile who had been washed ashore. The crocodile was exhausted and close to death; the little boys were afraid of him. But pity overcame their fear. Cautiously, they brought the creature fresh water and fish, and pushed him back into the sea. Soon, he revived; moved by the kindness of his rescuers, he asked what he could do for them in return. The little boys were lonely on their island and had never stepped off it in their lives. ‘Let us ride on your back,’ they said, ‘so that we can see for ourselves this island where we live.’

So the boys climbed onto the crocodile’s broad back, and the three of them sailed off. The crocodile swam and swam, and the boys were delighted with everything they saw. Whenever the crocodile was about to pause and rest, they always spied some new attraction and insisted on swimming over to see it. The crocodile began to feel exhausted again; above all, he began to feel hungry. Soon he was very hungry indeed. As the boys laughed and gurgled on his back, he considered what to do.

The boys might be small, but they were tender and juicy: a flick of his great tail, two gulps, and the crocodile’s hunger would be satisfied. But they had saved his life, and he could not bring himself to take theirs. So he continued to swim round and round the tiny island, the burden on his back becoming heavier and heavier, the movement of his tail slower and slower, until he stopped moving for ever.

In death, the crocodile became the island of Timor: his nose was at Kupang in the Indonesian west, his tail was at the eastern town of Tutuala, and his spiny back formed the mountains where Falintil lived. ‘So, somehow, the two little boys found two girls,’ Rosa said, ‘and their children were the first Timorese. The little island where they first lived is Pulau Semau, off Kupang. So that’s why Timorese are not afraid of crocodiles, because they protect us.’

A moment or two later, Rosa said, ‘Well, that’s not strictly true. There’s a priest in Dili who has a crocodile as a pet, and once an old man tried to feed it. It bit his arm off above the elbow. So people are afraid, but they’re not, if you understand what I mean.’

I asked whether wild crocodiles were often seen.

‘Quite often,’ said Rosa. ‘When they’re seen by the shore, it’s a sign that something is going to happen, something big.

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