In Search of the Lighthouse Keeper’s Residence

Part 2

Well, I think everything depends on where, how and with what one grows up.. I grew up in a not-so-safe neighbourhood (at least it was considered so by parents who have young daughters) in Colombo, where I spent all my teenage years, up until I was 19. I remember, some of my friends were not allowed to visit my place, and even if they did so, they were strongly advised by their parents to take an auto (three-wheel taxi), not bus and NEVER walking. Though I personally never felt unsafe, there were reasons for some to fear. There were slums along the railroad right next to the street where I lived, and these slums were full of drug dealers (the term used by our mom to refer these guys, ‘kudukaaran’ always amused us, since ‘kudu’ is a Sinhala word for some kind of narcotic, and ‘kaaran’ is a Tamil preposition which means anyone/the actor doing or using) and all sorts of people. Since the age of 13, I travelled within the city on my own (without anyone accompanying me, and that’s in a sense, an unimaginable thing for some families, even today) and of course I had to pass these slums every time I walk out of the door.

Unlike others, my parents never worried too much about the neighbourhood, but whenever I had to return home late in the evening they always ask me to take the bus, and not to walk through the deserted roads. But I hated the bus. Bus number 155 is the only bus that goes through our neighbourhood, well, there was also 167 but for some reason it doesn’t run so often, and it completely stopped some years back. One of the main reasons why I hate 155 is that, it’s always highly crowded (especially during peak times), crowded in a sense that sometimes, you won’t have enough space to land both your feet, and there were times when I had to stand on my toes. The crowd will push you, crush you, squeeze you, and that’s also a good opportunity for many to physically abuse girls. One could never tell the difference, if a guy crushing you is doing that intentionally or if he’s really helpless. There were times when I got really mad, I was trying to resist, to yell back, but things always flipped back at me. People point their fingers at you, you you’re a girl, you’re not supposed to be here, at this time, at this place, it’s YOUR fault! Like the guys are all innocent babies, and like I’m the one trying to provoke them.

But then, there are nice people too, most often grannies who come to your rescue, who sometimes offer their seats even if they can’t stand for too long. But I hated the bus because I have always been very conscious of my physical space, I hate anybody who violates that space. So instead, I choose to walk home, even though it’s quite late. The roads will be deserted except for some guys drinking, or doing whatever in the corners, and not all the streets have adequate lights. But still I preferred to walk. I used to lie to my parents that I did take the bus, when I was actually walking home. And I buy wild berries and acharu from roadside sellers with the money amma gave for bus tickets, and enjoy my walk back home. Of course, I do encounter ‘kudukaarankal’ and drunken men along the road, but they usually mind their own businesses and I mind mine. It was during one of these walks back home at late night, I wrote the poem “இரவின் தடங்கள்” (I was 15 or 16 back then), which depicts a girl walking alone in the dark, the footsteps she hear in the distance, and the confusing feelings the darkness arouse in her. (The link for that poem: http://rekupthi.blogspot.com/2006/10/blog-post_16.html)

Thus, I grew up with all these paranoia towards strangers, slums, the darkness, the deserted streets, and men, especially MEN. We grew up with stories, stories of girls being abused in the hands of strange, poor, alcoholics and drug addicts. But through my experiences, I kinda hated the professionally well-dressed, decent-looking, middle-aged men travelling in the bus more than the others. But then, in one way or the other, all these are highly stereotyped prejudices with which I, as a girl, grew up. Though I am too far away from Colombo right now, I still can’t ignore these feelings, the fears, and the anxiety which keep shadowing me, no matter if I was travelling in some remote village in Denmark, or a populated city in Estonia. They follow me everywhere.

It’s with this background one should understand the things we’ve been through in Denmark. Done with flashbacks, let me go back to the Skåne (Oh, I learned from Min that the southern part of Sweden is called Skåne region because it was under the Danish kingdom for a long time) and Denmark Trip. So we made a mistake when booking the hostel in Copenhagen. Well, it was not actually our fault since the hostel we booked was listed under Copenhagen, while it was actually an hour and half away (by train) from the city. We found out the night before and it was too late to cancel the booking. I kinda liked that place and really wanted to go there even though it was quite far, mainly because the hostel is in the suburbs of a coastal town lying in the northernmost shores of Denmark. And the hostel is actually a renovated building from 17th century, and formerly was the residence of lighthouse keepers. There’s a lighthouse right next to it. The town is called Gilleleje but this lighthouse keeper’s residence is actually situated in the suburbs of the town, near Staeremosen, which is quite a remote area.

It was a late autumn evening.. In Northern Europe even as early as October the sun will set around 4 or 5pm. We left Copenhagen central station at about 4.30pm, headed towards Gilleleje, since we did not want to arrive at the town too late. We had to make a transfer at another station, and we had a hard time finding the right train. The details we had in our hand (the name of the town/train) didn’t match with the names on the screen. It was not a big station; there were only 3 or 4 platforms, but even the people we asked were not very sure and confused us even more. A lady finally pointed out a platform. There was a young guy, in his late teenages or maybe early 20’s, standing next to her and was listening to our conversation. And after a while, when the train arrived at the platform and we were ready to get into it, he came rushing towards us and told us that this is not the right train but the one on the opposite platform. And he ran away! We were really confused. The train will depart in few minutes. We rushed to the next platform, got into the train, and asked an old guy if this train will go to Staeremosen. But he pointed out to the other train. So we ran back again to the previous platform. It was heck of a day, with lots of running. Some hours back, on the same day in Malmo, we ran through the main streets of the city to get to the central station because we were late for our train, then we rushed up and down the stairs at Copenhagen station to catch the other train. And here again. All with 7kg heavy backpacks.

So we finally got into the train, and the train went on and on, through the woods, through remote landscapes, far away from the cities. It wasn’t even 6pm but the sky was already dark and felt like 9 or 10 at night. Then our train finally stopped at Staeremosen station. Well, I wouldn’t call it a station. It was just a platform. And there was also a bench with a roof and that’s it. Nothing else. Only 6 people got off at that station including the two of us. Though it was pitch dark we were a little confident since we had directions in our hand. But all our confidence gave up on us when we got off the train. The direction started off like this: “walk towards southeast and continue on … street”. Okej, but we didn’t even know where the south or where the east is, and how the heck we’re supposed to find the southeast? There were no streets as far as our eyes could see in that dark. We had a clever idea. We decided to follow the people who got off the train with us. There was a young guy, who disappeared somewhere soon after we got off. And there were another three people, walking together in front of us, two men and a girl. We followed them for a while, with the hope that they would lead us to some street, so we could continue on our own.

But no, they were walking on a narrow path, which we couldn’t consider a street, because it was going through the fields. There were bushes and trees on either side, and it was not even a tar road. We decided it’s better to ask them. We ran towards them, explained our situation, only to learn that they don’t understand a single word in English. And we didn’t know a single word in Danish. Though both Swedish and Danish languages are so much similar, our basic Swedish didn’t help us there. We employed all forms of communication, actions, gestures, but no help. They didn’t know the street we were looking for, maybe they just didn’t understand our accent, or the way we pronounced the name of the street. I even showed them the printed address of our hostel, but they didn’t know it either. They were feeling terribly bad for not being able to help us. Though we didn’t understand a single word, it was apparent on their face. Feeling bad to trouble them, Min and I decided to search the street on our own. We departed, and walked in the opposite direction.

Fortunately, after sometime, we were able to find a big street (not that it was really big, but comparatively, since at least it’s big enough for vehicles). It was easy to follow the directions once we found the first street. Actually, the directions were meant for cars, which we found out later, since they took us right to a highway with no pedestrian walk. It was a strange experience walking on the highway for approximately 3 kilometres. Well, not walking, more precisely, running.. It scared the hell out of me, because it’s a perfect and typical setting we see in any horror movie. A two-lane highway with no single street light, with woods on both sides, and a heavy fog veiling the sight. The woods looked so creepy with the mist. Poor visibility, no street lights and no pedestrian walk mean the vehicles can’t see us and can easily hit and run. But I wasn’t afraid of death, no, not a bit. And I cared the least about the thieves, we had nothing precious with us. Rather, it was the fear of a lonely girl on the road. Technically, I wasn’t alone, Min was there, we had each other. Yet, I couldn’t help that inert fear.

We ran on that fog covered highway, with the help of our phone lights, and ONLY phone lights. There were vehicles passing once in a while, so whenever we saw a vehicle in the distance, we jumped to the side, on to the bush or woods.. The fog that evening was very thick that even if I walked a few steps away from Min, I feared I might not be able to see her. And Min took her hood off even though it was damn cold, because she said she might not hear me with the hood covering her head. The highway, and woods covered with heavy mist reminded me all the horror/ghost movies I’ve watched so far (Count in ‘I know what you did last summer’, ‘The motel’, ‘Gothika’, and many more). On a normal day, I’m not usually a very chatty person, but I was jabbering non-stop that night, all along the highway, to hide my fear.

Finally, we found the road – Fyrvejen, we’ve been looking for the whole evening. The lighthouse was situated in the shore, at the very end of that road, almost 500m away from the highway. Not to mention that the road was also very creepy, with mist covered fields on both sides. We noticed the light of the lighthouse and kept following it. After 200 or so metres, we came across a building, that somewhat looked like a hostel, and we tried to go in just to make sure we’re on the right road. But then, there came a dog barking at us, and it was not chained. That’s it. We turned back and started running again; we didn’t stop until we were sure that the dog is not following us. Heck of a day! Anyways, at the far end of the road, we finally found our hostel. We were so relieved to arrive there alas! What strange experiences or feelings journeys can bring to us? The day before, we were so happy and proud that we saw many places in a single day. But today, we are simply excited that we finally found the lighthouse keeper’s residence.

Well, the story didn’t end there. But I don’t want to drag it anymore. I’ll just sum it up in a few sentences. Upon our arrival, we found out that the hostel is rather a private house, and we were the only guests on that night. The only other person who lives there is our host – the housekeeper, a ‘middle-aged’ guy! And to make things worse, our room did not have a lock!! I think he understood our paranoia. It was so apparent on our face, we were terrified.. How can he not understand that? He left us alone that night.

However, our room was rather nice and cozy. It was worth all the trouble. Sitting in the room next to us, Min and I had some coffee and tea with bread and cookies. The warm drink down our throat was soothing our body and mind. We sat there talking and talking for hours. We laughed until our stomach hurts, until we had tears. We laughed for no specific reason but it helped to clear the tension. In a way, we were proud of ourselves for we didn’t freak out; we found the hostel at last, even though we were dead scared, and had to run along the highway without any proper lights. It was then I realized how strange life is. There we were, Min and I – who grew up in different parts of the world, meeting each other in some other corner (well, in Uppsala), travelling together just to get lost in a remote Danish coastal town. On that day, on that evening, in the remote suburbs of Gilleleje, I grew so fond of her. I wondered how different every single day can be, what strange things it can bring to us, and how our moods and feelings differ from day to day. I wondered what tomorrow will bring us..

And that’s how we celebrated our Halloween 2011!!