I was clinging to the flagpole desperately. The cold rusted metal was eating into my skin. It was not painted in a long time and covered with bird droppings. I tightened my grip, looked around, there was nobody on the deck. I yelled for help but the sea wind crushed my voice. The sea was rough, the ship was moving forward only at 5-10 knots yet the water was almost making my feet wet. I could see the harbor; “Hang on”, I told myself. In situations like these you might pride yourself being a Hindu with 33 million gods to call upon. The difficult part lay in carefully choosing the few who might help you out. Calling out the different names I prayed, wish we had a spider god who could have given me the required powers. My fingers were aching to let go, how I regret eating those delicious all you can eat buffets. I tried lifting my body in vain, cursing my muscles. I tried placing my leg on the sides of the ‘The Hamlet’; they were very slippery to say the least. The irony in the name made me smile, could I be a tragic prince and then my hand gave away.
My flailing hands caught the stuttering flag and my body swung like a pendulum. The harbor was still a few meters away, were the gods’ intent on giving me another chance at life. The old flag was no match for my couch potato body. The eerie tearing sound of the cloth made me cringe. Not again, I was so close. The prayers started with double the intensity and the cloth seemed to acknowledge by tearing faster. The moving ship, the sound of sea, the tearing of the fabric, the world seemed to work in a musical harmony against me. The flag ripped off and my body almost floated for a second before dropping like a rock.
I had almost forgotten how good a swimmer I was. There was something with water that I had loved all my life; being submerged always gave my thoughts more clarity and peace. May be I was a hippo or a fish in my previous life some had said. Being from a coastal town, my father had made sure that I learnt swimming in the sea from a pretty early age. It had included several baptisms with him always around to protect me. Even in winter the sea in India was never this cold. Today it was almost freezing; the icy waters were like sharp knives across my face. As the water seeped in through my jacket it made it a lot heavier and the heavy sole woodland boots made it tougher to rise up. The swinging flag had made sure I was not directly under the ship. As my head rose above water, I tried to take in as much air as possible. The ship was making the water sway unpredictably. Suddenly something hit me.
’Håll den’, somebody shouted. Whatever that meant, I made sure I held on to the lifebuoy. Staying afloat on it was easy; I could see some people dive from the ship. I felt a tug, I smiled and then everything blacked out.
