Last Update : Thursday 9 August, 2001 10:13 PM
Last Update : Thursday 9 August, 2001 10:13 PM |
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Combat Manta ray
BEGINNING
BEGINNING
“Flap…flap…flap”
“Hey! There she goes.”
“Flap…flap…flap”
“Hey! Here she comes.”
Divers were sending their hand signals to each other. If there could be sound under water, the sea would have been noisy from frogmen that day.
“Flap…flap…flap”
I stared at the dark shadow in front of me steering around the group of divers, coming nearer…nearer. I saw both wingtips stretched flatly before lifted up, and flapped rhythmically pass the water propelling the body of more than four meter wide toward me…for an encounter…to make this documentary come true.
My hands clutched the camera. My mind was tensed. Was it a dream? Let alone the dream, I had never dared even to think about it. To think of producing a documentary about manta ray by a Thai staff was a joke that even westerners are almost at their wits end. How could we? How long would it take? How much resource would have to be spent? Who would know when she would appear?
But at the end, the sea gave me…and her …a chance. The chance given once in a lifetime to bring photographs and memories back home in order to tell other Thais that there was such wonder awaiting, under the water.
Amidst the blue wide world, I kept myself afloat waiting for the encounter with Manta Ray – the world’s largest stingray.
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