The word ‘surfing’ brings to mind images of exotic locations like Bali, the Gold Coast (Australia), J’ Bay (South Africa) and Hawaii. I imagine men and women, mostly white, on their boards paddling into the waters only to leap onto the feet, tunnelling their way through the wave, allowing it to embrace and engulf them. I see surfing as a sport, a leisure activity of the westerner. If any Indians are involved in surfing, they are those who live life in cocooned luxury.
Meet Murthy and his beach boys and all these images will be reset. Murthy belongs to Kovalam, the little fishing village 35 kilometres from Chennai. As to any person of the seas, ‘land’ to Murthy only meant the beach and ‘life’ was the ocean. He grew up, ducking school ever so often, only to play with his friends — ‘the waves’. Soon, like his father and his father’s father, he went fishing looking for the jewels of the ocean. But that was not the real reason he was at sea; the sea was more than an occupation, she was his companion.
In 2001, Murthy spotted a man, a swami, surfing on the Kovalam beach. He picked up courage to ask for the board for a few minutes. He says, “Those 20 minutes on the board changed my life.” He had touched the dream of his life, the reason for his existence, and he was not one to let that feeling evaporate. By 2003, Murthy had got himself a small surfing board from a friend in the village, who did not realise its value, and was riding the waves. The only ones who knew about the beauty of the Kovalam surf were a few foreigners like Tobais, a German. Soon they were friends and Murthy was their outpost contact, messaging them updates such as “today’s waves… two ft…off shore wind.”
