Jungle trek with tappal runner Kalua: Laggala — Pallegama in 1947

By Frederick Medis

It was 1947, and everywhere there was the lingering post-war euphoria of victory in the Second World War in which Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) had played a significant role with Lord Louis Mountbatten’s South-East Asia Command headquarters in Kandy. By now British, American, African and Indian troops had ceased to be evident in most of the populated areas, and the skies were free of the continual droning of British fighter airplanes as they rummaged the skies.

The Soulbury Commission had made its recommendations. Our college class studying the subject of government had been asked to go to the Colombo Town Hall and listen to some of the submissions and recommendations. Food scarcities and queues were quietly being eliminated, but prices were stabilizing at higher levels. The war had brought money into the hands and purses of many people, and a noveau riche was emerging. The five-cent emergency currency-note of June 1,, 1942 (divisible into two and three cents values) was slowly going out of use. The British Government had followed a policy of issuing low denomination currency as being the most effective method of stalling inflation.

Invitation to Laggala-Pallegama

I had just passed 20, and was awaiting results of the university entrance examination. Time was hanging heavy on my hands when, along with my parents and my sister, I attended the wedding reception of a family friend at the Silver Fawn Ballroom. This was one of Colombo’s fashionable places at the time; there were only three recognized hotels in Colombo and another in Mount Lavinia.

At this wedding reception I met a childhood friend and her husband, a planter of Eurasian descent, James Gibbs Martin. He was a happy-go-lucky man and a few years elder to me. He was interested in places connected with history and wildlife. While on a short holiday in the fast developing tea estate at Panwila in August 1945, we had explored what was then the dense jungle fastness of Hunasgiriya peak. Miles and miles of jungle were there with little life at all, both human and animal. Today it is vastly different.

We got into conversation and they invited me to spend a few days on the remote tea estate where he was now stationed temporarily. “Come”, he said, “to be in Kandy at night. Then at 5.20 in the morning take the train to Matale. From Matale there is a bus to Rattota, a sleepy village. Inquire at the Rattota Post Office and they will direct you to the only vehicle which plies the route.” (This “bus” was a small-sized converted lorry with strapped-on wooden benches and open wire grills for windows on either side.) “This makeshift bus will leave at about 9 am. They will charge you 40 cents as fare. It will stop a short distance from the rocky roadway leading to the small bungalow on Laggala Estate. The road that the bus travels is about 10 miles distant. It is narrow, rough and boulder-strewn. But hopefully, you can be with us for lunch by one o’clock in the afternoon.”

The description and the veiled warning forebode a journey of adventure, and I listened with ears and eyes wide open. Naturally, I agreed instinctively (with my parents’ permission). “Write,” they said, “before you come. There is no telephone communication. But in any case it does not matter. We are lonely out there and only the servants, estate workers and trackers are there in the vicinity.” I promised to write.

Rattota via Kandy and Matale

It was just before the Vesak festival in May that I decided to go. The evening train from Colombo Fort took me to Kandy for 90 cents in a third class compartment. At Kandy, it was too late to get to the home of friends in Suduhumpola. Besides, I had to be up and ready to board the 5.20 am train to Matale while it was still dark. I stayed in the rest room, where there was nobody else. The lounge chair was bug-infested. So I slept on the large table in the centre. A fair-sized cut-out of soft plastic, which I had brought with me, served as a good spread. It had served the purpose of a protective barrage balloon over ships in Colombo harbour during the war, and was freely available for sale in the Pettah at the time.

I was up at four in the morning, with the huffing and puffing of steam engines of trains serving as an alarm clock. I washed, ate some biscuits with plain tea from my vacuum flask (milk-tea gets spoilt after some hours) and I was ready.

My luggage consisted of my canvas boy-scout haversack in which I carried a change of clothes, a camera which was a gift from my father, a tripod stand for use with the automatic self-timing shutter, a vacuum flask and some miscellaneous essentials including aspirin, iodine, cotton wool and sticking plaster. For some unaccountable reason, in addition to biscuits, I had taken three anamalu plantains and a generous helping of jaggery cut into manageable pieces.

The train to Matale had a fair number of passengers. On reaching Matale, I crammed along with my haversack into the first available bus, which was shaped like Cinderella’s coach, and reached Rattota. I was shown the post office, which had not yet opened for business. I spent the extra time gainfully watching some well-cared for and trained Sinhala game-cocks tethered to a clump of plantain bushes down the shadowed slope on the opposite side of the road.

The owner, a bare-chested stalwart, was happy to discuss game-fowl characteristics with me. A few years earlier I had joined as a junior member of the Ceylon Poultry Club and by now I owned a few Sinhala game-birds, which had won awards at exhibitions. When he learnt where I was going, the man told me that the bus would not ply the route that day, as it was under repair. This was disturbing news.

When the post office opened, I renewed my inquiry regarding the bus. The officials confirmed the bad news. When they found out that I was determined, if necessary, to walk, they told me that it was a long and circuitous route of 17 miles to Pallegama, through streams and dense jungles infested by bear, wild boar and an occasional leopard. It was impossible, they told me disparagingly. I would get lost, and most likely never return.

Jungle walk with Kalua

However, there was a ray of hope, for soon after 9 am Kalua, the tappal-runner would leave the post office with the mail bag. I could go with him, if I was so inclined. They warned me: “You have to keep pace with him; he walks fast through the jungle. Don’t lag too far behind. You are inexperienced, and the jungle is dangerous.”

I had come this far, and I was determined to go on. I was wearing khaki shorts, my scout shirt with its numerous pockets, belt and pith hat. The haversack was strapped round my shoulders. I wore khaki hose-tops, for I probably thought of leeches, and comparatively new leather shoes with light-coloured compressed rubber soles.

A postal officer introduced me to Kalua. He was a dapper, black-complexioned man, as the name implied, nearly six feet tall, bare-footed and wearing a grey-brown sarong about 10 inches above ground, with a brass-buttoned official black serge coat. When told that I was keen to join him, Kalua grunted his approval. Aside, he spoke a few words to those who were sealing the smaller bags to be enclosed in the large canvas sack to be carried by him. I gathered from his gesticulations that what he was saying was “I have no time to waste. If he is slow I will leave him behind.”

The postmaster, as I guessed him to be, edged close to me. He said, “Don’t take off your shoes. Your feet are not used to the sharp rocks and thorns like our tappal-runner.” I nodded my thanks.

By now Kalua was ready. “Yamu (let’s go)”, he said bluntly and somewhat condescendingly. Impulsively, I moved forward at a steady pace behind him, with shoes and all.

For about one mile of descent, Kalua’s sturdy frame pushed through narrow jungle paths where there was evidence of at least some agricultural use. We were now leaving the semi-cultivated land and moving upwards for half a mile through brushwood and patna with sparse and heavily foliaged, gnarled trees.

The scene then changed. An occasional grunt made my muscles tense, but I was relieved to realize it came not from an animal, but from my leader and guide. Both Kalua and I took cautious steps as it was evident that hidden under the bushes with innocent-looking leaves were sharp drops that hid dangerous ravines and streams.

We had now reached an open valley. The gurgling sound indicated that there was a fast-moving stream winding over both sharp and rounded rocks of massive proportions. Kalua, balancing the mail-bag on his head, walked steadily through the water gushing a few inches below the knee. Above the sound of the rumbling water, he shouted to me to keep to the identical path he was taking. As there was no time for me to take off my footwear, I plunged in after the leader, with shoes and hose-tops to boot.

The upward climb through a heavily wooded area was not easy, especially with the fair weight of my haversack. It was then that I noted his feet. They were broad, strong and the toes splayed apart. This gave him a firm grip of whatever came in contact with them. This man walked with unusually erect posture. He was balancing the canvas postal bag vertically and sometimes horizontally on his head without the aid of his hands, except when he bent under creepers and low branches.

In his right hand he held something like a light manne knife and a nail about six inches long. From a cord on his left wrist was suspended a thin metal plate about two inches by five inches in size. He struck the nail on the plate from time to time, much like an alarm bell, whenever we crept through the bushes. Each alarm he sounded four or five times in a staccato rhythm. In the still silence of the morning it echoed, specially in those areas where a stray wind was swaying the low trees.

Kalua was a strong and bold man. How intrepid he was became evident to me when we were in a dense jungle area where he cut his way through the creepers and the tall, slender undergrowth, while I followed in his footsteps. The pathway he had cleared two days earlier had to be cut once again, so fast did the jungle regain its lush strength after the light rains.

In front of us was a sizeable mound, partly hidden by bushes and wild creepers. There was no other way in which we could move out except by going round the hillock. Trees on the sides were too dense and their huge trunks of wide circumference would daunt anyone thinking of going through their interstices.

Kalua moved round the hillock and I followed. And then I saw what made me tremble. Kalua simultaneously turned round with the bag gyrating on his head to keep direction. Looking at me he clamped his four fingers and thumb over his mouth. This was in much the same way that a school teacher places her index finger vertically over her lips, indicating that the pupils must keep silence.

On the mound I saw them; there were four black bears, three large and one small. Two were stamping around, and we heard the sound of loose earth being scattered on the leaves in front of us as they clawed the dry ant-hill, which was a fairly large termites’ nest.

Kalua paused momentarily, and without any hasty movement, indicated that I follow him in close formation. I was trembling. The sight was a menacing one, and the bears were above us about four yards away. After the encounter, Kalua was more relaxed and spoke occasionally.

As we passed the area of wet vegetation resulting from light rain, there arose from the ravine an uninterrupted sound of shrieking whistles, five or six long calls of high and low-pitched notes resembling a hen’s cackle, but reaching a crescendo and then going lower down the scale. This continued for a long time on a raucous, almost quarrelsome note. Without my inquiring, Kalua volunteered the information that it was the call of the Ceylon spur fowl (haban-kukula). He told me that we would perhaps see them if we were fortunate enough.

We continued to climb over the incline of what appeared to be a semi-montane wilderness, but the trees, though shorter, let in more streaks of sunlight on the dry decayed leaves which formed a thick carpet over the long and broad supporting roots. I asked Kalua about leeches. He grunted again, as the question appeared absurd to him. In any case, who bothered about leeches?

Then we heard the clattering as about 30 red-faced monkeys (rilaw) were swaying high up in the trees. They were a diversion. Kalua informed me that we were approaching a jungle clearing where three families chose to plant millet and kurakkan in the valley fed by a small ravine. They were a good distance away from the rest of humanity.

We came upon them in a few minutes. A tiny straw-thatched hut served as a small boutique, but there was nothing to buy except a welcome cup of plain tea, and of course some dried fish, dried game meat, kurakkan seed and wood-apple. These were not on display but brought out only when there was a wayfarer who stopped by. They said that monkeys were thieves and nothing could be kept exposed.

Kalua gave the order for boiling water for tea, while I gladly pulled off my haversack and slumped on the sliced log-seat placed on two flat stones in the compound. Although there was ample room on the seat, Kalua refused to sit with me. He preferred to squat on his haunches. Two middle-aged women and two men, who were sparsely clad, fetched and boiled water for tea on an open hearth fed by dry twigs.

Kalua sniffed at and declined the round kurakkan rotti, which was placed on a flat, woven mat-tray. He drew up the sleeves of his black coat and showed me two long welted scars on his forearm. “This is what a bear did to me one morning in the jungle. I did not see him in time.” He had also lost part of a little finger in the fray.

While we sat waiting for the tea to brew, the two men asked me some questions. I answered as best as I could, but most of the words were strange to me as the Sinhala they spoke had a peculiar drawl and accentuation. Kalua therefore answered for me. He was a familiar figure to them and was a link with the world outside the jungle. They were able to gather from him information relevant to their lonely lives, and they awaited his twice-weekly arrivals to and fro.

He would go alone through the jungle to Laggala, Illukkumbura, Makumbura and Laggala-Pallegama. Then he would rest for a day and come back to Rattota with mail for onward transmission through Matale and Kandy.

The cost of the two cups of tea was two cents, and I paid with two copper one-cent coins I had in my bag. This was about the price anywhere in the country at that time. Instead of sugar they gave us a spoonful of tal sukiri, a type of jaggery, to the palm of the hand.

Refreshed, Kalua sprang to his feet, as he had no time to lose.

After we had walked for about a mile in silence, Kalua asked me why I was going to the jungle tea estate of Laggala, which he knew. I told him I had friends there. Again he grunted. When I asked whether anyone else had made the trek with him earlier, he said there was no need for company. He knew the jungle well enough, and there had been tappal runners who carried staves for defence and bells for scaring away the wild animals.

He had hardly finished speaking when two large sambhur stopped in their tracks a few yards ahead of us with a young fawn on slender quivering legs. They looked at us and almost immediately ran across with a thumping sound on the dry earth. It was a beautiful sight. “As I was telling you,” Kalua said, “today there are fewer animals. They cannot harm us. They are afraid of us.”

He told me he was brought up as a young boy in a walauwa (stately home) with many children. He was their servant and messenger, and later the master arranged with the postal authorities for him to serve as a tappal-runner. They had been kind to him and even given him a small outhouse in the walauwa garden where he stayed and did odd jobs during his free time.

By now the uphill climb and the downhill drag were making me feel hungry and exhausted. If I lagged behind I would lose my way, for other than Kalua there was no human being in sight. Then it occurred to me that in my haversack were plantains and pieces of jaggery. This was a wonderful discovery. I offered Kalua his share, but he took only the plantains. Within a minute of taking a few bites, I was back to normal with revived energy. I plodded on, ready to walk many more miles.

Ahead of us, in a partly open area with low bushes, we heard a persistent series of short grunts. As the bushes moved to and fro, we stopped to watch an amazing struggle between two full-grown porcupines as they came to the open patch of jungle. They were contending for a point of vantage. Instead of facing each other, they were turning around in semi-circles so that they attacked by backward thrusts in order that the sharp quills would injure the exposed part of the opponent.

At first I thought it was a mating ritual, but soon we heard the rattling sounds of the quills grating, mixed with the low pitched sniffs and grunts. It was for me an interesting combat, but Kalua decided to move on.

Within minutes after this encounter, we were confronted only a short distance away by the tall grasses being flattened. Kalua showed me a grey-black wild sow with about a dozen piglings as they moved very fast trampling the mana grass. He stopped until they were out of sight, and then he uttered one sentence: “They are dangerous”.

The sun was now right above us as we came to a dense jungle of low trees. Kalua set to work with his knife, as he struck at the wild creepers and slender twigs that blocked our path. Our progress was slowed down, but when we finally emerged, there was open country, desolate except for the omnipresent low bushes.

I was cautioned to be on my guard. There was an animal that soon made its way out, and to our relief it was a peacock that nuzzled its way out of the grass. In a jerky way it rose in the air with its bedraggled, cumbersome tail folded behind. Within seconds it was followed by two peahens making persistent, awkward noises.

The heat had made me thirsty. Before I could communicate this to Kalua, he moved to a rocky outcrop where we drank from a cascade of cool gushing water.

I looked at my watch. It was nearly 2 pm. Above and beyond the canopy of trees I now saw smoke coming from the kitchen chimney of a large zinc-roofed house half a mile away. There was a sense of relief when Kalua announced we had almost arrived. I could then see patches of tea with some shade trees on an estate.

While we were within sight of the bungalow, he told me it was time to part company. I thanked him for all his help, and the protection and advice he had offered me. When I took out from my purse a new King George VI one-rupee currency note and gave it to him, he politely refused to take it.

As I moved forward and away from him, he paused to watch me go, and even at a distance he cautioned me to move slowly across the narrow metal bridge, which had no balustrades. When about 25 yards away, as the dogs started barking, my friend’s wife appeared in the doorway. As soon as she recognized me, I turned round to Kalua and asked him whether he would come in. He grunted, shook his head and was on his way where duty called.

His help made the journey possible, and naturally I was grateful to him. I had earlier heard of postal runners, whose duty was to distribute on foot letters from a post office to distant, out of the way villages, but this was the first time I had seen one. With time, their breed has suffered a natural death.

(To be continued)

(Excerpted from Jungle Journeys in Sri Lanka edited by CG Uragoda)