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Avantika Chaturvedi

Upon exiting Port Blair airport in India’s Andaman Islands I am met with a stream of cabbies offering to take me to the ferry for Havelock or Neil, the archipelago’s two most popular tourist islands.
When I ask to be taken to the Port Blair bus station instead, my driver is confused, eyeing my obvious tourist get-up. He is intrigued when I tell him: “I am going to Mayabunder.”
As if the Andaman Islands – an archipelago of around 200 Indian islands geographically closer to Thailand and Myanmar than to mainland India, 1,300km (800 miles) away – were not remote enough, I am setting out for a part where only a few tourists tread.
A town on Middle Andaman island, Mayabunder was where the first Karen people on the islands set up their homes. The Karen are an ethnic group originally from Myanmar that were brought to India during British rule for their forest know-how and relative immunity from malaria, the Andaman rainforest being similar to those back home.

Mayabunder was mostly cut off from Port Blair, the Andamanese capital, until the ATR (Andaman Trunk Road) was built, in the early 1990s. The only other connection between the two is a more than 12-hour journey by ferry that is often cancelled due to cyclones in the Bay of Bengal.
At the break of dawn, I board a bus, the red body of which is obscured with dust. A handwritten cardboard sign pasted on the windscreen declares Mayabunder as its destination.
Some 40km from Port Blair, traffic is stopped at the Jirkatang checkpoint, from where the ATR cuts through the Jarawa Reserve, home of the Jarawa, one of four remaining tribes indigenous to the Andaman Islands.
Later, when the sun finally comes out and the mist over wet paddy fields starts rising along with temperatures, I see a Jarawa couple by the side of the road, a beaded silver headband glinting on the woman’s forehead. I wonder what they think as they watch traffic pass along the road that threatens their habitat and exposes them to measles and other diseases they have never encountered before.
After seven hours on the road and a few minutes before the bus reaches Mayabunder, I alight at a junction and am picked up by my host, John Aung Thung, for the ride to the village of Webi, a Karen word meaning “hidden city”.



Paddy fields of Burmese black and white sticky rice stretch off into the distance on both sides and a narrow dirt lane cuts across a field before opening up to a unique wooden structure, unlike the concrete houses that now fill Webi.
The Koh Hee Homestay (koh hee means “island home” in the Karen language) is the ancestral home of my host John, a third-generation Indian Karen who is dedicated to protecting a cultural heritage that is being lost in the rapidly modernising Andamans.
Three thousand Karen live in the Andaman Islands – mostly in eight Middle Andaman villages – but Koh Hee is one of the last of their traditional homes here.
“Traditionally, Karen houses have been made using bamboo and timber from the Lagerstroemia hypoleuca [Andaman Crape Myrtle] tree,” John tells me, as we sip from a coconut his wife, Doris, has brought us.
I have all but forgotten about the afternoon sun now that I am on the Koh Hee balcony, sitting on a hammock chair made with the traditional Karen weave. The open balcony on one side and large windows on the other are ventilation enough so that we do not need a fan in the 35-degree-Celsius (95-degree-Fahrenheit) heat.
“The wood we use, the thatched roof, the direction of the windows, all help keep the indoors several degrees cooler,” John says.

By converting his home into a homestay, John can afford to maintain the timber structure. The owners of the few other traditional Karen houses struggle to meet the cost of keeping termites at bay and rethatching their roofs every few years.
That, and changing laws regarding the newly “protected” forests, has pushed many Karen in the Andaman Islands to start using concrete as a building material.
John’s attempts to protect Karen heritage in the Andamans do not end with Koh Hee.
He also founded Andaman Karen Crafts, an initiative designed to keep alive the arts of traditional woodworking and weaving, as seen in the red bag John flaunts while showing me around his backyard medicinal nursery, established using the knowledge of his grandfather – a traditional plant-medicine healer.


According to John, tourism is the only hope of saving the remaining Karen houses from falling apart one by one.
As long as intrepid travellers keep going beyond the road frequently travelled, John and other committed Karen will be able to keep their heritage alive.


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Homestay on India’s Andaman Islands aims to keep Karen people’s heritage alive via tourism

A bedroom at Koh Hee Homestay in Mayabundar, in India’s Andaman Islands. Photo: Avantika Chaturvedi

A bedroom at Koh Hee Homestay in Mayabundar on Middle Andaman, in India’s Andaman Islands. The homestay is one of the last traditional wooden Karen houses on the islands and its owner hopes tourism can help keep their heritage alive. Photo: Avantika Chaturvedi

A local bus heads towards Mayabunder. Photo: Avantika Chaturvedi

John and Doris Aung Thung at their homestay in Webi village. Photo: Avantika Chaturvedi

Koh Hee Homestay is one of the last surviving traditional Karen homes in Middle Andaman. Photo: Avantika Chaturvedi

John walks around his backyard medicinal nursery. Photo: Avantika Chaturvedi

The balcony at the homestay. Photo: Avantika Chaturvedi

The starry night sky seen from Webi village. Photo: Avantika Chaturvedi

A vehicular ferry (front) carries two buses on a river in Middle Andaman. Photo: Avantika Chaturvedi

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The Jeonju Hanok Village is the largest of its kind in South Korea. Photo: Getty Images

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The Jeonju Hanok Village attracts many domestic and international visitors. Photo: Erika Na

A cat relaxes on the roof of one of the hanoks. Photo: Erika Na

Jeonju Hyanggyo in the Jeonju Hanok Village. Photo: Shutterstock

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Jeondong Cathedral was completed in 1914. Photo: Erika Na

The statues of Yun Ji-chung (Paul) and Kwon Sang-yeon (James) outside Jeondong Cathedral. Photo: Erika Na

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The Museum of Art and Photography in Bengaluru. Photo: Anita Rao Kashi

Exhibits at the Museum of Art and Photography. Photo: Anita Rao Kashi

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Exhibits at the Indian Music Experience. Photo: Anita Rao Kashi

A space inside The Courtyard. Photo: Anita Rao Kashi

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The entrance to the Bangalore Creative Circus. Photo: Anita Rao Kashi

Ranga Shankara was built by actress Arundhati Nag in memory of her husband, Shankar Nag. Photo: Anita Rao Kashi

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The remains of an old well in Kurdi, Goa,  western India, that re-emerges each year as reservoir waters recede. Photo: Arti Das

Kurdi in Goa, India, was submerged under a reservoir when a dam was built in 1986. The village reappears during the summer heat, and is a hotspot for selfie takers, who often leave litter and damage buildings. Photo: Arti Das

Remains of houses in Kurdi that reappear when the waters of the reservoir that drowned it decades ago recede. Photo: Arti Das

An old photograph of the Someshwar Temple in Kurdi, Goa, which was submerged under a reservoir after the building of the Salaulim Dam. Photo: Arti Das

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The tower of the Someshwar Temple, which is partially submerged in the reservoir for much of the year. Photo: Arti Das

Litter in Kurdi village, which is thronged every summer by visitors, who often climb onto its buildings to take photos. Photo: Arti Das

The remains of an old well in Kurdi, Goa, western India, that re-emerges each year as reservoir waters recede. Photo: Arti Das

Now one of India’s best places to visit, Hyderabad’s Qutb Shahi Tombs complex has been beautifully restored using traditional methods

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The towering Tomb of Sultan Quli Qutb-ul-Mulk before and after restoration, at the Qutb Shahi Heritage Park. Photo: Tata Trusts

Freshly renovated mouldings and lattice windows have enhanced the grandeur of the mausoleums’ interiors. Photo: Ronan O’Connell

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The Idgah Baoli stepwell. Photo: Instagram/ @qutbshahiheritage

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A Land Rover drives down a street in Manebhanjyang. Photo: Shail Desai

A Land Rover in Manebhanjyang. Photo: Shail Desai

An illustration on the side of a Land Rover in Manebhanjyang. Photo: Shail Desai

The border in Manebhanjyang between India and Nepal. Photo: Shail Desai

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Land Rovers in Manebhanjyang. Photo: Shail Desai

Lifestyle

Travel & Leisure

The wooden homestay in a village near Mayabunder is one of the last of the Karen people’s traditional homes in the Andaman Islands


In a village near Mayabunder, on Middle Andaman island, the owner of a traditional wooden homestay hopes tourism can help keep alive the heritage of the Karen people.


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