About me

Name: Helmi Maria
I am Helmi Maria Holzheuer At the moment I am living in Niamey - Niger but I am calling Australia home. I work as a free lance travel writer.

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a new home in niamey
a taste of sharia law
africa
african fish eagle
african hoopoe
aid and development
australia
back to bedlam
bad hair day
bird-watching
bird identification challenge
bird songs of europe
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black-head heron bird
blue-headed tree agama
boattour on the niger
bomb blast in karachi
breakfast on lake tanganyika
bujumbura
bujumbura golf club
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but im nowhere near being over p
by the frangipani tree
by the roadside
catapult
critters in my garden
desmond and the miracle healer
desmond found god
diwali
donelly lakes
dr livingstone i presume
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drink coca cola
dum spiro spero
earthquake update
eichhornia crassipes
environmental issues
every garden tells a story
everything in africa bites
feast of sacrifice
fulani
gabar goshawk
gardening
gitega
greycrownedcrane - balearica reg
gräfin von roedern
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hadida ibis
halloween and thanksgiving may h
happiness is
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historic fotos
historique fotos from burundi
home thoughts from karachi
hooded vulture
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interactive map of burundi
international fashion festival i
internet censorship
islam politics
islam politics pakistan
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latest news
laughing dove- immature- steptop
love thy neighbours
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malaysia
math advents calendar
missing drummers wanted
mustafa and the order of the alp
mustafa and two yellow-lipped fi
never a dull moment
ngo
niamey
niger
niger river tour
nteractive map of burundi
of birds and bondage
of dead donkeys and electrocutio
pakistan
perth
peul
pit bull in size 7 thongs
ramazan
red-billed firefinch - amarante
relais de kanazi
reminiscences and a song in the
ruzisi national park
spur-winged lapwing
survival skills
tabaski
tales from hajji ali goth
the fine art of advertising your
the fine art of doing nothing
the magic of a royal show
the man-eating crocodile
the nursery
the sands of time flow slowly in
the village on kanazi island
the villages on the niger river
things you never knew existed
thoughts around the year of the
tout pour la femme et lenfant
tout pour la femme et les enfant
tranquil lewana
travel
twenty random thoughts around mi
urgent help needed
w national park
water hyacinth
we are moving
western australia
whats the point
when disaster struck
wildlife photography
yanchep
yanchep national park

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Grey clouds accumulate over the hills of Balochistan. The air is sultry and the mercury is hitting already 37 C in the early morning.The monsoon season is right upon us.

The Muttahida Majlis-I-Jamal called for a strike to protest against President Pervez Musharraf’s new policies, rising prices and the increasing poverty of the masses. Driver Paul is worried that we may encounter violence on our way to French Beach and we decide to hit the road early.

The roads are almost devoid of motorized traffic. A few donkey and camel carts are plying their trade, we spot a few water tankers, but altogether there is more of a holiday mood about rather than a strike feel. In Maripur most of the shops are shuttered down, but we manage to get our ice blocks and an orange ball for Mustafa’s two-year-old nephew Daniel.

Once we are beyond Maripur’s outskirts we find ourselves in a different scene. The country opens up into an arid coastal scene dotted with weathered men dressed uniformly in salwar kameez and Sindhi prayer caps. Most women, if we see any at all, are covered from head to toe in black cloaks. The landscape is infertile and shows the hardship the region is facing. The ongoing shortage of potable water has caused terrible suffering in an area already afflicted by poverty.

Our destination, Mustafa’s Fishing Hut on French Beach is certainly something of an anomaly. At first glance the place seems almost absurdly picturesque. Framed by ochre hills of Balochistan in the distance and a rocky beach and the turquoise sea, the fishing shack seems to be of another era. You can almost imagine you are some intrepid Victorian traveler stumbling on the place for the first time.

Despite the early hour my fisher folk friends are already there and very busy. Old Babaji’s arthritis seems to be worse than usual. He limps about the main room, while Paul and I unpack our baskets.

I remembered to bring my old English - Hindi dictionary and a coffee table book with Woldendorp’s photographs of Western Australia and some worksheets for our  weekly Englishlesson. Jameel, Mustafa’s son refills the iceboxes, but moments later he spots the large book. Interested to see what life looks like in and keen to practice his English, Jameel soon grills me with questions about Australia. Jameel, despite his good command of spoken English is illiterate.

Old Ibrahim, the village’s boat carpenter is replacing the keel of Mustafa’s boat. The squatting man works entirely with traditional tools that need no electricity. I watch him for a while, and although my patchy Hindi limits our conversation, we manage to communicate with affable smiles.

In the late midmorning heat a languidly peaceful scene plays out before our eyes. Along the rocky coasts many small fishing boats are riding the angry waves of a murky turquoise sea, their crews casting lines and reeling in the catch. Fountains of white foam leap over rocks, gulls screech, a crow with a fish in its beak flies over, and a large school of fish has chosen the rocks right in front of me to seek shelter from the rough sea.

Paul, who only ever gets excited when he watches his beloved cricket, is thrilled to see that the fisher folks in their boats hook plenty of big fish today. "Whoa!" Paul shouts, when one fisherman jerks his line and then steadily pulls in another heavy beast. Suddenly the line goes slack: yet another one that got away.

Lunch was late on this Friday. By daybreak Mustafa had caught plenty of sardines with his net. Now they have been fried to a perfect crispness. “This is delicious,” I say, and indeed there is nothing more heavenly than fresh sea fish, hot chapattis and spicy pickles by the sea.

After lunch Paul and I drink tea and we watch the world go by for a while. I ask him whether he would go down to the fishermen a little later and buy some nice fish for stock up our deep freezer. “Jameel and I will try our hand at line fishing now for a while. Maybe there will be no need to buy fish,” he says and smiles.

As we slowly slip into the afternoon, Mustafa and I sit down to our weekly English lesson. We practice writing today. It is hard work for Mustafa.

As the sun is setting, Paul and I get ready to return to smoke-drenched Karachi . A fisherman appears carrying two big fish in a hand-woven basket. The Urdu name is suwaji. The heavy fish has a distinctive yellow lower lip. They assure me a suwaji is very tasty.

Mustafa hands them to me and says: “ Here Helmi, take, one is for you and one for Paul. But you choose first, when you get home.” I ask him, how much I owe him for the fish.

The look on his face says it all. He looks straight into my eyes and says: “I no have money, (but) I have friends.”