an Andaman language dies

An 85-year old woman, the last speaker of the Bo language, DIES IN THE ANDAMAN ISLANDS.

I spent some time in the Andamans two years ago, and am quite fond of the place. The islands are part of India, but lie extremely far off the east coast of India, south of Myanmar in fact.

Unfortunately, the great typhoon that struck Myanmar at the time made the water of the Andamans dangerously choppy, and so I was deprived of the full experience of exploring some of the more remote islands, and was confined to the capital, Port Blair. But it was still a wonderful experience, despite the terrible sunburn I received at the beach one day.

Two scary moments in Port Blair:

1. Going out a bit too far in the water and getting caught for a minute or so in a scary current. It was never quite a perilous situation, but is probably the closest I’ve ever come to drowning.

2. Sitting in a cybercafe. Up from under the desk, and onto my computer screen, crawled a giant spider that was some sort of tarantula lookalike.