Still moored by the small village, we woke the next morning around dawn. The houseboat that had been moored next to us on the right was already gone, and the village was full of activity. To our left, two people prepared to go out fishing. A boy and his grandmother, I thought at the time, but it could equally well have been his mother.

They are late. All those dots in the lake in the background are fishing boats, already out there and fishing. The sun is barely up.

Meanwhile, the mother is taking care of the laundry, and colorful clothing blossoms on the line.

To our right, across the space where our neighbor houseboat used to be, some men have begun working, unloading a boatload of–muck from some canal or riverway they were trying to clear? fill for some swampy area they were trying to turn into a field? or both? They have exquisite balance, walking along the rail of the boat and then across narrow boards to the shore.

I like the cooperative work of these men, and of the fishermen in Varkala, and I feel sad for the woman washing her lonely laundry.

But our crew has been hard at work too, and it’s time for us to leave. A delicious and plentiful breakfast awaits us as we head out across the lake where the fishermen are still hard at work, and back down the waterways to Alappuzha.