There is a definite tipping point. A point in which there are too many surfers competing for the same waves. Such a situation might result some surfers having to succumb to lesser waves like John Candies and Bikinis and such, or it might result in aggression and strong-arm tactics. At Pipeline in Hawaii there has always been strong control over the goings-on in the water because there is such a high danger factor. A drop-in and subsequent wipe-out can result in serious injury, even death at a place like Pipe, and disregard for the rules of surfing amongst crowds are strongly enforced and must be adhered to. Yet there is no one to enforce such rules at a wave like Rifles, where one can get seriously hurt on a big day. No one does anything at the even more serious Nokanduis. There is no one who owns Rifles or who can claim local status. Thus a recent swell saw about 60 people jostling for sets with people getting burned and people burning others. The situation isn’t helped much by the media like us, for publishing endless dreamy and empty line-up shots, for writing endless flowery prose about the beautiful solitude where you can find yourself, where you can hear yourself think, and where poetry flows like mercury when in truth the constant chatter of surfers and staff never ceases and where the only thing flowing is the stench from the toilet under full capacity situated next to your bed. We perpetuate the myth, we sell the dream, and we lie through our teeth and then sit back and admire our work.
The truth is that it’s all about the money. Land camps cost money and boat charters cost more. Everyone wants to own a piece of it, and we do what we need to do to get our slice. The travel agents want their piece, the boat owners, the photographers, the videographers, and the bottom-feeding journalists. We all want a share, to be able to make a living while surfing and having fun, without working in a Burger King, without losing our shirts to the American bankers and all their gormless minions. Up to sixty surfers at Rifles, a glut of frothers at Pistols, and the same amount again living on the beach around E-Bay and Beng Bengs.
Surfers are generally indolent and fussy. Give us perfection and give it to us uncrowded. Take our money and turn on the wave machine. Ply me with booze and wake me up when we reach Kirra. Like sheep we follow, we moan and we groan and we curse the skies when the world conspires against us and throws a curveball like crowded surf spots in paradise, when all we have to do, seriously, is a little bit more homework.
The Mentawais are not done, as there are more and more surf spots that come into existence every year. There are a few slightly more remote zones and there are places like Enggano and Simeulue to name but two zones that deserve some more exploration on different swells, and there are certain surf spots that come alive on a certain swell, and then disappear just as quickly. There are also untapped zones further north, in the Aceh zone, and there are waves a plenty in the Nias/Telos zones. It’s not Orange County yet, out there in the islands.
Crowds exist in your mind. You can make them infinitely worse, or you can make them disappear. There are people who moan endlessly about the proliferation of surfers, about the urban creep of surf camps, about the ruthlessness of the charter boat industry and how it is slowly destroying it for all of us. How exclusivity is the death of our beliefs and the destruction of a lifestyle. Yet there are other people who know how to find empty waves at crowded surf spots. Who know where to sit at a place like Uluwatu and get all the bombs, who know when to paddle deep at HT’s and sneak a runner at The Office, who are aware of the peripheral movements of the people and know when a dawnie is going to be the most important surf, or whether it is more important to hold out for a late evening surf. It’s a mind thing.
There might be more people in the Mentawais, but it’s not done. Not just yet.
