Cocos Keeling islands, a hint of my destiny

by Paula Carnell (United Kingdom (Great Britain))

A leap into the unknown Australia

‘That’s Cocos Keeling islands’ I told my mum sat beside me on this dream aeroplane. ‘It’s paradise and it’s just off the Isle of Wight’. I looked back, watching the long blond haired hippies sat on huge boulders along the waters edge. A large warehouse behind them flanked with palm trees swaying in the wind. Then I woke up. It was the early 1990s, pre internet, so I was forced to open my large atlas and search for Cocos Keeling islands. What had prompted such a dream? What did it mean? Most importantly how could I get there? Many years of research followed including synchronicities with no obvious reason or source. I learned that this coral atoll of 27 islands, in the Indian Ocean, not near the Isle of Wight. I did learn that its founder’s descendant, George Clunies Ross, had died on the Isle of Wight. The islands had no hotel, or tourist industry. A quarantine Station for Australia and its main business was a coconut processing plant, not everyone’s idea of Paradise. As an Artist, I wrote to the administrator, hoping for an offer of a residency. I received, several months later, a letter from an artist living there. Photographs of her paradise home and art projects with snippits of information of her life there. Motherhood came, success and exhibitions, then with my diagnosis of Ehlers Danlos syndrome, seven years bed and wheelchair bound with no hopes of ever travelling again. Still my dream haunted me. Why could I still remember it so clearly, and what did it mean? 2016 saw a recovery in health. A new career with honey bees was blossoming and new travel destinations pushed the dream to the back of my mind. South Africa, Bhutan, America, so much to see and catch up on. Then one day a photographer working with one of my clients requested a shoot with me. Dressed up in a bee suit I posed with flowers, beeswax and hive parts. ‘My brother keeps bees’. I politely asked where his brother was based. ‘Cocos Keeling islands’. My jaw dropped, my pose ruined for the perfect image, ‘COCOS KEELING ISLANDS?!!” I exclaimed. ‘You sound like you’ve heard of them…’ he responded. Dook Clunies Ross was born on these islands, and his brother still lived there. After sharing my dream from 28 years earlier, it was settled. I had to visit. Sitting on the plane leaving Christmas island watching the clear blue sky, only separated from the deep blue sea by the fluffy white clouds and their reflections, I was so grateful to be sat by a window. Awaiting for the moment when my dream would come true. Searching all over the internet prior to our trip, I hadn’t seen any pictures of boulders, or factories. Just perfect white sandy beaches and palm trees. Could I have dreamt of the wrong islands? What if this isn’t where I was meant to be? The pilot announced our descent, then excitement rose as the passengers on the other side of the plane caught site of the beautiful coral atoll. Squeals of delight at its beauty filled the plane, whilst tears ran down my face as I could only see blue ocean. Passing my camera across the aisle, photos were taken for me whilst I grieved, pressing my tear stained cheeks against my own tiny window in the hope of a glimpse from my dream. A few hundred feet above the trees we rushed past an old wooden jetty, then as the land came into view, I spotted the boulders, large grey and white boulders lining the waters edge. No sooner had I spotted them, and they’d gone, replaced with the tops of palm trees, then the settlement on West island as the plane landed straddled by the islands golf course. Ten nights followed, immersed into the community that is West Island on Cocos Keeling. With only 1000 tourists a year, and around 10 others with us, we were embraced by the community, and I got to see the bees that thrive on this island paradise. A place I was meant to visit, with people I could help, I look forward to my return.