The Island That Disappeared
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Once upon a time, it was a dot in the middle of the ocean — a lush green jewel surrounded by turquoise waters, white sands, and coconut palms swaying lazily in the breeze.
The locals called it Kavuli, which in their language meant “the place where the sky touches the sea.”
It was paradise.
A Slow Vanishing
Kavuli was never on most maps — too small, too far away. But for the few hundred people who lived there, it was the center of the universe. Generations were born and buried on that patch of land.
Then, the ocean began to nibble at its edges.
First, it took the fishing huts on the north shore. Then, it claimed the vegetable fields.
The people rebuilt, higher inland — until inland became shoreline.
The tide line crept closer each year, like a polite but unstoppable visitor. Scientists called it rising sea levels. The locals called it the ocean coming home.
The Year of No Dry Season
In the old days, Kavuli had two seasons: wet and dry.
In the dry season, children played on wide, sun-bleached beaches.
But one year, the dry season never came. The rains didn’t stop. Saltwater flooded the taro fields.
The well water turned brackish. You could taste the ocean in your tea.
The elders sat under the banyan tree, their voices low.
No one wanted to say it, but everyone knew: the island was dying.
An Emotional Farewell
When the government finally arrived, it wasn’t with sandbags or sea walls. It was with a plan to relocate the entire population to the mainland.
The day they left, every family took a jar of Kavuli sand and a bottle of Kavuli seawater. Children cried. Some adults refused to look back at the shoreline as the boats pulled away.
One old fisherman, who had never left the island in his 82 years, whispered:
“You can move my body, but my soul will wait here for the tide.”
The Ghost of Kavuli
Within two years, the island had vanished completely beneath the waves.
On calm days, divers can still swim over the rooftops of the village school. Coral is slowly claiming the ruins, and fish swim through the windows where children once laughed.
Kavuli is now a ghost island — a warning in the middle of the sea.
The Lesson
Kavuli teaches us that climate change isn’t some abstract “future problem.”
It’s here.
It’s swallowing land.
It’s uprooting communities.
The people of Kavuli now live scattered across cities they didn’t choose, with streets instead of beaches and noise instead of waves. They carry their island in memory, in stories, in jars of sand kept on their mantels.
Here’s the irony — when the relocated community planted mangroves along the mainland’s coastline, the mangroves not only slowed erosion but brought back a thriving fish population.
The ocean took their home, but they learned how to keep it from taking someone else’s.