As the large boats which laid the nets return for the day, everyone available lends a hand to beach them

Early in the morning the mussels divers put together their balsa rafts and propel themselves towards the cliffs with a bamboo pole.  At their destination they don masks and snorkels and  dive.

Market traders are waiting for their return.  With luck they earn 300 Rp for the mornings work.  Catch sold they take their rafts apart and dry them out in the sun until next morning.

Stores line the beach, many staffed by Kashmiri salesmen.  They lure you in with promises "looking is free Madam", then show you gorgeous jewelry, pashmina, made by their blind 92 year old grandmother and follow that up with $2000 pieces of the most exquisite embroidery you can imagine, representing two long years of labour by their equally long lived grandfathers.   (Embroidery is always done by the men)

While you are busy envisioning Grandma and Grandpa hunched over their work in a village far away in Kashmir, they fix you with their limpid black eyes, flash a white toothed smile and swipe your VISA card faster than the speed of light.

They are some of the most attractive men on the planet and are "full of it" as we say in Manchester, or Kovalom for that matter.  You have been warned.