INTO THE EAST

SET SAIL ALONG THE EASTERN FRINGES OF INDONESIA’S VAST ARCHIPELAGO TO DISCOVER REMOTE ATOLLS HOME TO COMMUNITIES OF SEA NOMADS, THE WORLD’S LARGEST CONCENTRATION OF REEF SPECIES, AND THE BIRDS AND BUTTERFLIES THAT HELPED SHAPE THE THEORY OF EVOLUTION

- SARAH BARRELL

JAGO ISN’T PICKY ABOUT WHAT HE SMOKES. AGED 84, HE’S TRIED THEM ALL — CLOVE-TIPPED INDONESIANS, SOME EXPENSIVE AMERICAN BRANDS; THEY’RE ALL JUST SOMETHING TO PASS THE TIME BETWEEN DIVES.

But Jago isn’t diving today. He sits dockside, poised as if ready to do so, dressed in nothing but a pair of loose shorts, bare feet placed lightly on the decking. You get the feeling Jago is always ready. His sea salt-thickened hair, silver at its roots, is rudely abundant. He’s slight and leathery-tanned, with a teenage boy’s build; liver spot-mottled cheeks frame eyes that are rheumy but resolute. At his hip, a bag bulging with cigarette packets — some gifted, some barter-traded as is the local way. I wonder aloud about his lungs. “They’re fine,” answers his nephew. “He’s not so happy with his knees, though.”