But why is the Rum gone?

There’s more to the island nation of mauritius than rum, but boy oh boy, what great rum it has

- Farhan Shah 

Perhaps it is telling of the times but as I exited the Air Mauritius plane together with a fellow Singaporean writer, we whipped out our smartphones while walking along the jet bridge and launched Pokémon Go. We had heard rumours that Ditto, an extremely rare Pokémon, could only be found on the African continent and while we were not sure if these speculations were true, we found no harm in trying our luck.

Heavenly Hospitality

On 15 April 1896, Mark Twain’s ship had docked on the shores of Mauritius. The island was one of the stops in the novelist’s year-long lecture tour around the world. Twain would document his travel experiences in Following the Equator, a 712-page tome published in 1897. More than a century later, his thoughts on Mauritius would become the most misquoted selling point in journals, brochures and articles about the island. Twain wrote, “From one citizen you gather the idea that Mauritius was made first, and then heaven, and that heaven was copied after Mauritius.”

Eight omitted words later, it became, “Mauritius was made first, and then heaven...” This anecdote was on my mind as the van I was in made its way to La Plantation D’Albion, one of two Club Med resorts on Mauritius.

The sun might have already set but even the darkness could not hide the natural beauty of Mauritius. Its stunning rock formations stood proudly in the horizon, a ring of greenery on their slopes acting as capes. An array of stars populated the night sky, twinkling as furiously as possible before the sun reclaimed its bright mantle. I was enamoured. As a city dweller used to light pollution and concrete as far as the eye could see, sights such as these could only be found in YouTube videos and travel photographs.