The moutya drumming started again last night, somewhere up in the hills behind the house — a low, patient pulse that carried through the open window and settled into the room like a second heartbeat. I lay there listening, and I thought about how the rhythm doesn't seem to start so much as it reminds you it has always been there, underneath everything. This morning, with the drizzle still soft on the leaves, I decided to follow it as far as I could, which in Victoria means walking the streets of La Rivière Anglaise until the sound either grows or fades, and then letting the day take me wherever it wants.
The rain here in August is not the dramatic tropical downpour you might imagine — it is a fine, almost apologetic mist that darkens the granite pavements and makes the takamaka leaves shine. The air is thick with the southeast trade wind, steady and warm, and even at this hour, nearly nine in the morning, the city feels like it is breathing slowly. I walked past the Independence Avenue roundabout, where Little Ben still stands in its neat Victorian way, a small copper memory of London transplanted under the palms. A bus went by, packed with people heading toward the terminal, and I caught the eyes of an old woman by the clock tower who nodded at me the way locals do — a quick, friendly acknowledgment, not a conversation, just a recognition that we are both here, in this small city at the edge of the ocean.
I had a coffee at Gotcha, a tiny place near the market where the cappuccino costs about 60 rupees, which is maybe four dollars, and I sat at a table by the window watching the morning unfold. The market hall a few steps away was already busy — the fish stalls gleaming with parrotfish and jobfish, the air carrying that clean, salty smell that is the real perfume of Victoria. I thought about the moutya rhythm again, how it is not just music but a memory of resistance, of the enslaved ancestors who would gather under the cover of night and dance with their bodies close, the drums muffled so the masters would not hear. There is a story that the drum was originally a goatskin stretched over a clay pot, and that the dancers would sing their pain and their hope into the same beat. I have never heard it live, only in recordings and in the distant thump of these hillside sessions, but every time the rhythm surfaces in this city, it feels like a secret being passed along.
The practical threads of life here are never far from the poetic. This is day three of eight in Victoria, and I am still learning the map of my own daily needs. The Department of Immigration stamped my visitor's permit without fuss on the second day — a free stamp on arrival, then a visit to their office on State House Avenue to extend the three months, which requires a passport valid for the stay, proof of accommodation, and a return ticket. They also asked for proof of funds, and I showed them a bank statement, and the entire process took less than an hour. It is one of those things that seems intimidating from a distance and then becomes just another errand, like buying a bus pass or finding a good market for octopus curry. The extension can apparently go up to twelve months, but I am only planning three for now, and I will have to renew again in November.
I crossed the road to the Sir Selwyn Selwyn-Clarke Market, which has been the city's commercial heart since 1840, and I bought a small bunch of bananas and a slice of papaya from a woman who insisted on giving me an extra coconut as a gift. "For the journey," she said, and I laughed because I was only walking back to my flat. The market is where the price of daily life becomes concrete: a plate of grilled fish and rice at a local takeaway costs about 75 rupees, which is five dollars or so, and a full octopus curry plate from a stall near the fish section will set you back around the same. I am told the kari zourit at Delikates Kreol is worth every rupee, and I made a note to try it before I leave Victoria. But today I was not hungry for lunch yet — I was hungry for the hill.
Mount Fleuri rises east of the centre, a green hump wrapped in forest that holds the Seychelles National Botanical Gardens, and I decided to walk up through the district of the same name. The road climbs gently at first, past the University of Seychelles campus and then into quieter lanes lined with flame trees and hibiscus. The drizzle had stopped, and the sun was beginning to burn through the cloud, turning the air to that heavy, steamy warmth that makes you grateful for every patch of shade. The moutya drum was gone now, or maybe it was just that the wind had shifted, but I did not mind. The walk itself had become the rhythm I was following.
There is a lookout point about halfway up, a small clearing where you can see the whole of Victoria spread below — the rooftops a patchwork of rust and white, the harbour with its ships, the green spine of the island curving away to the south. I stood there for a long time, letting the view settle. The cost of staying here is not trivial. A modest one-bedroom flat in central Victoria rents for around 13,000 to 14,000 rupees a month, which is getting on for a thousand dollars, and imported groceries are eye-wateringly expensive. But the bus fare across the island is about 10 rupees, less than a dollar, and a simple meal can be had for a handful of coins. I am beginning to understand that this island is not a place where you come to get rich; it is a place where you come to live within the limits of your own needs, and to let the days unfold at their own pace.
I came down from Mount Fleuri the long way, through Mont Buxton and back toward the centre, and I stopped at Wildflour Cafe for a late lunch. The menu is written in Creole and English, and I chose a grilled fish served with a small heap of rice and a chutney made from shark, which sounds strange but tastes like the ocean itself. The fish was about 350 rupees, which might seem steep for a casual meal — maybe twenty-five dollars — but the portion was generous, and the view from the terrace looked out over the city towards the port. I ate slowly, watching a freighter being nudged into the harbour by a tug, and I thought about how Victoria has always been a working port, first with the French L'Établissement du Roi, then the British rechristening after Queen Victoria, and now with the tuna canning plant that drives so much of the economy. The history is layered here, but the sea is still the constant.
After lunch I went to the Seychelles National Museum of History, which is housed in a colonial-era building near the clock tower, and I paid the modest entry fee of about 50 rupees. The exhibits are not grand — a few rooms with maps, photographs, a faded moutya drum in a glass case, and a display about the coco de mer palm that seems to be the national obsession. But there was one thing that stopped me: a grainy video of a moutya performance, the dancers moving close, the drum beating a rhythm that seemed to come from somewhere older than the building. I watched it twice, and I felt the rhythm begin to live in my chest, that same pulse I had heard in the hills last night. I asked the woman at the desk about local moutya events, and she said to listen for the drums, and that sometimes there is a session at the beach at Beau Vallon, but that the best time is during the Creole Festival in October. She smiled and said, "You will find it. The drum always finds you."
The afternoon had turned warm and bright, so I decided to walk along the east-coast coast road, past the port and the small industrial plots, until I reached a stretch of shore where the granite boulders are piled like a giant's playground. The sea was rough, the trade wind whipping the water into whitecaps, and I sat on a rock for a while, just watching the waves crash. The moutya drum was nowhere to be heard now, but I did not need it anymore. I had heard it, and I had seen its story in the museum, and I knew that it would call again. That is the thing about this island — you cannot force it. You just have to stay open, and the rhythm will find you.
I walked back to Victoria as the evening began to settle, the sky turning the colour of a bruised peach. I stopped at the market again, but it was closing, the fish stalls being hosed down, the last few vendors packing up their spices. I bought a Seybrew for about 60 rupees and drank it standing outside the market, watching the city ease into night. The bus terminal was still busy, and I watched a family struggling with suitcases, perhaps new arrivals like I was three days ago. I felt a small pang of something like belonging — not ownership, not even familiarity, but a quiet understanding that this city has its own pace, and I am slowly learning to match it.
Back at the flat, I opened the window to let the warm air in, and I heard it again — the moutya drum, patient and low, somewhere in the hills. It had been with me all along, I realised, not as a sound but as a thread, a rhythm that ties the market to the museum, the port to the mountainside, the old stories to the new arrivals. I thought about how a permit is just a piece of paper, but a rhythm is a kind of home. Tomorrow I will go to the Beau Vallon side, where the sheltered bay is busy with sailfish fishing and the regatta is apparently in full swing through August and September. But for now, I am content to sit here, listening, with the drum beating like a promise that I will find my way, in my own time, into the true pocket of this island.
The night has deepened, and the drum has not stopped. I will let it be the last thing I hear before I sleep, and I will carry it with me wherever this journey goes. Bonzour, Victoria. I will see you in the morning.