On Lake Titicaca, the cold wind howls. I glide across the frigid lake surface on a motorboat, with the distant mountains appearing especially lush against the backdrop of a bright blue sky. The lake sparkles like a vast blue ocean, seemingly endless. According to legend, there exists a small boat made of reeds, known as the "cattail boat." This is said to be a traditional means of transportation on Lake Titicaca, though the craft of making these boats has gradually faded away.
I arrived at a small village on Suriqui Island, where I found two elderly Indigenous people weaving a small boat about 15 feet long. The boat is wide and narrow, with beautifully curved ends. I sat beside them and watched the entire process; one of the elders, wearing a peculiar hat, occasionally used his bare left foot to push against the boat's body. He would also wipe the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand to increase the stickiness of the rope, ensuring that each reed was securely tied together.
The boat under construction was resting in the backyard of a dilapidated farmhouse, surrounded by discarded reeds. A flock of chickens and a shy alpaca wandered around it. Seeing these exquisite little boats reminded me of the reed boats that sailed the Nile River in Egypt thousands of years ago. Their design is almost identical, with striking similarities in the way the sails are hung and the structure of the hull. This resemblance raises a fascinating question: why do similar boat designs exist in such distant places?
