The sea teaches you to be honest and humble,” said Lt Cdr Abhilash Tomy of the Indian Navy, as we joined him on his sailboat between Gateway of India to Naval Dockyard. “You can’t lie to the sea. It will just tear your sail out.”

Tomy should know—the seaman spent 150 days and seven hours circumnavigating the globe alone on the sailboat INSV Mhadei. This makes him the first Indian and the 79th person in the world to have accomplished the feat.