Unawatuna – Galle – Colombo – Wattala

One day Miriam and I venture over to the other side of the beach at Unwatuna, where we look over to from our side as we sit and swim. Walking up the road we get to a muddy carpark full of cars and people, going through the trees the beach is packed with people. You can hardly see the sand or the sea. All the women are fully clothed and Miriam and I, her in her shorts and me just being me, are the bearest and whitest people here. As we stand watching we become aware that this is not our beach, this is their beach – just a small stretch of sand – the end bit – packed – festive atmosphere – people enjoying their families and their picnics. We begin to feel acutely uninvited and head back to our beach very much aware of the dividing line between our nicely-kept, holiday brochure beach and the beach for the locals.

So, having spent 10 days at a tourist resort we now head to the real Sri Lanka.

As we get into the tuk-tuk outside Shangri La I still have my huge suitcase that flew with me from UK to Colombo to last us four months (wondering why on earth I didn’t drop it off at Miriam’s house on the way) and my carry on bag and my handbag and there is Miriam’s suitcase too. Tuk-tuks are tricycle scooters with a shell that people will squeeze as many people and as many belongings into as they can, so of course our bags are made to fit and we arrive at Galle train station in time for the 2:30 train to Kandy which stops off at Colombo on the way. With our 2^nd class tickets we drag our suitcases up the platform in and out of people waiting – it’s busy because it’s the second week of the New Year holidays. As we wait I smile at a little girl in the carriage we are facing and the whole family smiles back. The little boy in the carriage next door to us slowly waves his hand too. He seems to be quite shocked to see such a foreign face. The family next door seems to find it entertaining too and Miriam and I decide that whether they are laughing at us or smiling with us, it’s got to be a good thing to make people smile :)

When our train arrives the carriages that go by are stuffed to the brim with people travelling from Matara. Instead of bothering to find our actual seats in 2^nd class we pull our suitcases up the steps onto the first carriage we can fit onto. The doorway to the carriage already seems half full of people and as I push my suitcase just through the doorway the carriage next to us is brimming with people, the luggage racks are at their limit and we conclude that the spot where we pushed ourselves on is where we are going to stay. We seem to be blocking all the doorways, but none of the people stuffed in the corridor with us grumble or moan or ask us to move. After waiting for the train to leave for half an hour we contemplate getting off to get the later train. I feel like I’m in the way because my suitcase is taking up enough space for 3 people, but the two men that are standing on the steps outside hanging onto the doorframe instead of where my suitcase is persuade us to stay, insisting that we are not bothering them at all. If anything they seem quite happy that we have joined them for a journey in 3^rd class!

For the first few minutes the prospect of spending 4 hours standing up squashed in between people seems painful, but after a while your feet become numb and the people around you just seem to slot in without complaint. To let people out of the carriages we twist and turn and breathe in, but not a cross word is spoken. People have been travelling like this for always - they don’t have National Rail to blame or strikes or the weather, they are just resigned to the fact that there is never enough space. As the train leaves the station I watch a world of colour flash by the open door as the men brace themselves against the wind and turn to smile at us every now and then as if to check that we are standing comfortably.

The train line follows the coastline. King coconuts, villages, papayas, bananas, lagoons flash by in between sunlit stretches of the Indian Ocean. Beaches go by where children and women splash in the waves fully clothed – beaches littered with fishing boats and debris – a world away from the beach at Unawatuna – tourist-less. At each station, although it seems impossible, more people fit on and we re-arrange ourselves to let them past and to relieve the pins and needles. At one station our friend at the door acquires a bag of white crystals from a vendor outside the carriage. We point to the bag questioningly and he offers us one – crystals of sugar. The next vendor squeezes through the corridor calling something in Sinhala and as he passes me, stops to translate, ‘Hello. Peanuts?’ This makes me and everyone around us smile and even more so as we near our destination.

At Colombo the people behind us push so hard to get out that I barely have time to pick up my suitcase. The door men smile at us again and seem relieved as they have another two hours to get to Kandy and can now take up the place of my suitcase. Outside the station, after wheeling my suitcase through the well-suited crowds of commuters, down the platform and across the tracks, we get into the first tuk-tuk that tries to rip us off and make the last-leg of our journey. Colombo to Wattala. Home. Miriam’s home.

The creaking metal steps, the annex room with its pink walls and asbestos roof, the view of the rooftops that surround us and the chipmunks that call from the roof outside – everything seemed familiar when I got here. The early morning noises – the loud clatter of the shop opening its shutters beneath us, the tuk-tuks revving up in the garage next door, the dogs barking, the jolly music and Sinhala babblings of the radio in the house below, the mopeds, bikes, cars honking and people selling fish at 7 in the morning, rattling past. It feels like we are living on top of the neighbourhood. People are early-risers because they are hard-workers and also because it is cool early in the morning. As for our holiday lie-ins, it becomes unbearably hot to stay in bed under the mosquito net much after 9 and so the idea of going to bed at 9 and getting up before the sun does becomes a very sensible one!

The past two weeks have been spent putting faces to the names that Miriam has spoken of and experiencing Sri Lankan hospitality. Wherever we go we are invited to drink plain tea or ice water and offered platefuls of lemon biscuits. One family make sure we eat lunch everyday – either at their house or by sending us lunch packets of rice, chicken curry, fish curry, jack fruit curry, beetroot curry, anything curry – cooked nice and hot to burn the lips. After all the worrying about coping with the chilli, I actually seem to be managing and, much to Miriam’s disappointment, have not shed a tear! Maybe they are being kind and cutting down on the chilli, but for now it’s bearable and really quite tasty! We have settled into a routine of visiting people, cooking, eating, watching films (you can get nothing but pirate films here for £1, including the ones which are still showing in the cinemas at home, although I will resist the temptation to bringing them home to create my own black market when I leave :p) and playing scrabble. It storms every other day and if we happen to be sleeping at the time, we get rained on in bed, which is an interesting, if not refreshing experience! The heat is bearable at the moment because it is the rainy season, which keeps things a little cooler. The temperature has been on or just above 30 celsius most days, which is nice when we have the fan but when the electricity cuts out asbestos roofs are not known for keeping things cool and it gets rather warm to say the least! On the second day of our recent power cut we made a trip to ‘Majestic City’, a shopping mall in Colombo. We ate ice cream and then went to Pizza Hut for pizza and some air-conditioning bliss. What a treat! It seems that I despise these chain restaurants when I’m at home but when I get over-heated and chillied out, I am all too happy to swap my so-called ‘principles’ for a bit of comfort!! ;p

Monday, 3^rd May, we go East for a couple of days, where it gets a lot hotter on both the food and the weather front. Every person we tell seems to grimace at the thought of it, including the Sri Lankans…so that should be fun! Watch this space :)

Unawatuna

Sea, sun, sand.

Sun stretching through waves, touching my hand.

Lie back, relax, float.

Tree, breeze, warmth.

Warm wind rushing overhead.

Leaves shelter me as storm lingers.

Waves lap, footprints tread, sea breeze cools us.

Look out, Indian Ocean.

Breakers on horizon, stories from afar washing up, washing away, washing over.

As soon as I arrive in Colombo we leave in an air-conditioned mini-bus for a beach resort just South of Galle, called Unawatuna. On the way the driver stops for a King Coconut – the shop-keeper chops the top off and sticks in a straw – a nice welcome drink! The drive is a hectic dash in and around other vans, cars, tuk-tuks, bikes, buses and people. The narrow gaps that our driver heads for sometimes shrink as the vehicles on either side of us get closer to each other, forgetting what’s in between! There seems to be a strict rule that anything goes – undertake, overtake, drive in the face of oncoming traffic until the last mili-second, tempt fate. I close my eyes and drift off to sleep, telling myself not to worry, the driver’s in control…right?!

3 hours later we arrive at Shangri La, our guesthouse, run by Malle, a South-African ex pat, painted a warm yellow with wooden cabins dotted about the grounds, among palms and banana trees. Hammocks hang from the tiled roof of the guesthouse. It is a tropical haven. This is where Miriam stayed when she first arrived in Sri Lanka. I’ve heard stories of giant spiders in the loos and all manner of insects and weather coming through the hole in the roof, not to mention giant scorpions falling from the trees in the rain. But in the day time it all looks so much like paradise. Rajika meets us outside and offers us a room inside the main guesthouse which we take, favouring comfort over adventure just for now. After being shown our room, we walk to the beach, past a few shacks selling shawls, bags, ornaments and internet access for the tourists. This is by no means a glitzy and shiny tourist resort. Unawatuna is relaxed and still has character.

I get my first real view of the sea and sand at an open front café that fronts onto the sand (they all do as since the Tsunami everyone re-built right on the sand so that there is not much room for the sand before it falls into the sea, a fact that is causing some people to call for emergency action to save the beach before it disappears…but for now it is still beautiful…). I try to take in the fact that I am really here J

For the next ten days activities vary between sleeping, swimming, lying on the beach, reading, eating, sleeping and drinking fresh lime juice and papaya lassis. Yum!

Highlights of our stay in Unawatuna:

• First night eating at Neptune Bay restaurant, an open front restaurant just above the waves - paddling afterwards only to lose a flip-flop in the waves, chasing it under the bemused watch of the waiters and customers, and going back in soaking wet to pay for the bill (you had to be there ;)
• Second evening at the same restaurant. Thunder storm. The rain hits the tin roof and clatters down the drainpipe - an awe-inspiring soundtrack to a very nicely cooked meal. The view changes from pitch black to daylight in a split-second as the lightning lights up the seascape in front of us.
• Visit to Galle Fort in Galle, 10 minutes away. Built by the Dutch as a port in the 17^th C, now a UNESCO world heritage site. A stroll along the walls, sitting dangling our feet above the waves below, a walk through the old streets within the walls. Grand old buildings - some in disrepair, some well kept - an air of calm away from Galle town. We go to Peddlar’s Inn twice – a hang out for expats and tourists, with nice milkshakes and delicious creamy garlic prawn soup ;)
• BIG tree, inside the walls, next to the courts and the Maritime museum. Each branch big enough to be a tree in itself. Cascades of thick vines pour from each of them; they fall down and root themselves into the ground. Below the tree a yellow ruin of a wall, graffittied with inspirational quotes and doodles left by visitors and guests to the tree. Outside the fort walls, along the seafront, are the ramshackle fishing boats, shacks and stalls. Faded pastel blues and greens and bright primary coloured boats waving colourful flags. Fish as fresh as you can get.
• Birthday meal at the Kingfisher - a lantern-lit hut on the edge of the waves - and a drink on the sand under the fairy light stars.
• Fireflies or ‘glow bugs’ in the garden at Shangri La – ‘Like stars, only lower’ ;) My first sighting of these little creatures – they make me smile :)
• April 14^th, Sinhala and Tamil New Year. Woken up to loud bangs of firecrackers (or something bigger!) throughout the village at 7 a.m, lasting for a solid half hour and then throughout the day – part of a tradition to ward of evil spirits (and to give un-suspecting tourists the fright of their lives!). People are happy when you acknowledge their New Year. Our waiter friends at NB give us some Sri Lankan sweets to taste.
• Afternoon spent at NB playing Scrabble and drinking pots of plain tea – very civilised!
• My first Sri Lankan breakfast – string hoppers (thin noodles made with rice flour) with potato and coconut curry and sambol (which Miriam said was slightly adapted for tourists as it wasn’t red with chilli!). The curry was really nice and creamy and the chilli manageable but after that for breakfast I wanted to go back to bed again! I sit there, not looking forward to the prospect of eating like this 3 times a day (soon to get used to it!)!
• Swimming in the rain – after lunch at NB the waiter tells us the weather is not good for swimming, pointing to the grey clouds rolling in overhead. We walk down the steps, onto the sand and then into the water. Shortly afterwards the heavens open. A heavy rain that bounces off the surface of the deep and creates a sheet of misty hills – each rain drop is a drop of silver bouncing off the bubbling surface. Under water the rain crackles and bounces against the surface in rain stick fashion.
• Sitting in the hammock at Shangri La at dusk (covered in mosquito spray!), looking up to the sky to watch the bats fly over (think the tiny bats at home but ten times bigger), like a flock of birds. See the silhouette of a monkey climbing up to the top of a palm tree in the garden (Malle hates the monkeys – the best thing to do when you see a monkey is to shoot at it (with blanks), he says, to scare them off – they steal the bananas, damage the roof and all sorts, but the tourists love them (I’m such a tourist!)). Also sitting in the hammock another evening reading, I hear a scratching noise and peep over the side and there is this wild cat called a ‘godowa’ (that’s how it’s pronounced anyway). Add these experiences to the morning we see a mongoose chasing a monitor lizard across the grass in front of us and Shangri La is like a safari park :)

An Adventure Worthy of Middle Earth* ...

So I’m here in Sri Lanka - land of tea, tuk-tuks, hoppers, bangles, king coconuts, but mostly rice and curry for breakfast, lunch and dinner and chili always. And it’s fruit season so for now there are mangoes, papayas and butter fruit (avacados) aplenty.

I thought I would keep a blog while I’m here, not just as a way of keeping everyone updated but also as a kind of scrapbook for the things I learn and see while I’m here and my ponderings along the way. I don’t have a great memory, so the hope is that this and my travel journal (which I will paraphrase here. If you know me, you know there is a lot of it!) will remind me of my stay here in days to come!

Warning: I like to write, so if you don’t like to read just have a look at the pictures ;)

So first thing’s first, on the 8^th of April I launch off on An Adventure Worthy of Middle Earth (*according to the blessings of my brother David :)

Sitting in the plane waiting, watching, wondering – gliding above crystaline clouds – blue and white perfection. Ready to explore again, praying that my mind would stay open to whatever adventure comes along. Contemplating the importance of moving - the key to growing, whether physically or just mentally - to resist getting stuck in static. I guess travelling makes it a bit easier and so I go, hoping to be inspired and to see my life and the world with different eyes.

I fly with Emirates airlines, over Gaza and Basra, cocooned in my own reality, to Dubai – city of lights and skyscrapers, lights twinkling on the water, paradise for boat parties and pleasure seekers. We land at 1a.m, temperature 28 degrees Celsius. After my connection I’m up in the air again for another 7 hours or so. I fall asleep and wake above the southern-most part of India – lush green mountains dotted with the shadows of the clouds that wrap around me. I feel so close to this country that I have only heard stories of and seen on t.v but yet I am so far off the ground, still ignorant of the people and what goes on down there, just as they are oblivious to me floating above them in the clouds.

We leave the tip of India behind and roll across a short stretch of Indian Ocean until a carpet with rice paddies and palm trees comes into focus below. Miriam is waiting for me at Colombo airport, equipped with water and mango juice, and as we wait on the platform outside for our lift, it is hot and sticky and I am here.