We arrived in Dambulla, having seen a herd of wild elephants just off the side of the road at a watering hole (very cool), and set about visiting the only thing worth visiting in the area, the cave temples. Now how we have been getting into all of the cultural triangle areas without paying is a letter from the Cultural Triangle office, saying that we are doing research and need to access these areas. We assumed that as long as we had some collection tubes with us, we should capitalize on this opportunity and visit some of the areas whilst we were separated from the main research group.
To reach the entrance to the cave temples, there is a 150m vertical ascent (over about half a km horizontally), which we surmounted with vigour, to reach the ticket office at the top. We took off our shoes (sacred site etc) and paid 25 rupees (tourist rip off anyone) to store our shoes. We were then promptly denied entry to the site as we didnt have a stamp on the letter by an extremely Jobsworth security guard. We dutifully (still without shoes) descended the mountain, got a stamp, and re-climbed the monster in the 35 degree heat, to be told that we had got the wrong stamp, and would have to go back and get another from some kind of head monk.
I decided that it was a waste of energy for both of us to repeat the down and up journey, so valiently let Ben wander down and back up again in search of the stamp. Seeing a dispondant Ben re-emerge 25 mins later having been told by the monk that "you are white, you are foreign, you must pay full price" didn't fill me with much hope. Lukily the security guard took pity on us and let us enter, although for the hour and a bit we had spent wrangling a free entrance, the 5 caves weren't quite as impressive as we hoped, so 10 minutes later we were walking back down the hill, slightly dissapointed, and waving away touts with slightly more vigour than normal!
After this we got a bus to our Guest house near Sigiria, and settled in for the night quite early, as apparently wild elephants roam the road after about 8pm, and thus that was when the gates were closed... *cough* guy wanted to go home early? *cough*. The next morning however we woke up, and decided all of a sudden that today was a good day to go ride an elephant, having read about the possibility in the guide. We made our way to Habarana, and were presented with at least 10 people flocking to try and sell us elephant rides. We settled on the most legit looking person (mainly judged by the number of teeth, and ability to speak english), and after some furious bartering from 20 euros to approx 10 pounds, we approached Raja, the elephant to ferry us around the place for an hour of pure stereotypical gap-yah-ishness. It was an incredible experience, especially being perched on his neck for 10 minutes, with my previous riding experience consisting of sitting on a pig whilst it was walking, once... It was a once in a lifetime oppertunity, but I still felt saddened at how the elephants were treated, being shouted at by the mahoot who was effectively weilding a pike at the elephants knees... which left me in 2 minds about it.
From here we moved on to Sigiria town, and the "other rock"... a large rock near the main Sigiria rock (see my facebook again for pics). We climbed the rock by steep steps for about 20 mins, and after a 5 min scramble over boulders we made it to the summit, which was incredible. None of my pictures can do the panorama justice, but the view over the unsullied landscape was breathtaking, and the view of Sigiria Rock itself was postcard perfect (and I in fact recognised from many post cards)! All was well and good until an elderly Sri Lankan walked over and sat next to us, started pointing at things and naming them "jungle" and "rock". This flagrant disregard for our privacy really ruined the seclusion, so we decided to leave, with the tout in rapid pursuit. He started holding out his hand asking for money for his services, which did not go down well, having not asked to be stalked up the rock by a "guide". He was dismissed somewhat harshly, but the fact that he just wandered up to us and expected money really ground our gears! After descending the rock, we drank some water from a random well (again 35 degree heat is not good), and lived to tell the tale, and headed back to the guest house before we would inevitably be killed by an elephant!
The next day was Sigiria day, when we would mount the "lion rock", and would finally meet up with our research companions in Dambulla. My highlight of the walk to the site entrance from the bus stop was undoubtedly Ben walking along with his loaf of bread for breakfast, and suddenly being surrounded by monkeys hissing and bearing their teeth! We beat a hasty retreat with the monkeys pawing at Bens loaf, and him throwing chunks in our wake to try and quench the monkeys hunger before our face was next on the menu! Luckily this was successful and we progressed onto the site entrance.
After much less hastle from the ticket office at Sigiria, we entered the complex, which is the large rock with the palace situated at its summit, surrounded by endless ruined gardens and buildings. We decided to summit the rock as soon as possible, as it was 10am, and would only get hotter and more sweat provoking. The ascent was steep, but filled with things to stop and see such as the mirror wall (a wall covered in ancient graffiti and poems) and the cave paintings, so we made the top of the 200m rock in about 45 minutes, and got to look at fantastic views similar to those of the day before, but in the setting of the ruins of an ancient temple... not too shabby! We made the most of our free entry to the site (which normally costs 25 dollars) by having a nap on top of the rock in the shade, and playing a game called "avoid the rabid stray dogs" which is always fun!
After a couple of hours we descended the rock and via the Sigiria museum made our way to Dambulla, where we were to meet with the rest of the researchers. Now there had always been a bit of contention over who was supposed to pay for hotels, us or the Japanese researchers. When we met up with the others in Dambulla, they told us the room price and asked for the sum. At this point myself and Ben had between us less than half the sum of the room, having expected another night in a hotel, so we decided it was best to ask for a lift to the bus stop and head back to Kandy a day early (we didn't want to pay money for a night in a hotel purely for the pleasure of picking up more piles of steamy science). After 2 hours standing on one of the crazy death buses we arrived at Kandy, went to KFC to satisfy our need for cooked meats, then headed home for a MASSIVE SLEEP!
As I write this I am 2 days and a lot of relaxation after this epic journey to the Cultural triangle, and having made the acquaintance of some other foreigners in the university (Australia and France), we are planning a weekend of westernised exploits, followed by a trip for me and Ben into the Hill country early next week, and the promise of trips out with an elephant tranquilizer team towards the end of next week... all signs point to a lot of hard research work in our immediate future!
xx
Friday 30 July 2010
Thursday 29 July 2010
Indiana Jones and the Temples of Poo - The cultural triangle part I
Ok, so its been a while since my last blog, as I have been out and about in the Dry Zone, with little access to internet. LOADS has happened in the last few days, so Ive decided to split the cultural triangle into two parts, this being the first:
Before we left for the cultural triangle, we didn't really do anything too exciting - I had my day of gastritis, and a few days in the hospital and the Lab, both of which I have already described ad nauseum, so I will begin on Saturday, and our journey from Kandy to Polonorawa. We left the university at about midday with some Japanese researchers who are researching the transfer of diseases (especially entamoeba dysentry) from monkey to man, via taking monkey fecal samples and analysing them. We were recruited for the study as extra labour, with free accommodation and entry to the cultural triangle sites in return (I would like to add that this blog is best read along with my pictures on facebook - as I cannot describe anything I have seen here to do it justice)
4 hours later we arrived 120km (you work out the average speed!) away in the ancient capital city of polonorawa, and much to our surprise found ourselves driven to our accommodation in the regional monkey sanctuary, which has played host to such legends as Sir David Attonbourgh in the past (spelling prob wrong). This was situated next to the biggest "Tank" in Sri Lanka (A tank being a man made lake, made 1000 years ago by damming a river... its 26 square miles big!). This tank was the local fishing lake, bath, washing machine, swimming pool, elephant watering hole, and a fantastic setting to see storks, kingfishers and countless other nameless birds and small amphibians!
After stopping off at "Monkey Camp" to drop off our kit, we were taken to the ruins of the ancient city itself, including a 100 year old palace, which had over 7000 rooms when it was complete. A few touts trying to sell awful tourist tat later, we had explored many of the most impressive areas of the site, including a huge Stuta (Dome with sticky out thing on top - Buddhist religious symbol), we went back to camp for dinner, far too much chat about monkey social groupings with the 25 year proprietor of the camp, and an earlyish night, for reasons which will become apparent!
5am is early. Very early in fact. However, it turns out most monkeys defacate at approx 6-7am after waking up in their sleeping tree, so if you want to collect those steaming little piles of science when they are fresh, its a sacrifice you have to make! However, I did not begrudge this as soon as I saw the incredible sunrise over the Tank, and got to look around the ruins (following monkeys of course) before the tourists were out of bed, and more importantly when people were not trying to sell us tat!
From here, after some brief sample analysis, and sightings of a brown mongoose (the reason why snakes are rare in the area!), and various awesome dragonflys, we moved on to Anuradhapura, the first, and most ancient capital of the early Sri Lankan throne, which houses the largest Stuta in the world (third largest ancient structure after the great pyramid and another Egyptian pyramid... which apparently contains enough bricks for a wall 3m high from London to Edinburgh!). We arrived late afternoon and stopped off to explore the site, which is much larger than Polonorawa, and was packed out with worshipers due to the fact that it was both a Sunday, and a Full moon day.
Packed out with Temple elephants and buddhist worshipers, we saw the procession of bowls and saffron robes to be given to newly ?ordained monks, with the procession lined with people touching and blessing the robes. The pure scale of the site, and the fact that it was rammed with people who had evidently travelled long distances accross Sri Lanka to be there (we heard of people travelling from 300km away to be there for the event as a kind of pilgrimage). This event culminated in the evening with a kind of carnival through the centure of Anuradhapura, with dancers, far too many people on 3m high stilts hopping on one leg (these stilts were literally strapped onto their legs... bad move I rekon!), and a veritable circus of elephants covered in what I can only describe as christmas lights! Oh and alot of people were throwing fire in all guises around the place... which was fun...
After this we turned in for the night (at about midnight) and got some nice "rest" in our sweatbath of a rest-house room before the quest for steaming piles of science would begin the next day. The next morning we moved to another set of ruins, about 10km away from Anuradhapura, where there were purportedly more monkeys. After climbing up into the jungle following monkeys until we weren't entirely sure where we were any more (we made it out obviously... but it did feel very Indiana Jones as we did it), we made our way back to the vehicles to move onwards. *wildlife note: Here we saw possibly the best animal I have ever seen, the giant land squirrel... imagine a squirrel that is the size of a medium size dog, and could probably eat a cat... and you are about there.... IT WAS AWESOME. See facebook for a couple of pics of it*
From here we drove down to Dambulla, near Sigiria, and were dropped off by the Japanese researchers, as they were going to go back to Kandy to further process the samples, whilst we explored the Sigiria area over the next few days. I dont want to spoil the next blog, but it involves walking up a 100m high temple twice, (three times for Ben), and old man following us up a hill and expecting to get paid, and Ben being bullied by monkeys... but thats for part II
xx
Before we left for the cultural triangle, we didn't really do anything too exciting - I had my day of gastritis, and a few days in the hospital and the Lab, both of which I have already described ad nauseum, so I will begin on Saturday, and our journey from Kandy to Polonorawa. We left the university at about midday with some Japanese researchers who are researching the transfer of diseases (especially entamoeba dysentry) from monkey to man, via taking monkey fecal samples and analysing them. We were recruited for the study as extra labour, with free accommodation and entry to the cultural triangle sites in return (I would like to add that this blog is best read along with my pictures on facebook - as I cannot describe anything I have seen here to do it justice)
4 hours later we arrived 120km (you work out the average speed!) away in the ancient capital city of polonorawa, and much to our surprise found ourselves driven to our accommodation in the regional monkey sanctuary, which has played host to such legends as Sir David Attonbourgh in the past (spelling prob wrong). This was situated next to the biggest "Tank" in Sri Lanka (A tank being a man made lake, made 1000 years ago by damming a river... its 26 square miles big!). This tank was the local fishing lake, bath, washing machine, swimming pool, elephant watering hole, and a fantastic setting to see storks, kingfishers and countless other nameless birds and small amphibians!
After stopping off at "Monkey Camp" to drop off our kit, we were taken to the ruins of the ancient city itself, including a 100 year old palace, which had over 7000 rooms when it was complete. A few touts trying to sell awful tourist tat later, we had explored many of the most impressive areas of the site, including a huge Stuta (Dome with sticky out thing on top - Buddhist religious symbol), we went back to camp for dinner, far too much chat about monkey social groupings with the 25 year proprietor of the camp, and an earlyish night, for reasons which will become apparent!
5am is early. Very early in fact. However, it turns out most monkeys defacate at approx 6-7am after waking up in their sleeping tree, so if you want to collect those steaming little piles of science when they are fresh, its a sacrifice you have to make! However, I did not begrudge this as soon as I saw the incredible sunrise over the Tank, and got to look around the ruins (following monkeys of course) before the tourists were out of bed, and more importantly when people were not trying to sell us tat!
From here, after some brief sample analysis, and sightings of a brown mongoose (the reason why snakes are rare in the area!), and various awesome dragonflys, we moved on to Anuradhapura, the first, and most ancient capital of the early Sri Lankan throne, which houses the largest Stuta in the world (third largest ancient structure after the great pyramid and another Egyptian pyramid... which apparently contains enough bricks for a wall 3m high from London to Edinburgh!). We arrived late afternoon and stopped off to explore the site, which is much larger than Polonorawa, and was packed out with worshipers due to the fact that it was both a Sunday, and a Full moon day.
Packed out with Temple elephants and buddhist worshipers, we saw the procession of bowls and saffron robes to be given to newly ?ordained monks, with the procession lined with people touching and blessing the robes. The pure scale of the site, and the fact that it was rammed with people who had evidently travelled long distances accross Sri Lanka to be there (we heard of people travelling from 300km away to be there for the event as a kind of pilgrimage). This event culminated in the evening with a kind of carnival through the centure of Anuradhapura, with dancers, far too many people on 3m high stilts hopping on one leg (these stilts were literally strapped onto their legs... bad move I rekon!), and a veritable circus of elephants covered in what I can only describe as christmas lights! Oh and alot of people were throwing fire in all guises around the place... which was fun...
After this we turned in for the night (at about midnight) and got some nice "rest" in our sweatbath of a rest-house room before the quest for steaming piles of science would begin the next day. The next morning we moved to another set of ruins, about 10km away from Anuradhapura, where there were purportedly more monkeys. After climbing up into the jungle following monkeys until we weren't entirely sure where we were any more (we made it out obviously... but it did feel very Indiana Jones as we did it), we made our way back to the vehicles to move onwards. *wildlife note: Here we saw possibly the best animal I have ever seen, the giant land squirrel... imagine a squirrel that is the size of a medium size dog, and could probably eat a cat... and you are about there.... IT WAS AWESOME. See facebook for a couple of pics of it*
From here we drove down to Dambulla, near Sigiria, and were dropped off by the Japanese researchers, as they were going to go back to Kandy to further process the samples, whilst we explored the Sigiria area over the next few days. I dont want to spoil the next blog, but it involves walking up a 100m high temple twice, (three times for Ben), and old man following us up a hill and expecting to get paid, and Ben being bullied by monkeys... but thats for part II
xx
Wednesday 21 July 2010
Railway travel in Sri Lanka
In my latest “main” blog, I commented on how we travelled down to Colombo, and to these various beaches along the West Coast by Train, but I did not go into just what an experience train travel is in the country. I have already described to you the colonial feel to the railways themselves and the Stations along the track, but I was amazed to find that this historic feel was maintained on the trains themselves.
The choice of First, Second or Third class in itself makes me think of the British rail network as it must have been in the early parts of last century (of course now everyone in Britain travels by our very own “third class”). However, the choice of third class allowed us to travel the 120km from Kandy to Colombo for a sum of 150 rupees, slightly less than a pound. The carriages looked straight from a history book, with dim flickering lights (It was still dark as we went aboard the train), and a wooden interior, with bench seating sprawling from a thin central corridor. All the seats were taken, and there were already a large number of people filling the gang way, so we moved back towards the buffet car, which was mostly open space, but provided us with a clear space to sit with our bags for the journey.
I suppose you all must think we are mad for going for third class for a 3 hour journey, when a first class observation seat (at the opposite end of the train to the locomotive, with a large window allowing vision out of the back/front of the train, depending on the direction of travel) costing only 450 rupees (3 pounds). At first it was because we are spectacularly cheap (as I am sure you have gathered by now), but in retrospect it was one of the best travel decisions we have ever made.
Health and safety have evidently not caught hold in this country to the extent which it has in the UK, and the doors on the side of the train in third class are left entirely open throughout the journey. On a normal journey by car or train you are sitting within an enclosed environment, viewing the landscape through a window, in a state of abject detachment, in a similar way to how you might see a scene on a television, or in a photo. When you take advantage of this portal into the surroundings, you experience the passing of scenery in an entirely different way. By grabbing the alighting handles (as hard as you can obviously) and putting yourself outside of the train, into the environment, you experience the journey not passively, but actively, seeing the track disappear below you, feeling the air rush by you, truly sensing the sounds, sights and smells of the areas you pass (and even occasionally being slapped in the face by a palm leaf!). You travel though villages communicating with those you pass (almost catching a mango someone threw to me), experiencing the atmosphere and being involved in your surroundings, which in my opinion makes the journey by rail just as important as the destination here!
There are however some disadvantages to being forced into such a small environment for prolonged periods of time. Many people ride the train to busk, beg and sell food to passengers. They walk around with CT scans or letters from their doctor, outlining medical procedures they cannot afford, or drugs which they cannot obtain. The sheer volume of these people is awful, and the sums of money they need to raise (assuming credibility of their story – another matter entirely) is large, even by our standards at several thousand pounds. It creates a somewhat awkward environment as you never know who needs help, and who is scamming you, and you can never know if any money you chose to give is going to a truly good cause or not.
Overall, Sri Lankan train journeys offer a much better price, experience and feel than those in the UK, although their infrequency (3-4 hours on average, some longer journeys only once or twice a day), and the veritable circus of people trying to steal your money somewhat take the edge off a fantastic system.
Tuesday 20 July 2010
Its fun to stay at the YMCA!
Ok so I have now recovered from our weekend in Colombo, and ALOT happened there, so I will almost certainly miss out some relatively major chunks!
We got the 6:20 train from Peradiniya to Colombo, stepped off the train and exited the station (the train journeys themselves are worthy of their own blog post... which I will probably make). Colombo is not a pretty place... the smell of sulphur billowing from the green (??) river was our first clue that this was not going to be a tropical paradise. This feeling was confirmed when we saw our first dozen beggars, and were harrassed by our first 20 or so Tuk-Tuks "Where you going... I take you... Where you going... Why you walking..." SHUT UP! There was the standard array of con artists who asked "do you not recognise me from your hotel" and "I friend, I show you to room", and litter scattered all over the place. This was confounded by the police officers armed with AKs placed every hundred metres down every road, and the military patrols that we saw going about the place!
We decided that before we tried to explore any further, we would find out where we would be staying that night, so we walked over the the YMCA and asked to see our room. The outside of the building was less than attractive, but thats nothing compared to the room! When flushed the toilet sprayed everywhere, the sheets which we knew were once white were a shade of brown, the window consisted of a peice of plastic dangling down from the outside of the building! Still, for 2 pounds a night, we were both convinced we could cope with this if we went and bought cheap camp beds, so we set off to do some shopping.
First stop was Majestic City, the City Mall, which featured 5-6 shops selling counterfeit DVDs, just as many selling illegally aquired designer clothing, and a spatting of shops selling random assortments of technology and tat. Needless to say I now own some Armarni and Boss clothing, and Ben went a bit nuts on burbarry, and we picked up the whole series of "The Pacific" for about 7 pounds... When in Rome...
We then checked out the "beach" at Colombo, which consisted of a railway track, broken glass and a weird green tint to the water that looked like food colouring (same colour as the sulphur river). We were not overly impressed with Colombo at this point, as you might guess, so we tried to check out some of the cultural aspects of the city, checking out the National museum. Now I do object to tourists paying 500 Rupees when locals pay 5 to get into a museum, but it was still worth it, despite the "white tax", as we got to look at the full history of the island, and learn about the ancient ruins of Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa which we should be visiting this weekend. We stopped off on the seafront for a bit of dinner, which was great until the horizontal rain drove us back to the YMCA to consider staying for the night, despite not finding camp beds.
We reached the pit of horror, and thought "we will just take off the matress and sleep on the planks, we will probably be ok". 3 fleas and a moment of joint fear later we found ourself checking into the grand oriental hotel for the night. We had warm showers :) then set off to the club underneath the hotel to see what the Colombo nightlife could be like. I first sensed problems when we were told as we went down the stairs that "it was fine to touch" as the bouncer grabbed my moob. a minute later we were sitting at the bar with scantily clad women introducing themselves to us... another minute later we had "left something in our room" and had escaped! Next thing we see is a car with one man and three women crawl past us roll down its window, and have one of the girls proclaim "hello" in that way only special women can...
Not too badly phased we wandered away and found our way to a british style pub called "In... on the green" where we met and chatted to several slovakian girls who were travelling Sri Lanka for 3 weeks. We had a pint of 9% beer, 2 shots of arrack (a kind of whisky made from coconuts) and felt far too tipsy before heading back to the hotel for the night.
The next day was much more tame, as we headed to Alusgema, a coastal resort south of Kandy. It had stretches of fantastic golden beaches, a sea so warm it could have been bath water, and of course the touts who appear from the bushes to offer you a hotel to stay in, a place to eat... and of course "English boys really like Sri Lankan girls, do you want to meet any?"... Brilliant.
After this we made the several hour (as all journeys are) journey back into Colombo and out into the suburbs to meet up with miss Di Luzio and Khema in a place where I still dont know where it is... We just got off the bus when we were told! We had an awesome night of shisha, lasange (I miss western food) and the highlight, swimming in the cobra pool in a lightning storm (dont worry, we hit the water with a big stick before getting in to make sure the cobras werent in there at the time!).
The next day, we went back to Colombo to renew our Visas, and travelled to mount lavina, a decent beach near Colombo before heading back to Kandy. In true tradition, we used our "white persons credibility" (the ability of white people to never be questioned when they walk into expensive hotels) to walk down to a private beach, and enjoy a few hours reading and feeding palm squirrels nuts (check them out they are adorable). We took the train back to Kandy and wandered home. The culmination of the trip was when I arrived home, felt ill and just CHUNDERED EVERYWHERE! (had to say it) We still cant figure out what it was that destroyed my stomach but I'm just going to blame Colombo and its filth!
We got the 6:20 train from Peradiniya to Colombo, stepped off the train and exited the station (the train journeys themselves are worthy of their own blog post... which I will probably make). Colombo is not a pretty place... the smell of sulphur billowing from the green (??) river was our first clue that this was not going to be a tropical paradise. This feeling was confirmed when we saw our first dozen beggars, and were harrassed by our first 20 or so Tuk-Tuks "Where you going... I take you... Where you going... Why you walking..." SHUT UP! There was the standard array of con artists who asked "do you not recognise me from your hotel" and "I friend, I show you to room", and litter scattered all over the place. This was confounded by the police officers armed with AKs placed every hundred metres down every road, and the military patrols that we saw going about the place!
We decided that before we tried to explore any further, we would find out where we would be staying that night, so we walked over the the YMCA and asked to see our room. The outside of the building was less than attractive, but thats nothing compared to the room! When flushed the toilet sprayed everywhere, the sheets which we knew were once white were a shade of brown, the window consisted of a peice of plastic dangling down from the outside of the building! Still, for 2 pounds a night, we were both convinced we could cope with this if we went and bought cheap camp beds, so we set off to do some shopping.
First stop was Majestic City, the City Mall, which featured 5-6 shops selling counterfeit DVDs, just as many selling illegally aquired designer clothing, and a spatting of shops selling random assortments of technology and tat. Needless to say I now own some Armarni and Boss clothing, and Ben went a bit nuts on burbarry, and we picked up the whole series of "The Pacific" for about 7 pounds... When in Rome...
We then checked out the "beach" at Colombo, which consisted of a railway track, broken glass and a weird green tint to the water that looked like food colouring (same colour as the sulphur river). We were not overly impressed with Colombo at this point, as you might guess, so we tried to check out some of the cultural aspects of the city, checking out the National museum. Now I do object to tourists paying 500 Rupees when locals pay 5 to get into a museum, but it was still worth it, despite the "white tax", as we got to look at the full history of the island, and learn about the ancient ruins of Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa which we should be visiting this weekend. We stopped off on the seafront for a bit of dinner, which was great until the horizontal rain drove us back to the YMCA to consider staying for the night, despite not finding camp beds.
We reached the pit of horror, and thought "we will just take off the matress and sleep on the planks, we will probably be ok". 3 fleas and a moment of joint fear later we found ourself checking into the grand oriental hotel for the night. We had warm showers :) then set off to the club underneath the hotel to see what the Colombo nightlife could be like. I first sensed problems when we were told as we went down the stairs that "it was fine to touch" as the bouncer grabbed my moob. a minute later we were sitting at the bar with scantily clad women introducing themselves to us... another minute later we had "left something in our room" and had escaped! Next thing we see is a car with one man and three women crawl past us roll down its window, and have one of the girls proclaim "hello" in that way only special women can...
Not too badly phased we wandered away and found our way to a british style pub called "In... on the green" where we met and chatted to several slovakian girls who were travelling Sri Lanka for 3 weeks. We had a pint of 9% beer, 2 shots of arrack (a kind of whisky made from coconuts) and felt far too tipsy before heading back to the hotel for the night.
The next day was much more tame, as we headed to Alusgema, a coastal resort south of Kandy. It had stretches of fantastic golden beaches, a sea so warm it could have been bath water, and of course the touts who appear from the bushes to offer you a hotel to stay in, a place to eat... and of course "English boys really like Sri Lankan girls, do you want to meet any?"... Brilliant.
After this we made the several hour (as all journeys are) journey back into Colombo and out into the suburbs to meet up with miss Di Luzio and Khema in a place where I still dont know where it is... We just got off the bus when we were told! We had an awesome night of shisha, lasange (I miss western food) and the highlight, swimming in the cobra pool in a lightning storm (dont worry, we hit the water with a big stick before getting in to make sure the cobras werent in there at the time!).
The next day, we went back to Colombo to renew our Visas, and travelled to mount lavina, a decent beach near Colombo before heading back to Kandy. In true tradition, we used our "white persons credibility" (the ability of white people to never be questioned when they walk into expensive hotels) to walk down to a private beach, and enjoy a few hours reading and feeding palm squirrels nuts (check them out they are adorable). We took the train back to Kandy and wandered home. The culmination of the trip was when I arrived home, felt ill and just CHUNDERED EVERYWHERE! (had to say it) We still cant figure out what it was that destroyed my stomach but I'm just going to blame Colombo and its filth!
Friday 16 July 2010
Carry on Doctor
Before we start - Wildlife report: We have now witnessed possibly the most majestic of Sri Lankas wildlife... THE GIANT LAND SNAIL! Now monkeys are cool, and the monkeys we saw crawling around Kandy city centre are alright... but having seen this graceful beast, I might as well go home, my work here is done!! :) Although that is the only new addition on our animal count, we went to the Parasitology Dept. today, and got a lesson on how to identify the 5 different types of deadly land snakes in Sri Lanka: Russells Viper, small scale viper, cobra, Ceylon Crait, Indian Crait (at sea it is easy - ALL sea snakes can kill). My conclusion was in general, snake = run (and scream like a little girl). However, it is good to know that some snakes are not poisonous, such as the python, which can only kill you by constriction...
Right, onto the last two days. We have been attached to the medical wards at Peradeniya Teaching Hospital, and have been attending ward rounds with the final year medical students, following around the registrar/consultant discussing all the cases in the ward. Now being aware that most people are not medical freaks, and wont care what diseases I saw, I'll just say I saw some tropical diseases that I'm likely never to see in the UK... which is cool!
The hospital itself was weird, as it was precisely like stepping back 40 years in teaching methods, with the bad-ass consultant wandering around the place, diagnosing at will, with his minions following in awe!
However, what confused me the most was that although this hospital had money for CT, MRI and neurosurgeons, there was no facility to wash hands before reaching the wards, let alone between patients. The wards themselves were entirely open to the elements and there were so few beds that half of the people on the wards, even inpatients, had to sit on chairs along the sides to await attention! Overall it was an exciting experience, but it left me somewhat skeptical about the doctors priorities - Diagnosis technology vs basic hygiene. We should be going back to the hospital to the surgical departments next week sometime so perhaps this will change my opinions.
Another point that I noticed at the hospital was that of language in Sri Lanka. All of the medicine is discussed and undertaken in English, which most people in the population can understand a small amount of, but few outside the academic sphere are fluent in. Therefore there is a constant switch between English between the Doctors, and Sinhalese (Or Tamil, depending on the patient) when communication to the patient is required. We saw this from the odd angle of only being able to understand the medical aspect of the conversation, and not being able to converse with the patients, weirdly detaching ourselves from the medicine. All of this reminds me of the Latin - English divide of the past, where Latin, the language of the Learned was used almost to confuse/impress those who could not speak it. This really reinforces a Doctor-knows-best mentality over here, and the patients are entirely trusting of the doctors, being cooperative of any examination they wish to perform. This was of course surprising for us coming from the culture of "my doctor knows nothing and is crap" that we have in the UK (and moreso in the USA).
As we have spent alot of our time in the hospital recently, there has been a slight lack of interesting occurances for myself and Ben - So I apologise that this blog is a bit less jovial than my last few. However, we are up at 5am tomorrow to get the Train to Colombo, where we are staying for 3 days in a 2 pound a night YMCA and meeting up with miss Di Luzio... what could possibly go wrong :P xx
Right, onto the last two days. We have been attached to the medical wards at Peradeniya Teaching Hospital, and have been attending ward rounds with the final year medical students, following around the registrar/consultant discussing all the cases in the ward. Now being aware that most people are not medical freaks, and wont care what diseases I saw, I'll just say I saw some tropical diseases that I'm likely never to see in the UK... which is cool!
The hospital itself was weird, as it was precisely like stepping back 40 years in teaching methods, with the bad-ass consultant wandering around the place, diagnosing at will, with his minions following in awe!
However, what confused me the most was that although this hospital had money for CT, MRI and neurosurgeons, there was no facility to wash hands before reaching the wards, let alone between patients. The wards themselves were entirely open to the elements and there were so few beds that half of the people on the wards, even inpatients, had to sit on chairs along the sides to await attention! Overall it was an exciting experience, but it left me somewhat skeptical about the doctors priorities - Diagnosis technology vs basic hygiene. We should be going back to the hospital to the surgical departments next week sometime so perhaps this will change my opinions.
Another point that I noticed at the hospital was that of language in Sri Lanka. All of the medicine is discussed and undertaken in English, which most people in the population can understand a small amount of, but few outside the academic sphere are fluent in. Therefore there is a constant switch between English between the Doctors, and Sinhalese (Or Tamil, depending on the patient) when communication to the patient is required. We saw this from the odd angle of only being able to understand the medical aspect of the conversation, and not being able to converse with the patients, weirdly detaching ourselves from the medicine. All of this reminds me of the Latin - English divide of the past, where Latin, the language of the Learned was used almost to confuse/impress those who could not speak it. This really reinforces a Doctor-knows-best mentality over here, and the patients are entirely trusting of the doctors, being cooperative of any examination they wish to perform. This was of course surprising for us coming from the culture of "my doctor knows nothing and is crap" that we have in the UK (and moreso in the USA).
As we have spent alot of our time in the hospital recently, there has been a slight lack of interesting occurances for myself and Ben - So I apologise that this blog is a bit less jovial than my last few. However, we are up at 5am tomorrow to get the Train to Colombo, where we are staying for 3 days in a 2 pound a night YMCA and meeting up with miss Di Luzio... what could possibly go wrong :P xx
Wednesday 14 July 2010
Lets get this research on track, or has it gone a bit off the rails?
And so we intrepidly walked the 2 miles to our lab on Monday morning, with visions of solving the worlds most poignant scientific problems, and being home for tea and medals. Alas, it wasn’t to be, as everyone in the Lab either spoke no English, or were busy organising the 2nd year Vet exams at the university, so we were instructed to go for a walk. There are a few spoilers on my Facebook photos, but in essence, we found our way to the small Railway station next to our Lab, and noticed people were casually walking along the track. Not wanting to miss out on some potential danger, and some exciting culture, we started to explore the track between Kandy and Peradeniya.
The locals were evidently not used to tourists using this method of getting around, and we got a good few odd glances, as well has fruit handed to us by a friendly family who lives by the track (this was a jack fruit, which was in essence slimey sweet pulp covering a mysteriously testicle like seed – a fruit arrangement common of the fruits of the region that are not exported, I wonder why). The old school stations, with the original colonial signalling systems, as well as the tropical surroundings made the whole experience feel like something out of an early Indiana Jones movie, and made for excessive photography only equalled by Japanese tourists in Cambridge!
Finally there was THE BRIDGE, which was just south west of our local station. It was about 100m long, with a narrow maintanece walkway comprised of steel strips to one side. It spanned a large river, and gave breathtaking views up and down the valley, although (apart from making sure we had a couple of pictures) we did not linger there for too long, for obvious reasons.
The wildlife here just keeps giving and giving, and a group of wild monkeys, casually wandering around the university campus, a flock (right collective noun?) of fruit bats which must have numbered in the thousands flying over campus in a continuous stream for about an hour, and a disturbingly large scorpion (lukily dead) have kept our eyes peeled, checking around for the next taxonomical surprise which lies around the corner. (We have been told that in the area there are small leapods, mongeese, porcupines and deer, which I am still eager to see, along with the hundreds of frogs I hear every night, but never see!)
Bens money woes were almost deepened the other day when we tried for a second time to cash his travellers cheques after the mishap in Kandy on Sunday. After signing his cheques (I don’t know whether he used his new or old signature), they cashier disappeared for about 10 minutes, without warning. Now I was ready to go “wait outside”, and watch the arrest of my friend, as the fraud police swept in to take him away, primarily so that there was only one bail that our host out here would have to pay, but before I fled the wrath of the Sri Lankan legal system (just as an example, trying to take drugs into the country is the death penalty – as we were repeatedly told at the airport), they returned with his money, and Ben is now solvent again.
As for the more normal aspects of our life here (if there are any), we have now gone entirely local, eating Rice and Curry for every meal (and at 100 rupees – 60p a pop, who can blame us), although the lack of cutlery was disconcerting at first… I like knives and forks! Getting around the place also took a slightly more crazy turn as we decided to take the 9p busses to and from Kandy. Just a few facts to give you the feel of these busses: Imagine how packed the tube is at absolute rush hour – Now imagine you are in a 1970s Indian built bus which has a clutch that gives the whole bus a parkinsonian tremor as you pull away – put this bus onto the roads described in an earlier blog, and imagine a driver that doesn’t ever want to come to a complete stop (even at bus STOPS)… and you are pretty much there. They are a fantastic way to make small journeys, but for anything longer I am inclined to take the train!
Now, being in a hot country, especially with the propensity to sweat excessively that I have meant that we decided some washing was in order. It was much to my surprise when I asked my host where to get my washing done that he brought me a bucket and some washing powder. Now I don’t know if any of you will have hand washed your clothes, but I can assure you that it is not fun – 1 minute to wash the clothes in the suds, and 15 mins to rinse all the suds out of the clothes, to ensure that next time there is tropical rain, I don’t turn into a one man foam party! I am writing this having just finished washing my clothes, and have decided that I can wear shirts more than one day before changing them! I also feel that this is a good time to mention the fact that we only have a cold shower here too, as this is the only time that I might be able to squeeze the slightest bit of sympathy out of you all for my strife :P.
I have just realised that I didn’t really mention anything else about the lab work, but that’s because there is nothing else really. A few more railway wanders and an afternoon of immunoflouresence assays to find anti-rickettsial antibodys in patient serum from the local hospital is all that we have to show for our efforts (not that I’m complaining). However, we have talked to the Prof. of Medicine at the medical school here, and hopefully we should be going into the hospital for the next two days to get a 1st hand experience of tropical diseases like Dengue, Leptospirosis and Rickettsia, and I for one am looking forward to putting on my white coat tomorrow (here you still have to wear one) and really experiencing tropical medicine!
xx
The locals were evidently not used to tourists using this method of getting around, and we got a good few odd glances, as well has fruit handed to us by a friendly family who lives by the track (this was a jack fruit, which was in essence slimey sweet pulp covering a mysteriously testicle like seed – a fruit arrangement common of the fruits of the region that are not exported, I wonder why). The old school stations, with the original colonial signalling systems, as well as the tropical surroundings made the whole experience feel like something out of an early Indiana Jones movie, and made for excessive photography only equalled by Japanese tourists in Cambridge!
Finally there was THE BRIDGE, which was just south west of our local station. It was about 100m long, with a narrow maintanece walkway comprised of steel strips to one side. It spanned a large river, and gave breathtaking views up and down the valley, although (apart from making sure we had a couple of pictures) we did not linger there for too long, for obvious reasons.
The wildlife here just keeps giving and giving, and a group of wild monkeys, casually wandering around the university campus, a flock (right collective noun?) of fruit bats which must have numbered in the thousands flying over campus in a continuous stream for about an hour, and a disturbingly large scorpion (lukily dead) have kept our eyes peeled, checking around for the next taxonomical surprise which lies around the corner. (We have been told that in the area there are small leapods, mongeese, porcupines and deer, which I am still eager to see, along with the hundreds of frogs I hear every night, but never see!)
Bens money woes were almost deepened the other day when we tried for a second time to cash his travellers cheques after the mishap in Kandy on Sunday. After signing his cheques (I don’t know whether he used his new or old signature), they cashier disappeared for about 10 minutes, without warning. Now I was ready to go “wait outside”, and watch the arrest of my friend, as the fraud police swept in to take him away, primarily so that there was only one bail that our host out here would have to pay, but before I fled the wrath of the Sri Lankan legal system (just as an example, trying to take drugs into the country is the death penalty – as we were repeatedly told at the airport), they returned with his money, and Ben is now solvent again.
As for the more normal aspects of our life here (if there are any), we have now gone entirely local, eating Rice and Curry for every meal (and at 100 rupees – 60p a pop, who can blame us), although the lack of cutlery was disconcerting at first… I like knives and forks! Getting around the place also took a slightly more crazy turn as we decided to take the 9p busses to and from Kandy. Just a few facts to give you the feel of these busses: Imagine how packed the tube is at absolute rush hour – Now imagine you are in a 1970s Indian built bus which has a clutch that gives the whole bus a parkinsonian tremor as you pull away – put this bus onto the roads described in an earlier blog, and imagine a driver that doesn’t ever want to come to a complete stop (even at bus STOPS)… and you are pretty much there. They are a fantastic way to make small journeys, but for anything longer I am inclined to take the train!
Now, being in a hot country, especially with the propensity to sweat excessively that I have meant that we decided some washing was in order. It was much to my surprise when I asked my host where to get my washing done that he brought me a bucket and some washing powder. Now I don’t know if any of you will have hand washed your clothes, but I can assure you that it is not fun – 1 minute to wash the clothes in the suds, and 15 mins to rinse all the suds out of the clothes, to ensure that next time there is tropical rain, I don’t turn into a one man foam party! I am writing this having just finished washing my clothes, and have decided that I can wear shirts more than one day before changing them! I also feel that this is a good time to mention the fact that we only have a cold shower here too, as this is the only time that I might be able to squeeze the slightest bit of sympathy out of you all for my strife :P.
I have just realised that I didn’t really mention anything else about the lab work, but that’s because there is nothing else really. A few more railway wanders and an afternoon of immunoflouresence assays to find anti-rickettsial antibodys in patient serum from the local hospital is all that we have to show for our efforts (not that I’m complaining). However, we have talked to the Prof. of Medicine at the medical school here, and hopefully we should be going into the hospital for the next two days to get a 1st hand experience of tropical diseases like Dengue, Leptospirosis and Rickettsia, and I for one am looking forward to putting on my white coat tomorrow (here you still have to wear one) and really experiencing tropical medicine!
xx
Monday 12 July 2010
This is the way, to Kandy mountain
P.S. Ben and I are writing our blogs without consulting eachother, so that we can give two perspectives of our stay - so if you want to, check out his blog arrack to the future (I am following it so you should be able to find it easily).
This morning we were dropped into Kandy for our first experience of Sri Lanka on foot. The first discovery we made was how reluctant a bank is to cash travelers cheques if you have changed your signature so that it is different to your driving license. Turns out very (courtesy of Ben). After this the bank of Coleman was set up with the travelers cheque I had successfully cashed, and we were on our way.
My first impression of Kandy is organised chaos. Everyone knows where they are going, what they are doing, and how to do it (except us of course). Hundreds of fruit stands, small traders and "guides" (see later) lined the streets, and gave it a real hussle and bussle. They even had the army controlling traffic at crossings to try and protect pedestrians from the onslaught of Sri Lankan traffic.
Another major impression of Kandy is that conversation costs... alot. I am used to a pleasent conversation at the side of the road, or in a temple being free... but not here. When we arrived at some of the buddist shrines in Kandy, we got chatting to a local about the statues of Budda, and when we turned to walk away, he started asking for "something for his services"??? We gave him 50 rupees (about 30p) and escaped with the knowledge that people want our money.
To try and stop this flow of money for conversation, we came up with the "wave off" and say no thankyou approach. This is effective, but not as awesome as the american approach which seemed to be the "bullshit" approach of replying to all questions with phrases like "my friend eats monkey feces and testicles". We have been tempted to take up this approach until we head a local reply with the phrase "me too!"!
Around the lake in Kandy there was an incredible amount of wildlife - monitor lizards (1.5m long), turtles, fruit bats and scores of birds. These were all awesome, but the cream of the day was when we saw the elephants in the temple (domesticated elephants) being washed by trainers. For a small fee (obviously) they let us take photos stroking the elephants, which seemed surprisingly docile throughout this whole process (box ticked!!).
We then noticed an arrogantly large statue of the budda on top of a mountain nearby (now dubbed Kandy mountain), so we decided to go have a gander. After a 200m climb in 35 degree heat, we made it to the top, and went onto the plateau where the statue was. We met a number of monks at the top, who explained that the statue was still under construction (the back of it was scaffolding). The monks were extremely friendly, and calm in nature, a lovely contrast to the chaos of the town below (which incidentally you got awesome views of from up the top).
After an incredible local dance show (obviously with many people all to happy to take your money for a "guided tour" on your way out), and a decent steak and onion at Devon(?!) resteraunt, we decided we wouldnt risk the chaos of the bus at this time of night, and so we would take a three wheeled "tuk-tuk" back to the University. Now, we know from talking to people out there that this is a 250 rupee fare - but the tourist effect was so strong that we were asked by several drivers we asked to pay 500! (still only 2 pounds 50, but thats not the point). We rapidly learnt how to haggle, and managed to get the ride back for 300 (nobody would offer us the local rate, no matter how hard we tried).
One or two near death experience later we arrived back at the university, and walked back to where we are staying. We casually commented that we had seen alot of cool wildlife, but no dodgy arachnids (mistake). When i was writing up this blog I heard "OH MY GOD, OH MY GOD" billow from the bathroom, and saw a very pale Ben run out. Turns out spiders with a leg span of about 20cm splayed do exist, and one happened to be in our bath room. Due to our lack of knowledge of spider danger out here, several ideas were mooted - Attack it with the bin - mosquito spray - close the door and hope it crawls into a hole a dies. None of these seemed good so we both turned into massive girls and got the person who owns the house to deal with it. He killed it with a broom, but it was too late - every movement, every sound was automatically transformed into something trying to kill us!
Anyway, I have missed out many things that happened in Kandy because this is already getting far too long, and my readership has probably halved in the last 2 paragraphs so I shall leave it here for now. Now that the spider is dead we will try and sleep and get ready for the first day actually in the Lab. Lets see how much Gap will be in this Gap-month. xx
This morning we were dropped into Kandy for our first experience of Sri Lanka on foot. The first discovery we made was how reluctant a bank is to cash travelers cheques if you have changed your signature so that it is different to your driving license. Turns out very (courtesy of Ben). After this the bank of Coleman was set up with the travelers cheque I had successfully cashed, and we were on our way.
My first impression of Kandy is organised chaos. Everyone knows where they are going, what they are doing, and how to do it (except us of course). Hundreds of fruit stands, small traders and "guides" (see later) lined the streets, and gave it a real hussle and bussle. They even had the army controlling traffic at crossings to try and protect pedestrians from the onslaught of Sri Lankan traffic.
Another major impression of Kandy is that conversation costs... alot. I am used to a pleasent conversation at the side of the road, or in a temple being free... but not here. When we arrived at some of the buddist shrines in Kandy, we got chatting to a local about the statues of Budda, and when we turned to walk away, he started asking for "something for his services"??? We gave him 50 rupees (about 30p) and escaped with the knowledge that people want our money.
To try and stop this flow of money for conversation, we came up with the "wave off" and say no thankyou approach. This is effective, but not as awesome as the american approach which seemed to be the "bullshit" approach of replying to all questions with phrases like "my friend eats monkey feces and testicles". We have been tempted to take up this approach until we head a local reply with the phrase "me too!"!
Around the lake in Kandy there was an incredible amount of wildlife - monitor lizards (1.5m long), turtles, fruit bats and scores of birds. These were all awesome, but the cream of the day was when we saw the elephants in the temple (domesticated elephants) being washed by trainers. For a small fee (obviously) they let us take photos stroking the elephants, which seemed surprisingly docile throughout this whole process (box ticked!!).
We then noticed an arrogantly large statue of the budda on top of a mountain nearby (now dubbed Kandy mountain), so we decided to go have a gander. After a 200m climb in 35 degree heat, we made it to the top, and went onto the plateau where the statue was. We met a number of monks at the top, who explained that the statue was still under construction (the back of it was scaffolding). The monks were extremely friendly, and calm in nature, a lovely contrast to the chaos of the town below (which incidentally you got awesome views of from up the top).
After an incredible local dance show (obviously with many people all to happy to take your money for a "guided tour" on your way out), and a decent steak and onion at Devon(?!) resteraunt, we decided we wouldnt risk the chaos of the bus at this time of night, and so we would take a three wheeled "tuk-tuk" back to the University. Now, we know from talking to people out there that this is a 250 rupee fare - but the tourist effect was so strong that we were asked by several drivers we asked to pay 500! (still only 2 pounds 50, but thats not the point). We rapidly learnt how to haggle, and managed to get the ride back for 300 (nobody would offer us the local rate, no matter how hard we tried).
One or two near death experience later we arrived back at the university, and walked back to where we are staying. We casually commented that we had seen alot of cool wildlife, but no dodgy arachnids (mistake). When i was writing up this blog I heard "OH MY GOD, OH MY GOD" billow from the bathroom, and saw a very pale Ben run out. Turns out spiders with a leg span of about 20cm splayed do exist, and one happened to be in our bath room. Due to our lack of knowledge of spider danger out here, several ideas were mooted - Attack it with the bin - mosquito spray - close the door and hope it crawls into a hole a dies. None of these seemed good so we both turned into massive girls and got the person who owns the house to deal with it. He killed it with a broom, but it was too late - every movement, every sound was automatically transformed into something trying to kill us!
Anyway, I have missed out many things that happened in Kandy because this is already getting far too long, and my readership has probably halved in the last 2 paragraphs so I shall leave it here for now. Now that the spider is dead we will try and sleep and get ready for the first day actually in the Lab. Lets see how much Gap will be in this Gap-month. xx
Fancy a tipple before lunch?
P.S. I am sorry that several blogs from different days will come out at the same time, I am writing them on MS word then publishing them whenever I can.
As predicted, sleep didn’t really Happen before leaving Bens for the coach in the morning, but a little bit happened in the Coach, and apart from having my passport swabbed for explosives(!), we passed through to departures without any problems.
However, when we reached departures, our adventure really began, when we were offered a free sample of some “Snow Queen” premium vodka. We weighed up the fact that it was free, and the fact that it was 7am, and decided it was worth a tipple… That and our pint at 8am set us up well for the first flight.
A lifetime of flying easy-jet didn’t set me up for the glories of our first Emerites flight to Dubai. Screens in seats, up to date films, and complementary alcohol every hour or so made us far more tipsy that it is reasonable to be at midday. We also got a bit too excited when we were looking through the “under the aircraft” camera whilst going over Baghdad.
We got to Dubai at about 8pm (their time), and headed straight to the tallest building in the world (its name escapes me at the moment) on their metro. Two major thoughts about Dubai – 1) the use of unnecessarily big buildings to prove they are rich, and 2) don’t try and walk anywhere! The latter was discovered when we tried to walk from the airport to “the creek” after the metro closed – about a mile as the crow flies. After crossing one 5 lane road and walking through 2 neighbourhoods which looked like mugging central, and travelling about 400m total (as the crow flies) in 45 mins, we thought it would be best to spend the 2am-9am period of our stopover in airport departures. After a few hours of talking to randomers (including a south African doctor who might offer us an elective there!) and riding those travelling escalators up and down the airport, we finally set off for Colombo (via Male in the Maldives).
After another flight of several hours (and Ben having a G and T which did NOT agree with his tiredness), and an hour sat in the aircraft in the Maldives, we arrived in Colombo just after sunset. The queue for Immigration was a bit nerve-wracking as we didn’t actually get VISAs in the end before leaving the UK, but we got in anyway so all was good. We then started the 2.5 hour drive from the Airport to our accommodation (at this point we still didn’t know where it would be - the driver didn’t speak English, but seemed to know where to take us).
Where can I start on Sri Lankan Driving… my old saying that its not too close unless you hit rings true here. I did not know it was possible to fit a car, 2 bikes, 2 three-wheelers and a cow side by side across a road, but it turns out you can! Overtaking seems to occur primarily on corners (especially around the inside of corners), with busses overtaking lorries favouring this tactic mainly. Luckily in our tiredness induced stupor we found this experience fun, not realising the eternal danger we were in.
Finally we arrived at our accommodation – A friend of our lab supervisor who has offered us his spare room with en suite as accommodation. After an extensive search for things with more legs than we have, we went to bed after our 48 hours of sleep deprivation joy, and thought about what would happen when we finally saw this country in the day time!
As predicted, sleep didn’t really Happen before leaving Bens for the coach in the morning, but a little bit happened in the Coach, and apart from having my passport swabbed for explosives(!), we passed through to departures without any problems.
However, when we reached departures, our adventure really began, when we were offered a free sample of some “Snow Queen” premium vodka. We weighed up the fact that it was free, and the fact that it was 7am, and decided it was worth a tipple… That and our pint at 8am set us up well for the first flight.
A lifetime of flying easy-jet didn’t set me up for the glories of our first Emerites flight to Dubai. Screens in seats, up to date films, and complementary alcohol every hour or so made us far more tipsy that it is reasonable to be at midday. We also got a bit too excited when we were looking through the “under the aircraft” camera whilst going over Baghdad.
We got to Dubai at about 8pm (their time), and headed straight to the tallest building in the world (its name escapes me at the moment) on their metro. Two major thoughts about Dubai – 1) the use of unnecessarily big buildings to prove they are rich, and 2) don’t try and walk anywhere! The latter was discovered when we tried to walk from the airport to “the creek” after the metro closed – about a mile as the crow flies. After crossing one 5 lane road and walking through 2 neighbourhoods which looked like mugging central, and travelling about 400m total (as the crow flies) in 45 mins, we thought it would be best to spend the 2am-9am period of our stopover in airport departures. After a few hours of talking to randomers (including a south African doctor who might offer us an elective there!) and riding those travelling escalators up and down the airport, we finally set off for Colombo (via Male in the Maldives).
After another flight of several hours (and Ben having a G and T which did NOT agree with his tiredness), and an hour sat in the aircraft in the Maldives, we arrived in Colombo just after sunset. The queue for Immigration was a bit nerve-wracking as we didn’t actually get VISAs in the end before leaving the UK, but we got in anyway so all was good. We then started the 2.5 hour drive from the Airport to our accommodation (at this point we still didn’t know where it would be - the driver didn’t speak English, but seemed to know where to take us).
Where can I start on Sri Lankan Driving… my old saying that its not too close unless you hit rings true here. I did not know it was possible to fit a car, 2 bikes, 2 three-wheelers and a cow side by side across a road, but it turns out you can! Overtaking seems to occur primarily on corners (especially around the inside of corners), with busses overtaking lorries favouring this tactic mainly. Luckily in our tiredness induced stupor we found this experience fun, not realising the eternal danger we were in.
Finally we arrived at our accommodation – A friend of our lab supervisor who has offered us his spare room with en suite as accommodation. After an extensive search for things with more legs than we have, we went to bed after our 48 hours of sleep deprivation joy, and thought about what would happen when we finally saw this country in the day time!
Thursday 8 July 2010
The calm before the storm.
Due to the demand of at least 3 people, I am setting up this Blog to chronicle the adventures of myself and Ben in Sri Lanka in our "Gap Month". We are sitting here, in Foxley, Wiltshire, awaiting 3am, when a coach will majestically whisk us off to Gatwick, for the start of the 28 hour journey to Colombo.
I'm pretty excited if im honest - having never been further east than Berlin, the idea of a 13 hour stopover in Dubai, a quick hop off the plane in the Maldives, and 5 weeks in Sri Lanka seems like a pretty good way to break up the summer!
Currently having the classic debate of whether it is worth trying to get some sleep before the coach, although we both know that we probably wont bother/wont be able to! In fact, skrew it, sleep is for the weak, and is what plane journeys are for right?
Still have no idea where we will be staying out there, or what we will be doing, but that just adds to the adventure of it all I suppose. Dont think there is too much more I can say at the moment except I hope all three of the people who said they would read this enjoy my blog, and I'll let you know more about what I'm doing for the next 5 weeks when I know myself!!
Speak to you all soon :) x
I'm pretty excited if im honest - having never been further east than Berlin, the idea of a 13 hour stopover in Dubai, a quick hop off the plane in the Maldives, and 5 weeks in Sri Lanka seems like a pretty good way to break up the summer!
Currently having the classic debate of whether it is worth trying to get some sleep before the coach, although we both know that we probably wont bother/wont be able to! In fact, skrew it, sleep is for the weak, and is what plane journeys are for right?
Still have no idea where we will be staying out there, or what we will be doing, but that just adds to the adventure of it all I suppose. Dont think there is too much more I can say at the moment except I hope all three of the people who said they would read this enjoy my blog, and I'll let you know more about what I'm doing for the next 5 weeks when I know myself!!
Speak to you all soon :) x
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)