Last week, days ......of our travels in india and sri lanka

We're now into our 6th week away from home and although we have not been travelling all that time, living out of a suitcase has become a drag and giving the souvenir sellers a hard time has worn off. Deciding to stay in one place for our 3 days in the historical triangle of Anuradhapura, Sigiriya & Polonnaruwa, we are encamped in a hotel just outside Dambulla where the power supply goes from steady to slow to steady every minute! Plays havoc with the aircon as you can imagine.
Sri Lankan spirits rose on Sunday night when their cricket team triumphed over India in the 20/20 World Cup final; beating big brother set off wild celebrations & nationalistic fervour. We were in Kandy, the old capital, at a much cooler 600 metres above sea level & watched the game with the staff & some English boys cricket team managerS at our hotel. In Kandy we were privileged to be able to view Buddha's Sacred Tooth Relic, an icon visited by millions of Buddhists throughout Asia every year& which is only open for 15 minutes.
Earlier on Sunday Tony had been to World's End, on a tramp across Horton Plains National Park at about 2200 metres above sea level, a sub-alpine wonderland with great views, wild rhodedendrums, monkeys & leopards.
The night before we had stayed in Nuwara Eliya, the highest town in Sri Lanka & a much visited location where we had some great entertainment when Sally went looking for a thick jacket at the markets. All the stall holders tried to get her to try on various variations of such brand names as North Face & Colorado despite protestations that she didn't want that one & they were the wrong size.
So its a steady diet of history & Buddhism for the next few days before we head into Colombo for a couple of nights. Unless you come to this lovely wee island it is difficult to appreciate the amazing culture they have built up and fought for over the past 3000 years.   

Anyone for tea, tea and more tea.

We have driven up to the hill country after an early morning 'safari' yesterday at Yala National Park.  Picked up by a converted jeep with 'luxury' seats set high up above the road, we raached along the roads to the dry dirt roads of the national park.  our driver apologised for the speed but he wanted to get into the queue for tickets and permits early! Permits were issued and this was the sign for everyone to gun their engines and take off at break neck speed again along the parks dirt and corrugated roads, often overtaking on corners in an effort to be the first to spot a leopard or an elephant keeping in touch with other drivers by mobile, so everyone got the chance to see. Reminded me of the tow truck drivers in Perth who always appear so quickly when there is a prang!

We did see a leopard very briefly through the trees on the side of the road, and we saw several elephants, a couple of crocodiles, some mongeese ....or is it mongooses... And a couple of monitor lizards and some spotted deer ... So not a bad collection for a couple of hours hurtling round the roads.

The road to Ella was windy and slow with much to see along the way. Sri Lanka needs rain badly but near the  highlands it is still very green.  We stayed the night at the  EllaGap Guest house which had amazing views of the valleys below before the mist came in and we watched the 20/20 cricket last night with the drivers and tour guides on the TV in the lounge.  Sri Lankans love cricket so if you can drop a few names, you get instant interest.

This morning we drove through the tea plantations to Lipton's seat, greeted at the end of a gentle uphill climb by a cup of tea and some Local snacks hot off the wok.  They tell you they aren't spicy and you believe them until it is too late...when the chilli hits the back of your throat!





The tea plantations hug the hillsides in an ordered form of plants and pathways, with rainforest alliance posters along the way and quotes in English every few hundred yards posted on the side of the road, about sustainability and our relationship with the land.  interesting they are all in English and most of the workers are Tamils whose grasp of English is not great.




We had a tour around the tea processing factory and now we know where a lot of your daily teabags come from if you purchase Mr Lipton's bags.  The plant was built in 1880 and hasn't changed much apart from mechanising the machinery.  The staff work barefoot and the tea is spread on the floor to ferment.  They make teabag tea and it takes many kilos of leaves to make one kilo of tea leaves ready for us to use.  the women pickers pick about two sacks full a day weighing 20kg....they are paid according to how much they pick and it is a year round process only stopping for festivals and occasional holidays.  it is pouring with rain now and the hill is shrouded in mist so in a couple of days there will be new leaves to pick.  We also have a power cut, hopefully it will be back in time for the cricket to start on tv tonight!

The Muezzin has started up for evening prayers ..a little eery through the gloom and the thunder and lightning...

Tomorrow we are catching the mountain train from Ella to Nuwara Eliya and then the next day to Kandy or thereabouts.

Will be back again soon.

Whale watching nr Mirissa, southern coast Sri Lanka

What a pleasure it is to be in Sri lanka, the people are lovely and friendly and it is certainly not as challenging as India can be.  We are staying just outside the old fort town of Galle which was flattened in the 2004 tsunami, in a guesthouse owned by an Australian friend of a friend from Perth. Eka cafe and rooms is highly recommended, directly on the beach east of Galle; Tony has been waking up each day with an early morning swim in the booming surf.  We are also backed onto the main road along the coast and are amazed at the speed and stupidity of bus drivers here, similar to India.

Yesterday, Tony persuaded Sally that going whale watching would be fun and fairly safe. He was right on both accounts - we had a ball, saw a couple of blue whales and a fair number of dolphins and enjoyed the company of a Danish cyclist amongst others on a very well-organised and professional tourist boat. We seemed to be in the midst of large ships all day, 200 pass by the coast here daily evidently, on the way to the Arab states or SE India.

Invariably asked where we are from, as soon as Australia is uttered, the subject of cricket is brought up & Shane Warne & the 20/20 World Cup are discussed. People here are quite relaxed but also determined to get things done, the job is completed properly, unlike India.

Tomorrow we're off with Kelum, our Sinhalese private tour owner/driver on 10 days around the central highlands and the ancient historical sites. First stop is Yala National Park in SE Sri Lanka where we hope to see elephants, leopards & crocs. Last stop will be Colombo on the 11th April before we return to Freo via Singapore.

GOA - the Bali of India is how I'd describe it. Development has altered the place a lot since our previous visit in the early 80's; there has been a big influx of people from elsewhere in India for work not to mention the bus-loads of Russian tourists.
Steamy, sticky & green with jungle encroaching; there is now only a fading memory of the Portuguese who ruled Goa for 450 years until they were kicked out in 1961. We've played at being tourists for a couple of days, using a driver to visit the sites over narrow roads clogged with scooters & horn-tooting.  Old Goa, the original Portuguese capital now only has UNESCO-listed R.Catholic churches & huge cathedrals; unfortunately poorly maintained although their past grandeur is evident. We had fun on a sunset ferry trip around Panaji harbour; the Indians on board weren't interested in the view only on dancing to the disco music. A flea market crowded with Poms & Ruskies, a potent combination; & the merchandise was very "Baliesque"! Lunch & a tour of a spice plantation proved educational - cardamon, peppers, nutmeg, cashews, cinnamon, vanilla plants all being harvested. 
Tomorrow to Sri Lanka, just as news reaches us of a UN Human Rights committee & it's finding the SL govt. are guilty of war crimes - hope it doesn't cramp our style at all. We've endured Indian bureaucratic pettiness at it's best at the GPO when wanting to send a parcel to Shikshangram -"no From address in India": so we returned later & no problem:) Still we've also had great coffee & internet access at Lavazza cafe & Sally has had a trim for wait for it  - 100 rupees, A$1.85!! And the fascination Indians have with any westerners continues to amaze us, they will stare for ages & ask the most inane questions with a seriousness that means can can't laugh.

Chapter 2 : A reality check

Pune, formerly Puna and Poona, home in the swinging 60's & 70's to Mahareshi Mahesh Yogi and the Orange People, now a fast growing manufacturing and service city 560 metres above sea level in the Deccan region of Maharashtra state. Yesterday we drove for just over an hour from www.shiksangram.com where we had stayed for 11 nights in fairly spartan surroundings up in the Western Ghats; washing from a bucket, eating vegetarian rice & chapattis with the kids, trying to make ourselves understood in a Maharati community of 120 children and a dozen or so adults.
Various kids from the most basic of upbringings- garbage sorting, orphans, alcoholic & mentally damaged parents, living on the streets, on railways platforms, with severe growth deficiencies now given an opportunity to have a roof over their heads, three meals a day and an education. Amazing,  friendly, resilient boys and girls from the ages of 6 to 18 who wrung the cynicism and Western world-weariness from us, whose love of living and learning has made our journey worth it. We've promised to go back and we will with a better grasp of what we can assist with.  Fundraising can also be done now we have lived amongst the kids and we better understand their needs.
Tomorrow we head back to the coast, to Goa, formerly a Portuguese colony for 5 nights before Sri Lanka beckons.

Pune is a typical indian city with noise everywhere, duelling tuctucs, rubbled strewn pavements under large poster ads for luxury goods. It is such a contrast to our time at the childrens shelter where possessions are few, kids go to school in shifts and spend much time doing homework afterwards.  Some of the classes in their schools have sixty kids, and numbers are growing fast.  A good sign in  rural area that families value what education can give their children, especially the girls.  It is difficult to even think about what the shelter kids have gone through in their short lives before they came to Shiksangram and then to see them as the confident young people they are becoming, happy to stand in front of a large group and speak in English, perform traditional dances and martial arts.  We have been very privileged to have had this insight and in so doing, reviewing how we live, are much of the trappings of modern life really vital to living fulfilled lives?